Some ramblings

It’s that time of year again, everything looks dusty. There is almost no grass and what little there is, is dust coloured. Everywhere there are huge swathes of dust. When you are driving you literally can’t see the car in front for dust. That is because they are repairing the roads again so the main road into town is shut off with random tyres and large stones and everyone creates their own diversion along the dust track. It is quite dangerous and I have had a few near misses with cyclists. God definitely watches over my driving. A few seconds and millimetres in the wrong direction and it could have been a whole different story.

Lots of people seem to be ill here at the moment, sore throats, aches, malaria. Maybe swine flu has reached Dodoma! However, we are all well. Bethany had another front tooth fall out this week, of which she is very proud. I now have two very gappy children. Caleb is thrilled because his girlfriend next door has arrived back from Sweden, which means he gets to go out to lunch at her house and vice versa and he gets to fight with Ruben next door about who is going to marry Elizabeth. It is very serious. Daniel says he is getting a bit tired of the love triangle!!

Joshua has his actual 8th birthday tomorrow. He had his party when my mum was here but tomorrow he gets his presents. He seems to be really thriving in school this year with his new teacher and loves to go. He got full marks on his test on the Romans this week. I was quite surprised that he actually knew some stuff. He has become a bookworm like his parents; we just need to wait for the other two to catch up and then it will be a very quiet house!!

Elizabeti came back to work this week. She will now work on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I wasn’t sure how it would be having her back because every time I saw her it just reminded me of the whole Sarah thing. Anyway I really prayed about it and it has been great. I am really beginning to feel that I am getting over what happened to Sarah, not that we don’t miss her but I can think about it all without feeling nauseous. For those of you who don’t know she had HIV, an all too common reality here. People die like flies here of various minor aliments or nothing. I suspect that more often than not it is HIV linked. So much stigma surrounds Aids here that people do not want to talk about it. I only know about Sarah because I went to speak to the doctor at the hospital the day after she died. The family still don’t know what happened and haven’t asked. Limited medical knowledge and a kind of fatalistic acceptance, means that people don’t really ask any questions. Elizabeti, bless her went to take a test to prove to me that she didn’t have HIV. I said she didn’t have to but I think she wanted to. To be honest it’s nice to know. With the initial shock I did feel terrible that I had let someone with HIV look after my children, but I think I have worked through those feelings now. However out of control things can sometimes feel here, I have to trust that God is in control and that he knew what he was doing when Sarah started working for our family. I look forward to seeing her again one day under very different circumstances!!

TIA This is Africa