Chatham Hall in South Africa 2008

All seems to be on target following day one. We arrived at the Lawrencia School today, had a tour and met the students, ate a wonderful catered lunch, and then set off on different projects—one group leading a soccer clinic, another heading into town to look for books for a library that we are helping to put together at the School, and another driving to the supermarket to buy food for breakfast for 300 students for the next three days.

I was in the last group, and we had at least eight carts filled (hundreds of oranges and bottles of juice, large quantities of cereal, numerous tubs of butter, dozens of loaves of bread, massive jars of peanut butter and jelly, a tall stack of egg  boxes, the store’s complete supply of apples and oranges …) by the time we got to checkout. Our carts filled the length of one aisle in the store. When we had arrived at the store, it was already on generator power because of the power shortages in South Africa. “Usually two hours,” the manager of the store told us when she realized that we were going to be her shoppers of the day. She directed us to a checkout booth that she would work for us. The registers were humming happily on generator electricity.

With two carts to go in our check-out process, and the others already loaded into the car, the generator went out as well, and we stood in the dark, unable to leave the store, fearing that we would have to unpack the dozens of boxes already in the car, return them, and either check them out again (we were already late for our meeting with the other groups) or the next morning (which would make it impossible for us to cook breakfast). The managed immediatley and naturally reached in her pocket for matches, struck one, and lit an oil lamp next to her register. The faces of all in our group swam out of the darkness.

We waited. The students laughed. We chatted among ourselves. We were silent in the dark. We waited some more. Then, miraculously, after twenty minutes, up went the lights and the cash registers, and, to our good luck, ours with the original, incomplete total. Checkout proceeded, we piled into an overloaded van, and off we went. A wonderful event with fellow travelers — student and adult — and store workers who simply took things in stride, were patient, and, well, I guess, were rewarded.

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