Mud House

07.22.15

I can't believe I've been in Africa for almost 2 weeks now! That's crazy! A couple days ago Krystal, the boys, and I all walked to the stores to get bread milk and a couple of other things. We got to try donuts from the bakery. They were actually pretty good! Not nearly as sweet as ours in the US, but they were good! On the way home a man stopped us and said "look my baby." and gestured to his daughter who was probably about 4 or 5 years old. He shook our hands and told his daughter to do the same. She was super cute! I swear it's like we're famous here! ha ha! Seems like a lot of people want to talk to us. Which I don't mind! It's really cool to be able to communicate with the people here. 

We got the chance to go to a traditional Ethiopian house last night! Well, The Fussner's have already been, but it was a first for me! We went to Messeret's house for her young girls' graduation party it was a small mud house. The whole house was smaller than my bedroom at home. Maybe even half the size! it had a small kitchen and bedroom.  One bed, three people. The girls were adorable! Ficarasalaam and her older sister (I can't remember her name) are both beautiful! They are four and five or six years old. 

The food messeret made was so good! I would've eaten so much more, but I had too  take it easy because my stomach has already been a little upset since I've been here. But it was all Ethiopian food with the exception of lasagna. Cabbage and potatoes, green beans and carrots, bread, spring rolls, rice, and some other foods I don't know how to pronounce yet! But all that was homemade! [We had pretty good spread!]

We stayed for a couple of hours and visited with Messy and her girls, neighbors, friends, and family. Most cotuld speak some English, but some couldn't. Most were women but there were some men, but we didn't speak with them. I don't think they could speak English. The lady seemed impressed with the AMHARIC that Heith and Joshua knew.   

They are very pushy when it comes to food! You finisa plate they tell you to get more. No matter how much you eat or say no thank you! Lol! Ficarasalaam spent most of the night in Hheith's laps teaching him new words in Amharic.. And he taught her some English words. Both of Messy's girls caun read and write in English but they can't speak it. But Fica knows what cake is! LOL! [While] waiting for the food, we sat on the bed with the window open and the gate was open as well. Some of the kids passing by stopped to wave and blow kisses to us! It was so funny! They kept coming back too! LOL! When we gave the girls their present of chocolates and we're getting ready to leave, Ficarasalaam came to me and I started talking to her. I said "Ficarasalaam?" And pointed to her. And she started smiling and nodding your head yes. Then I pointed to myself and said "Sarah". She repeated Sarah and her grin grew bigger. She was so cute! She started playing with my hair and seemed like she was just having a ball playing with it! 

There was also a little girl there named Sarah. Heith told her my name with Sarah to and she started just grinning. She came over by me later and I pointed at her and said "Sarah!" Then pointed at myself and said the same. She started smiling and nodding then ran off to play. It was really fun to see and experience so much culture at once! We had homemade coffee and got to watch them cook the beans and everything! I thought it was good! We had chocolate cake.it was good, but since they use real sugar and not a lot it wasn't very sweet. The coffee here is so much better than American coffee! Though it was a small madhouse we said a lot of people and they're pretty comfortably and they had electricity! So that was nice!  

Messy has an oven small enough that she alone can carry it! It was pretty cool! Messy walked us out so we would make it up the slippery uphill climb that was their walkway to the house. It was dark so messy held her held my hand until we reached the stairs at the top. We hugged and said ciao. When we arrived earlier for the party message showed me how to properly greet someone. You take the person's hand and lean in and kiss close to their face three times. But I've seen people say goodbye the same way. Miss you seemed really happy that we came and she just kept thanking us! We had a pretty quiet ride home. We sauce two horses in the middle of the road, the car in front of us barely missed one of them! 
Once we got home and got the boys in bed, Krystal told me that Joshua was scared [and having a hard time going to sleep. He was pretty concerned and Krystal tried to console him.] Krystal prayed with him and he went to sleep.  he was almost crying when he was telling Krystal about it so he was pretty torn up about it. Krystal told me some about some violent things they had seen and that was common but she said that what Joshuah just described wasn't something she expected to see on the side of a busy road. So I don't know but I just hope Joshua can either forget about it or find peace about it through prayer! 
we continued  to talk about how the night had gone and the plans for the rest of the week,  and then we went straight to bed! Today nothing much but cleaning and we will probably try to pack a bit. Messy and her girls are coming to visit on Saturday so I'm excited about that! I get to meet Daniel on Monday he comes to help us move. Daniel is sort of like the fussners interpreter. Well, that's about it! Hopefully within the next week or two I can update my blog!(which I never got to do in Ethiopia! Lol!)

         Simply,
                Sarah

 I apologize for the vagueness of the last story! I decided it best to leave some of that out. But please let this be a reminder to pray for not only the missionaries, but their children! Moving to a new place is hard enough, but when the culture is full of violence and filth, it can affect the MK's in a big way! So please don't forget to pray for missionary kids!