Still not quite there

Just a quick blog here while the internet is actually working. It was on for a few hours yesterday again... and then off again! Grrr... I'm getting a bit frustrated. But maybe it's good for me. I sorta wandered around the house last night, looking for something to do. I ended up sitting on our new "day bed"/sofa, wearing a big purple tie-dyed mumu and cross-stitching. Argh! I'm such a missionary. At least I was listening to some cool music on my little MP3 player.

We had quite a crazy day yesterday - got called to the Ministry of Education to meet with some people to give our input into the "Education Act" that needs to be passed by the Legislative Assembly next week. Yikes. But ends up the consultant we were working with was really good, and we communicated well, so I think we had some good input. As soon as we got back from that, another chap who is quite influential in these parts dropped by for a visit and we were able to get him some resources to help him with some literacy work that he wants to get going. I still have some work to do this week to burn a cd of resources and make up a writer's workshop manual for him. I LOVE being about to connect people to resources and let them get on with what they want to do in their own communities! He left here a very satisfied man, which makes me very happy, as well.

If it's not one thing..

Yup, welcome to life here. If it's not one thing that's going wrong, it's another...

I haven't posted in a while because we've been having Internet issues... yeah, what's new?! Well, this time, it's been the actual VSAT satellite dish or the modem that's having some problems. Those problems are well beyond what I can fix, and well beyond what my people can talk me through fixing on the phone.

But suddenly, this morning, it started working again.

Then, suddenly, this afternoon, it stopped working again.

Then, this evening, it was still not working.

So I came back into the container again... and this time, all the lights were flashing the right colors... but someone had unplugged the modem from the rest of the routers! So no wonder it wasn't working this evening.

Anyways, there are crazy things going on with this kit, and I don't know what the deal is. I think there's a storm somewhere over the Sahara that's messing with our satellite signals.... but really, who knows?! And without any technicians around, it's really beyond me to be able to do anything about it. So I just keep praying that God miraculously fixes anything that might actually be wrong with it!

But other than that, things are going well! We've had a visit from the Minister of Education, and so we've got some things to put together so we have a bit of a strategy document to use with him, since he's got some VERY high expectations of just what he wants us to do! It's amazing that he's so keen and so excited to see the languages be used... but anyways, I'm looking forward to seeing how God's going to work it all out!

I'd better get back to the house and tell everyone that the Internet's running again. And it wasn't working because there was a cable unplugged... but that wasn't the problem this afternoon when I checked - this afternoon, there were flashing orange lights on the modem! Flashing orange is not a good thing. Now they're all happy and sparkling green :)

I'm praying that this continues tomorrow.

Dirty fingernails

Yeah, it really is just like I never even left - less than an hour after I got back here, I had dirt under my fingernails. And it's still all there! I just can't for the life of me get them all clean, no matter how many nailbrushes I scrub with multiple times a day. I've been slightly annoyed with all the dirt this week, but I know that will pass and I'll get used to it in a few more days. It's just part of life here.

I had quite an interesting day today, actually. As I was in the computer container trying to figure out what was going on with the internet, I started receiving some emails. One of them was a rather interesting email from a rather unexpected person, basically professing his love for me. I'm not quite sure how to respond to this one, as, well, it is from an unexpected source. I don't want to say too much more lest I embarrass this person (though I'm positive he doesn't read my blog... but you never know!). It's quite puzzling to me to try to figure out why men here find me so darn attractive.

Then, while I was reading that email and trying to figure out if this person was serious or what, a very high-up government official stopped by to chat with us! So we sat and chatted with him about the future of the education system in this country and how me and Jackie are going to help them.

By then, it was time for some lunch - a lovely meal based around different shades of the color orange (pumpkin, tomatoe sauce, pasta, papaya and mango). Another few hours of work then it was time to turn off the generator again. By then, it was hot and I was suffering a bit - I'm still not quite used to being back. So I came down to the house and spent some time studying my Arabic in prep for our lesson today! But, something came up, and my Arabic teacher wasn't able to come.

So I had some extra time to do a bit more unpacking and sorting of the stuff I brought with me! I also gave my two pairs of flip flops that I had left on my closet shelf a good bath - they were so dirty that I didn't even want to put my dirty toes in them! It never ceases to amaze me just how much dust there can be!

Anyways, that's just another typical day here. I should go and give my fingernails yet another scrub before running down to the generator shed to turn it off... maybe something even more exciting will happen tomorrow!

Back in Rhythm

Somehow, it seems like I never even left this place! I've been back for two days now, but I've quickly slipped back into life here as though I never even left. My first morning here, I was crawling under desks and over cupboards to figure out what was wrong with the Internet. My buddies over here had left the problem for me to sort out when I came home - thanks, guys :) And it's strange how quickly you get used to having your life be run by the generator. But I refuse to become a slave to the generator schedule... I'm just trying to see it as a tool to organize my time around. There have been about 2 days of city electricity in the last month and a half here. I am SO thankful for our generator! And so far, there is fuel in the city, after a spell of nothing here. Of course, that also means the price for diesel has skyrocketed... but such is life over here.

We tried to go out for chicken at our favorite restaurant last night. But it was closed for refurbishing! I'm just hoping they don't make the prices sky-rocket to reflect their newly painted and tiled interior. We had to go down the road to a different restaurant that just re-opened after having been closed for renos. They have grilled chicken, which is tasty, but they only serve it with a piece of bread, nothing more. And it's more expensive. The best part was when we saw the waitress from the other restaurant chowing down on some chicken at the next table! She recognized us and told us that we only have to wait for two more days for our favorite place to open again.

So yeah, life seems to be back to normal here, which is somehow not so bad!

The trip that never ends

So I fixed the Internet today, which means I can happily sit in my little porch, enjoying my fan, watching my kitty do crazy things, and be online at the same time. Ah, life is good! I just wanted to post a few photos and tell a bit about my very, very long trip here.

Started out quite funny, actually. Somehow, I had the time wrong for departure, and we ended up at the airport a full 4 hours before the flight was to leave! Ooops. No wonder the check in desk wasn't open yet. Anyways, I did check in, and we ended up going shopping at Costco and Best Buy and had some chicken McNuggets before heading back to the airport! However, it was a bit of an indication of how the rest of the trip was going to go...

I was also quite sick before I left, so I was NOT looking forward to the overnight flight, the layovers and all the hassle. The flight to London actually wasn't bad. I was sitting next to an East Indian grandpa, who kept trying to talk to me in a language that was definitely NOT English. But he was very insistent and persistent in chatting away at me, even though I clearly had no clue what he was talking about! It was actually quite entertaining to watch the reaction of the poor flight attendants who were also trying to figure out what he wanted when it came time to serve him meals and drinks! I'm just thankful there wasn't an emergency on the flight, as the two of us were sitting in the emergency exit row.

We landed in London at about 9:30 am, and I made my way through customs, and out to the bus station. I know that people were praying that I would feel better, because despite the lack of sleep, I felt SO good. Not even a sniffle! I found a bus to Oxford to spend the day with some good friends. I had such a nice visit with Wendy and her little girl, Emma. Wendy was a wonderful hostess - she fed me, entertained me, let me have a wonderful hot shower, and showed me around Oxford.
I love buildings, especially old ones, so I was quite in awe of all the beautiful buildings in the city. We had a nice brisk walk through the town, which was a really good way to enjoy the city, as well as shake some of the cobwebs from my little sleep deprived head.
Wendy even walked me around to the church where C.S. Lewis went and the place where he got his inspiration for the "Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe". After our walk through the town, Wendy made sure I packed a cheese sandwich for my supper, and she brought me back to the bus station where I caught the bus back to Heathrow.

That's where everything got a bit crazy. I arrived at the check in desk, thinking that I would simply check in, then go through security and enjoy munching on my cheese sandwich whilst waiting an hour or so for my flight.

However, seems there was a bit of a problem at the airport that day, while Wendy and I were strolling the streets of Oxford, a plane had missed the runway at Heathrow! So my flight was delayed, and the airport was crazy, since a lot of flights had been completely cancelled. Well, that was fine, I had my cheese sandwich, and I'm used to waiting around for planes. However, that was the least of my problems. Seems my booking had been cancelled, as well! The flight was going, but I wasn't booked on it, even though I had my ticket right there - I even had an old fashioned paper ticket, which I had called and confirmed the day before!

As it turns out, I had to wait around at the check in desk for the station manager to appear. I waited for about an hour, entertaining myself by watching everyone rearrange their luggage. They were SO picky about luggage on that flight - only ONE carry on of 7 kg. That's not very much stuff, especially when you're already carrying a printer and a laptop! So the whole time I was sitting there, I was mentally rearranging my stuff and trying to figure out what to do with my 13.9 kg of carry-on. I also spent some time chatting with a Somali man who was also waiting for the station manager. He had a bit of a problem, which, as it turns out, means he's going to be taken to court by the airlines! Yikes. I also saw the security come and take away a passenger who was in line because he was verbally abusing one of the passenger service agents at the desk! There were some crazy people there, let me tell 'ya.

Anyways, the station manager had to call the headquarters in Addis Ababa to see if they could let me on the flight. They did, in the end, let me on, but also let me know that there was no room on the on-going flight, nor could they do anything to help me while I waited in Addis for a space to open up on the on-going flight. They just weren't too helpful. The only person that was helpful was one of the agents who allowed me to check my excess 6.9 kg of carry-on for free. So there went everything and anything that I could have used for an overnight stay in Addis... contact lense solution, extra underwear, computer cables...

Perhaps God was trying to tell me that I really was holding on to my "stuff" too tightly, and that I was depending too much on my stuff for my security... when I should have just been trusting that He had it all under control.

Anyways, to make a long story, um, well, a little less long, I ended up in Addis after my on-going flight (which I wasn't booked to fly on anymore anyways) had already left. Even though the folks in London had said they couldn't do anything to help me, the folks in Addis told me to join the line up of people who had missed their flights because of the delays in London. So I did.

Turns out, they gave me a boarding pass for the next on-going flight to J., escorted me through immigration so that I wouldn't have to pay for a visa, found my carry-on luggage which I had had to check, and put me in a little mini-bus bound for a hotel downtown, where I would be provided with three meals a day and a room, for free!

Of course, as soon as I got there, I called one of my dearest friends, Hiwet, who lives there.
As soon as she was finished her work, she came straight to the hotel. I picked up my stuff, and we were off on a taxi to her house, where I spent the weekend! It was really an amazing weekend. We visited with her family, some of old friends, wandered around the town, enjoyed more cups of macciato than I'll have all year here in J., and just enjoyed being together. Hiwet is one of those friends who you can pick up with right where you left off - I haven't seen her in almost two years, but when we're together, it seems like it was just yesterday that I had seen her!

She has her own little apartment in Addis, and I got to stay there with her. I think all the neighbors were slightly shocked to see a white person staying in their apartment block, though!
We got to eat some nice injera and shiro and all sorts of other wonderful Ethiopian delicacies, which I LOVE, and we had such good company all weekend to enjoy it all with, as well, such as these little girls who are the neighbors of Hiwet's sister, where we had lunch and coffee on Sunday afternoon.It was a special weekend in Ethiopia, too, called Timket, or Epiphany (on the Julian calendar). So on Sunday morning we got to see the Ark of the Covenant in a procession of priests and parishioners, all decked out in their white shawls. I've never seen so many people in a city wearing traditional clothes, and I happen to think that the Ethiopian traditional clothes are some of the most beautiful in the world!It was really quite a special weekend to be in Addis, to see all of this celebration, which is HUGE in the Orthodox church. A lot of tourists go to Ethiopia especially just to see the festivities, and I just happened to be there on the right day :)

The weekend, of course, was too short, even though Hiwet and I made the most of all our waking hours! On Monday morning, we left her little house, took a bus back to the hotel where I was supposed to have been staying all weekend, and she went off to work, and I waited for the bus to take me back to the airport!

I know that I had been praying that I would get stuck in Addis for a few days, but once I got to London and it looked like it was all just going to be an expensive, stressful experience, I got a bit anxious about it all, and I just wanted to get straight on the plane to get back "home" to J. But of course, God had it all under control, and the weekend turned out better than I ever could have imagined! And it was a real blessing from God - starting with the time in Oxford where I got to have a great visit with an old friend, and ending with an amazing weekend in one of my favorite cities in the whole world with another dear old friend. It was all a good, unexpected gift from God, and the memories of the trip that never seemed to end will make me smile for a good long time to come!

I'm home!

I have had SO many bloggable moments in the last few days! And I don't have much time before the generator goes off... so yes, that means that I have arrived home! I left Addis this morning after a most amazing weekend. Really, it all just worked out so wonderfully, and I feel like it was such a gift from God to have such a wonderful weekend with a good friend there. I'll write more and post photos tomorrow, I hope. But for now, I just wanted to let you all know that I'm alive! Thanks for praying for the trip and for all my luggage - it ALL arrived with no problems!

I gotta go find Zane and go back home to bed. Of course, the Internet isn't working in our house again...

Stuck?

So for those of you who were praying that I'd get stuck in Addis - good work! Now you need to pray that all of my stuff makes it to Addis intact... and then makes it onwards to the final destination intact, as well.

At the moment, I'm enjoying some wi-fi in London Heathrow. I'm too tired to write about all the crazy details of this whole thing... long and short of it is, there was a bit of an incident at the airport today which has one of the runways closed. So everything is backed up, meaning my flight from here will arrive 2 hours after my connecting flight is leaving.

However, that's irrelevant to me, since my entire reservation had been cancelled sometime between the time that I called and reconfirmed it on Tuesday and today. And, the onward flight is already oversold by 8 seats. And the next flight out on Monday is also oversold. So. The folks here said to go to the transfer desk in Addis tomorrow and see what they can do.

I AM excited about spending a few days in Addis, but at the same time, I'm a little nervous about what's going to happen, since there's been all this trouble with my actual ticket booking. I don't want this whole affair to cost me wagon loads of money! And please pray, too, that I can manage to get in touch with my dear friend in Addis and that she will be able to take care of me. If I can't get through to her by phone somehow, then I'm hooped. Well, not completely hooped, it just might cost me a little more money! And silly me, had to pack my Lonely Planet guide because I could only bring 7 kg as carry on - so that's my computer, my printer and my toothbrush. If my luggage doesn't make it, I'm going to be one stinky girl by the time I get to my final destination next week!

I think, perhaps, in retrospect, maybe booking my next ticket with a North American travel agent just might be the way to go...

At least the airline gave us all some food vouchers because of the long delay here in London. So I'd best go and spend those before the flight leaves.

More from... um, well, whereever I end up in the next few days!

I'm Outta Here!

So I'm nearly all packed and just have a few things to organize and clear up here in the house... I leave for the airport in a few hours!

However, I went to bed with a super sore throat last night, and have woken up this morning with that head-achy, feverish, stuffy, achy-all-over feeling :( So I'm not feeling in good shape for two days of travelling. Please pray that I make a miraculous recovery from this cold in the next two hours!

Will write again once I get to my destination!

Leaving on a Jet Plane

Sorry that I haven't blogged in a while... and there have even been some blog-worthy moments to blog about! But somehow, it's harder to get around to doing when I'm home. There are just too many other things to keep me entertained around here!

One of the adventures came a few days ago when my nephew had to come down here for some unexpected surgery. My sister blogged about it, so if you know her blog, you can go and look there! We're all thankful that the little guy is ok, and as it turns out, it was quite nice to have a little unexpected visit with my sister and her husband and all the boys! The poor little guy was pretty upset about the whole thing, since he hardly had any sleep, nothing to eat, and he was all hooked up to a bunch of IVs and machines and nurses kept coming to check his vitals.
I spent the afternoon in the hospital with my sister while we waited for little Joey to have his surgery, and while we waited for him to wake up. It was amazing and sobering to realize, as we were sitting in the waiting room, how many surgeons there were running in and out of the waiting room, giving parents the reports of their children's surgeries. Where I come from, there is one surgeon. You can imagine how many hundreds of thousands of surgeries just don't get done. People just, well, die of all sorts of preventable and cureable illnesses and conditions because there simply isn't anyone to help them. What a blessing it is to have a beautiful new hospital, equipped with so many amazing machines and conveniences to keep us all safe and a healthy.

And on Wednesday, I get to go back to my normal life! It's been so good to be here for a while, and there are quite a few thoughts and ideas and things that I've been learning over the past few weeks, and I should blog about some of them, but, well, um, I just got too much to do tonight... and it's already after midnight... sigh... two more sleeps... then two sleeps missed in transit, then, I'll be "home"! I am, actually, secretly praying that something happens to cause me to miss my flight in Ethiopia so I will get to stay there with some friends for a few days before the final leg of my journey :) At least I have made some arrangements to see some friends in London during my 11 hour layover in Heathrow! I can't imagine spending another 12 hours in that airport...

Winter Wonderland

Yesterday I went on what is becoming my annual Father-Daughter Winter Fun day!

Started off with Dad's song, as we cruised down the highway: (I post this video mostly for my sister's benefit, who, I'm sure, has fond memories of Dad belting out his song every time we come within sight of the mountains! Don't click on the video if you don't want to be subjected to my Dad's singing :) )



The mountains were amazing, as usual.

On the road, we saw a moose and her baby and a family of mountain sheep.
Even though the temperature was only -15C when we started out our skiing, we quickly warmed up as it was a beautiful sunny day, and hardly a cloud in the sky!Here I am doing a little skiing. How graceful am I, eh?

Once we had a little ski, we stopped in the hut and had our lunch. The highlight of the lunch was meeting a little squirrel friend - he looked surprisingly like a rat with a fuzzy tail warmer. I guess I looked like a rat-friendly girl, so the little squirrel decided to come and make my acquaintance up close and personal by jumping on my back! Seems there's never a dull moment with me when there's a rodent in the room.

After lunch, Dad and I drove up the road and found a nice place for some snowshowing! That was great fun, too! I felt like an Arctic explorer, tromping off into the great unknown... except that the going was much easier when we were actually following a trail.

Breaking your own trail in that puffy snow was rather difficult. But it was so much fun to play in the snow and be so surrounded by so much natural beauty! It really makes me feel like I'm surrounded by the beauty of the Creator, which is something I miss so much while I'm in my usual place in Africa.
How blessed am I to get to come home to such a beautiful place!? And how blessed am I to be able to come home each year for this annual snow fun trip?!

Not so wordy

I'm not feeling so wordy tonight, but my sister posted some beautiful photos of the fun we had over Christmas, so I'm going to copy my big sister and also post some photos... of course, if you've seen my sister's blog or facebook album, then you've seen many of these ones, too. But some of them are just so beautiful that they deserve to take up a bit of cyber space.

Here's the Christmas 2007 Album, on Picasa this time.

Enjoy!

A New Year's Eve Walk by the River

So I'm spending a few days with my sister, my brother-in-law and my 5 nephews in their cabin in the woods. This afternoon we went for a walk through the forest with Cocoa, the dog. I got a new camera as an early birthday present, and so now I finally have the capacity to take videos! So I have to admit I've been trying out the camera on anything and everything! Here's a little video I took as the sun was setting over the river.