Creating Fun

Do our kids spend their days wishing they were in some other place?



Are their days filled with hard schoolwork?



Home-schooling IS work, but with schedules prepared ahead of time, they can get done quickly and have more free time.






There are many opportunities for fun times outside, when it isn't too rainy and muddy.  The two bush apple trees in our yard make good climbing trees; L sticks to climbing the smaller one, while long-legged K can scramble up the larger one, taking care to avoid the very painful biting ants as he searches for ripe apples with his friends.

Naturally, ripe fruit attracts a lot of village kids, many of whom don't bother to ask if they can pick & eat the fruit.  One day last week the translators noticed that some well-meaning person had tied some "magic" onto the large apple tree, probably hoping to scare away the kids who were causing problems.  Of course, we didn't condone this, so the translators took it down for us.


 But K & L continue to enjoy simple things, like watching a coconut being prepared.  First you take off the very thick, greenish-brown outside husk (that many people in North America don't know about).  The more well-known hard dark shell is now visible, and this one needs to be poked in order for the coconut milk to be poured out before the coconut is cracked open.

K & L really enjoy the cooking of Johannes, the man who works for us in our house (I would call him our "house-help", but that doesn't adequately portray all he does for us).  He makes wonderfully creamy mashed potatoes, yummy meatballs (from scratch, of course), and his salads are an artistic creation.





Unfortunately, because of the really bad roads, we cannot get a regular supply of vegetables, so salads are a rare treat right now.  Starting the week we arrived, L & I planted tomato seeds (NOT from a packet; from a real tomato :) ), and I am hoping to eventually be able to harvest our own tomatoes.  Their chance of survival is slim, between goats wandering around our yard, cutting ants in the flower bed, and village kids sitting/walking in the flower beds.  I have learned from hard experience that putting sticks next to plants is a sign to others that these are ones you WANT to grow.



These muddy legs do NOT belong
to our male child... :)

So while the tomato plants grow, our kids also grow.  And dirt is a part of their life too.  But they clean up pretty well :).













Which is good, because they also need to help clean up things in the house that haven't been cleaned for many years, including this bunk-bed that was eventually set up in L's room.

A butterfly we rescued from the school room window and released outside...

Translation week

One week ago today, translation week ended for September.  It was a very busy week with 9 men coming and going, burdened with family, church, and village responsibilities, but willing to take time out to be involved in the important work of translating God's Word into the Oroko language.  Mornings would start with devotions - everyone around the Ping-Pong table, the men taking turns leading. 




Then they would break up into groups - some people drafting 1 Peter, some revising John, one finishing exegetical notes on 1 Peter and then starting on Jude, one typing in chapters of Revelation drafted in August, and one proof-reading drafted chapters.

Our front yard, including a coconut tree

These men have had to be very flexible.  While we were gone for 5 years, they became accustomed to using our whole house during translation week - those from outside the village would sleep in our bedrooms, and they would spread out throughout the house for their work sessions.  Now that we're back, they have had to find alternative housing, and the work sessions are limited to a few rooms.  But still, we are glad that our house can serve as a base for this work, at least for the time being.





Looking a bit to the left in our front yard, you see
the walkway leading to our house.
Note: it is not OUR house - it is rented :), but on a long-term basis



The front left corner of our yard,
including another coconut tree.  Usually
we have a lot of pineapple plants again, but
nobody has taken care of them in the past 5 years.

Taking it as it comes...

 We never know what a day will bring - flexibility is the name of this game, and the kids are playing along really well.  Kenneth's friends will drop by, and he'll go out and spend a couple hours playing "football" in our back yard "field" with them, coming in muddy and dripping with sweat.




This is the same back yard that contains the grave of our landlord.  The tiled-over grave has now become even bigger as the relatives have built a small building to protect the grave from goats etc.




As we continue to unpack the belongings that have been stored for 5 years, we don't know what is waiting for us under the flap of the next box.  Will it be rusty sewing pins?  Or Tupperware that is cracked or multi-colored from age and weather?

When we hear rustling in the kitchen, is it just a friendly gecko trying to find bugs to eat, or is it a mouse trying to eat through the plastic containers?  Note that a regular mouse trap seems mighty small for these mice; good thing it caught him on the nose and basically suffocated him!  We're looking forward to the time when our teammates' kittens are grown enough to leave their mother - we will be glad to welcome one of them into our household!

It seems like there are always adventures around the corner.  Kenneth and Laura now come running when I call them, as they know it is usually some novelty like this big ant (that's an adult fingernail, so the ant has to be at least 1" long).  What will show up tomorrow?

Creepy Crawlies

Ok, here is the obligatory posts about bugs and stuff.  I'm sure I'll have other pictures to post in future weeks, but for now, here is the spider Mike saw on one of our walls.  I haven't had the time/internet access to figure out what type of spider it is, so if you can find out, let me know :).



Lizards OUTSIDE the house are our friends, catching bugs.  The kids like to try to tickle their stomachs through the screen :).  We don't mind the smaller variety, geckos, inside the house, but they can still startle us if we're not expecting them.






We've learned to put bug spray on whenever we go outside, not only in the early morning and at dusk.  If not, evidence of "moot-moots" will soon appear.  And these bites can also itch....


And then there are the times when the line between the "creepy-crawlies" and food becomes blurred.  This fine specimen of a snail was one of a bagful (still alive) that my name-sake brought as a gift.  Someone else kindly prepared them for us, and even our kids ate a couple (without complaining, but it's not something they want to repeat very often!).
















But there are also foods the kids REALLY enjoy, like freshly-baked bread,






 "bush apples" picked from the two trees in our yard (notice the large pit instead of small seeds),









and oranges - not eaten the traditional way, but with the top sliced off so the juice could be sucked out.  They soon learned to cut off more of the outer rind  (leaving the white skin on) so the skin didn't "burn" their lips.



 

The simple things...

Evenings at home as a family (a wonderful change from the way Mike's schedule was ending up in Canada!) are great, but sometimes we do need to promote more creativity, especially with very limited internet access.



We have to make sure the Ping-Pong table (which doubles as the translation main meeting table one week a month) is cleared off so it can be used.




Legos are still a favorite toy - very versatile, and not as prone to decay as many other items.

But renewing friendships is always the best option.  Sometimes this is slow going, especially when our kids have forgotten all their Pidgin English, but Kenneth is already modifying his vowels and his vocabulary.








On a practical level, there are some basics needed here that aren't needed in N. America.  Like rubber boots.  And a "country broom".



And sometimes we can go beyond the basics; instead of putting up with dingy walls, we can get a good layer of paint put on, which makes everything seem brighter :).

Life in the... slow lane :)

"Stuck" in the village, 2 weeks without internet, at least 2 of those days without phone, so totally shut off from the outside world in a sense... and yet it isn't the end of the world.  Life goes on, we have food to eat, the weather is very rainy but otherwise warm (not hot), people are friendly, and we are (slowly) readjusting.  Here are some of the "realities" of living here right now....




No clothes dryer; instead, a clothesline in the fresh outside air.  But because of all the rain, it makes much more sense to use a drying rack that can be moved onto the porch when you hear the rain sweeping nearer.







Things that break down, or just simply break over time, even sitting in a box for 5 years (yup, that is/was Corel).

Different items as part of our kitchen, including a meat grinder.  Cows are brought to the market town 3km away, and sold by the chunk. 


The stove is not electric, but rather runs off bottled gaz.  With the roads virtually impassable, we hope the gaz bottles last until the roads get better!  This stove is the same one we brought over in a container many years ago (we will probably purchase our next one here, though the ones here tend to be much smaller and only one small cookie sheet would fit in the oven).  We have ordered a new stove top, as this one is almost rusted through.











 When it is cloudy so much (rainy season), sometimes the solar panels can't keep up with our power usage (computers and washing machine), so this handy little generator keeps us going.  There are many gadgets associated with the solar system; I know only enough to turn on what I need to keep the household running :).

The Muddy 7-Mile Trek

The main road from Kumba westward wasn't too bad, no 4-wheel drive needed.  We were dropped off at this intersection, where a cocoa-truck came to haul all our luggage & groceries.  After a quick stop to down some rice & sauce at a local eatery (the porch of a house), we ladies and children set off on foot, each of us moms carrying backpacks with 2 computers each, plus water/juice and umbrella.

Mud boots protected our feet & legs, but also ended up giving many of us sore feet (maybe more pairs of socks are needed next time). 





Enjoy the pictures, though it was impossible to get good enough pictures to show you the real state of the road...


4 hours of walking....

And finally, home and "safe" under mosquito nets....