Desert Gills

Ir: "Why did they eat manna off the ground?" Recently she has been taught not to eat food off the floor so the question was a good one. She was also seen recently crawling along the ground "looking for manna" since the "Lord would provide all her needs."

Ir quote from today: "Can you move to Wurren in a couple years because I want some gum?" She does talk on occasion about Grandpa's gum... its kind of amusing because he has this stash of gum which she found and which she was allowed liberal access to. This is something that looms large in her mind when she talks about Wurren. Another Ir quote: "I want to go to America in a couple hours, not a couple years." More seriously, it has been interesting to see her come to talk about flying to America or to Wurren or to Philadelphia fairly frequently over the past couple months. One of her favorite pretend play activities is to assemble various cushions as 'luggage,' and to pretend to enter a plane for her flight to sometimes Galmi, but more often America. Its just benign but I don't want to see it develop into a constellation of signs pointing to a dissatisfaction with where God has called us to live.

Ir: "Why do I have two fathers?" T: "You have an earthly father and a heavenly father." Ir: "Why do I have a birthday father and a heavenly father?" Yes, Ir is in that time of life when she is very preoccupied with birthdays. She keeps bringing imaginary birthday cakes to visitors and singing to them.

I participated in a softball tournament a couple weekends ago. Our team went 0-4, and I was unspectacular, but it was fun. I did scrape up my knees a couple times sliding into base wearing shorts, so the scabs on my knees were a source of fascination to Ir for weeks. She asked how I had gotten them, and having understood that it was from 'falling' while I ran, on a couple occasions she explained to me very kindly that 'kids run without falling,' and preceded to show how this feat might be done... running briskly back and forth across the room as a demonstration. She indeed did not fall.

One thing that really terrifies me in this city is driving. I had never really driven overseas - only once actually in Wadi Rum, Jordan in 98 - so didn't really figure I would have too many opportunities this time around. But our contacts here set us up with a loaner after our first couple months in Niamey. Its only cheaper than taxis if all four of us are going somewhere... but a whole lot more convenient. I generally take a taxi if I am going somewhere alone... usually just the agency office. But I actually don't go out that often. Taxis in and of themselves can often be an "Only in Africa" experience. All the taxis are much older than any car you'd see in the states... its amazing they still run, and they often have little quirks. One time, as we were driving along one of the paved roads, the taxi driver stuck a wet tshirt out the window and held it there as we drove... I can only assume as a cost-effective dry cleaning. Yes... the dearth of pav...

We were eating some re-heated leftover pasta this week, and Ir, who had not been impressed with the first iteration, was eating very slowly. In fairness to her, it was pretty soggy and not thoroughly heated up. So anyway, we were trying to hurry her around by interest her in the fruits available for desert... guavas, melons etc. We started munching on them, and T bit into one and said, "Mmm... so cold and *delicious*!" Ir then took a bite of pasta and said "Mmm... so cold and *delicious*!" We both cracked up... Ir had not a hint of sarcasm, she just often repeats what we say at her stage... but it was just so true what she said.

On Friday we went into "the bush" with some friends in a landrover. (I had thought it weird that expats here use the word "bush" much more than we would in the states... but I think its because there are some Hausa/French words that well correlate with the English "the bush.) Anyway, our goal: giraffes. East (not West) Africa is the place to go for safaris but there is apparently one last herd of giraffes in the wild near the capital. So off we tromped to track it down. After a couple hours of driving (half off road) we found them. 5 very graceful fellas chomping away contendedly as we got close. Ir as you might imagine not only wore her giraffe shirt but has since been talking to us about the experience. An authentic African experience I guess.