South Africa Diary - Seamus Lynch

Hello from Uitenhage in South Africa’s Eastern Cape. After a hectic couple of weeks, we are now settled in nicely to Muir College. We arrived in South Africa almost four weeks ago and are enjoying every moment of it. When we arrived in Port Elizabeth we were picked up by Runeshan Moodley, who we would be staying with for the next two days. He took us to St George’s Park to have a look at a local club side's match that play at the stadium. The next day we went to play the last game of the Grey High School festival for the Muir 1^st XI. We met all our teammates who were all very nice and made us feel welcome. We played a T20 against AB De Villiers' and Faf Du Plessis' former school, Affies. After bowling well, our batting was poor and we couldn’t chase their total. After we went to watch the local province's training at St George’s Park which Runeshan Moodley acts as a coach for. The next day we headed up to Muir College in Uitenhage. When we arrived, we got a tour of the school from Mr Gouws, who looks after the boarding area. On Monday, we went to our first proper day of school and were put in grade 11. Our typical day of school starts by waking up at 6:30am which can be tough. We then go to breakfast at 7:00am and start school at 7:45am. The school day is started off with lines which is all the students standing in the yard starting with a prayer and then various teachers telling us anything that is going on that day. After, we attend our various classes throughout the day until 1:55pp. We also get to help out some of the teachers with their P.T. classes. If we have any free time during the day, we get to have a net with Mr Pohlongo, the 1^st XI coach. After school on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday’s we have training. We also get to go for a swim nearly every evening at the school’s swimming pool. Every weekend we are looked after by the ‘on-duty’ teacher at the school hostel. On Saturday’s we have matches with the 1^st XI. So far, we have had three matches against Grahamstown, York and Westerns. Unfortunately, we lost two and had one rained off. We have also had one mid-week T20 which we lost by three runs after playing well. Sunday is our only completely free day so the on-duty teacher takes us somewhere. We have gone to Summer Strand beach and Baywest Mall so far. Last Sunday Mr Pohlongo organised for us to play some club cricket. We were playing for Mr Pohlongo's club, Dispatch Krieket Klub, an Afrikaans club. It was a great experience to see what South African club cricket is like. We got beaten by the league leaders Gelvandale CC. We also went go karting with the cricket team in Port Elizabeth last Friday. We are looking forward to the rest of our stay and going to as many international and provincial games as possible at St George’s Park. We are loving everyday here and would like to thank Cricket Leinster and Muir College for giving us this amazing experience. Seamus Lynch (Firhouse Community College & Terenure CC) Mathew Lynch (Terenure College & Leinster CC)