Breaking the Silence

I'm not sure who's reading this blog - but apologies go out to any of you who check it regularly for the almost 3 months with no posts.  Now that we're starting our third year here (haven't lived in a house that long since 2004!) a lot of things will be annual occurances, so I probably will be posting less often.

But there's another reason that I might not get to post so much:

Abigail is doing 9th grade at home.  This was a VERY hard decision because she really enjoyed the social interaction at HIS.  But for a variety of reasons, we decided the best thing would be for her to attend part-time.  We made this request of the school during the second semester last year, and much to our dissappointment, we were turned down.  Happily, the school will continue to allow the girls to particpate in after school activities.

While Abigail is taking many online, teacher based courses (Algebra 2, Spanish 4, Biology and Literature), she is not doing a complete school program.  So, that combined with her need to get out and about every day is going to make life a bit interesting in the coming school year.  She started school two weeks ago and so far is enjoying her course work but does miss being with her friends every day.

Of course, we also have a high school senior who is applying to college.  Happily, Arianna's school doesn't start until after Labor Day so she has been able to spend the last couple of weeks relaxing and getting a head start on applications.

This coming week both girls will be busy with some of those "annual occurance" events.  Abigail is at the National Musicamp out in the country (the HIS kids also skip a week of school to go) and Arianna will return to a day camp that is run by the local churches for 15-25 year olds (Week of Transformation - otherwise known as WOT).

We are definitely getting settled back into our lives here after our "home leave" summer in the US.  Hopefully I'll get to post a few high lights of that in the future.

8th Grade Commencement

 

The Commencement ceremony for 8th grade took place yesterday at Harare International School. The kids planned and mced the event which was just delightful.  There was the 8th grade "Orchestra" - about a dozen kids who play put together a tune with a little help from the orchestra director.  Pretty impressive for a class of 28 kids - many of whom move around a lot and don't always have a chance to learn an instrument.  There was also a Marimba ensemble - made up mostly of kids who had been at HIS for many years.

The students were presented with Certificates (can you see Abigail's little girl photos in the background above?) and gave each of their parents a small gift and note of thanks.  After the ceremony there was a reception in the Band Room.  The parent committe, headed by my friend Yifat, did a great job of decorating and organizing the reception.  

HIFA 2014

I have to admit that I was underwhelmed by Harare Festival of the Arts 2013.  It is the well anticpated week of the year in the international community so many of the people that we know book lots of tickets for the six day event which features music, dance and theater performances by artists from all over the world.  The girls and I picked out about 4 events but I wasn't really impressed with any of them.

So, when the time came for HIFA this year I wasn't super eager to book too many things.  But there were a number of interesting looking shows and the kids were interested in seeing a string quartet from South Africa that was performing a piece they just started to work on.  So, we again picked a few events.  I have to say that now I understand the fuss much better.  Most of the shows we went to were for the most part great (there was one pop concert that I could have lived without but that was the exception).  My favorite was a Canadian guitarist of Iranian descent.  Not only was his playing amazing, his life story was equally amazing (and well told).

Theater Opening

As I mentioned in a previous post, Sixteen Strings was asked to play at a movie theater opening.  They were quite excited to do this and worked hard in the middle of a very busy time to be sure that they were ready.

Here the girls are playing, and if you look at the dignitaries sitting in the chairs, you will see the Vice President in the yellow dress.  She gave the opening speech.

While the theater costs almost as much as the US (unlike the other two theaters here which are about half the price), it is quite nice.  And also in the area where we live, so ends up being the theater of choice for mostly that reason.  Abigail has been there several times to see a movie and I went with her once.

April's Funeral

After the months of February and March that were so busy, April was the month where life kind of stood still to the point that we felt like we have no idea where it went.  It actually started back on a night in March.  We were in the middle of all the Eisteddfod craziness and the girls were playing at a big opening of a movie theater when I got a text message from John saying that his dad had suddenly passed away from a massive heart attack.  He was in good health (you may recall that I mentioned that in a post about December when we last visited John's parents) so it was quite a shock.

At the time, my parents were here in the middle of a two week visit that was meant to include a holiday to the lake.  We quickly decided that we all wanted to go to the US for the funeral, but took a couple of days to sort out the details.  In the end, the funeral was delayed for a week and we were able to both go to the lake and get some plane tickets that were normally priced (some departure dates were twice as much as others!).  I am so thankful that we were able to go to the US to be with family and celebrate John's dad's life.

John's mom with ALL of her grandchildren - only the second time that they've all been together!

Happy that they are all together, sad that there is no Grandpa with them.  He will be very missed - especially as the three oldest granddaughters are all to be married in the next 13 months.

Crazy Month #2 - Eisteddfod 2014

As crazy as February was, March was crazier!  It was our family's second experience with the Eisteddfod Music Festival that I wrote about last year. This three week long festival was a time consuming and yet wonderful experience.  The first week, Arianna had students who particpated (and did quite well, I might add):

The second week, the HIS orchestra particpated and got an Honors (the highest distinction) AND got to share the cup for the best orchestra:

The third week, both Abigail AND the girls' string quartet - Sixteen Strings - received Honors. As a result, Sixteen Strings was invited to play in the final concert - which is a showcase concert featuring a sampling of the best of the 2,000 entries.  To top it off, Abigail received the Di Wright Cup for the best string player under 16.

Sixteen Strings out celebrating after their Honors performance!

That's all for now - hope to catch up with some more updates of this past month before April is over...

Couple of Crazy Months - February

Life has been a bit of a whirlwind since my last post.  February was spent getting ready for a major musical event in early March:

It was a great opportunity to get back into recital playing, but since I hadn't learned a new sonata in over 20 years it seemed like perhaps I should have started with a more modest goal of performing a piece I already knew (our pianist and I both learned the Prokofiev Cello Sonata).  Of course, Abigail also learned a new piece so I had a double role as performer and as coach.  Fortunately, we had some wonderful people to work with and the concert was well attended.  I'm hoping we get to do some more concerts here in Harare but I'm not sure when that will happen!