a week in the life...

Lately, I've been trying to pull out my camera more often and snap photos of day to day life. So though the perspective may be a bit lopsided (Adam could capture more of the "work" front of things if he were the one taking most of the pictures), here are some of my photos from the last week or so. A glimpse of what life is like here in the big city of Yaoundé, Cameroon (and particularly in our small corner of it).

Cameroonian cuisine, I'm discovering, is full of absolutely delicious stuff I've never tasted or imagined! Here's Julia with freshly-steamed koki. A paste made of ground black-eyed peas, hot pepper, red palm oil and garlic is wrapped in banana leaves and then steamed in a large pot. Oh, YUM!

Found this growing in my kitchen sink. Think I need to clean a little better?

On the road, you often see many more taxis than other vehicles.

Lots of things are for sale on the side of the road. Wood...

Televisions/computer monitors of questionable quality:

Cement.

There are many kinds of motorized vehicles to be seen. Here, a vehicle advertising an insecticide:

A roadside carpenter:

Hair salon, perhaps just for men judging by the artwork:

Plastic salesman creatively toting many wares:

Just a couple more pictures on the road:

One of several very happy visits with a pastor and friend from Berbérati, who's living in the neighborhood for a few weeks:

Another mouth-watering dish called ekwang - basically cocoyam "dumplings" wrapped in cocoyam leaves and cooked in a sauce of red palm oil, crushed crayfish and smoked fish. Sam enjoyed it so much that he ate it for lunch...and snack...and supper:

John and Sam have so many little friends here that they love running and playing with:

And today my sweet, fun girl turned 11 months old!

giving thanks today

Today we are thankful...

For our amazing families: our loving parents who raised us faithfully and keep loving us so well, even from afar; our brothers, sisters and the extended clans. We always miss them, but maybe a little more on special days that are meant to be spent together...

For the family of God: the brothers and sisters we get to cross paths with in this place and at this time, catching glimpses of what it will be like to spend eternity with Jesus and all who belong to Him (from every nation and every era of time!)

For getting to watch friends enjoy mashed potatoes and gravy for the first time...

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For delicious pumpkin squash pies and so many happy Thanksgiving memories (yes, today I have reminisced of some wonderful Thanksgivings past! How these special days of the year tend to live on in the heart...)

For lots of little children eating, laughing, playing and having crazy fun!

For this life, yes, we are thankful. But also for a great truth that nature itself is always reminding us of. This life now is just the seed that will one day sprout and grow into eternal life. The love we felt with our family and friends today are just foretastes of what it will be like to be "face to face" when the dwelling of God is with man.

For the One who has promised to walk this path with us, all the way home: for Him most of all, we are thankful today.

Happy 6th birthday to John!

Having celebrated his first birthday in France, second birthday in Dallas, third birthday in Bangui, fourth birthday in Berbérati  and Gamboula, and fifth birthday back in Dallas, John got to celebrate his sixth birthday in Cameroon!

In keeping with his people-loving personality, John wanted to invite his entire social network (well, at least those who live within the general area) to his birthday party. Not so sure about footing a dinner bill for dozens of guests (and also remembering that Bangui birthday, when we invited so many guests that there was pretty much standing room only!), we invited his friends for Tampicos (a type of frozen treat popular with kids here) and some tag at the soccer field.

We enjoyed having the Kingues with us for supper: we met and got to know each other in Bangui, and now we are happy to be neighbors once again. Supper was peanut sauce and chocolate cake with pink frosting, per John's request.

I'm so thankful for our six-year-old, who always seems busy with some project indoors or outdoors, He loves to learn and play, and is so fun to be around. I'm thankful for his love for Jesus and others. Here are a few photos of John from the past week: happy birthday to my...

book-reading,

big brother,

snake-killing (yep, that's a green mamba John's helping to finish off right there!),

olive-loving,

hard-working

six-year-old!

We love you, John!

the seasons here

Yes, I miss fall. I look at friends' photos on Facebook, and I can almost smell those piles of brown and orange leaves. I can almost feel them crunching underfoot. I remember the times we would ask our neighbors if we could rake all their leaves and bring them over to our own backyard to play with. Now, as the parent, I realize how much patience Mom had with us. But how I loved making a huge bed out of leaves, covering it with an old sheet carefully tucked in around the edges. I took some blissful naps on those leaf-beds, covered with a blanket to protect against the Autumn chill.

But I can't take for granted the seasons I get to experience now. So very different from Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter! Here, we have dry season and rainy season. Rainy season, at the moment. There's often a sudden cool wind that gives us a minute's warning that a torrential downpour is on its way toward us. More days than not, I'll feel that breeze rush into the house, and I will drop whatever else I'm doing to run outside and frantically rip clothes off the line before my sun-dried clothes get drenched with tropical rain.

I love standing at the window or on the step waiting for the rain to arrive. You can hear the thunderous sound of its approach on tin roofs; then, with a deafening roar, it arrives.

If you are standing outside when it comes, you might as well be standing under a waterfall. The other day, while this neighborhood was in the midst of a days-long city-water outage, a friend told me she had considered going outside and just shampooing up her hair and taking a rain-shower. Indeed, when the rain arrives, people everywhere are gratefully putting out buckets to catch the precious torrents.

As far as seasonal fun, you should hear the boys' cries of glee when the rain hits. If I let them run outside, they will doubtless return drenched, mud-covered and totally content at the end of the rain. There was that one time John ran out in a white t-shirt...a t-shirt that will never be white again, no matter how much bleach is used on it. So these little guys are making their own youthful memories, like my happy autumn-leaves memories from childhood...even if they are memories in different place, and in a different kind of season.

After the rains, it is calm, and the sky is beautiful and clear again. Time to go hang the laundry back out on the line.