Continuing With the High School Play . . .

For myself there has been a bit of change within the dynamics of the play. My role has been switched from Lady MacDuff to the role of Ross. Although there are a lot more lines to memorize I am actually quite happy with this change as I feel I will have more opportunity to push myself to learn more about the stage and acting on stage. This past week I have been learning the basic blocking for Ross'  various scenes and trying to more fully understand my character. All in all this past week has been quite productive for me when it comes to the play.

Horseriding - 14th Sept

Today I had another horse riding lesson after a two week hold up in my lessons. We didn't do much more than trot, but my trot is getting much better. We tried to try a canter today but it seemed as if the horses were a little bit too unmotivated to go much faster than a trot. But at least I feel like I'm making a little progress.

Cheleta Reading Group

Today we went on our first trip to the Cheleta Primary School. We are going to this school in order to help tutor the younger children how to read. There aren't many people in the group that I actually know, so it's a bit awkward but hopefully as the year goes on I'll have the opportunity to get to know my fellow students better. The school itself is actually quite nice compared to some of the other primary schools in Kenya. Once we got there, we got about six children to teach how to read. The majority of them were in second and third grade but there were a few first graders, which made it a little difficult, but overall the event went quite well. Supposedly for further on into the year, we will be given the first graders to teach. This makes me worry a little, as the first graders speak very little english compared to the higher grades and I'm a bit confused as to how we will teach them how to read if we cannot communicate well with them. But that's a problem to be dealt with later. All in all, the first trip was successful and hopefully it will continue to be.

Book Club - Agent ZigZag

Book Club - Meeting 2

On the 9th of September, we had our second book club meeting. We had all met to discuss the first book we read, The Housekeeper and the Professor. It was interesting to see everyone else's different perspectives and opinions on the book. The majority of us really quite liked it and enjoyed reading a translated work from another less cliché culture. After we had eaten and discussed the novel, we decided on the next novel we were planning to read. We chose the true life biography of Agent ZigZag, written by Ben MacIntyre. The biography is the story of a man who worked as a double agent during the second world war, and is about both his personal life and his professional life. So far, I am really enjoying participating in book club, and hope that I continue to enjoy the books as much as I am now.

Stage Fighting

In the week of the 5-11th of september, I didn't have any actual acting rehearsals but we did have a couple of our stage fighting workshops. For the play's war scene we're going to use wooden staffs and hand to hand combat techniques in order for the audience to understand the scene. These first couple of rehearsals, our instructor Miss Riley, taught us a few basic stage fighting moves. These moves will help us to seem as if we are actually fighting without having to harm each other. I'm actually rather enjoying these workshops, and it's giving me the rare opportunity to learn combat with staffs and stage fighting. So I hope all goes well. 

MacBeth by William Shakespeare

This past week we started our rehearsals for our high school production of Shakespeare's MacBeth. This week all we did was read through the script, just to get the feel of how the play sounds. This is my third production with the school, but its the first time that I've been involved in a production that isn't a musical, so I'm actually really excited. I have managed to score the role of Lady MacDuff, it's not a major role but it's still fun to be given the opportunity to participate in such a famous, classic play.

Horseriding

At the beginning of this school year I started horse riding. I'm actually terrified of horses but somehow I still love the idea of horse riding. So in doing this activity I am hoping to not only expand my confidence but also learn a sport that is not the typical after-school activity. I have lessons every wednesday afternoon with three other girls, all of which go to the same school as I do. And today we had one of these lessons. We've been doing it for a couple of weeks now so we're still all beginners and we're all still getting used to the feel of horse riding. In today's lesson I rode a different horse to the one I usually ride, so I was rather afraid considering this horse was a little bit taller than the other one and a lot more stubborn. If I continue horse riding, I do eventually want to learn how to jump but at the moment I feel that that ability is much too far away and way out of my comfort zone. Overall, I am both really excited and afraid to do horse riding, but so far I seem to enjoy it.

The Housekeeper and the Professor

We held our very first book club meeting today. It was a short meeting but all we needed to do was to decide on which of the nine books to read first. We all agreed on a novel called, The Housekeeper and the Professor, by Yoko Ogawa. This book is actually both fiction and a translated work. So it'll be interesting to delve into fiction originally written in another language, especially one as intricate and specific as Japanese. The novel is the story of the peculiar friendship between a successful mathematician, who suffers from short term memory loss, and the woman who is hired as his housekeeper.

I, personally, am very excited to be participating in a book club. I have never been presented with the opportunity to be part of a book club before, but have always wanted to try it. So I really hope that I enjoy it as much as I hope I will. I have always enjoyed reading but the majority of the time I have tended to only read science fiction or fantasy novels. It's not that I don't enjoy reading other genres, I am just more engaged with the less serious topics in literature. Although, I am hoping that this book club will encourage me to expand my literary experience.  Out of the books we have chosen to read, we actually have quite a few different genres. And my hope is that I enjoy most of them and that I continue to read novels that stray from the norm.