Walking in a Dusty Winterland

Sitope, Michal and I after helping decorate the Kennel's Christmas Tree :)

A lovely Togo Christmas Carol for all of you to the tune of Winter Wonderland:

Dusty Winterland

Motos honk are you list’ning

In the lane, dust is glistening

We sing a love song in the African sun,

Walking in a Dusty Winterland

In the kitchen we will do some baking

And we’ll make our own great food from scratch

Next we’ll do some shopping in the market

In French we will negotiate the cash

Later on we’ll perspire

As we dream by the fire

To face unafraid the plans that we made

Walking in a Dusty Winterland

5 Things Unique to Africa

1. A butterfly flitting beside me as I walk to the burn pile in which I discover several lizards scattering as I toss in the trash. Also, I never remember chasing butterflies as a child in the middle of December…

2. We didn’t have to pay extra for the twinkling lights on our Christmas tree because the electricity surges make the regular lights twinkle.

3. A tail-less lizard named Fred who walks into spelling class on almost a weekly basis. I suppose he wants to learn how to spell :)

4. Having a unique class pet. Our class pet Bob the wall spider (who is roughly the size of a half dollar), which along with his relatives mostly shows up in the evenings when I’m in my room lesson planning. Occasionally in the early mornings, I see him running from behind the whiteboard as I begin to write on it. Every other spider I have met has been given the name Cousin Bob and once I met Uncle Robert who is much larger than Bob and I am glad I have only seen him once.. I think he might be glad too ;)

5. Walking onto my roof and hearing children below yelling up at me various French and Kabiye phrases. Including “Hansi, Hansi!” and if it is one of the neighborhood children I have met they occasionally call out “Sarah! Sarah!” until I look over and acknowledge them.

Actually, something I have never had before moving here was a roof I could walk onto. I love to go up there especially at night to look at the stars and soak up the peaceful solitude the roof offers. I have seen several shooting stars while watching the night sky here… I have also seen many bats fly overhead.

I actually just found out that we will have a large meteor shower tomorrow night! So I will definitely be visiting our roof again to witness the beautiful spectacle of shooting stars :)

Lome Thanksgiving Trip!

Friday morning of thanksgiving break we began our journey down to Lome in the Miller's

beautiful blue Land Cruiser.

Bethany, Jacque and I in the backseat of the Miller's car, where we spent a good amount of time together :)

Yes, that was delicious ice cream, coconut (my favorite), chocolate and cappuccino! (One of our first stops of course!)

Jacque holding the baby of the man who sells the official Togo soccer team's clothing in Lome.

Jacque and I sporting the green away team color of the Togo soccer team :)

Pizza place in Lome with a kid's playroom and even a prize box! The kids even received prizes with their meals Asher chose a mask and Anna Marie picked a light blue straw hat with jalapeños around the brim.

Our room was reminiscent of a cabin with bunk beds along the side walls and one single bed in the middle as you walked in.

One of my new favorite places in the world, the house of chocolate! Yum! We enjoyed eating a few goodies after eating dinner at a chinese restaurant in town. Bethany and I split a dish of beef curry.

A mural on one of the walls at Coco Beach.

Yay Atlantic Ocean!

You have to have a burger on the beach to call a trip a vacation, right?

Joyeux Noël

It's December and Christmas decorating season :)

Here is a picture of our living room for your viewing pleasure with some of our festive lighting and decor!