On Wednesday I once again flew to Bloemfontein - This time I was providing support to another lecturer. The Appeals Court Judges were in basic IT training. When I say basic I mean basic.. eg:
Me: Judge would you please give me an example of the differences between Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel - what would you use each of the programs for?
Judge: One is blank and the other has blocks.
That is a genuine question and answer from my session with them? Eish! (Eish is a South African expression (from the African languages) which in this instance more or less means NO WAY! and is pronounced eyesh).
So, what happens is that the lecturer teaches from the front of the class, and I filled the role of "roaming lecturer". I stand at the back and check that they are following and provide support if they get lost - which was often!!
Anyway, a number of things transpired on Wednesday (as they always seem to do when I am in Bloemfontein - which means flower fountain).
Firstly, one of the judges forgot his wallet at home and asked me to buy him a coke.. I mean give me a break.. this man earns more money in a year than I will probably make in a lifetime, plus I have been on maternity leave for 7 months, so you can imagine what my cash flow is like at the moment - and this man feels no guilt with asking me to pay for his coke - and then at the end of the day drives away in his R1million Mercedes!! Now consider that we were in a 4star hotel and you can imagine how much the coke cost - I could have bought milk and bread on the way home with that money.
Moving along...
At lunchtime we went to a restaurant just up the road - It took them an hour to bring our food. One of the judges' food had still not arrived when most of us were already eating, and when the chef came out to apologise the conversation went like this:
Chef: Sir (they hate being called Sir, you must address them as Judge all the time), we apologise for the delay with your food, I am preparing it at the moment, and it will be here shortly.
Judge: Are you preparing it right now?
Chef: Yes Sir.
Judge: Then don't you think you should be in the kitchen cooking it and not standing here talking to me?
With that the chef turned and hurried back to the kitchen without another word!
Somewhere around this time I looked down into my salad - and the next minute felt like throwing up, because there sitting on my lettuce was a spider - so that was the end of my meal, and by this time all of you know that I am on a strict eating programme at the moment, so I was very hungry and very down!
We were so pushed for time at the end of the day that I was convinced we were going to miss our flight back to Johannesburg, so it was rush rush rush - As we get into the car it begins to rain; Karl switches on the wipers and the drivers side one is making a horrid screeching noise and the next minute it flies off the car! Great!
Fast-forward to on-board the aircraft - Just after take-off, the captain comes on and says his usual blah blah blah...it will be a bumpy ride into Johannesburg with the rain and heavy cloud cover! I HATE TURBULENCE - frightens the life out of me. As we start coming down through the clouds in Johannesburg, the turbulence is so bad that all the women on the plane are gasping every time the plane lurches up and down.
Once we land, there is such a downpour and we have to run from the aircraft to the bus.. I was drenched..
All in all an exciting trip!
2 comments:
I think I would have died had I found a spider in my salad. I don't like spiders at all. I tend to leave them alone if they leave me alone but having one in my salad would definitely cross the line.
Glad you made it back home!
Was it a Daddy Long Legs kinda spider or like a tarantula?
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