Greetings from Dusty Africa

Posted on Sunday, October 26, 2008 at 11:13

I have felt totally overwhelmed with everything and have fallen into bed exhausted every night, so I haven’t journaled for a few days. It is all I can do just to stay clean.

Cindy is constantly sweeping the floor, mumbling under her breath, “Dust and grime, dust and grime.”

Our room of 15 people remains a challenge to keep half organized, let alone dirt and dust free. Hands and faces are filthy more often than not.  Our feet will never be the same again. Our solar shower bags work fine if we don’t wait too long to use them, however they cool off very quickly as evening approaches. Some of the bags have sprung leaks and we haven’t been here more than a week. Things are getting set up better every day, though. Today mom found a large barrel and Teresa scrubbed out the oil. It is now over a fire warming water to add to cold bags.

Barasa, Mom’s Bible worker and translator, asked Jon if we set those shower tents up in our houses back home. They can hardly fathom owning such a thing or why we think we need them when a bucket and cup would work just fine.

The other night Sam had had it. He found gravel in his bed AGAIN! Work had been done on the window sills and cement crumbles had fallen on many of the beds. Sam, worn out and tired, could only groan and exclaim; “I don’t know if I can take a whole two months of this!!!”

Everyone thought it hilariously funny but him. Good thing he fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow. He hardly knew anyone laughed.

One by one we take our turn at cooking over an open fire. It’s a matter of necessity. Miriam does her part just fine, but we have to do the little extras that allow for a bit of variety.  Kristen looked like she was having a serious cry over the smoke. She managed and everyone enjoyed the treat of spaghetti with sautéed onions, peppers. Soy curls and seasonings. So far I have made gravy and cashew cheese and Steve made popcorn.

One can find a wide variety of birds in this land. We brought our binoculars and thankfully, Mathew brought an Eastern Africa Bird book. I have seen several birds, but I have only positively identified a handful, but I do hope my list grows:

Pied crows

Indian House crows

Spectacled weavers

Common stonechat

Marwitzi – common fiscal shrike

Black-headed herons

If I discover half of the birds that we hear first thing in the morning we’ll be excited to add several more.

Fire Miracle

As we have arrived in Dar, unbeknownst to mom, a major fire raged here in Mago. Africans burn the grass all the time. I think that part of the reason they do it is because of their incredible fear of snakes, I suppose there are other reasons, but that is what I have gathered, thus far. We saw several fires on our way here and many burned areas. The fire in Mago turned into a regular forest fire. The pine forests around the property caught fire and torched the trees right up to the edge of the property, but miraculously, no further. Everything right up to the fence is black.

The last couple of days we have been watching a forest fire not far from here. The sky glows red at night. Today the wind picked up and the flames were traveling in our direction at quite a speed. We could tell when the fire reached bamboo groves; the bamboo explodes like gunfire! Jason took a couple of guys and some machetes and joined up with some villages and in no time at all they had the fire under control. We still see billows of smoke, but no flames or explosions. Mom says there are several more fires burning in the area. My lungs would appreciate a little smoke free air.

Every the sky clouds over and rain seems apparent, but they soon roll away. It’s almost the end of the dry season. One day the clouds rolled in blacker and thicker. Everyone asked Jason and Barasa if they thought it would rain, “NO, not likely”.

However, the sky wasn’t listening and we experienced a thorough rain. It patted down the dust for awhile, which was a blessing.

Sabbath

We had church service in front of the church since all our beds are in the church… We divided into two Sabbath school groups; Swahili and English. Cindy led out in the English class and then Dad had the sermon with Jason translating.  Some of us rested afterwards and some of use went for a walk through the village. Steve and I went on our own little walk to a different section of the village. It reminded me of when we were courting and walking through Zambian villages and countryside 20 years ago.

We invited all the workers in and set up the generator and projector and we watched a nature dvd. It was a real treat. I don’t know if I mentioned it before or not, but Jason put up some temporary lights so in the evening we have lights!!!!

I read Jeanne’s comment to Bethany Thursday night and Friday night she asked Steve if she could please use his cell phone because her parents “needed to hear from her”. His cell phone doesn’t work here, of course, so she went off to cry. Natalie tried to comfort her but I came along and gave her a hug, told her I was proud of the way she was handling things, and I understood the homesick feeling, but I also knew that the best way to handle it was to buck and up distract herself.  Abi felt bad for her and offered her cell phone, but Bethany wisely said, that it was better if she didn’t and that she would just cry, so she passed up the opportunity and has been just fine ever since.

Tomorrow we start VBS.

mail!

Posted by michelle fowler on Sunday, October 26, 2008 at 11:29 - Link

What can I send? What do you want or need? If you let me know right away.............I can drop it in the mail right away................and then you wait!! :) Maybe you will get lucky and it will arrive sooner!

Love to read about your goings on! We are praying for all of you to receive blessings and safety!!

Lots of Love, The Fowlers

Hello

Posted by Delores on Monday, October 27, 2008 at 10:38 - Link

I first discovered I could comment on Abbi's so see her for my note. Do you need any more granola? I hear of you eating it so much, are you running out? Is there some other food item I could send with Tom or Dale? I'll be checking on things at your house again today, I've been going 2-3 days/week. Let me know how to turn off the water to the cat barn, thanks! We continue to pray for all of you each day. We look forward to see you all when you return.