Wow, I feel like it's been forever since I've posted! To those of you that live to merely read my blog (I know, that's a ton of people), I am so very sorry. I hope you survived the wait.
You'll never guess what Kendra and I got to do on Tuesday. Well, if you have Facebook you might be able to guess. Anyways, we got to shower!! First real shower in 12 days! I know, that's disgusting. Just keep in mind that during that time, we did clean off using bottled water. No worries. I've totally smelled like a beautiful flower every day in Africa...don't doubt it.
In other news, we went to the orphanage on Tuesday and played with the 6-12 month olds. I know I've already mentioned this, but it's ridiculous how little they get changed. When we got there in the morning, they were just waking up. They got pulled out of bed and put on the floor without being changed. When we left for lunch four hours later, they were laying down for naps and just being changed for the first time that day. All of them were in wet clothes, and stinky. That can't be comfortable. You guys (whoever is actually reading this) should just come adopt these babies because they are incredibly adorable and would be so much better off out of the orphanage! The nannies seem nice enough, but the babies just don't get cared for very well and it's really sad. They cry and cry (probably because they're sitting in soaking diapers and stuck in a tiny room) and Kendra and I can only hold so many babies at one time. I could go into a lot of details, but let's just leave it at this: the babies are so super cute, and the orphanage is a rather sad place.
On a happier note, we've handed out a lot more toys recently! We brought beanie babies to the toddlers at the orphanage, which they loved, and a bunch of little toys to the 6-12 month babies at the orphanage. They were so funny...even the babies were fighting over the new toys. Their old toys totally got the cold shoulder. At the school on Wednesday, we brought some tennis balls. Oh man, were these a hit! There are about 90 kids at the school, and I only had 10 that day. It nearly caused a riot. After about a half an hour when they stopped attacking each other, they had a lot of fun. Some were kicking back and forth, others were playing catch, and a few were playing basketball with me...sort of. I was the hoop, which resulted in me getting a tennis ball to the face pretty often. But they had so much fun, and we can't wait to bring more.
The kids have tests all week this week in school, so they have half days. In the morning, they test the whole time. Then they have about an hour of playtime outside, and then they go home. When my class was testing, only half could test at a time because the room is so small. If they all tested at the same time, they would be practically sitting in each other's laps (because this is how they usually have to sit) which would make cheating pretty easy. So for over an hour, half of the kindergarten students sat squished on one side of the classroom silently. They had nothing to keep them busy, they literally just sat there and waited to take their tests. It was quite the process. As they finished and handed them in, I was looking them over...a lot of them didn't do very well. These kids need some serious school catch-up! They have next week off, because these tests finish off their semester. After that, Kendra and I will make those little five and six year olds hit the books ;)
Speaking of hitting the books, we had our first Amharic lesson yesterday! Amare is one of our amazing and brilliant teachers. He taught us all kinds of stuff...I've got some practicing to do! Next time I skype with you peeps, I can show off my skills. Get ready.
Okay, be excited. Because when I get back to America, I can make Shiro for all of you! Tigist, who cooks and cleans for us at the house, taught us how to make it yesterday. It's very similar to stew/soup, and it's delicious. This weekend, we're supposed to be getting an injera lesson, too. I could pretty much be an Ethiopian chef. It's impressive, I know. Get ready to taste some authentic Ethiopian when I get home! Kim, I know you're crazy pumped, but unfortunately you're going to have to wait another two and a half months. Sorry.
We had our first blackout yesterday! We had our second blackout yesterday, too. So that was pretty thrilling. The first happened when we were playing cards with Amare and another boy (whose name I have no chance of spelling right, so I'm just not even going to try) at our house last night. It was dark out, since it was nighttime (sidenote: we couldn't find the moon here for like a week and a half. But no need to fret, we finally spotted it a couple nights ago), so when the power went out we had to bust out some flashlights. In the end, it was a bit anticlimactic because the power came on about five minutes later. The second time, we had just killed several bugs and were peacefully reading in bed. When all the lights went out again, we decided that meant it was time to sleep. I suppose we should have turned the lights off before, because when the power came back on at like 1:00am it was pretty bright in our room. Kind of a rude awakening...not that we didn't fall right back to sleep :) Not gonna lie, my bed here is pretty comfotable!
This morning, we got up nice and early and got ready to head to the orphanage. We've been pretty proud of our minibus skills, feeling almost like legit Ethiopians working the system. We didn't feel so confident anymore after we were standing on the side of road for an hour and a half trying to flag one down. Usually we can get one...not so much today. We gave up at about 9:00 and went home feeling defeated. Dundee was at our house, and we told him our sad story. He laughed, and told us that he would drive us to a store today to buy some things for the kids at school instead. As a result, we didn't get to go to the orphanage today because we aren't as good at being Ethiopian as we thought ;) but we did get to buy some fun kid things! Casey, Maggie, Brady and Henry...I've got some souvenirs for you, too!
I think that brings us pretty much up to date for now! Hopefully I didn't forget any thrilling stories...I always feel like I'm leaving things out. I suppose when I get home and show you the one and a half bajillion pictures/videos I have, I'll remember all the other little stories. It's gonna be intense! :)
You'll never guess what Kendra and I got to do on Tuesday. Well, if you have Facebook you might be able to guess. Anyways, we got to shower!! First real shower in 12 days! I know, that's disgusting. Just keep in mind that during that time, we did clean off using bottled water. No worries. I've totally smelled like a beautiful flower every day in Africa...don't doubt it.
In other news, we went to the orphanage on Tuesday and played with the 6-12 month olds. I know I've already mentioned this, but it's ridiculous how little they get changed. When we got there in the morning, they were just waking up. They got pulled out of bed and put on the floor without being changed. When we left for lunch four hours later, they were laying down for naps and just being changed for the first time that day. All of them were in wet clothes, and stinky. That can't be comfortable. You guys (whoever is actually reading this) should just come adopt these babies because they are incredibly adorable and would be so much better off out of the orphanage! The nannies seem nice enough, but the babies just don't get cared for very well and it's really sad. They cry and cry (probably because they're sitting in soaking diapers and stuck in a tiny room) and Kendra and I can only hold so many babies at one time. I could go into a lot of details, but let's just leave it at this: the babies are so super cute, and the orphanage is a rather sad place.
On a happier note, we've handed out a lot more toys recently! We brought beanie babies to the toddlers at the orphanage, which they loved, and a bunch of little toys to the 6-12 month babies at the orphanage. They were so funny...even the babies were fighting over the new toys. Their old toys totally got the cold shoulder. At the school on Wednesday, we brought some tennis balls. Oh man, were these a hit! There are about 90 kids at the school, and I only had 10 that day. It nearly caused a riot. After about a half an hour when they stopped attacking each other, they had a lot of fun. Some were kicking back and forth, others were playing catch, and a few were playing basketball with me...sort of. I was the hoop, which resulted in me getting a tennis ball to the face pretty often. But they had so much fun, and we can't wait to bring more.
The kids have tests all week this week in school, so they have half days. In the morning, they test the whole time. Then they have about an hour of playtime outside, and then they go home. When my class was testing, only half could test at a time because the room is so small. If they all tested at the same time, they would be practically sitting in each other's laps (because this is how they usually have to sit) which would make cheating pretty easy. So for over an hour, half of the kindergarten students sat squished on one side of the classroom silently. They had nothing to keep them busy, they literally just sat there and waited to take their tests. It was quite the process. As they finished and handed them in, I was looking them over...a lot of them didn't do very well. These kids need some serious school catch-up! They have next week off, because these tests finish off their semester. After that, Kendra and I will make those little five and six year olds hit the books ;)
Speaking of hitting the books, we had our first Amharic lesson yesterday! Amare is one of our amazing and brilliant teachers. He taught us all kinds of stuff...I've got some practicing to do! Next time I skype with you peeps, I can show off my skills. Get ready.
Okay, be excited. Because when I get back to America, I can make Shiro for all of you! Tigist, who cooks and cleans for us at the house, taught us how to make it yesterday. It's very similar to stew/soup, and it's delicious. This weekend, we're supposed to be getting an injera lesson, too. I could pretty much be an Ethiopian chef. It's impressive, I know. Get ready to taste some authentic Ethiopian when I get home! Kim, I know you're crazy pumped, but unfortunately you're going to have to wait another two and a half months. Sorry.
We had our first blackout yesterday! We had our second blackout yesterday, too. So that was pretty thrilling. The first happened when we were playing cards with Amare and another boy (whose name I have no chance of spelling right, so I'm just not even going to try) at our house last night. It was dark out, since it was nighttime (sidenote: we couldn't find the moon here for like a week and a half. But no need to fret, we finally spotted it a couple nights ago), so when the power went out we had to bust out some flashlights. In the end, it was a bit anticlimactic because the power came on about five minutes later. The second time, we had just killed several bugs and were peacefully reading in bed. When all the lights went out again, we decided that meant it was time to sleep. I suppose we should have turned the lights off before, because when the power came back on at like 1:00am it was pretty bright in our room. Kind of a rude awakening...not that we didn't fall right back to sleep :) Not gonna lie, my bed here is pretty comfotable!
This morning, we got up nice and early and got ready to head to the orphanage. We've been pretty proud of our minibus skills, feeling almost like legit Ethiopians working the system. We didn't feel so confident anymore after we were standing on the side of road for an hour and a half trying to flag one down. Usually we can get one...not so much today. We gave up at about 9:00 and went home feeling defeated. Dundee was at our house, and we told him our sad story. He laughed, and told us that he would drive us to a store today to buy some things for the kids at school instead. As a result, we didn't get to go to the orphanage today because we aren't as good at being Ethiopian as we thought ;) but we did get to buy some fun kid things! Casey, Maggie, Brady and Henry...I've got some souvenirs for you, too!
I think that brings us pretty much up to date for now! Hopefully I didn't forget any thrilling stories...I always feel like I'm leaving things out. I suppose when I get home and show you the one and a half bajillion pictures/videos I have, I'll remember all the other little stories. It's gonna be intense! :)
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