Dear Ian and Anique
There was a wedding in our class today…
Dorje made a cover for the (my) register (journal).
Ghannaan styled the couple, Zidkijah and Jason.
Dorje and Nicola attended:)
Have a great weekend!
Teacher Caroline
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After a long hike at Kirstenbosch, Dorje still had enough energy for a song:
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Dorje turned 5 last Friday, and, by all accounts, had a magical birthday at his school. His kindergarten teacher, and the Waldorf school system, made the day really special, and he was talking about it for a long time afterwards. Each of his classmates gave him a card, and a gift, as did his teacher (her gift included an actual dorje).
His mom and I are not the best organisers in the world (I’ve had about one birthday party as an adult), but we did manage to organise a small get-together this weekend.
Dorje has been talking about turning five since he turned four, and already the milestone has led to all sorts of achievements. When he does something to celebrate, such as catching a ball, it’s something “four-year olds can’t do”.
He’s a bit disappointed to find out that it’s all of three-hundred and fifty-eight days (fifty seven…. fifty six) until he turns six (”why so loooong?”), but I’m sure it’ll fly by for me, if not for him.
As part of the day’s celebration at school, I was asked to write something brief about his five years to date. So, in summary, Dorje’s first five years:
Dorje was born early one Spring morning, when the road over the mountain to his then home was filled with pink ‘Dorje flowers’.
He spent his first two years in a small wooden house on the edge of a nature reserve, with a garden visited by sunbirds, tortoises and, sometimes, at night, a porcupine. The house had a balcony without railings, and was on stilts. Dorje used to make everyone nervous when he crawled right to the edge, but he soon learnt to judge for himself how for to go. He only fell off once.
He could crawl down the stairs masterfully, and learnt to walk there too. However, when he was learning to walk, the stairs proved too much, and once he came tumbling down. There was a long silence as he drew in a deep breath, before letting out a huge cry, much to dad’s relief.
Ylara came to visit once, and Dorje taught her to crawl. The wooden floors were much easier to crawl on than the thick carpets at Ylara’s house, so even though Dorje was smaller than Ylara, he could crawl before she could.
Mom used to work at what’s now Ella’s house, right next door to where Dorje lives now. She used to bring Dorje with her every day in the car. Dorje met Gogo, who played with Dorje while mom was working.
Dorje remembers being at Ella’s house, but I don’t think the wooden house, where he actually lived - he was still too small.
Two
Just before Dorje turned 2, mom and dad moved to a new house. This house was also close to the mountain, this time Table Mountain, and was up a very steep hill. Once he went for a long walk with dad all the way to the Cable Station. He walked all the way up, but fell asleep at the top, and dad had to carry him home.
There was a big fire on the mountain, and everything was covered in smoke. Dorje went to stay with granny and grandpa while the firefighters put the fire out. After that, the mountain was black, as all the plants and trees had been burnt.
One night, mom and dad woke up to a terrifying scream. Dorje came running into the room, screaming in agony. We looked over him to see what was the matter, but couldn’t find anything. Suddenly he screamed again, and we saw a scorpion running across his neck. Dad flicked it off - he’d been stung 5 times. Mom took him to the hospital while dad looked for the scorpion to identify it, in case it was poisonous. Luckily, it wasn’t - just very sore.
The scorpions must have come off the mountain because of the fire, as we found 3 more in the house that year, though luckily no-one was stung.
Three
When Dorje was two, close to three, mom and dad moved to his new house, where he’s staying now. This house was big, and had space for mom and dad to work. Dorje didn’t have to go to work with mom every day in the car anymore. A little later, Ella moved next door.
Dorje also started school, with teacher Alison.
Four
When Dorje was three, close to four, Dorje got a new house. Dad went to go live there.
Londy came to stay with mom and Dorje, and Dorje sometimes used to ride his bicycle under the subway, and come visit with mom and Londy.
Dorje turned four, and had his party at the Millstone. He rode round the fields on a big horse.
One day, at the Millstone, Dorje was playing on top of the boat. Suddenly he started screaming. Dad didn’t know why, and rushed him to the hospital. His tummy had been very sore, because mom and dad hadn’t given him enough to drink.
Dorje went on a boat for the first time, going around the harbour with with dad, KT and Jemima. He saw seals swimming in the harbour, and felt the back and forth rocking on the boat.
One day, Dorje and dad went to the top of Table Mountain, up the Cable Car. He’d seen the cable car every day fom his old house, but never before been on. They walked to a big crack in the mountain, and then came back down by the cable car.
Not that long ago, dad got a new house. So now Dorje has a much nicer house, with a big tree in front. Dorje couldn’t at first climb the tree, but one day he managed to get up all by himself. Sometimes he sits on the wall, watching everyone play soccer and rugby.
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Dorje and I did one of my favourite short walks today - from Kirstenbosch to the ‘waterfall’, which in summer is more like a leaky shower faucet, but today in early spring was a respectable water-saving showerhead. It’s one of those ’secret’ walks that no-one seems to know about. I’ve often gone to a spot nearby to do some meditation, and rarely see anyone.
It took some coaxing to get him to walk uphill. I’m sure he was much better about two years ago when he walked from our house in Oranjezicht all the way to the Cable Station, unaided. Now every time the gradient exceeds 5% he feigns exhaustion and asks to be carried. Finding an exciting bug about 10 metres ahead seemed to do the trick most of the time.
It’s a pleasant, shady walk most of the way, and we spent the afternoon ‘feeding the fish’. The curtain of water, as it fell, separated into a two streams, and the gap became the ‘mouth’. The hungry fish got well fed as we tossed small stones, and the occasional nut, into the gap (or at least in the general direction of the water).
Sometimes we got hungry too, and ate the assorted ants, spiders, ladybirds and snakes that we’d brought along - raisins, nuts, goji berries and peanuts (with the skin that moults like a snake).
The full album is on Facebook with selected pics below.
Dorje passed out at the end of the hike. Rolling 40 metres down the grass probably helped.
The ‘fish’ in the background.
It’s a 50m drop below - I tried to get him to hold on with two hands, but the Spiderman shirt was making him feel invincible.
And I hope the moss isn’t too slippery.
One of the pictures Dorje took had a recognisable human form.
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You think you know what your child gets up to at other people’s houses (hey Kath) until you add them as friends on Facebook and find incriminating evidence. 
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He tells me this morning on the way to school that he shared germs yesterday with Trinity 
So I am laaik So I ask “How did you share germs with Trinity?”
He goes “MOOOOOOOMMMMMMM, she gave me her strawberry” 
Flip I am relieved 
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Day 1
[13:42:33] Oma: Sat watching whales, climbed the rocks (was’nt in my daily planner) fed dried seaweed back to the sea. Because I care for the seaweed, he says.
[13:43:04] Oma: We also bought a power ranger puzzle but tv for now
[13:43:46] Oma: Wanted a 1000 piece puzzle, managed to divert to a 93 piece
[13:44:03] Oma: my rug is al klaar
[13:44:31] … you have not been ,mentioned ha ha ha
[13:45:34] Oma: He asked when he is 40 how old will I be. I said 100 and replied, then you will be my mom
Day 2 …
[10:49:48] MUM: hey
[10:49:52] … how was night 2?
[10:49:54] … :*
[11:26:36] Oma: why are you bothering us when we are fine?
[11:26:46] … He woke me up!
[11:27:02] MUM: :)
[11:27:03] … sorry
[11:27:07] … i kinda miss him :)
[11:27:11] … what time?
[11:27:17] Oma: come and get him!
[11:27:23] MUM: :)
[11:27:23] Oma: 7.15
[11:27:35] MUM: yo :^)
[11:27:39] … must be the sea air
[11:27:55] Oma: Dragged the curtain and said look it’s day
[11:28:30] MUM: shame, you get about a million heaven points for this
[11:28:54] Oma: still in his pajamas
[11:29:04] MUM: and you too i hope ;)
[11:29:12] Oma: no
[11:29:39] … going for a pancake and a dop at 1.00
[11:29:51] MUM: hahahaha
[11:29:53] … enjoy the dop
[11:29:59] … and leave dorje in his pj’s :D
[11:30:04] Oma: macaroni and cheese for supper
[11:30:25] … leaving him at home by himself
[11:30:37] MUM: you know how you can win sleeping late? put a tv in HIS room lol
[11:30:44] … oh lol at leaving him at home :D
[11:30:49] Oma: hahaha
[11:31:04] MUM: swop rooms and give him the remote for the next 3 days
[11:31:11] … i will come early friday to let you off :D
[11:31:22] Oma: don’t worry
[11:31:47] … the traffic is going to be hectic. whale festival
[11:31:58] MUM: oh crap ja
[11:32:02] … ag sigh
[11:32:21] Oma: hope you are still coming?
[11:32:32] MUM: changed my mind - can you keep him for 2 weeks? :D
[11:33:03] Oma: You’ll see a for sale sign at my house, one child and a remote
[11:33:18] … tv free
[11:33:39] … nearest offer secures
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Here are some pictures of the trip to the Tankwa Nature Reserve.
It’s hot, 25 degrees, semi-desert, and snow in the background
Taken by Dorje
Getting out of the way so we can see the snow better
Dorje’s experiment with the camera effects
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This weekend, Dorje, Anique and I drove up to the Tankwa Karoo National Park to join some friends in a house there. The trip was estimated at about four hours, and we left around 3pm on Friday.
We got there at at about 2pm on Saturday.
The maps and directions we got were humourously bad. “From Ceres, take the R355 north…” There is no R355 in Ceres, and no-one in Ceres seemed to have a clue where Tankwa or the R355 were, and, being the last to leave, everyone else was already out of cellphone reception.
Eventually someone pointed out where he thought the R355 was, and, being in a vaguely northerly direction, and the most likely route according to my guess, we headed off.
An hour later, as we were beginning to lose faith, we discovered the R355, turning off from the road we were on. Flushed with success, sure we were a short distance away, we turned off. It was now already dark.
At some point, the ‘R355′ petered out into a dead end, and we approached nearby farmhouse for help. “We’re going to Tankwa”. “O Hel!” was the unpromising answer.
By this point, Dorje was thankfully fast asleep, so the drive back to Mount Cedar, the suggested stopoff point for the night, passed fairly painlessly, albeit with me asleep in the back, after the five and a half hour drive coupled with the four hours sleep the previous night finally caught up.
Mt. Cedar was full (there was snow on the mountains, what were we thinking, they implied), and they suggested either Op Die Berg, about another hour (back the way we’d come), or all the way back to Ceres, a further hour after that.
Driving back to Op Die Berg, we saw the elusive turnoff to the R355, rather hard to spot in the dark. The gate to the National Park closed at 9pm, and it was already well past that, but at least we knew where to come tomorrow.
Miraculously, Op Die Berg had a place for us, and we spent the night at the Oppi Berg Gastehuis.
The next morning, over breakfast, the owner showed me a map. The R355 turnoff we’d missed and spotted on the return the previous night actually wasn’t the R355. It joined the R355 after an hour’s drive over a mountain pass, and we were still 2 hours away from our destination.
The pass, which I can’t find right now on Google, opened (or was at least renovated) in 1999, and is called something like the Katteberg Pass.
Crossing the pass made the delay entirely worthwhile, as this pass took us from the snow-covered Ceres mountains, to the dry and dusty Ceres-Karoo. The vista was unbelievable at times. A hot day, about 25 degrees, snow peaks in the background, and dry deserty sands before us.
So we stopped to take some pictures. As we pulled off, a rock leapt out in front of us, and the car found itself wedged in the air over a rather large rock, unable to move.
We unpacked the car, and the boot, and dug out the jack, one of those devices designed to meet the absolute minimum standards of jackdom. In other words, lifting the car by hand would have been only marginally more effort.
I jacked the car up, then did it again after the jack collapsed in a heap during the first attempt. We moved the rock, and repacked the car, and the boot.
At this point Dorje decided he’d had enough of sitting in the car, and raced up the mountain. I cursed our expeditions together, wishing I’d brought him up on ice cream and computer games, and scaled the peak after him in my flipflops. With Dorje on my shoulders, heading down, I slip gracefully onto my backside as the occupants of the only car we’d seen all day wave cheerily as they head on past.
About 22 hours after we started looking, we finally turned onto the R355, and arrived at Tankwa an hour or so after that. We get detailed directions to our house, fifteen kilometres away, and, measuring to the metre on my odometer, we head off.
There’s no sign, but at exactly the right point, there’s a house, and we turn in. None of the familiar cars are there, but it must be right, and I knock on the door. Two strange woman are inside, but they refuse to open, or even come, to the door. I shout that I’m looking for Maanskyn, our house. They gesture for me to leave.
Assuming it’s the wrong house, we leave, and carry on along the road. Almost exactly to the metre, a few kilometres further, the next turnoff appears, and I realise I’d been measuring accurately all along, and the previous house must have been correct. Perhaps the road continued behind that house?
We head back. Dorje has by this time lost his sense of humour, and wants to go home, little caring that it’s twenty-three five hours away.
Back at the house, the two woman remain as welcoming as ever, and there’s no sign of any other house or road. By this time, twenty-three hours after we left, both Anique and I are also starting to lose our sense of humour. We head off back on the fifteen kilometre road to reception, ready to kidnap someone and insist they lead us directly to the house.
My sporty Golf GTI, not the most practical car for the Tankwa Karoo, cuts out as I, in my good humour, roar over the potholed gravel a little too ambitiously at thirty kilometres an hour.
We manage to get it going again, and continue at a more sensible twenty. There, coming the other way, is one of our companions in his slightly more practical Toyota Corolla. He waves as he drives past. And doesn’t stop… Or at least that’s what it seemed like for a unpleasantly drawn-out second.
“Are you lost?”, he asks, casually, as I try and greet him civilly. “Follow me!”
We turn and follow him… back for the third time to the house with the strange women. It turns out we’re sharing the house with them - the back part of the house is completely separate, which is probably for their own good, as I wouldn’t have been too friendly if I’d had to share space with them.
Finally, twenty-three hours later, we’d arrived.
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