Pacific Games and children's action

On November 21st, Michel flew with a men's and a women's team to the Solomon Islands for the Pacific Games. There was a brief thought about taking the whole family, but fortunately this couldn't be implemented as all the accommodations were fully booked. After just a 2-hour flight, Michel reported from his accommodation in the evening, bathed in sweat. With very high humidity, it was sometimes 30 degrees at night. He spent the night in a classroom with his volleyball team and the boxing boys and girls. Privacy was out of the question, but there was enough space for everyone, the sports facilities were close together and the organization has been going quite well so far.

For us as a family it would have been rather stressful and far too hot. So we were happy to spend the time in Vanuatu and the anticipation of Grandfather grew ever greater.

In the first few days up to the weekend and the weekend I had made a lot of appointments for us and so the days went by without any major problems and nice meetings with Vivi and Tiani, Alexandra, Marie and her son Hugo (4) or at football followed by a visit to the Christmas bazaar with Vicki. It was clear that there was little time for me and I had to make sure that I was in bed by 9 at the latest so that I could start the day again at 5 with two awake children. Since Pepe no longer wanted to go to kindergarten, we also did a lot of daycare programs at home. In the meantime, Pepe had some great opportunities to play and was able to keep himself busy. When he got bored or didn't feel like being with Anton, he ran out to the gardeners Cliff and Helen and helped trim the hedge, fill the wheelbarrow or pull weeds. Helen was also very fond of Anton and so he was often carried around the garden. On a few days Lowra also came by to help me with laundry and housework and looked after Anton so that I could spend a little more time with Pepe. So the first 6 days without dad went by quite well. When Anton woke up on the 7th day with a sticky and swollen eye, it was clear that I had to go to the doctor immediately. Conjunctivitis was still missing. Well, Grandpa was almost there and so we managed to get through the next two days until Grandpa Sebastian came out of our guest room on the morning of November 30th. After a long journey, he landed safely that night and was brought to us by taxi. The conjunctivitis got better quite quickly thanks to antibiotic drops, although of course we weren't spared the other eye.

Thanks to Sebastian, who was 100% involved in our everyday family life, the days went by much easier and the apartment looked a lot better. We lived through the days, took turns with the kids, the pool and making coffee, and on the 4 days until Michel came back, we took short, calm trips into town or over to the resort on Erakor Island. Only on Saturday Sebastian went to soccer with Pepe while Lowra looked after Anton so I could teach my weekly yoga class. That worked out pretty well. On Monday, grandfather spontaneously took over the babysitting job for both children because Michel's flight was delayed for 24 hours and I was teaching a private yoga class. That also worked very well.

Finally, on December 5th, Michel came around the corner in a taxi and we jumped into his arms. Of course we had a lot of contact and often made video calls, but the connection was usually very poor. With a bronze medal for the girls in his pocket, he was very happy and had a great time with his players and other coaches from Vanuatu. But 2 weeks was also a long time in the heat and in a small space. Now we still had 10 days together with Grandpa ahead of us, which we will tell you about in the next report.

Have a nice, cozy pre-Christmas season!

Lukim yu