March 2012

BIRDS AND ANIMALS

Starting from the smallest to the greatest. Ben got into a fight with the smallest and lost. He got bitten on his eyelid by a mosquito. Delightful sight for us to wake up to next morning.








We spent a wonderful evening in a brothers home, he cooked a fantastic meal and we were
joined by his pet parrot, Calypso. Calypso sat on the edge of my plate pinching my spaghetti, Paradise!!









This is Dom and Lily (our landlords) who took us to a nature reserve. Perhaps we should have left Dom there!!









We saw red billed hornbills (we get these in our garden but I can never get a decent photo
for some reason, anyway they were a bit tamer in this park).




The endangered Western Red Colubus monkey. They are very shy and stayed up in the trees.







Far more friendly are the Green monkey. They come to beg peanuts from tourists.





Some take a little TOO many, check out those cheeks!!



Ben made some good friends to the point that they asked him to join their troupe!!








There are also some beautiful trees in the park.












The park is near the sea so Dom and Ben went for a swim. I didn't bother taking my costume
as to me the sea is always cold (I could never swim in Spain!!) but it was actually warm
enough even for me so I'll swim next time.

RECIPE FOR CHICKEN DOMODA
1. Organise your Kids (Mama has 6). Send Kid One and Kid Two to school (optional), send Kid Three to market for forgotten supplies, ask Kid Four to light the fire, ask Kid Five to pound black pepper in the monster sized pestle and mortar.

2. Wash and skin 4 chicken legs, add salt and rinse. Add half of the pepper to chicken to cover then dry fry.

3. Add stock cube for Kid Five to pound then add 2 fresh chillis.

4. Peel 3 potatoes and peel and slice 1 onion. Put the onion in mortar then add 6 cherry tomatoes.

5. Put a large bag of peanut butter (unsweetened) into a bowl and water (about 2 cups) stirring all the time. Put this into the pan with the chicken and the crushed ingredients.

6. Kids Four and Five are now free to start the washing of the used pans and bowls. No hot water or washing up liquid are to be used. This is an environmentally friendly recipe!

7. Add the potatoes, 1/4 cabbage and 2 more whole chillis to the chicken, bring to the boil and boil for about 10 minutes.

8. Breastfeed Kid Six.

9. Add a large (about fist sized) bag of tomato paste, salt and a small bag(!) of vinegar. This is probably about 1/4 cup. Add a stock cube.


10. Reduce the heat, (take a few coals from the fire, put in another fire and put the pan on top) cover and simmer until oily streaks appear on top.

11. On the first fire start to heat water for rice in a very large pan. Pick stones, insects etc out of rice then wash rice.

Put a metal colander on top of boiling water and fill with rice to steam.

12. Change Kid Six's nappy. Give icky nappy to Kid Whichever to wash.


13. Steam rice for about 15 minutes then put into the boiling water but spoon off any water that covers the rice. Simmer very gently until water is absorbed.


14. Welcome Kids One and Two home from school.


15. Feed guests (offer spoons if they're foreign and not used to eating with their fingers) d8 and feed as many of the neighbours kids as happen to be around. Sit on floor or the tiniest stools you can find, use only one plate and eat with your fingers.

16. Enjoy!

CONVERSATIONS

More for my own memories than for sharing but feel free to read this anyway. It's a record of some of the wonderful conversations I've had this month and that possibly couldn't happen anywhere else.

We went on a return visit and arrived as they were starting to eat so we were invited to join them. The Africans ate with their fingers but we were offered spoons. During the meal the conversation turned to our eating methods and they asked do we ever eat with our fingers in Britain. We told them we do sometimes, for example at McDonalds. This was met with blank faces.

"Do you know McDonalds?"

"No"
"Do you know what a burger is?"
"Yes" holding his hand out in a c shape exactly as you would hold a burger.
"But you've never heard of McDonalds?"
"No"

Terry was delighted. For those of you who don't know him he HATES McDonalds and was so happy to have found a corner of the earth where they are unknown.

We were shopping in the European supermarkets one day and called for a taxi to take us home. We try to use the same driver each time so I called him. He asked where we were so I told him very clearly:

"We're in Westfield, go to the roundabout at the top of Kairaba Avenue (the main shopping street) and you'll see a mango tree. We're in the car park behind the mango tree"
"OK, can you give the phone to someone ELSE who knows where you are?"

One evening we had a visitor and made him a cup of tea.

"Do you take sugar?"

"Yes"

"How many?"

"Just enough to make it nice."

My friend told me she was going to go to Ghana.

"How will you travel?"

"By bus"

"That's a long way. How long will it take?"

"About four days"
"So, do you stay in hotels or something along the way?"
"No, that's four days AND NIGHTS, ON THE BUS. It stops for breaks every few hours"
"Does the bus have essentials like toilets, air conditioning, TV?"
(laughing)"No, none of those things"

I die!! I don't know exactly what I'd die of but I'm sure I wouldn't survive a journey like that.

We were talking with another visitor about children and what they do to entertain themselves. Earlier that day I'd seen two girls who had collected bottle tops from the street. They had a nail and stone and were hammering holes in the tops to make beads for necklaces. They also make cars from sardine cans. Terry had seen boys running along with an old bike tyre. Our visitor's eyes lit up.

"I LOVED my tyre!! I would run and run with it all day then at the end of the dayI would tell my mum "Mum, I feel ill" She would say to me "You've been running with your tyre all day so how can you now come and tell me you are ill" (Laughing) I had made myself ill with running so much. The next day my muscles would hurt so muchI couldn't even stand up."

"We used to put up a fence by the river and take the horse and ride it fast up to the fence then pull back on the horse so it didn't jump the fence, it threw the child over the fence into the river. That was so much fun."

I regret not recording these stories, I can't reproduce the enthusiasm in his voice like this.

A few years before we married (probably around 1999/2000) Terry went to visit hissister in Ireland. The local congregation met in a boat yard shed and the publictalk that was given by a French brother. You guessed it, this same brother is herein the French congregation. Small world in the truth!!

TRANSPORT
Terry and I were in a taxi on a dual carriageway. Remember that we drive on theright here. We were in the left lane (overtaking lane) approaching a tractor whowas also in the left lane. The taxi driver moved into the right lane to overtakeit but a parked car was blocking his way (yes, a car had parked on the dual cariageway!!). He wasn't sure if he was going to make it between the car and tractor so he hit the brakes then decided that he probably would make it after all. He hit the accelerator but when it was REALLY too late to change his mind a cyclist appeared from in front of the parked car heading TOWARDS US down the MIDDLE of the dual carriageway!! It was too late to stop so the driver continued through the middle of the parked car, cyclist and tractor. Please tell me how nobody died!!




We have our Circuit Overseer's visit starting Tuesday (27th) and two weddings coming up so I'll let you know how all that goes next time. Thanks so much again for the emails and lovely comments from everyone.