How to Watch a Rugby Game

I’ve learned in college to always start with a definition; haft the time we define definition. Thus I will begin most effectively discussing rugby with a brilliant definition.

‘Rugby- A football game in which play is continuous without time-outs or substitutions, interference, and forward passing are not permitted, and kicking, dribbling, lateral passing, and tackling are featured [as well as pushing, shoving, clothes/hair pulling, biting, slapping, bone breaking, and no doubt swearing]’

Several weeks ago I went to Bible study and I was invited to stay afterward and watch rugby. So being the adventurous spectacle watching individual that I am, I stayed. It was after all the rugby world cup final in Stade de France Paris. I learned several things about rugby, all enlightening.

First off, the first 20 minutes are amusing, highly amusing. Rugby is slightly different from American football and at first it’s hilarious. After about 30 minutes, it looks like a bunch of sweaty men making human piles. After haft time you’re waiting to see a proper goal (there are only 3 or 4 ways to score points) but it doesn’t come so South Africa beats the English and you decide that has to be okay.

Second, watching fellow rugby watchers is the greatest fun one can have on a Saturday night. Everyone get so excited they get silly and then you just laugh because they are laughing. They start yelling words you don’t know in Afrikaans in their excitement and use a host of British based English expressions as they jump, scream and yell about how the game should be going. Not to mention the rugby fans on TV are something else!

Can I also say I kind of like it? In a strange sort of way, naturally. "If they don't play rough sports, they go to war..."

How I ended up in Zimbabwe

How I end up anywhere, is a great question. Most the time I haven’t a clue how I end up in any given situation. I’m like a trailing spouse…without a spouse…but not quite a trailing child. Having graduated high school this past summer (which I am well aware means little or nothing in most cultures), I was accepted to both my college choices. I have decided on Liberty University’s Distance Learning Program. Liberty is in Lynchburg Virginia, one of the largest private Christian liberal arts colleges in the United States. I’m an undergrad freshmen working towards a AA in General Studies which I’ll get without ever having to set foot in a Liberty classroom. School in bed online, pretty sweet deal. The degree will transfer into a four year degree at a residence university so only my first two years will be distance.

But this isn’t about school, this is about how I ended up in Harare Zimbabwe. Part of the agreement with college was that I live at home. That in a nutshell is how I got from Paris to Harare. My dad works with an international humanitarian organization, and the post of country representative in Zimbabwe was vacant and needed instant replacement. Leaving his position in the regional Southern Africa office in Lusaka Zambia, he went over to help. As the trailing family, we followed behind with school books in bag and ready for stories.

And so we are here! I’m in college, my younger siblings homeschooled as ever, and we take group tennis lessons. It’s an interesting way to start one’s university education, but then again, when introducing myself in group discussion boards for classes, I’m always the most exotic.

How to Spend Saturday Chez-Moi

Delectable scones to be topped with butter jam and cream (whipped cream mind you)

Saturdays are popular world around. Americans have a very strong tendency to adore weekends, Saturday in particular.

Saturdays for a family of seven are quite an event. We start out by running around to different grocery stores and seeing what’s available and buying for the week. After that, other members of the family (i.e. myself) are awake and fully clothed and we all head out for breakfast. Breakfast as a Saturday morning tradition is always very important. We must go to a particular restaurant for scones and lemonade, perhaps pancakes and a cappuccino but always scones and lemonade. Quickly following is a visit to several art galleries, a few arts and craft and furnisher stores for fun. Recently we’ve become enraptured buying a set of living room furnisher and therefore must find cushions, pillows and then move on to a set of dinning room dishes. This might be even completed by a few more visits to other grocery stores in search if nonexistent bread.

Afternoons are generally up for grabs. If you’re a real adult (over 40) you take a nap while the fan blows to keep the flies away and the room cool. If you’re a real kid (under 13 and under) you watch an Abbot and Castillo movie on the computer. If you’re a real teen (16), you’ll catch up on Facebook and make sure you still have more friends then all your friends. If you’re…whatever I am…you’ll busy yourself reading international news, writing long emails and listening to the fan drown out Carrie Underwood, Edith Piaf, and Chris Tomlin. Sometimes a family tennis match and pizza dinner is in order.

In the evening, my sister and I head out to Bible study where we are the only ones on the group who don’t speak Afrikaans. It’s still a very cultural event because we get to hear fellow youth talk about cricket and rugby which aren’t exactly in the sphere of our knowledge.

Naturally there’s the promise to update your blog Saturday evening and then it doesn’t happen. Such a shame….

How to Survive your First University Classes (Online and Overseas)

My high tech classroom/office/bedroom

If there’s one thing I learned about college is that it has an aptitude to consume your thoughts. When you aren’t spending time reading, writing papers, taking exams and listening to/watching lectures, you think about all the above and how you could perform better. Maybe other students don’t but when it’s your first class, freshman year and you’re rattled by moving to a country lacking commodities, you strive for excellence more then customary!

I decided with my unusual life, (homeschooling myself, growing up overseas, a year of exclusively language, interning with NGOs), I had to have an unusual college experience. What’s more, if you’re studying development, Africa would be a great place to live. So, it ended up being Liberty University’s online distance learning program, designed mostly for adults seeking another degree but I get the joy of being the geeky freshy of the bunch.

The day after returning to Africa, I sign into my LU portal and discover the joys of learning. A week later, I move to a strange and unusual country, pin-up my posters and decide that’s where I’ll call home. The initial reaction is shock (maybe horror and the inclination to run bawling back to…well you can’t really run back anywhere so that settles that). But with a little work and the realization that your strange online professors are actually rather nice, you can move forward. It’s not bad at all! You can manipulate your time and finish assignments when convenient and have time left over to help your 6 year old brother do math facts and make apple fritters.

So, today, having taken my final exams for my first university classes, attained respectable grades and being ushered into a week long season known as “semester break,” it’s rather easy to be pleased and decide that the online concept is rather brilliant!