A Little Nostalgia

My new job as a second grade teacher in Carthage keeps me busy grading papers every night. My usual work station is the couch where I wrap an afghan around me and often watch TV as I grade. It's a long way from the days at Namwianga when I graded by the light of my headlamp during power outages and listened to the crickets and bats outside the window.

Dodgeball

At Sinde Basic School on Monday I witnessed some girls playing a spirited game of dodgeball in the school yard. Their homemade ball worked quite well! I love Zamgenuity.

Let the Adventures Begin

I landed in Livingstone and made it through Customs and Immigration without incident. My greeting committee of Ellie and Kel Hamby, Joseph Lawrence, and James Estes (all here preparing for Zambia Medical Mission) welcomed me, and we set out to do our errands in Livingstone. Then the adventures began.

The first ATM I tried would not work. I went down the block and found another one. Then we went into a fast food chicken place and got in line behind two other people. Fifteen minutes later it was finally our turn to order. I ordered first, and then Joseph ordered the same thing. Sorry, I had managed to get the last order of potatoes and Joseph had to order something else. Then the clerk did not have enough change to give me in return. Joseph had to chip in the equivalent of two dollars so that I could get my change. I’ll pay him back some day.

Next stop: cell phone shop. I bought a sim card and inserted it into my global phone. Immediately I started getting spam text messages – 2 different messages repeating every few seconds until my phone reached its limit of 168 messages! At that point, I couldn’t send any text messages because—surprise—there wasn’t enough memory!

I started trying to call the cell phone company. I followed the prompts: Press 1 for English. I listened to the menu, which surprisingly does not feature “How to handle 168 spam text messages,” It does say “Press 5 for all other business. “ I pressed the 5 and listened to another menu that again ends with “Press 5 for all other business.” I pressed 5 and got “We are disconnecting you now.” So far I’ve tried this about 25 times, and twice I have managed to get put on hold instead of being cut off. Those two times I got to listen to three minutes of music before being cut off. Meanwhile, as fast as I can delete the messages, they come in again. I hope you’re not trying to text me here in Africa. It may be a few days.

Back at Namwianga, things are much more functional! Harold had fixed his famous chicken spaghetti for our supper, along with his equally famous chocolate cake. The electricity went off just as we finished eating, making me feel right at home in Zambia. Security guards Webster and Justin let me join them around their brazier fire and get caught up on the news. Sadly, Webster reports that our cat Makua disappeared over a month ago. He says I should not worry, because the cat has done this before and always returns eventually.

The sky is brilliant under the blanket of stars, the crickets are chirping, and the air is cool and crisp. Africa has me in its grip again.

I’ll try to write more after I delete 168 text messages . . . and if the power stays on . . .

The Itch for Africa

Our first trip to Africa was in 1999. We thought it would be a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and we thought we were doing it mainly for our teenage kids. Near the end of our three-week stay, a co-worker who had grown up as a missionary's kid in Africa warned us that we would have to return. He said, "Africa is like poison ivy on the brain, and the only way to scratch it is to go back."

He was so right. Twelve years later I know that Africa has infected not only my brain, but my heart as well. There is always a part of me that is itching to return. There is always an empty place in my heart--an Africa-shaped hole that can only be filled with the people and places and craziness of Africa.

And tonight I'm starting to scratch my African itch. I'm overnighting in Johannesburg, South Africa, on my way to Namwianga. This trip is mainly to work with the sponsorship program--I haven't met the students who are new to the program in 2011. I need to meet with them and also check on how Rajiv is managing the overwhelming responsibilities I piled on him.

But George and Jason are part of the itch as well. I can't wait to have their little arms around my neck and hear them say, "I love you, Nana!" I'm sure Jason knows most of his alphabet by now, and he'll want to impress me with his new knowledge. George will have to show me his usual cute antics, and there will be other toddlers to love and hug on as well.

Meagan Hawley is at Haven III for the summer, so I'm looking forward to some long talks with her as we compare notes about our year of re-entry and get caught up on our lives in America. I brought along some Beginner's Bibles, so Rodgers Namuswa and I will head out into the bush somewhere to train Bible class teachers. Mrs. Moono and I will have tea and discuss our families and the chickens. I hope Webster will bring our temperamental cat around, although it's too much to hope that the cat might be glad to see me.

And who knows what else might be in store? The only thing that's certain on a trip to Africa is that there will be some unexpected, unplanned, and maybe slightly crazy adventures along the way.

There are few things in life that feel as good as a scratched itch. Africa, I'm back! And it feels so good.

Grandmommy Longlegs

This is a guest blog from Roy Merritt at Namwianga (with my comments at the end).

As our rainy season drips to its end, insects are preparing for the long dry.

We have had our wettest season in years. After the last storm, our dam’s main spillway flooded and water flowed over our emergency spillway for the first time. Even that wasn’t enough relief, and water eventually lapped over the top of the main dam wall. It’s an earth dam, so we are grateful it wasn’t damaged.

These two ladies are hatching little ones who will protect us from assorted bugs till rains come back.
Gibson (one of the boys at Eric's House) found this one for me, a granny wearing black with yellow polka dots. I have shown her life-size here, her abdomen about the size of an egg yolk.
I’ve never seen one like this before. If anyone out there knows what kind this is, please tell me.

This is a female grandaddy longlegs hauling an egg basket, busy hatching scrawny little newcomers.

Linda here: Seeing these pictures brings back lots of memories for me. When we took down the things off our walls last March as we got ready to move, we found the remnants of spider nests on almost every single item! No wonder we had eight-legged critters everywhere!

We had been told that the wall spiders were harmless and actually helpful--supposedly they eat the mosquitoes. However, after five years of co-existing with the wall spiders, I had to admit I had never seen a spider eat a mosquito and it seemed that we had plenty of mosquitoes to go around anyway. We still advised our guests to leave the spiders alone as long as they were on the walls, but any critters who dared hit the floor were fair game for a smashing.

I personally think live and let live has its limits when it comes to spiders (but don't tell Roy!).