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| A Trip to A Friend's - A Friend Show's He's following a New Road. It was a sweet time as our brother from our village travelled with us to a friend's village to celebrate this day with them.    
Within that same week, our brother declared, "I want to be bapt1iz3d."  Down by the creekside, a story was told and a prayer said.   A little one looks one, clings to the pantleg of a big "brother", hopefull one day to follow in his footsteps. Dirty, but oh so sweet water. Our brother told a story of how one African man came to know the story of J3sus. That African man was bapt1iz3d to show that belief to the world. "Now", our brother exclaims, "I am like that African man and want to be bapt1z3d."     
You know it's hot when the Africans are tearing down trees to wear on their heads. 
Soon after - a much needed break and time of refreshing and reflecting was upon us. What better place, than the coast of Benin.    
We take our times of refreshment serious: see ice cream selection below and mad tennis playing skillz by Reaiah.  
Once training had begun, the badminton tournament was underway as well. Some teams, while dressed in matching "OneStory" apparel, did not fair as well as they had hoped. But all is fair in OneStory Badminton play. 
Amazing Race OneStory - A chance to ride on the back of "zimmies" (motos) through the crazed streets of Cotonou, performing mad feats in order to win the prize of a goodbye dinner to some of our teams. Thankfully my Amazing Race team was comprised of the superhero team of Charlie's Angels, as we were given the task of choosing a Superhero team and attiring yourself as such with market apparel found in the streets, then saving a city worker from dehydration by giving him a coconut. After all, "if you're not peeing, you're not drinking." .... 
And if training time wasn't sweet enough, with some moms from Alabama to give us some southern cookin', we got to eat granola! Whoo hooo! Thank you Mr. Quaker Oat, hat and all. 
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| Greetings! Ah, this month has brought exciting events as always. You never know what to expect. Expectation: The "Pink Outfit Party" in which we bought outfits, along with the rest of the women in our family, six months ago was never going to come to fruition. Reality: It happened. Expectation #2: It was just a party to celebrate being done with the harvest. There would be mass eating and dancing. Reality: It was a time to go out to the main "fetish" and offer sacrifices, smearing blood on rocks, dancing not just to dance but to ask these fetish idols for things and to parade around greeting each one. Needless to say, this was not the fun celebration for us we'd hoped for. Conclusion: I knew I didn't like pink outfits to begin with.  
There was dancing. 
They can pull of these pink outfits quite well, but you notice I chose not to post a picture of myself in this.   One of the cutest kids in our family all decked out in new attire. We headed out ... "pink people on parade" .... don't ask where we were going. We didn't know til we got there.
 
Meanwhile, we are wrapping up building season here. Mud bricks out the wazooo. Other expectations: I was walking in the kitchen to heat up some water. I expected to look out the window. Reality: I could not see out of the window. There was a bat plastered to it. Do not fear. It was alive. And to my knowledge, is still alive today (although it's no longer stuck to our "window") 
Expectation: We were the only two new kids learning how to ride a moto. Reality: Our 2-year old village brother is learning as well.  (me ... ready for the ride to the village... backpack on, helmet on, skirt on, earings in....)
Modaboo's mad riding skillz .... shhhh, don't bother him, he's concentrating. Easter Celebration - With our friends down "south"  
Sleep-helpers are easy to find here in Mali. You try to nap alone and something must be wrong .... suddenly, a child appears beside you to keep you company while napping. It's the African way. 
If it appears that Krystal and I are wearing matching outfits, yes, we are. It too, is an African thing. We are soooo cool right now. And hey .... these outfits aren't even pink. 
Expectations of driving back to town without blowing a tire ... no way ... we know better than to expect that. There was a big celebration as a new Catholic church opened its doors for the first time in a nearby town. And man was it a celebration. Dancing, African music, Catholic-style ceremony. The building was beautiful with stained-glass windows with Supyire scriptures on them.   
So, to sum up the month ... it's been your average pink-outfit, shredded tire, stained-glass window kind of month. Stay tuned for next month's episodes of expectation vs reality. | | |
| Ah, back to life here as normal? At the start of each day, we go on extensive greeting walks to make sure we say good morning and "How was your house?" to everyone in our extended village family. Better make sure the headwrap is on and throat cleared before stepping foot outside the hut. 
Our favorite village task: Gathering a large crew together and listening to stories...   It's officially hot season again ... among sleeping outside, getting bit by mosquitos, and sweating all day ... this now means the start of cotton spinning season again! You'd think we'd be better at it this year, but unfortunately that's not the case. 
Ah, but don't you worry ... there's still time to go to the field, gather sticks, or beat some grain, or just fight over an old tire ....   We have a new addition to our family ... she's named after Krystal. However, it's hard for them to pronounce that name, so it comes out as "Krystoff". Isn't she a cutie! (She cries all day - it's not just because we're white) There's always time in a day to hug a child. Aren't they precious!  
The work is never finished .... This is a typical "crafting session" in which we work to put a story into the Supyire language. Afternoon tea and a story, ah, good stuff.  
Once the story is crafted into the Supyire language, we back-translate the story back into English. Here is our awesome and wonderful English/Supyire speaker who tackles this task for us.  And of course, as you saw the pictures above, once the stories are back-translated and edited if need be, they are then tested with a group of our friends who have never heard these stories before. Nowdays, we are testing in multiple villages and splitting time in different places. Transportation became a slight issue. Solution: See below. Please pick out five things you find particularly odd about the picture.   Things A Westerner May Find Odd above the Above Photos: We have a motorcycle. That building-looking-thingy is a house. We are taking the motorcycle out of a house. We are practicing driving the motorcycle around circles in the yard. That dirt-like ground surface is our yard. We are wearing quite unique outfits to be riding on a motorcycle. We have a motorcycle. Off we head to a testing session in a nearby village that is best accessible by bush-path on a moto. 
Yes, keep praying for us. | | |
| When far away from home at Christmas, make Christmas as close to home as possible: Play in the snow (or cotton or dust) 
Make snow angels  
Go find nuts for your stocking (a slightly larger process than buying a can at WalMart) 
Digging up the field after it's been burned .... forming piles of sand/dirt... sifting the dirt on "holy" tables    
fun for all ages  
but have fun doing up .... there's no rules against dancing while you harvest the nuts. Instead of caroling ..... try cow calling ... "orrrrrrrrow chay .... orrrrrrrow chay ..... orrrrrow chay" Please note that this only works if the cow speaks "Fulfulbe". If the cow speaks another language you're out of luck. 
Eat. Instead of roasting a turkey or having a spiral cut ham .... have some goats, along with 110 lbs of rice, 22 lbs of potatoes, and some watermelon. Mmmm, not quite mom's cooking, but pretty good.   
Give fun gifts.  
Leave time for creative toy play .... You remember the days when the box gets played with more than the toy inside??    
More importantly.... enjoy your family.            (let's not leave out the importance of wearing matching Christmas skirts) Most importantly.... remember why you celebrate Christmas. Share His Word, sing His praises, lift up your voice to Him.   
a gathering of those who came to hear His Word Merry Christmas. Happy New Year. | | |
| 12/10/2007 
I can't believe it's almost Christmas! Merry Christmas everyone! Yes, we went Christmas shopping in the lovely African market of Mayberry and boy did we find some goods. A beautiful Christmas sweatshirt, sported by Krystal, lovely tobogans, some hand-knitted baby hats and mittens worn by our small penguin friend, a traditional Santa hat, worn by "Ponch" the big penguin, and a Malian soccer jersey, see me. What else could say "Merry Christmas"? Please note - it is cold now. Praise Him! We're waking up under blankets in sweatsuits.... no fear though, don't send the ski jacket just yet, it is still a low of 65. We will survive without frostbite. So, time marches on .... so do birthdays and holidays like Thanksgiving. What's been going on? Village life is as normal: 
The cutest little one - enjoying the food of the season - corn. I may take her back home with me. (not the corn) 
The colorful outfits, the loud music, drums, dancing, shakers - all part of a funeral procession. 
Cooking for the big party! 
Everything has a rhythm and a beat and a pause to clap in-between.  
It's cotton season. Feels like Christmas. Looks like snow. 
Finishing up the peanut shelling - cleaning up. 
That's a whole lot of sorghum drying. I'm not sure why there's a flag. I guess it's like man's first step on the moon - something worth marking your territory for. Our one year retreat and training came and went in Burkina Faso: 
Rock climbing - whoo hoo! Lot's of fun, until our tour guide told us the rocks were not stable. Oh well. Minor detail. 
Nalgene - Need I say more? 
The crew. 
One guess: Famous Village People song. What else would you want to do after climbing to the top of a rock formation? Do you think any of the Africans know "YMCA"?  
There is water in Africa, at least right now. It's quite a pretty sight too.  We got dressed up and celebrated as some of our brothers and sisters are leaving to go back to the states soon. Me and Krystal - don't we look cute. 
Our 3 newest sisters. 
Can you say "SMORES"! Thank you.... THANKSGIVING Thanksgiving came and went in our village and town - our "Turkey Day" meal consisted of hummus, banana muffins, black eyed peas, and potatoes. (yes, it is odd). Day after Thanksgiving - instead of going shopping, we drove to the capital, ate a lot, then I got malaria. I'm pretty sure it wasn't related to the amount of food ingested, although our village claims that if you eat too many peanuts you'll get malaria. Watch out you Peter Pan fans! Our latest news: No need to worry. There are still monkeys in Africa. One drove up on a bicycle the other day. If it weren't for the lack of a good place to keep it, rabies,we already have pets - our 4 rats in our hut, the need to feed it, and the fact that it's a monkey ... we almost got a pet.  
He is cute though, huh? A little self-involved. | | |
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