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Friday, May 19, 2006

Some news and our Hawaiian daughters

Firstly, thankyou to all those that have been so supportive and added Alison and for that matter all of us to their prayers. God is great and we're thankful for her progress so far. We're still not out of the woods yet so please keep up with them, we trust God ! Due to this "development", we (the girls and I) have managed to move our flights forward a week - wish it were sooner but just not a possibility at this point. So we'll be arriving in South Africa Friday June 9th...

In the meantime though, life is hotting up here in Saudi and we're looking forward to a little bit of cold and wet miserable weather hehehe
So Andrè turned a ripe old 37 on Wednesday, Aimee actually woke up and said as she was getting out of bed half asleep "It's Dad's birthday today, he's 37 hey?" strange what sticks in their minds hehe. Well he had an okay day I guess and we went out to Rumors (our compound restaurant) for a quick dinner. Obviously our minds were elsewhere and we wanted to stay close to home to get any updates on Alison's condition.
Went across the bridge to Bahrain Thursday to try and sort out our airtickets and ended up staying to take the girls to see Ice Age 2 at the movies. No movies in Saudi so this was a first for us. Very cool and the movie was excellent too :)
Lucy graduates from Preschool this week - graduation ceremony on Monday :) so we're very busy with practicing and preparation. She is VERY ready to move into Kindergarten. Think Aimee is too, Lucy loves watching her doing homework and tries to participate. Lucy's homework is typically done so quickly and she becomes the peanut gallery during Aimee's. Aimee can't wait for her to have 'challenging' work to do hehehe
The photos (excuse the quality, these are scanned prints):
Last week the girls went to Mira Maalouf's 5th birthday party (actually had another one in the afternoon too which made for a very busy day). It was a Luau theme and so these are our lily-white Hawaiian daughters :) Sadly they've lost the little bit of a tan they developed over our December holiday at home in SA.


Well thats about it for now, enjoy the photos of our 'little' girls, more news & photos during the week. Have a great weekend everyone xxx.

Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Alison

(Alison & Llewelyn at their wedding just 6 months ago)
We need your prayers !
My second eldest sister Alison is in the High Care unit at Umhlanga Hospital. It was first believed she had had a stroke Tuesday night late (SA time). Doctors ran a battery of tests (MRI, CT scan, Lumbar Puncture) Wednesday to try and establish the cause for her paralysis (right side), memory loss, disorientation and inability to communicate amongst other symptoms. She was in Nigeria last month for work and doctors were concerned she may have picked something up there. We have now been informed that she seems to have viral encephalitis which could have additionally caused a stroke. A diagnosis is great as it means the true cause of her severe illness can now be treated and she can start her recovery. She is being treated for both stroke and encephalitis which means all the bases are covered. At first she was being kept sedated but doctors seem happy with her progress and have lessened the sedation. We still await the final diagnosis - the results for the virus could take up to a week to be confirmed.
She is a wonderful person, so full of life and love !
Please add her to your prayers and spread the word too please.

Sunday, May 14, 2006

Happy Mother's Day


To the wonderful Mom's who make a difference in their child/ren's lives, THANKYOU !!
You are truly great !
Have a wonderful wonderful wonderful day !
You deserve it !

Friday, May 12, 2006

THE Team !!

Okay so very very very very very sadly the Stormers lost tonight, 13 may 2006.
Bulls won, with a bonus point and sneaked in with JUST 1 more than The Sharks in the points difference.
CONGRATULATIONS

Aldo, BGG, WGC and the Brummer Family and any other sudden Bulls supporters - your team won, let's just hope these boys can play as hard next Saturday in NZ !!!

The celebrations last night were good, the day was wonderful and bright, glory might have been shortlived for us Sharks supporters but it was lived and loved while we had it !

_________________________________________________________
WOOOOOOHHHOOOOOO

Seems the support paid off ! Well done The Sharks !

Full time
Sharks 41 - 25 Force
Okay so here's the deal : Sharks and Bulls are in contention for the semi-final spot.
Bulls play the Stormers tomorrow !
We're banking on either a complete loss by the Bulls or a win by less than 32 points !
That way ..... Sharks will be winging their way to play the Canterbury Crusaders in Christ Church, NZ !
Where they'll need a whole wack more support !!!

So, for 13 May 2006 ONLY ....

GOOOO SSTTOOORRRRMMMMEEEEEEERRRRRSSSSSS !!!

___________________________________________________________

Remember to support Our Sharks tonight 7pm (SA time)


GGGOOOOOOO SSSHHHAAAARRRRKKKKKSSSSS !!!!!!

Only in Saudi...

In the absence of any real major family news, thought we'd share some little gems from life in Saudi.
Petrol & Diesel Price
While the rest of the world is dealing with supply cuts, rising prices and searching for alternate fuels or methods of transportation. In the land of sand and sun and of course OIL .... We have just experienced, wait for it (and if you're waiting for it in your own country, you might be waiting a very very very very long time !), we just got a 33% price reduction for petrol & diesel ! Petrol per liter now costs 60 Halala and diesel per liter costs 25 Halala. Now you're asking what on earth is a Halala and what value does that convert to ? A Halala is to Riyal as Cents are to Rand/Pound/Dollar etc. The conversion .... 1 Halala = 1.64 South African Cents !!! Now would be a good time for you to fall off your chair in disbelief ! Yes, we ARE paying less than ZAR 1,00 per liter of petrol and less than 45c per liter of diesel !
Beer at school or while driving
In most countries around the world it would be a no-no to be drinking beer while driving, walking through a store and most especially walking through the gate at school or on your way to classes. Not in Saudi ! While walking the girls to their classrooms on Wednesday morning, Andre and I noticed a high-school student walking past the office holding a Holston Beer. It was open, it had been sipped and he was walking to class enjoying it.
Now before everyone starts with "But you said there was no alcohol in Saudi!" Wow how are they for lenient on rules ! This is NON-ALCOHOLIC BEER !!! You see these guys like the taste of beer, they just don't like the alcohol content. So its not an issue seeing a child walking around drinking beer because in fact it's not really a beer in the true sense hehehe. No that's what they drive across the causeway to have any chance they can, Bahrain - The Land of Milk and Honey - when you live in Saudi that is heheheh.
Learning/Teaching a new Language
As most of you know, I work at an American Curriculum school in Saudi. Up until now, all the time I have been working at the school, there have only ever been two South African families, ours being the one. Recently, The Brummers, sadly, left Saudi (although we're holding thumbs they find a way to come back sometime soon), leaving us as the only SA family in the school. Then even more recently, we had a young South African gentleman join our school. This grade six boy seemed friendly, well-behaved, a good, hard-working student. UNTIL ......
I received a phone call at the end of the school day, from my principal. "Could you please come to my office, I need a word translated." So off I went. It seems our nice new addition had been giving some Afrikaans lessons in his free time. And so it was my "pleasure" to have to translate, a phrase which according to these boys, they didn't understand, to my principal. I was prepared for many a word, in fact that week one of our seventh graders - who had been taking these impromptu Afrikaans lesson, used the word VOETSAK in front of me. But my face just about fell on the floor as my principal, in his very American accent asked my to translate "MA-SE-POES". Tell me how you'd have done that ??!?!?!! Mmmmm that was another interesting day in Saudi !

Anyway, less than a month to go of our school year. Andre back home from his travels for a bit. Sharks are on top of the SA Teams Super 14 log :)
Our weekend is done ! Enjoy yours everybody ! Remember to spoil that special Mom in your heart on Sunday ! 'Til the next installment of News from the Bosch Home .... Cheerio !

Friday, May 05, 2006

Student-Led conferences

At our school, we start out the year with a Parent-Teacher conference. Students attend this aswell and part of the conference time is devoted to setting goals for the student to work towards during the school year.
During the school year, work samples are kept aside to form part of a portfolio which is presented in the last month of the school year. This conference is student-led. In other words, parents come in to school to conference with their child not the child's teachers, to reflect (using these work samples) on their growth over the past year. Teachers are present but only to "sign-off" on the goal setting process - as to whether the goals set at the start of the year have been achieved or not.

And so May 4, 2006 was our Student-Led Conference day at Dhahran Elementary Middle School, Saudi Arabia.
The girls and I took a taxi in to school at 7am (can't wait for Andrè to be home next week again). Aimee and Lucy helped mom prepare the PC Lab for the Middle School conferences.
Our MS students create electronic portfolios in tech class with Tracy. Basically a personal website which is accessible anywhere on our campus from our servers. They present them in the lab instead of their classrooms though as the conferences are done in flexi-time and we can have 30 students conferencing at one time in the lab.
8am and off to Wilde Gang for the girls while mom 'played' teacher for a bit. Lucy was scheduled for her conference at 9am, so we headed up to Preschool to be amazed at all she'd done in the year :)

Photo of Lucy conferencing courtesy of Aimee :)


Lucy wasn't as animated this year with her "Bam and then .... happened" or "Voilà and there ..." but she did a great job showing her handwriting samples, math worksheets, coloring and beautiful art projects. Thanks go to Mrs. Sheila Rivers, Mrs. Rima Maalouf, Mrs. Neomy Daniel and Mrs. Jannet Durham - all her teachers.

Lucy with her portfolios - big sister Aimee had to hold the art portfolio for her :)

Lucy standing in front of one of the murals preschool created while doing their theme on transportation and then under the 'planet hats' they used while studying space (Lucy was Jupiter) :)


And then it was off to Aimee's classroom to share her portfolio.
Aimee did a fabulous job ! She has made soooo much progress this year although I could still pick up on some disappointments while she shared her work. Aimee has had a very demanding teacher this year which would normally be fabulous. However even with the help of her meds for her ADHD she has had a hard time in grade one. There were a few times during her conference that I heard "...but I didn't finsh" or "...thats as far as I got". It is a point to remember that these portfolios are not entirely for showing the best pieces but it is meant to be a true sample of the child's accomplishments throughout the year. I made a point then to make a big deal about the good things and gloss over on the disappoinments. All-in-all I tried to made sure that Aimee realised how clever she is and that her mom and dad are so very proud of her !


Dad will have to watch the video and go through the actual portfolios when he gets back next week.
Aimee and Lucy went back to Wilde Gang for the remainder of the day while mom went back to be a part of her students' presentations to their parents. Thankfully this year I could witness huge growth in my students from their efforts last year and we had a very successful presentation of our electronic portfolios to our MS parents !

It's Friday now and we're having a tv, jammies & junkfood day :) In recognition of our efforts to prepare for these conferences hehehe
Just one month left of school - WOW !

Charnè hope you had a very special day on the 3rd and little Jaden is not keeping you too busy :)
Aunty Elaine, hope you have a wonderful 60th birthday celebration, miss you all and wish we were there to share it !
Cheers for now everybody, have a good one, check back next week again for the latest in our lives hehehe :)
xxx