Visitors, New students, and a lunar eclipse

Visitors, New students, and a lunar eclipse

Well, it has been a very busy but good last couple of weeks. Never a
boring moment.

We had Kayla and Sarah Cook here for 10 days. They were here 2 ½
years ago. Kayla is a nurse and Sarah is her daughter and a flight
attendant in the US. They did a wonderful series of classes at school
on the human body. The way they present things makes it a way that
the children won't forget. They also set up the examining room in the
clinic, so we should be able to start using it. And they did very
complete physicals on all of the kids. They had done that when they
were here before, but about half of the kids weren't living in the
Village then. (Adam had grown over 6 inches and so had Docklin.) So
they had a very busy time for 10 days.

On Friday Prince, a Zimbabwean who is in ministry in Kenya, brought
his wife. He had been here in November to do the videotaping and made
that very nice tape that is now on You tube. He was here to video a
little more, including an introduction for a short video, with Claude
Allen who arrived on Saturday.

Prince's wife is Chipo and she has started a school in a poor section
of Nairobi, Kenya and it is in a 40 foot container. Prince had wanted
her to come and see what is going on here including with our school.
So this time she came with him.

Claude, who arrived on Saturday, is an advisor to our AKCLI Board in
the US. He has been in over 200 countries, both in his current job
and when he worked at the White House as domestic policy advisor to
President Bush. I enjoyed asking him questions about his jobs in
Washington and things he did then.

On Monday a man from Zimbabwe arrived, Francis. His wife is a friend
of Susan Lukaart in MI where she is teaching at Aquinas University.
They want to return to Africa at some point in the future.

Prince, Chipo, and Claude all left on Tuesday. Francis left on
Wednesday morning and then a couple who are from the Philippines but
are living in Lusaka working for an NGO, came out for the morning and
lunch. How amazing that in a short amount of time we can have all
these visitors from places around the world!

In addition to all the visitors coming and going, things have been
busy at school. We now have 14 additional children attending school,
children of our workers. Most can't read or write and understand very
little English. I have been teaching 12 of them in the mornings. I
have been doing pre-reading activities, and then some basic math. I
have been using the office, which is still somewhat a mess from
unloading the container and all the boxes with books and teachers'
supplies. Hopefully by the end of next week, the office will be
presentable and usable.

I enjoy working with these new kids since it gives me a chance to get
to know them. Most of them are so eager and want to learn. One girl,
Grace, really touches my heart. She is 10 years old and has never
been to school. She can kind of write her numbers but they are so
tiny, and she is still in the stage where they are backwards or upside
down sometimes. I can tell that she is trying to use what little
English she is learning, and every morning she runs up to greet me in
a very joyful manner.

Finally, last night was exciting. We had a complete lunar eclipse.
Kamau had had the yard workers collect fire wood. We started the
campfire around 8:00 and the eclipse began around 8:20. Many of the
kids were pretty active, singing, and "bouncing around." However,
Mary J, and Gift small came and stood by my chair the whole time
asking questions and looking at the moon. It was very neat. When the
moon was about half covered I made all the kids sit and be quiet and
ask questions if they had any. Around 9:30 the moon was covered.
Actually it looked kind of brown and not white. It was a perfectly
clear sky and as the moon disappeared, you could see the stars even
more brightly. The Southern Cross and the Milky Way are so clear to
see. As soon as the moon disappeared everyone went to bed. It stayed
covered for about 2 hours, so we weren't going to wait that long. But
this morning the white moon was back for all to see.

It is much cooler now. It was about 45 degrees this morning, so I
wear several layers. I would much rather stay in bed under the
covers! But it does warm up and was probably in the 70s during the
day.

Our lives are filled with so much variety: of people, of children, of
daily activities, and the world around us. I'm so glad that our God
is a God of creativity and variety and that He shares that with us.