Thunderstorms and Hail

Well one of our team at the Amanzi quiz late night predicted that based on a weather report he'd seen it would rain at precisely four o'clock this afternoon. It started raining before that, but at 4pm it hailed. I was round at Polish friends' and we watched hail stones the size of molar teeth come hurtling down. I went on to teach my form three student and the sky darkened to an inky blue.

It has been an interesting few days politically in the country and some people were waiting for a potential coup. We discussed it at my art class and one of the ladies talked of her experiences of living through two previous coups in other parts of Africa. There has been some trouble in town but in the low density suburbs we continue living in our bubble for the most part. Apparently though US dollars in cash are trading on the black market at an 85% premium as of yesterday and it keeps going up. I went to a talk on Bitcoin with a friend yesterday and it could potentially be one solution. The way that it could affect macroeconomics was particularly fascinating to me.

We went along to Gulsin Onay's second piano recital at St Johns College on Tuesday. When she played Beethoven's Piano Sonata no 32, my mum and I were surprised that the syncopation had an element of jazz to it and we thought surely not for Beethoven?! A friend who is a musician however informed us that this piece was one of the first precursors to jazz. Who knew! Yesterday the old girls committee for Convent had our last meeting before the annual lunch on Saturday. Despite the rather dire state of the country's economy, local businesses have been very generous with prizes. I will have to try make a hat between now and Saturday. Am going to try use my prefect basher as a base.

Have been helping my form three with unseen poetry pieces. Tonight we were analysing Refugee Mother and Child by Chinua Achebe. I found the final line very moving. Previously we had looked at The Bereavement of the Lion-keeper by Sheraq Omar, which is also beautiful. My favourite five year old wanted to go back to dinosaurs tomorrow as a topic but I have managed to talk him into the story of the Trojan Horse and then a trip to Australia with Aboriginal art and animals. It's going to be a busy weekend. Am going to two art exhibitions tomorrow after work and then on Saturday there's the old girls' lunch and I then have to head to the airport to meet and greet French tourists and assist them with car hire in French.