Well here's the scoop on the gas situation because we have had a few concern
ed well wishers. The day after I wrote the blog last week, I went to worn a friend about the gas shortage. She responded with the fact that she had two electric hotplates that I could borrow and her husband who is the science teacher at the boys school mentioned that he had an extra gas tank in the science lab that I could borrow and replace. God is soo good and thanks for praying for us!
Here's how our Christmas went for those who were asking:
Christmas Sunday we went out to the main street by our house to get breakfast. Chenchea is a deepfried ball of beancurd dough that looks a little like a Timbit (or a donut hole for all of you unfortunate people who have never experienced Tim Hortons). The locals will frequently buy a piece of bagette and place these little balls inside then pour a little oil and a tomato and onion sauce over the top (oh and I forgot to mention the "piment" --hot pepper powder). But for the sake of the kids we brought a bowl for the chenchea and had the bagette separately. It was amazing how fast the chorus of "I'm not eating that!' changed to "This is good!" (especially when they got to add cinnamon and sugar instead of piment and tomato sauce). Dave had a good chat with some neighbours while I was picking up breakfast, there are always lots of people along the street there, especially in the morning and evening. One of them even complimented me, but saying that my Zarma was better than Dave's. I just laughed and said "uhuh", because he has a much better grasp of the vocabulary and structure. But maybe my pronunciation is better.
On Christmas Eve I baked coffee cake to take to some people to wish them a Merry Christmas, but it turned into a bagel and coffee cake delivery when Dave came back with 50 bagels instead of the 15 that I had thought that I ordered (another long story about communication break downs in foreign languages on cell phones!). We later delivered to an Algerien merchant friend that was missing thier kids for "Tabaski", a Togolese merchant friend and our neighbours. I also cut Ben's hair (I think that was mom's Christmas present) and constructed candy cane ornaments with the boys while the cake cooled. (I'll try to add a picture, but Cole was too shy to get in it.)
Christmas morning breakfast consisted of "Fruit Loops" provided by friends from Canada via Dan Sheffield. The boys and I ate them while Dad tried to wake up. Then we opened presents and I spent the rest of the day cooking. Cole had asked for
"a real pizza" for lunch--which means a thick pizza crust, pepperoni (or the closest equivalent we could come up with --in this case a beef sliced meat with piment) and lots of cheese (cheese is expensive here so the restaurants use it very sparingly and there is no such thing as delivery!). But, I also had to make rolls, potroast, salad dressing and ice cream to take to a friends house later that evening for dinner. In between all the cooking we got to talk family on the Lawrence side, we are still waiting to talk to the Wrights tonight (we missed them when we were out for dinner). Oh and tonight we have also been invited out to a Nigerien friends house to visit for Christmas.
We hope that your Christmas was good too!
ed well wishers. The day after I wrote the blog last week, I went to worn a friend about the gas shortage. She responded with the fact that she had two electric hotplates that I could borrow and her husband who is the science teacher at the boys school mentioned that he had an extra gas tank in the science lab that I could borrow and replace. God is soo good and thanks for praying for us!Here's how our Christmas went for those who were asking:
Christmas Sunday we went out to the main street by our house to get breakfast. Chenchea is a deepfried ball of beancurd dough that looks a little like a Timbit (or a donut hole for all of you unfortunate people who have never experienced Tim Hortons). The locals will frequently buy a piece of bagette and place these little balls inside then pour a little oil and a tomato and onion sauce over the top (oh and I forgot to mention the "piment" --hot pepper powder). But for the sake of the kids we brought a bowl for the chenchea and had the bagette separately. It was amazing how fast the chorus of "I'm not eating that!' changed to "This is good!" (especially when they got to add cinnamon and sugar instead of piment and tomato sauce). Dave had a good chat with some neighbours while I was picking up breakfast, there are always lots of people along the street there, especially in the morning and evening. One of them even complimented me, but saying that my Zarma was better than Dave's. I just laughed and said "uhuh", because he has a much better grasp of the vocabulary and structure. But maybe my pronunciation is better.
On Christmas Eve I baked coffee cake to take to some people to wish them a Merry Christmas, but it turned into a bagel and coffee cake delivery when Dave came back with 50 bagels instead of the 15 that I had thought that I ordered (another long story about communication break downs in foreign languages on cell phones!). We later delivered to an Algerien merchant friend that was missing thier kids for "Tabaski", a Togolese merchant friend and our neighbours. I also cut Ben's hair (I think that was mom's Christmas present) and constructed candy cane ornaments with the boys while the cake cooled. (I'll try to add a picture, but Cole was too shy to get in it.)
Christmas morning breakfast consisted of "Fruit Loops" provided by friends from Canada via Dan Sheffield. The boys and I ate them while Dad tried to wake up. Then we opened presents and I spent the rest of the day cooking. Cole had asked for
"a real pizza" for lunch--which means a thick pizza crust, pepperoni (or the closest equivalent we could come up with --in this case a beef sliced meat with piment) and lots of cheese (cheese is expensive here so the restaurants use it very sparingly and there is no such thing as delivery!). But, I also had to make rolls, potroast, salad dressing and ice cream to take to a friends house later that evening for dinner. In between all the cooking we got to talk family on the Lawrence side, we are still waiting to talk to the Wrights tonight (we missed them when we were out for dinner). Oh and tonight we have also been invited out to a Nigerien friends house to visit for Christmas.We hope that your Christmas was good too!
PS. If you are on our mailing list to receive our quarterly newsletters and didn't receive something in the last few days. It means that we have a problem with your e-mail address. If you would like to have that fixed you can either e-mail us (out address is on our prayer cards/bookmarks) or post a comment on our blog sending us your e-mail address (we monitor the comments so the address doesn't need to show up on the blog, but it will get to us). Thanks!
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