thanks for your concern and comments.

Thanks for all your concern.  I am feeling a thousand times better and hopefully for all readers – I am thinking better as well.

Firstly let me thank everybody most sincerely for the comments received back after my outburst and the involvement of one of my sister/cousins who decided to put links on Facebook.  Thanks Gillie.  I had an email from my sister who told me that Facebook had lit up with comments.  This made me sit up and take note.  I was so thrilled and overwhelmed at all the comments.  

I must now confess that I have felt bad about my outburst, and as I re-read it today I can see that I was just not well.  I will be continuing to do blogs….  So do keep reading.

I am still not back at work, instead, I am now in Johannesburg at the insistence of AVI.   I feel like a pawn in their game but at the same time I know they are very concerned about ensuring that all volunteers get the most superior medical care possible. They could be ensuring they do not leave themselves open for litigation in the future.   My local GP was retesting some bloods because some aspects had not returned to a level that he was happy with, so he added into that mix TB test. 

Happy to announce that I don’t have ‘consumption’ (TB).  I am now waiting to see a specialist here sometime this coming week and then I can go back to Swazi and back to the ladies.

It’s nice for a few days to be in a big city again with some great shopping and good food options also I found a great cinema today with about 4 must see movies for me.  I now have a challenge to fit them in before the specialist sees me and sends me back to Swazi.  That’s better than feeling that I am sitting around waiting.

Today I found the roof top market of handmade arts and crafts etc.  Where I came in to the market the first point of call was a special book fair – not normally there.  I only bought 5 books.  All novels.  I had been feeling a huge deficit of good reading material – that’s now fixed for a while.  Penny will be happy too – I hope - I found some of the books in the series of the No 1 Ladies Detective Agency that she doesn’t have and they happen to be the next 2 that I am wanting to read.  BONUS  !!

There was heaps of very interesting arts and crafts.  I was interested in anything was significantly African and I looked for the makers to ensure they were authentic.  Some great artists there with some great work and just for me, an African drummer with several drums and a few spare seats. I had a few minutes to sit and drum.  It brought back some great memories of full moon drumming in Townsville many years ago.

I could have spent more time and Rand there, but I also needed a good cold drink.  Down off the roof top- multi story car park - I found a place that does great fresh juice, then a shop with some fresh fruit to take back for lunch.

So here I sit writing to ensure that you I am well and all is OK and I will be back in Swazi by the end of this week and then back to work.

While wondering the mall yesterday and again the markets today I have seen some great uses of the fantastic shwaeshwae fabrics.  One very talented lady is making hats with a matching clutch purse.  The hats are small and suitable for evening, weddings etc.  very inspiring.  Yesterday I saw a bunch of stuffed toys all made with shwaeshwae.  They are just cute / strange creatures all drawn by children and made with many different pieces of fabric and matching or blending threads and other bits of interesting stuff.  In October I bought a very small one of these to show the ladies, but I think it was way out of their thought process.  These women are very practical about their sewing and seem to concentrate on making things that are serviceable.  I now need to shift their focus and when I get back and we finish the dresses, I think it’s time to start to playing. 

I was talking to the Swazi AVI coordinator and she is keen to apply for some funding for us so we can get a bundle of fabrics to start with.  She also asked me to put together a list of things for each of them as a starter bundle for them.  At this stage they share scissors and machine oil and threads for their machines etc.  I am very excited about this and will be happy to work with her to get our application in before the dead line on 9^th April.

I do have some interesting times ahead to still forward to.  Lusanda keeps asking if I have started teaching the ladies to knit the dolls I make.  She has inspired me again to get them into some very different.   I get concerned when I realise that I have already done 6 months and only have 18 months left to get all these things done.  I guess the answer is  -  what are you waiting for – so get started now !!!

I like it when I write and the answers come to me. 

Time to close this and get it published .

Take care of each other and be kind to yourself.

Much love and special hugs to all.

Georgie. xxxxx