Itching powder and frogs

They look so small here, but small doesn't mean docile!

Last Friday I picked up the group from Northern Ireland. They would be here for the weekend to play a football tournament and needed a coach (as in bus) to take them to their accommodation. I was going to stay in a hotel for three days and pick them up every morning and drive them back every evening. It was a hard job!

The driving however wasn't the hardest part, the children were. Now, in the Netherlands children are getting more and more used to seatbelts and bus-etiquette. Those boys from Northern Ireland clearly weren't! They would not sit still for more than a minute and were continually getting up to punch someone in the face. On two occasions I've even seen them wrestling in the aisle! What was all that about? Don't get me wrong, the adults did shout at them to sit down. Every two minutes in fact, but... did you read the title? They must have had some of that in their underpants...

The empty half of the Irish team, on the first day the goalie actually texted during the games!!

Other than that, they were a nice enough group, I certainly had some laughs, even though I declined the offer of some craic, which probably was a very wise move, since I saw the dads the next day and they looked as if it had been a great night with a lot of alcohol (which turned out to be true, especially since the alcohol had been free at some point).

The boys actually won all of their games and of the nearly thirty teams in their age group they came first! Which was great of course. And even with my very limited knowledge of football, I know they were quite a good team.

The hairdo of this linesman must be the next big thing. It must be...

The result of all this was that when I had dropped them off at the airport on Monday, the coach looked as if a herd of cows had lived in it: cola, fanta and beer all over the floor and seats, the toilet was just gross and needed a massive hose down and in general it was very dirty. How 13 boys (and 8 men) can make so much mess is a mystery to me, but they did and before I felt it was good enough for the cleaning crew to come in and clean it, it took me over an hour to get it to that state!

Next, I will be off to Paris...

Children

Sitting in front of so many people on the bus causes you to hear so many different and fun conversations. Especially if you have children on board. Sometimes I get involved as well and then the conversations range from the normal to the completely ridiculous. I've had pre-schoolers see cat-sized yellow elephants in the trees, six year olds wonder about my sanity for calling every single dog a bear (and even asking one unsuspecting dog owner whether it was a dog or a bear) and I've been told I'm a fibber for telling five-year olds that I had seen lions and tigers and bears (cars and lorries and buses). But sometimes the children don't need my input and can do the ridiculous by themselves perfectly well.

Like this week. On Tuesday a girl was telling her teacher and me about her fast growing teeth. And as soon as that subject was half finished she continued by talking about her little toe! Today I learned that you need a stallion and a mare if you want to have a foal, but that it can also be achieved by an injection. However, if you do use the stallion and the mare, the stallion needs to stay on top of the mare for at least two minutes! Some of the other girls asked whether it was the same way cows did their business and when the answer was yes, another chipped in with the 'and the sheep and the goats do it like that as well' (most of them lived on farms or small villages).

That's where I get my information from!

Truth

First of all I want to say that I am not bashing religion here. Or the bible. I have been raised a protestant and my parents read from the bible after dinner (to this day) and pray before and thank after every meal (regardless of where they are). I had to go to church every Sunday, Christian primary and secondary school, Sunday School during primary school and Bible classes during secondary school. I respect people who believe, even if my own beliefs have shifted somewhat over the years.

So, what's this all about? Today I had to ferry lots of children between school and PE-building. The children go to a strict protestant school, where about 99% of the girls wear skirts, where some children to this day do not own a television and a school which (in my opinion anyway) is not teaching the children properly, despite their so-called Christian background. Respect for one, is very low on the list! But this post is not about the teachers or their teachings.

During one trip there were two little boys and two little girls seated almost directly behind me (two on either side of the coach). They were probably about 7 years old. One of the boys kept saying the world was going towards some really bad times. The two girls were just laughing. The boy kept saying it over and over and over, while the two girls kept laughing. At one point, the boy was almost in tears, because the girls were making fun of what he said. 'It says so in the bible', he said. 'You shouldn't take everything in the bible so literal', said one of the girls. 'But the minister said it too! Because of the greed of everybody, we will all become really poor!' said the boy again. He then proceeded to tell them that they (his family) weren't buying: they were selling and had just sold some doors for over 1500 euros!

I am happy my parents didn't raise me like that!

PC

There's a small village close to where I live. The people who live there are generally speaking not my favourite people. In the past the village used to be an island (until 1942) and the people are still acting like they live on an island. Large families (more than 10 children becoming a bit more rare now, but it's taken a while) and I think because of those large families all children are extremely loud and unruly. Horrid!

Today I had to drive two schoolclasses to some museum. Two different schools, so the children didn't really know each other. But the noise they made. They screamed and shouted and the teachers did absolutely nothing. An occasional sht wasn't even heard by the children in the first few seats, let alone by the rest. I bet most of them removed their seatbelts the minute I got behind the wheel and the teachers didn't bother.

On the way back it was bit different. One of the teachers was reading a book out loud. Well, politically correct it definitely wasn't! It was a book about some schoolchildren and it was set during World War two. No problem there. But when he started reading about the beating one particular school boy got for playing truant and not one single adult person on the coach said anything about it...

The village is quite old-fashioned in its beliefs. Most women and girls are not allowed to wear trousers (it's ungodly apparently) and they go to church twice every Sunday. No radio allowed on the bus (they do play the radio in the car home though), some people still without television. On the other hand, they make bucket loads of money in 'fish' (it's a fishing village) and it has been reported that cocaine use is rife. But mostly they are just 'us' against the rest of the world.

And not my favourites. At all!

Birthday

I've always felt that my brother's friends resemble Melrose Place. Not an ugly person amongst them! Now, all my brother's friends have children. Two with one on the way or three already. Which makes the Melrose Place look disappear a bit. However, with all the friends coming to the birthday party of my niece and nephew (number three is only three months away by the way) and bringing all their children, it was mayhem!

I don't have children. I have a goddaughter (lovely girl, keep forgetting her birthday and Christmas, sorry), a sugardaughter (same thing really, only not official and I do still remember her birthday), sugarson (I don't even know when his birthday is, sometime November I think), a nephew and a niece. Those children are easy. If they ever come to stay I can give them back again at the end of the day. Brilliant.

When I was younger I did want children. I wanted my first by the age of 21. I wanted five children in total. I managed neither. And to be totally honest, at this moment in my life, I don't mind that much either anymore. But today at that birthday party (even though there were way too many children about) I could see myself with a child.

For a day!