Visit by Caroline and my Mum
On Friday evening, Caroline and my mum arrived in Lagos and I went to the airport to meet them. After about an hour of waiting, they emerged from the arrivals to the sea of black faces (and one white one). Once the convoy had got us "back to base", they came up to our flat, where the children had been waiting for them and they met Salako and Joy. We had a light dinner and they went to bed in a flat on the 1st floor, which was available for them to use until the middle of next week, when we were going to Benin.

The next day, Caroline and my mum were lucky to see the school at it best as it was packed with activities. Daniel had football at 8am, then I had a Den meeting with Erik and the other boys at 9am, after which Erik had football. While Erik played, I mended the brake on the bicycle he had been given by the Faselers using spare parts I had brought back from Norway. After the football, we all went back to base for a swim and then went back over to VI for a pizza at Manuela's. In the afternoon, the school Parents-Teachers Organisation (PTO) held the "One World Day" event.

The teachers had divided up the grades into different regions and had worked with the children to decorate the outside of the classrooms according to countries of that region. Some of the classes also did the national dance from their country. Daniel's class were chosen to do a dance from Egypt which his teacher, Mrs Ghandour (in the photo) had practiced with them; they even had the costumes. There was also a "duck the teacher" game where the children threw balls at a target. if they hit it hard enough it would tip a teacher into a pool of water. There was a long queue for this one.

Daniel's dance was great, they performed really well. The boys were all dressed in grey, while the girls were in brightly coloured Egyptian dresses. Mathilde also had a great time afterwards, jumping up and down with her friends. It's amazing how much energy they have at that age!

The parents had organised stalls around the school with food, games and decorations from their chosen region. They also organised a kind of treasure hunt, where the children were given a ticket which they had to get stamped at the stall of the different countries. When they completed the ticket, they could exchange it for a prize. They could also win vouchers by playing game at the different stalls and exchange them for prizes. The more vouchers, the nicer the prize. Erik roamed free with his friends and had a great time, while I went round the stalls with Daniel. He enjoyed the games and getting his ticket stamped, but the thing he liked most was looking for vouchers people had dropped on the floor. Tricky Daniel!

In the evening, we had champagne as an aperitif with salmon and cream cheese on rye bread, followed a rack of lamb for dinner with lots of red wine. Here are some quotes from the evening:

"We have drunk three bottles but one of them was champagne and that doesn't count" - Jeremy

"I'm going to drink less, but only champagne" - Caroline

Jeremy