The biggest birthday surprise happened for me on Saturday. The day started off normally enough. I left in the morning to play frisbee with the other missionaries. Because of all of our traveling, I haven't gotten to play in about two months. It was a really great game, and I guess it was just so good we couldn't end it. By the end we were so worn out that no one was able to score. Honestly, it was taking about 20 minutes for someone to score. Eventually, we just ended it instead of continuing until we reached the final score that had been agreed upon.
Afterwards, I went to a friend's house to do laundry. We had quite a pile up of laundry due to the water issues we were having last week. Thankfully, most of our missionary friends have washing machines and some offered to let us use theirs.
As I mentioned in a previous post, last week was pretty rough because of the water situation. Although it seemed to have been fixed and clean water had been returned to us as of Friday evening, we're now under the impression that it might be a while before the fix is permanent. Sometimes the water smells alright, but most of the time it smells salty or like rotten eggs and sometimes it goes back to being very dirty. I'm not sure about you, but I don't particularly wish to wash my clothes or myself in water that smells like rotten eggs. Luckily, God has provided and it seems that every time we are just about to run out of water, it rains or the water smells good enough to fill up the buckets at home. Honestly, I've found new meaning for the part of the Lord's Prayer when it asks "give us this day our daily bread". But for me it's been, "give me this day my daily water". I can say it's been a pretty powerful and sometimes frustrating lesson. I hope that I never take my water for granted after I return to the states where we never doubt that if we turn on the faucet that it will a) not be on or b) be dirty/smelly. In any case, we have water at our house now and I'm praising Him for His faithfulness!!
After doing laundry and hanging out with my friends all afternoon, I had a dinner date with Kjirstin and another friend. However, when I arrived and the restaurant, I was amazed to find that there were many more people than I was anticipating would be there. I was shocked and quite overwhelmed to realize that my friend had thrown me a surprise birthday party! I had decided that I wanted my birthday to be low key this year, and I hardly mentioned it to anyone. But, apparently, God had other plans and I have to admit they were pretty awesome. We had a great dinner at one of my favorite restaurants and then we went back to a friend's house for cake and a movie. They had even decorated the house for a birthday. The birthday sign was Tinkerbell and the plates were Cinderella. I was SUPER excited because if you know me, you know that I'm quite the fan of Disney! :D After dinner, we watched a movie, Anna Karenina, together which turned out to be a little bit strange. I hadn't heard of it before, but a lot of people wanted to see it, so I agreed. All in all it was a great evening!!
Here are some pictures of the party:
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| My friend Shantelle who planned my party for me! :D |
Sunday, my actual birthday, was pretty chill which is what I needed after all of the excitement on Saturday. I ran in the morning and went to church. Kjirstin and I watched The Avengers (which my parents had sent me for my birthday) and we went to prayer service. In the evening, Pastor's family had a celebration for me. We had birthday dancing, which turns out to be a tradition for them, and they had a cake for me. I got to cut the cake up and feed it a piece to each person who was there. It was a really fun tradition that we didn't do last year. They gave me a very nice card that everyone signed for me. It was a wonderfully perfect little party!! (I just wish I had thought to bring my camera so I could take some pictures!)
Also, I got to wear my new "birthday dress". Somehow, I see this becoming a new tradition for me (since I did the same thing last year). I bought the fabric a few weeks ago and had the ladies at the Susanna Wesley Center sew it up for me. They did a pretty amazing job with the little picture that I drew and my attempted descriptions of what I wanted. Honestly, I think it turned out to be a good mix of western style and Tanzanian style and I've gotten a lot of compliments on it.
Here's a picture if you didn't see it in my last post:
One of my piano students is my birthday buddy (meaning we share the same birthday). It was quite exciting although we didn't get to celebrate together on Sunday. However, she did give me a present on Monday (which I was totally not expecting). She gave me some earrings and they match my new dress very well. On Thursday after her piano lesson, I threw a small party for her. I went to the duka (small shop) nextdoor and got us chips mayai (basically french fries cooked with eggs. It's SUPER delicious), cokes, and some chocolate cookies. She's one of the children from the orphanage, and I'm not sure that they do anything for birthdays. But, I was very happy to be able to do a little something for her!! :D
As for the rest of this week, it's been pretty good. We're still having water issues as a rotten egg smell keeps showing up. But, somehow we are managing and I'm praising God for it. Next week, the students have mid-term exams, so I'm trying to get them geared up for that. I gave them a pop-quiz last week and some did surprisingly, but some really need to improve before the tests. Overall, I can really see a world of difference between where the students are starting this year and where we started last year. The students are becoming more and more used to hearing a interacting with native English speakers and it seems that their works just keeps getting better and better. And now they're moving almost too quickly through the books. Class V is already 2/3's done (granted, they actually started the book last year) and Classes VI and VII are getting pretty close to being half-way done. And it's not because I'm pushing them; they're just understanding the concepts so much easier now! I'm so incredibly proud of these students and what they've accomplished.
I'm excited that they're getting to have some opportunities to be creative as well. The journals, I think, are helping a lot. It's amazing to see how excited they get over some of the journal topics. Like on Thursday, I talked to them about visiting outer space. Class V was dead silent as I was explaining about how it is possible for people to travel in space, and how people have been to the moon, and how there are people who are trying to figure out a way for us to live on Mars, and so on. I feel like I'm opening up whole new worlds to them and it's SOO exciting! I can't wait to start my creative writing and reading unit after the Easter Holidays!! :D This post is getting pretty long now, but I'll have to post a new entry soon with some more really funny and cool stuff that my kids have written in their exercise books and journals.
As for this weekend, there's not anything very exciting that will be happening and I am glad for it. Everyone needs a break and I feel like I've been running for the past 2 1/2 months. It's definitely time for a rest!! I hope that you have a wonderful and blessed weekend!!
The Lord Bless You and Keep You,
~Christine
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