The childrens’ games are evolving and the starwars characters are now decidedly nautical. The Ewoks go snorkelling, hunting Giant Tarantula Squid in the Mariana Trench. One character has invented a breathing apparatus, so he doesn’t have to come up for air – he goes spear diving to conquer the evil poisonous giant pufferfish that lurks in the deep.
They ask time and time again for a speargun, and were very excited to go buy fishing gear with David. I have to patiently explain why we don’t eat turtles or kill whales.
For the last many weeks, any new Lego built has been boats. All shapes, colours and sizes. An Ewok boat, full of aquatic Ewoks. Alongside it is the coastguard boat, also full of Ewoks, who come to the rescue when volcanoes blast up nearby. (For the uninitiated, Ewoks are furry, fierce little animals from the Moon Endor).
Lukas has made snorkelling robots and accompanying submarines, and there is much talk about coming up for air, cleaning the masks and diving in murky waters. Equalising ears, slipping on fins and sinking deep. Hoisting sails, turning on engines, and setting anchors.
A lot of our homeschooling has been about marine things as the boys want to read books about marine life, about explorers and early human history on these islands. They ask endless questions about the bloodthirsty Caribs, slavery, and about the pirates that used to haunt the local seas. When back from snorkelling, they hunch over the fish book together, trying to identify what we saw. They spend hours looking for crabs, peering into each and every hole we meet – and we meet a lot! Hermit crabs are a real favourite, probably because you can pick them up without being too afraid to get nipped.
Another favourite pastime is jumping. Trampoline when we’re in places where we can’t swim, in waves when we’re on a beach, and walking the plank when we’re on anchor. Amazing how long they can spend just jumping, swimming, crawling out, jumping again. And again and again.
Their stuffed animals Beaver (Matias) and Koala (Lukie) have remained important. Last Saturday was apparently Beaver’s birthday, and they spent the whole day planning what kind of party Beaver was to have, asking us to sing Happy Birthday and make cakes. This evening they asked what ‘Climbing Kids’ were, having heard about these from Beaver, who insists that it’s a movie. We have no idea what they’re talking about, and Beaver is asleep so we’ll have to check with him in the morning.
Strange imaginary creatures still lurk around every corner, although they are decidedly more marine than before. Lukie has two imaginary friends whose chief habitat is navigational buoys, so whenever we pass a buoy he says stuff like ‘Oh, there’s Nijaga again, that’s his bouy’, or ‘Oh, that bird is sitting on Skiffie’s bouy’.
Whenever we meet other children they are invariably French, but that doesn’t stop them from interacting, asking questions, using me as a translator. The other evening they started playing soccer in a small thoroughfare with two lovely local boys at Marin. One goal was the sea, the other the busy road. I stood guard, and they managed to keep themselves out of trouble, and the ball out of the water, most of the time.
SV Bob The Cat 