Guards dropping, Big rigs stuck, Cobras hiding

Several events of the last couple of days have brought home the fact that we "aren’t in Kansas anymore." The other night as we were getting ready to go to sleep, we received a call from one of the guards. He reported that another guard, “had dropped.” Not knowing what that meant, Benedict had to ask, “Is he asleep, did he faint, is he dead?” He was just very sick, and I guess he collapsed. Francis Mboko drove him home.

The same night at 3 am we got a call saying that one of the big trucks parking for the night was stuck. Our parking lot is not paved, although we have put layers of laterite and gravel. Many of the trucks who park overnight are very heavy and very long. That night there were 18 trucks, so not much room to maneuver. Benedict had to find chains and lights so that the truck driver and his partner who was driving another truck could get the one unstuck. The whole process took a couple of hours.

Then people began seeing a very large snake on the path between the school and the community center. Roman saw it “standing up” and found the holes where it was living. Today I had to ask the older boys to redirect children walking to school to come around another longer way, so that they wouldn’t come near the snake. Our workers got the backhoe (thanks Uncle Wayne), dug up the holes and eventually killed the snake.

So life is never dull or boring or commonplace. And we are always learning something in all of these circumstances.