Ginny – Page 20 – Sibo's blog

Wish the flu would fly away

Yuk! I’ve been sick. Mum even made me stay home from school for a few days. She said there was no point in me going to the doctor because it was just flu. It would take seven days to get better – whether I went to the doctor or not.

Ghah! It might be just flu – but it did not feel very good.

She gave me lots of vitamin C tablets – the nice chewy ones that taste like orange and lots of orange juice to drink.

I reminded her that peppers have more vitamin C in them than oranges.

Mum gave me a skeef look and told me that I was Miss Know-it-all – even when I was sick. How would I like to drink pepper juice instead?

Hmmm…. not sure that pepper juice would be very tasty come to think of it.

Dad was busy reading his paper. He moved it a little bit so I could see his face and winked at me.

That made me feel better. Dad knows I like to learn lots of different stuff.

Mum has this rule – if I stay home from school I have to stay in bed. I pointed out that I would have much rather gone to school – even if I was sick. She said I should stay home.

So we compromised. I stayed in bed half the day and watched TV the other half. Mum said when you are sick, your body needs to rest in order to get well again. You need lots of sleep too.

Sjoe! I was so sick and tired of having a runny nose. I used up a whole box of tissues and two toilet rolls. Mum put Vicks under my nose so that I could breathe better.

After a few days I organised with my friend Lizzie to bring me all the work from school that I was missing. I thought this was a clever sneaky way of seeing my friend – but my plan backfired.

Mum would not let her into my room. She said my germs would make Lizzie sick and that would be mean. Mom talked so much argle-bargle that I closed my eyes and pretended to fall asleep.

She tip-toed out and left me in peace.

I’m better now.

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Cool (long) word for the week: Discombobulated (dis-com-bob-u lated)

Meaning: to be upset or frustrated

Example: Sibo was discombobulated because she was sick and had to miss school for a few days.

Talent Show

We had a talent contest at our school.

It was such fun.

Everybody was allowed to enter, but they did not have to. So those people that were shy could just enjoy all the activity and watch. There were all sorts of categories – hula hooping, singing, dancing, acting and impersonating famous people. Then there were also things like drawing, painting, embroidery, sewing, growing stuff and even cooking.

To advertise the show, Miss Ball (my favourite teacher) had an event in hall.

She showed everybody that she is learning to hula hoop. She’s okay at it – but not great. Then she got her sister in to show the kids what it is like to have a real talent hula hooping. Miss Ball’s sister, Iggy, is small and skinny and has tattoos!

She whirled that hoop like you would not believe – it went so fast that you could hardly see it on occasions. She did all sorts of fancy tricks too.

It was marvellous. Never mind appreciating her talent – half of us wanted to rush out and learn how to do those impressive hula hoop moves too.

It was a useful example, because some of us thought we could sing. When Lizzie’s brother recorded us singing on his cell phone and we heard ourselves – we realised we all sucked!

Although some of the other kids sing really well.

I decided to rather go in for the growing stuff. We had a few weeks to practise and sort ourselves out – so I decided to grow some beans in a smallish container. I made a nice trellis for the beans out of some wooden dowels that I bought at the hardware store. Plus I decorated my pot nicely.

Miss Ball invited sort-of-famous people (like local radio presenters, the mayor and the editor of the newspaper) to come and judge. She also went and asked all the local shops if they would be prepared to donate stuff for prizes.

Everybody was so nice. They all pitched in and gleefully participated.

We had a fabulous time.

I was really chuffed because my pot plant won – although I did think it was cheating a bit because it was the only entry in that category!

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Seriously cool word(s) for the week: Argle-bargle

Meaning: plentiful but meaningless talk (or writing)

Example: The guy who opened the talent show gave a talk that was so full of argle-bargle we all nearly fell asleep.

Helping Hand

I was so chuffed for my friend Lizzie.

She’s been having hassles at school. But this time she studied very hard for the exams and did really well. She was even top of the class for some of the subjects.

I gave her some help when it came to life sciences and she even beat me.

Hah! I must be a good teacher. Mind you, Dad always helps me study – and I just passed along the hints and tips that he gave to me. Sharing is good when it means that everybody can do well.

One of my other friends, Wayne, was miffed because Lizzie beat him too and can you believe it – he was nasty to her. Poor Lizzie was so upset – she had no clue what she had done wrong.

I looked at him and asked… “What’s your problem?”

He said he always came first in Maths and he did not like it when somebody else did better than him. Now he would have to work even harder so that he could beat Lizzie in the next exams.

Oh my hat! What a chump.

I think you should be glad when your friends do well at something. You should be proud for them too.

You wouldn’t like it if they were mean to you if you achieved something special. Would you? I know I wouldn’t.

Even if they get a new bike and you’ve got an old rusty one – so what! Be happy for them.

Sadly, it seems to me that some people tend to resent other people when they do well. Even if they win the lotto or get a promotion at work – instead of celebrating with the person – they get all grumpy and mean.

Lizzie and I went out for delicious ice-cream milkshakes to celebrate the fact that she did well in her exams. We invited Wayne to come with us too – but he said no-ways. He was too busy doing his maths homework to waste time on having ice-cream. Silly boy!

Lizzie got to work out the 10% tip for the waitress while I sat back and slurped up the last drops of ice-cream with my straw.

It’s great having smart friends.

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Word for the week: Chuffed

Meaning: pleased or delighted

Example: Sibo was very chuffed when Lizzie came top of the class in English, maths and science.

Healthy Snacks

Feh! I was always under the impression that being a kid meant we could gobble up as much junk food as we like… chips, sweets and cakes.

But I was reading the other day how easy it is to get addicted to junk food. And if you get addicted when you are a kid, it’s harder to kick the habit when you get older.

Worse – all the negative side effects were a bit shocking too. Who would have thought that eating too much junk food can cause tiredness and weakness? Seriously.

It’s so easy to grab a packet of something junky when you are hungry and chomp it down – but the problem is, a short while later you are usually hungry again. And so you grab another packet of something… and another and another.

So what could we eat for healthy snacks?

Yoghurt is a good one. It’s easy to pack in a lunch box and it’s full of vitamins too.

Another healthy snack is nuts – although preferably they should be unsalted.

Stuff like celery or carrot sticks is also good – you know what mums always say… eat up your carrots – they are good for your eyesight! Raw slices of peppers – red, green or yellow are yummy too. Did you know that a pepper has more vitamin C (the stuff you need when it’s winter and you don’t want to get a cold or the flu) than an orange. Sjoe! I was quite surprised when I found that out.

Of course oranges are good – although sometimes they are a bit sticky and messy to eat at school. All fruits are good snacks – but one fruit that is really easy to eat and full of goodness is a banana. They are also an instant energy boost because they are full of sugars like sucrose, fructose and glucose. They have lots of iron in them – which is great because many children in South Africa suffer from anaemia (iron shortage) and eating bananas is an excellent way of fixing this. Plus the potassium in bananas promotes healthy bones – which, as growing kids, we need.

Don’t drink too many sodas either – water is better!

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Word for the week: Acne

Meaning: a skin condition characterized by red pimples on the skin, especially on the face, due to inflamed or infected sebaceous glands.

Example: She rubbed the peel (the inside bit) of a banana skin on her face each night to help improve her acne. (This is a true tip – try it out.)

Delightful

Did you know that 2015 is International Year of Light and Light-Based technologies?

Probably we mostly think of light as being that stuff that Eskom turns off every now and then, but it’s more, much much more.

Can you think of some other ways that light is used?

Hmmm… what about CD or DVD players – they use lasers. In 1982 CD players became the first laser equipped device readily found in the home.

Ooohhh – but what exactly is a laser?

Well, regular light from the sun or from a light bulb really contains all the colours of the rainbow. But you have to split it up to see this. You can split white light up into its colours using a prism (raindrops act like tiny prisms when they make a rainbow in the sky).

A laser is a special source of light of only one pure colour (or wavelength). You can’t break up laser light into other colours.

So what is so cool about laser light?

They can focus. It’s not like a torch at all. Just think when you shine a torch, the beam of light goes wider and wider. But a laser beam can be focussed to a very small spot (it does not spread out) and can shine for long distances.

That laser spot contains lots of energy. So much so that it can even be used for cutting stuff like thick metal.

Even more exciting, small laser beams are used in surgery, like scalpels.

Eish!

BUT… lasers can be extremely dangerous if used irresponsibly. Recently, some kids at school got permanent eye damage from fooling around with laser pointers. In fact, you are now no longer allowed to take lasers to school in the Gauteng province. Shining a laser pointer into somebody’s eye is just silly. Don’t do it.

We haven’t even touched the surface about all the cool stuff lasers can do. If you know of some other uses of lasers – why don’t you write me a letter care of the African Reporter – I’d love to hear from you. Or email me.

If you visit my website – http://www.sibo.co.za you’ll find a cool experiment on how to bend light.

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Cool word for the week: Photonics

Meaning: Photonics is the science and technology of generating, controlling and detecting photons, which are particles of light.

Example: When I grow up I want to study photonics.

Stay Safe

I heard that there was an accident the other day when a person was killed just walking down the street on the pavement, minding his own business.

How terrible is this?

Cars and bikes should not drive like hooligans through suburban areas – but they do. And they probably always will – unless the municipality puts humps and bumps in all the roads. Even then, I’ve seen some drivers get very creative driving on the pavement to avoid the humps.

People should take care when driving in suburban areas. Kids and dogs roam around. They shouldn’t really. But still they do.

We children should also be vigilant. Keep an eye on the road. Walk on the pavement or side path. Don’t walk in the middle of the road. If you are taking your dog for a walk, make sure it is on a leash so that it cannot charge off after that unexpected cat and get you (or itself) into trouble.

Also remember the rules of the road.

Cross by the zebra crossing. Walk facing the oncoming traffic so that they can see you. If it’s night time – wear something bright so that cars can clearly see you. There is nothing worse than wearing black clothing walking down the road on a dark night. That is just silly.

And while we are on the topic of safety… don’t talk to strangers. No really – just don’t do it. And definitely do not take sweets from people that you do not know. Never ever! Not even if you are hungry and they look really good.

If you are at home alone, keep the doors locked. Don’t just open it if somebody knocks. Look out of a window or through the peephole to check if you know the person. Better still; just speak to them through the locked door. It’s also okay to pretend that there is somebody else there too.

Child molesters and drunk drivers should be locked up in a cold dank cell for a very long time – but unfortunately often they get away with their crimes.

Don’t be scared. Rather be alert my friends – it might save your life.

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Cool word for the week: Snigger

Meaning: to laugh in a half-suppressed, typically scornful way

Example: Some of my friends snigger at me when I wear bright colours at night time, but I don’t care – I’d rather be safe than sorry.

Hula hooping is fun

Don’t know if you’ve heard this, but they say that we use more of our brains when we are sleeping than we do when we watch television.

Eish! That’s a scary thought. We all know how much kids like to watch television. We’d probably sit and watch it all day if we got half a chance. My mum is quite strict. I’m only allowed to watch TV for an hour every day. So I have to pick my programmes carefully.

Often our parental agents tell us to go outside and run around. Like we were dogs or something?

Of course, if you have dog – you should go outside and spend time playing with it – throwing sticks or a ball, or taking it for a walk. I hope that your dog is allowed inside too – those people who think that dogs should be left outside, no matter what the weather, make me very sad. I don’t even want to even imagine how the poor dogs feel.

Sometimes people forget – they have lots of things to do, TV’s to watch, jobs or school to go to, families to talk to… but a dogs’ whole life revolves around his owner. Dogs are family too. Sadly, people tend to forget this.

Back to exercise… I got a hula hoop for a present and I’m having such fun with it – I don’t even mind when mum tells me to go outside and get some exercise. Some of my friends also have hula hoops – and so we all play in the garden together. We put some music on and have great fun.

To begin with it was quite hard to keep the hoop spinning around my waist – but I’ve got the hang of it now. It’s actually quite easy. I googled hula hooping and I see that there are some sites where you can learn cool tricks.

I think that my mum might quite like to do it too. I read that it’s great exercise. And you know how mums are – always trying to lose weight. Only thing is – she needs a bigger hoop than the one that I have.

Luckily my friend Ginny knows how to make these hoops. If you want to know you can contact her.

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Cool word for the week: Dank

Meaning: Unpleasantly moist or humid; damp and, often, chilly.

Example: I feel sad because the poor dog across the street has to sleep in a dank shed and is never allowed inside.

Adults acting worse than kids

Eish!

I have been feeling rather agitated just lately. All these people throwing coloured paint on statues and messing them up makes me sad, mad and just plain fed up.

It’s worse than littering.

I understand that not everybody is happy with their lives, and that things have not worked out the way they wanted them to, but destroying stuff is wrong.

And it does not fix anything. You might feel good or happy for a little while, but soon you’ll be looking for something else to mess up.

If you think about it, it’s a bit like stealing.

I’m just a little kid and one day I want to be able to go and visit history. Check out what people looked like, read up on what they did. All people – no matter what colour they are.

Even if I maybe did not agree with what they did in the past – I still have the right to know about them.

If they get rid of all the statues – how long before they get rid of all the information in the history books that we have at school?

It’s not like you can change things that have already happened.

But you can learn from mistakes and make sure that they don’t happen again.

I thought big people were supposed to know better. It seems to me that some of these big people are acting worse than little kids.

Seriously! If a kid destroyed something just because he or she didn’t like it – they’d probably get a fat smack and be in serious trouble.

Imagine if you stole your neighbour’s angel statue and broke it just because you don’t believe in angels?

I listen to a lot of adults moaning and whinging that they wished their lives were different. That they had a better job… or earned more money. Or they wished they were thinner… or whinge whinge whinge. But I don’t really ever see them doing anything to help themselves and change things.

This seems a bit odd to me.

It’s up to you, yourself, to change stuff that you don’t like.

But this does not mean that it’s okay to destroy things.

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Cool word for the week: Tolerance

Meaning: A willingness to recognize and respect the beliefs or practices of others

Example: We have to show tolerance for what other people think – even if we don’t agree with them.

Smile awhile

Hey everybody!

Hope that you all are enjoying the holidays or what’s left of them.

I was in the shops with my mum one day last week and was horribly bored. I’d much rather be out in the sunshine, digging in my garden or doing other cool stuff than trawling around a stupid mall. But my mum likes going shopping. My dad is one sneaky dude – he usually manages to avoid going with mum. He always has urgent “other” stuff to do.

Anyway, I was sitting on a bench watching people and do you know – nearly none of those people were smiling. Everybody had various different looks on their faces. Some looked worried. Some looked sad. Some looked cross and some looked so angry their eyebrows were nearly smouldering into their noses.

It was rather interesting. Even most of the kids were stomping along with faces like thunderclouds. I could hear some whinging that they wanted things that they were obviously not getting.

There was an old auntie standing on the other side of the walkway asking for money. She smiled at everybody who dropped some coins in her cup and thanked the people.

But most of those people did not even look at her again.

A droopy looking young lady walked passed and looked at me. I smiled sweetly at her.

Immediately she smiled back.

Ah hah! An experiment. I love experiments.

I tried smiling at more people. Big smiles and little smiles. Most people smiled back at me.

When mum came out of the shop I smiled at her.

She looked at me. “Oh oh Sibo!” She said. “What have you done now? Why are you smiling like that?”

I wiped the smile off my face and put on my hurt look. “Mum!” I exclaimed. “I was smiling at you because I love you. I have not done a single naughty thing. I promise.”

I did not consider experimenting smiles on people as being naughty.

She looked a bit doubtful and then she smiled back at me. “I love you too Sibo,” she said.

I took her hand and we walked off, smiling at all the people we saw.

Let’s make the world a happier place and smile more.

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Cool word for the week: Agitated

Meaning: Feeling or appearing troubled or nervous.

Example: A whole lot of people were looking very agitated because the shop had run out of chocolate eggs.

Fun stuff to do

Sometimes I get bored in the holidays. I mean the first few days are great – you get to sleep in late and don’t have any homework or stuff to do.

Then it gets to when I’ve read and reread all my books and the novelty of sleeping late has worn off. My beans are growing nicely on their own – all I have to do is water them, talk to them and pick them when they are big enough.

I do go play with friends sometimes, but they are not always around – they also have their own things to do and… some of them go away for the holidays.

I spend time with my dog too – take him for walks, brush him and train him. He’s my best friend and I really love him. I always get so sad when people mistreat their animals. Some people even leave them chained up in their yards or go away without bothering to get somebody to look after them. That’s so bad. I would never do that to my dog.

But even after doing all of the above – I still get bored and that’s when it is great to have some fun stuff to do.

Like what Sibo? I hear you asking…

Well – you all know I like recycling stuff – right? So I found a cool way of making a hanging mobile or a hanging curtain (if you’ve got lots of time and patience) using stuff like plastic bottles, bottle tops, corks, beads, buttons, straws and anything else that’s lying around that you can thread on a string.

You might need one of your parental agents to help you with the plastic bottles. You cut them up into shapes, like circles and squares and triangles using scissors – sometimes make the first cut is the hardest and that’s where you need help. You can also put glue on the plastic and sprinkle sand or glitter on the pieces. Then you thread all the stuff on a piece of string, or wool, or fishing line – whatever you have. Make a knot at the bottom. Put something heavyish on first so that it hangs nicely.

Have fun! Send us some pictures if you want to.

Go check out what my friend Ginny did: http://sibosays.blog.com/2011/08/16/make-a-cool-beaded-curtain-from-old-plastic-bottles/

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Cool word for the week:

Hah! It’s holidays – you get a break from leaning cool words!!!

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