Week 8 in the Lands of Africa

Our weekend adventures included going out hiking with the Newburns on Sunday! We picked them up, squeezed 14 people into the car, and set off down the road. Woohoo! Adventure's out there! Just after Santa, we turned off onto a dirt road, upon which Katelyn, Sarah and I climbed out and hung off the back to bump and slosh and bounce our way to Lake Awing. According to Cameroonians, there is an underwater castle where evil spirits live, and they come up on top of the water ("Big Mommy Water") at night. And I have to say it did seem quite mystical, with the fog drifting over the lake. When no ghostly apparitions appeared, we drove up the hill and walked around "in da bush" to find a nice view from above.

The 14 of us ended up climbing this massive hill/mountain/cliff that looked down on the lake, the Fulani village of Awing on the other side, and the mountains all around. The hike was intense (like camping!) but we managed to bring up our picnic baskets and blankets to rest and eat at the very top. It was absolutely lovely. Even when it started to rain, I was reluctant to leave that quiet hilltop. Something about struggling upward and finally reaching the top is so wonderful that I hate to go back down and render the triumph obsolete.

The day ended with a dinner of puff puffs, soya (beef), fish, and our daily dose of vitamins and pills - everything from calcium to vitamin C to doxycycline (for malaria). With all the activity over the weekend, this week has taken awhile to get going - yesterday we were all tired and moved slowly through our work, and this morning was our weekly grocery shopping trip. While Delphine, our house help, goes to the Food Market, we stop by all the different supermarkets. Today we also went to the American store, where good shampoo and Milky Way bars (hallelujah!) and Christmas lights can be found; more expensive than usual, but great finds nonetheless. At PresCafe we met Joy Newburn and Sarah Bourne, a lady who helps out at the Helping Hands orphanage every week. We are going to start going with her and using our Lessons from Luke to simultaneously teach the kids and practice using the curriculum.

Staying with us for a few days is Emmanuel, a guy from Switzerland who has worked at the SIL office. He came with us today to the market, then with Sarah, Katelyn and I when we went to Ocrika, which was nice. The amount of shouts and catcalls went considerably down once they saw we had a guy with us.

So now we are all back at work; this week Sarah, Chris, Karen, and I are all finally finishing the layout and template for lessons 1-5 of the Sunday School curriculum. Once these are done, we can move on to the rest of the 52 lessons in Luke, and move much quicker because the template is already put in place. Yayyy! Fadi and Maimu also had their first day of school yesterday, and it seemed to go well - Maimu came home smiling as usual! Apparently, during the first few days of school, it's not unusual for the teachers to be absent. I was shocked by this, but it's accepted as the norm here, and school really gets going the second week in.

We have now been living in the Jackson Village for 7 weeks! I'm amazed it's already September, and time is still flying by as rapidly as it did the first few weeks we were here. Before we know it, half the school year will have past, and I will still be marveling as to where the time has gone.