After a long, grueling death march to the waterfall, Ethan and I played Monopoly (it\u2019s the South African version, so instead of railroads it has international airports in Durban, Cape Town, Bloemfontein, and Johannesburg, instead of waterworks it has \u2018water board,\u2019 instead of just English it has both English and Afrikaans, and instead of dollars it uses rand in denominations of 1000, 2000, 5000, 10000, and 50000).<\/p>\n
Earlier on the trampoline, I had watched Ethan jump while Josi, the five-year-old girl who lives here, talked to me. She informed me that Sophia is seven, when their birthdays were, and that she\u2019s homeschooled. She also told me a joke:<\/p>\n
There was a family on a plane that was going to crash. The parents and pilot were worried they were going to die, so they talked about what they wanted to do most. \u201cI wish I could have my baby,\u201d the pregnant mother said. \u201cI wish I could be a dad again,\u201d said the dad. \u201cI wish I could fly more planes,\u201d said the pilot. Then the mom, dad, and pilot got in the parachutes (there were only three) and jumped out of the plane, leaving the four-year-old son up in the air. When the mom and dad got home, they found the boy in his room, watching TV. They asked him how he got there, and he said, \u201cMe no stupid, me no dumb, me hang onto Daddy\u2019s bum. When he go toot, I go zoom! And that\u2019s how I get home so soon.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Now Ethan and I returned to the trampoline, soon to be joined by Sophia. She told us the horses\u2019 names (Socks, Elter, Teddy, Rocky, and Strider) and that Socks was sore and couldn\u2019t be ridden because he had an operation a few days ago. She asked, \u201cAre our horses boys or girls?\u201d I asked if they were both. \u201cJust guess!\u201d she said. Ethan answered, \u201cThey\u2019re all boys.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHow\u2019d you know?\u201d Sophia asked. Ethan smiled. \u201cI read it on the website.\u201d Sophia groaned. \u201cWhy\u2019d my mom have to put it there? It\u2019s broken! Are you mad?\u201d This last part was to Ethan, because he was starting to go down the slide on the play structure. (Sophia had told him before that it was broken.) After some more Monopoly, we went back out, this time with the intent to play table tennis. The table wasn\u2019t down there, so we told Sylvia at the front desk. She said she would have Dayne and Brandon take it in.<\/p>\n So Sophia, Ethan, and I played Clue and Scrabble. No one won Clue because, well, we all accused incorrectly. I was winning Scrabble when we stopped with 121 points. Sophia had 78 and Ethan had 77 (although Sophia only got that many because I helped her). Then we went back out to the trampoline and jumped some more. Josi came and joined us. We stayed like that until it started getting dark.<\/p>\n Ciao!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" After a long, grueling death march to the waterfall, Ethan and I played Monopoly (it\u2019s the South African version, so instead of railroads it has international airports in Durban, Cape Town, Bloemfontein, and Johannesburg, instead of waterworks it has \u2018water … Continue reading