Hair Attack and other Things

The pigs have been named and are now known affectionately as Lulu (the bigger one) and Maisy (the little one). They have settled in well and are clearly enjoying their food! The girls love going to see them. We are also making some new nest boxes in the chicken coup, as the plan now is to breed some more chickens. These little chicks will grow up to provide the eggs to go with our bacon!

It is hotter here now and we seem to be getting more days without rain – this since we finished making our rain gauge! The road to our house is in a terrible state! We have to go a different way to get out now as the potholes have widened to a deep crevice across the width of the whole road in one place! It is still manageable on the bike, but it’s a bumpy ride (especially with mangoes bumping up and down on your back). The other day I walked home from school but forgot the consequences of walking with my hair down! I had not gone far before I was accosted by at least ten little schoolgirls! They were quite literally all over me, stroking, pulling, tossing my hair in every direction. The situation was quickly out of control but at least now I had some Swahili to tell them in no uncertain terms, “ENOUGH!” But even that didn’t work. In the end I just had to run away. But I had not gone far before, to my horror, another couple of girls approached and quickly reached up to stroke my hair. Thankfully this time it ended peacefully. Now my hair is always tied up.

Tim and the girls were in Magozi again this week and were able to meet four potters from the area. We were surprised to discover they were all grandmothers, one in her nineties! Unfortunately there are no young potters apprenticing under them. But it was an encouraging and useful visit and we are all looking forward to being with the church there for the first time on Sunday and Tim will be going back again next week to find the potters clay sources.

The black Magozi clay stove

We leave on Thursday for our trip to Malawi. We will spend the first night in Mbeya in the south. We will cross the border on Friday and get as far as we can before dark, heading south along the Lake. We plan to arrive in Zomba on Saturday. We will have a week with the EI Malawi Team, and are very much looking forward to learning all that we can from them. We will be looking at the work being done by churches in communities there, including the stoves and water/sanitation projects but also agriculture and healthcare projects, orphan care, a widow’s welfare programme and pastoral support. We will stop on the way back for an extra night in a hotel by the lake which will allow a day of exploring in and around Livingstonia. I am currently reading “Into Africa” about the efforts of Henry Stanley to find Livingstone (“Dr. Livingstone, I presume?”) and look forward to seeing this territory of their explorations over 100 years on.

Hair Attack Part 2

Further to the last blog written earlier but still waiting to be posted, we have had another hair attack! This time it was Tim with scissors in hand with instructions to take a bit off the bottom of my hair. In one fail swoop, it was up to my chin (in places). With my shriek of horror, the girls looked at the hair and both burst into tears, Amisadai trying to think of anything to help (“I’ll get some tape, we can tape it back on, Mummy.”) Tim assures me it truly wasn’t revenge for his haircut from me! He just thought he was below shoulder level with the scissors and didn’t think it would spring back up so much! But after a first attempt to sort the problem and Amisadai crying out “that’s going up Daddy!” none of us were keen for him to continue! I SOS’ed the Wingfields and Andrew (who rescued Tim’s hair the first time, and has cut Miriam’s hair a few times) was able to redeem the situation. After thinking I would be wearing a hat for quite some time, it actually looks just fine now!

And further to the blog about the new chicks … our first attempt has failed. Chuckles ate her egg.

And now to go and heat some leftovers for lunch … because last night this was one thing that did go right. We had a lovely family from the Pentecostal Church for a meal last night and the power cut off just as the rice was finishing cooking and the pudding was just five minutes short of coming out of the oven anyway! What good timing! Although the lemon pudding was interesting as it tasted remarkably like oranges instead. Both lemons and oranges here are green!

In all of this, all we can say you never know unless you try, and we do keep trying!