28/11/10

One of my colleagues gave birth last November and thus missed all of the work we are doing currently last year. During a particularly tedious task this morning she exclaimed “this sucks! I am going to give birth every November from now on, just so I can miss this work!”
At the end of work today my director told all of the faculty that one colleauge’s mother had died, they would be having prayers and a spirit sending ceremony for her tomorrow, and if anyone needed to take the day off to grieve they could. I don’t even know this colleague and certainly don’t know his mother, so afterwards I went to talk to her to tell her I would have to miss tomorrow morning in order to return to the Migration office to pick up a document. She gave me a look like I’m a bit of an idiot, “didn’t you hear me say that we don’t have work tomorrow?” “Well you said that if anyone needed to take time to grieve they could.” She was perplexed, “well I suppose if people showed up to work I could give them things to do.”
After work today Ann, Emma, and I went out to Tsene for one last time as the three of us. Yvette wasn’t there unfortunately, but John and Deon, the dive master, were. The three of us prepared sushi for dinner which turned out wonderfully and John and Deon overcame their initial skepticism and ended up loving it. Deon also made braai (South African barbeque) which was delicious. Tsene is really one of the most wonderful places in the world. We didn’t touch the dogs this time though.