Lifeguarding Has It's Privilages

The pool is back in action!!! Yesterday afternoon, after school, I saw Jim walking with a massive box so when I found out it was a new pool pump I went along to help him install it. It wasn’t the greatest of successes considering he got me to cut the pipe, then cut it 2cm shorter, only to find out it was 2cm too short but its ok because apparently we're re-plumbing the whole system in a few weeks so its no big problem. Its apparently working very well now but we gave it a day without the stress of kids in the pool today and didn't have any swimming. I thought I would have had nothing to do but last night I got asked by Brother Rick to take my highly qualified self out to the waterfall to accompany Primary D on their bush trip, now extending my title as 'Head Pool/Waterhole Lifeguard'! But before I go into that, I keep forgetting to mention the water situation in Balgo. Where I thought we would be lucky to have enough water to wash and hydrate the 3 of us, it turns out that because we are in some basin, water is not an issue at all over here! It kind of explains now why the kids never turn taps or showers off and why Jim was able to leave the fire hose in the pool all night just to let it flood and re-fill with fresh water. It's not even billed so apparently in the dry season, which is coming up in a few months I believe, Father John has his sprinklers going basically 24/7.

Anyway, when we got to the waterfall, the water was actually falling! Not much but it was definitely falling. Steph decided that we would go back again on Saturday. This of course was because she had forgotten about the men only 'white fella' cricket match Ale and I have been invited to on Saturday at the police station so we might head out there on Sunday. Unfortunately, the bush trip got cut short because there were some kids who ran away (a common occurrence out here) and there were others walking along the edge of the cliff face which is about a 12m drop down to the rocks surrounding the waterhole (pictures will be up soon fingers crossed) so it basically got too dangerous and Steve, their teacher, decided to go back to school early. When we got back to school, there was still an hour or so left of school so Steph and I just chilled with Primary C. Since I have been at the pool every afternoon, I had no idea of how little the kids do in the afternoons!!! I've been jipped working in the chaotic group session in the mornings! But I can’t complain considering I often have a good few minutes between classes to myself at the pool.



Fatima under the waterfall




PRMD at the waterhole





Pretty cute I thought.



This is old new now but I just remembered that I haven’t told you, my loyal fans about the upcoming holidays which start in about 3 weeks. I'll hafta double check the exact dates but in the last week of term, a group of year 11 students from De La Salle, Perth (Steph's school) are coming up for a visit and will stay for about a week, then we've got a few days to kill, which I’m thinking we should fill with going to Wolf Creek with John, Vin and Judy, but then we head off to Broome! Br Rick has got to go to Broome to get one of the cars serviced and while that is happening, he's offered for us to go there for a week as a chance to get out of Balgo and get a bit of a reminder of what civilisation looks like. We then get back the day before we start up for term 2. And for those of you wondering, that drive to Broome is approximately 12 hours.

Also, I should correct myself from an earlier post, the language used out here isn't Wirrimanu, that's the name of the people. The language is Kukatja which we have been trying to pick up bits of. Mindy tried to teach me 'be quiet' and 'come here' but I have already forgotten them.
So far, all I know is (written how it sounds because I have no idea about spelling):
- 'Kumenjay'; what you have to call people when someone with the same name has recently passed away, for example, Robert is called Kumenjay by all the kids and because there was once someone named 'Blue', in class, we say "the sky is Kumenjay"
- 'Mumma Gungara'; what they say at the start of prayers instead of 'Dear God/Lord'
- 'Yaninga Mumma, Gadja, Gurdum Bubbeya, Yati'; "In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen"
- 'Bukenunna'; possibly the most used word in the playground and often the classroom, meaning something like "I will fight you"

So tonight we're heading to Ant's to watch the 1st game of the AFL (woo...) but might play a bit of Fifa too, plus it’s a free meal! The pool should be running fine tomorrow and I'll be back there so I will make sure I let you all know how that goes!