BEFORE: a room full of books in no particular order (NOT a library)...
... AFTER! It's not quite finished, but it's getting there. Now it IS a library.
Saturday, May 23, 2009
Before and after!
BEFORE: a room full of books in no particular order (NOT a library)... ... AFTER! It's not quite finished, but it's getting there. Now it IS a library.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Weeks 8 & 9 in the library
RAT WAR 2009
I had a few weeks of sleeping pretty badly due to the rats’ exciting adventures: they stole my tea towel, ate my anti-malarial tablets and bit a hole in my HealAid cream (they also attempted to take the door mats, but they were too heavy). I took a little holiday to Pentecost Island to see the land diving (like bungee jumping, but using vines instead of elastic!). That seemed to put everything back into perspective again. I mean, the rats are bad, but I’m not tempted to jump off a wobbly wooden tower with a vine around my ankles. I got to see Richard and Carmen, who are volunteering on Ambrym Island. They don’t have rats in their hut, but all they get to eat is yams. That would make me want to jump. At least I get a hamburger every week or so.
In the library: no kids! School holidays!
• Miss Iapson (the librarian I’m training) helped me label and re-shelve those 1,524 items of fiction
• Everything is now labelled and shelved, ready for the kids to come back!
• I hung out with Miss Iapson and her son CJay, who is five, and his cousin Fennick, who is a bit younger. Cjay wanted to know, if we don’t have nouse in Australia, what fruit do we have? I said, “Apples”. With very wide eyes, he asked seriously, “You got apple pie?” I told him we do. He was very impressed. He could also recite, “One, two, buckle my shoe” but got stuck at nine and ten. Fennick called me “Missus” and wanted to see my toilet (she’s from one of the outer islands).
• Mr Principal and I had a long talk about mats. I was confused about what mats are actually for. I know that the “bride price” here is 80,000 Vatu and at least 100 mats, although if the bride has a degree, it’s more expensive (lucky I’m not the marrying type, gentlemen!). What I didn’t know is that the mats aren’t actually for anything. They’re just to exchange, kind of like currency, in situations such as marriages, funerals and in case you’ve offended someone. Good to know.
Meanwhile: The Rat War
By the time I returned from Pentecost, Au Bon Marche had got in a new shipment of rat poison, and I went to war on the buggers, laying bait all over the place. But I knew where they were nesting. Inside the back of the oven! I had already retrieved my tea towel from there, with the tongs Carmen made me buy, that I insisted I would never need. But today a terrible stench began to emanate from the oven. I did the bravest thing I have ever done. I took up the tongs again and withdrew one dead and stinking rat. To all the people who thought I was too much of a princess to come and do this job (little brother, I’m talking about you) I wave my dead rat in your direction, and shout, “Ulei!”*
*During WWII the Americans found a fresh water stream here, and shouted “Hooray!” The locals thought they were saying “Ulei!”, thus the area got its name.
Book of the week: Don’t Take Teddy! By Mr Friis-Baastard (and put that teddy down!)
This fortnight I’ve been reading:
By design, Ralph Caplan
Coming up for air, George Orwell
Within a budding grove, Marcel Proust
I had a few weeks of sleeping pretty badly due to the rats’ exciting adventures: they stole my tea towel, ate my anti-malarial tablets and bit a hole in my HealAid cream (they also attempted to take the door mats, but they were too heavy). I took a little holiday to Pentecost Island to see the land diving (like bungee jumping, but using vines instead of elastic!). That seemed to put everything back into perspective again. I mean, the rats are bad, but I’m not tempted to jump off a wobbly wooden tower with a vine around my ankles. I got to see Richard and Carmen, who are volunteering on Ambrym Island. They don’t have rats in their hut, but all they get to eat is yams. That would make me want to jump. At least I get a hamburger every week or so.
In the library: no kids! School holidays!
• Miss Iapson (the librarian I’m training) helped me label and re-shelve those 1,524 items of fiction
• Everything is now labelled and shelved, ready for the kids to come back!
• I hung out with Miss Iapson and her son CJay, who is five, and his cousin Fennick, who is a bit younger. Cjay wanted to know, if we don’t have nouse in Australia, what fruit do we have? I said, “Apples”. With very wide eyes, he asked seriously, “You got apple pie?” I told him we do. He was very impressed. He could also recite, “One, two, buckle my shoe” but got stuck at nine and ten. Fennick called me “Missus” and wanted to see my toilet (she’s from one of the outer islands).
• Mr Principal and I had a long talk about mats. I was confused about what mats are actually for. I know that the “bride price” here is 80,000 Vatu and at least 100 mats, although if the bride has a degree, it’s more expensive (lucky I’m not the marrying type, gentlemen!). What I didn’t know is that the mats aren’t actually for anything. They’re just to exchange, kind of like currency, in situations such as marriages, funerals and in case you’ve offended someone. Good to know.
Meanwhile: The Rat War
By the time I returned from Pentecost, Au Bon Marche had got in a new shipment of rat poison, and I went to war on the buggers, laying bait all over the place. But I knew where they were nesting. Inside the back of the oven! I had already retrieved my tea towel from there, with the tongs Carmen made me buy, that I insisted I would never need. But today a terrible stench began to emanate from the oven. I did the bravest thing I have ever done. I took up the tongs again and withdrew one dead and stinking rat. To all the people who thought I was too much of a princess to come and do this job (little brother, I’m talking about you) I wave my dead rat in your direction, and shout, “Ulei!”*
*During WWII the Americans found a fresh water stream here, and shouted “Hooray!” The locals thought they were saying “Ulei!”, thus the area got its name.
Book of the week: Don’t Take Teddy! By Mr Friis-Baastard (and put that teddy down!)
This fortnight I’ve been reading:
By design, Ralph Caplan
Coming up for air, George Orwell
Within a budding grove, Marcel Proust
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