The children bought a lamb together, as they do a lot of barbequeing over this time, and to buy meat from the butchers was very expensive, and they all sat around the table to sort out the different cuts, and devide it. It was a lovely time, albeit bitterly cold, and that was strange, as Xmas in South Africa was during mid summer. But we donned jackets and warm pants, and sat shivering outside around the barbeque fire, that is of course only until the meat was done, and then we stoke up the fire to rival the fires of old nick!
New years eve we had our yearly get together with the neighbors and friends, who had all to do a little number, whether it was singing, dancing, telling a story, or recite a poem. Everything went! I of course always did a poem, as sing I just could NOT. I remember when I was about nine years old, there was a song called 'Patches' that I loved to sing, and I really gave my all in pushing out what was to me the most beautiful notes ever heard, but usually my mum would tell me to go and make that funny noises outside, and one day I heard her tell my aunt that she thought I was funny in the head , as I was making a lot of strange noises! I was hurt, but my sister Lida gave me a good clout one day and told me to stop my caterwauling, so I stopped regaling them with my beautiful voice, and swore that one day when I was famous, they would not be invited to my shows.
However, the year of leaving primary school our class was to do a song for the rest of the school on our last day, and I was in my element, giving it my all, when the teacher told me to just open and close my mouth, but not to make any noises! So there, my ambitions were nipped in the bud at a young age, and until today I never sing when I know there was people around! That is one of the reasons I loved Haarlem, as I could sing at the top of my voice, and not one of the animals had ever snorted, or ran away!
After the new year revelling Jan had to go back to Pretoria to finish a project, and Nina stayed behind with the kids. Renè was to go to Uniondale boarding school with the other kids, and seemed happy enough, although he was used to a Danish school, and this was a typical Afrikaans school.
It was I think hard on Nina, being scandanavian, and used to shopping malls and other amenities, as living on Haarlem, where you can't just plug in your tv and it works, as you needed a dish, there being almost no reception, and for her to be derived from her computer must have been quite traumatic, as they had to first get all kinds of gadgets.

But she took it like a Trojan, and never complained.
One night, just before Stephan and Trienkie left for their home in Cape Town, I was woken up by loud knocking on my door, and there was Nina, highly traumatized, asking me to come with her, as Jan, who was on his way back from Pretoria, had an accident. I was shocked, running around in circles looking for my keyes, when Stephan woke up and asked the reason for this nightly racket. He said that he would drive us while Trienkie looked after the kids.
I got so frustrated, as Stephan was driving so slowly, whereas I would have almost did some low flying to get too my child, and after I let out a few hints about his slow driving, he told me that he would not go faster and have another accident. I only found out from Trienkie later that he was suffering from night blindness!
There was a lot of police vehicles and an ambulance when we got to the scene, and I just collapsed into a bout of crying when I saw my child standing upright, not showing any signs of being hurt.
The car was a complete mess, all scrunched up, as Jan had fallen asleep and the car went off the road and down a three meter ditch before rolling for another about ten meters.
He was lucky, as he had his safety belt on, and came away with a few broken ribs and a lot of bumps on his head where his coffee mug had hit him every time the car rolled over, making the mug fly around!