Day: 27 March 2017

Happy Days

Hope you all had a very HAPPY Human Rights Day on the 21st of March. Did you know it was also International Day of Forests on the same day? The 20th was International Day of Happiness.  I guess most people in South Africa were really happy on that day because they knew that the next day was a public holiday.

The 22nd of March is World Water Day.  Luckily we no longer have water restrictions because our dams are much fuller than they were at the end of last year, but poor old Cape Town is in a terrible mess.  They actually only have a few days of water left. Everybody there is saving water like crazy.

We all take water for granted but it really is very precious stuff. Without it we would all die. It is a simple as that.

Often people say that your body is made up of 95% of water. This is not true – babies typically have around 78% body water when they are born, but this drops down to 65% by the time they turn one year old. From then on it just gets less.  Elderly people have around 50% of water in their bodies. Also men have more water than women do.

Did you know that when you are feeling thirsty – you have already lost a percentage of your body water and are on your way to being dehydrated?  These are the symptoms of dehydration: dark urine, joint or muscle sores, crankiness, constipation, fatigue and dry lips.

In honour of World Water Day we are making my book “Sibo Saves Water” available to read freely on the website for the rest of the month. Just click on the link above and then click on the cover of the book.  If you have trouble opening it, try a different browser – it seems like Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox do not open this file at the moment. If you ever wondered where water comes from, what happens to it and where it goes to…  read this book.

Please remember to still save water where ever you can. The really easy ways are to take a shorter shower, wash your car with a bucket instead of a hose pipe (yes – I know it’s not such fun but it really does save a lot of water) and water your garden either early in the morning or later in the evening. You can also recycle your bath water into the garden – but don’t use that “grey” water on your veggie garden please.

Have a great week!

Sibo

 

Beautiful beasties – big and small.

Remember at the beginning of the year we posted a calendar – one that had all sorts of interesting days on it?

Well  on Friday the 3rd of March we celebrate World Wildlife Day.

Living in South Africa we are rather lucky because we have a wide range of furry creatures that are available for us to see – if we can get to a game park that is. Otherwise there is always the zoo. Of course, it’s not the same to see animals in cages – even if our zoos have nice big cages. Not like some of those horrendous places I have read about overseas.

We are also fortunate in the way that there are lots of bushy areas that contain smaller beasties like snakes, mongoose, dassies and other little critters that you would not see if you lived in a concrete jungle of a city. Not sure I would really appreciate seeing a snake too much though.

My friend Ginny lives near the Faerie Glen Nature Reserve in Pretoria and they have things like Zebra and other types of large buck roaming freely around – right in the middle of suburbia.  She gets to go hiking around the reserve most Sundays and says it keeps her sane.

In the East Rand area there is the Marievale Bird Sanctuary. I know that birds are perhaps not as exciting as big animals but they are still very pretty to look at. Many kids are not so fond of bird watching because we’re supposed to be quiet otherwise the birds get scared and fly away. What’s nice about Marievale is that it does not cost anything to visit, and apart from the picnic area, there is also a nice walk around the wetlands to bird hides. They say there are 267 different types of birds there. Sjoe! That’s a lot! I have also heard that there are otters in the rivers – but sadly I’ve never seen one. In the summer it is open from 05h30 in the morning and only closes at 19h30.

Then there is the Suikerbosrand Nature Reserve in Heidelberg which is a bit further away. You can spot the following critters in there… zebra, black wildebeest, red hartebeest mountain reedbuck, common duiker, steenbok, grey duiker, baboon, oribi, blesbok, springbok and kudu. It’s not that expensive either – R22 per person and R11 per car.

Have a fabulous week!

Sibo

Consider a career in Science!

The 16th of February was International Day of Science for Women and Children. People tend to think that science is only for clever people – but actually – it is all around us and we are all doing some sort of science in one way or another each and every single day. In honour of this day – you can read “Sibo Mixes Things Up” – my story book about chemistry – it will be free to read on the website until the end of the month.

Nowadays girls are actively encouraged to pursue careers in science and technology. There are so very many interesting fields that you can go into, it is almost mind boggling.

We’ve been talking about planning, imagination and initiative over the past few weeks and you are going to need all of these things if you want to go into the science field.

SAASTA Observatory in Johannesburg also offers cool programmes for learners, teachers and members of the public. They have all sorts of exciting things to make you look at Physics in a completely different way. Check out their website for more information.

Nanotechnology is the way of the future as well.  I bet many people don’t even know what nanotechnology is. “Sibo Sizes Things Up” is all about nano – one of these days we’ll make that a free read on the website too! Stay tuned!

Remember – a safe bet is to always take maths as one of your subjects. Maths is one of those things that you sometimes feel like dropping because it seems a bit hard or not really necessary. In fact – it’s very necessary for lots of careers. If you don’t have matric maths there are some doors that are so firmly shut there is no easy way to open them again.

I mentioned while ago that science centres can help with career guidance. Sci-Bono Discovery Centre in Jozi has a very awesome career guidance centre and it’s free. You can just walk-in and find out about jobs and careers that you never even dreamed of. However, for career assessments and career counselling they do prefer if you make an appointment. It’s a professional service and they don’t want to you to be disappointed if you arrive at the centre and the staff are all busy.  Call (011) 639 8450/8476/8479.

Last but not least – you can always go and visit a science centre like Sci-Bono in Newtown or Sci-Enza in Pretoria to have an enormous amount of fun and get you into a sciencey frame of mind!

Science rocks!

Sibo