Motorcycle Mahem!

Oh dear I've just realised how long it has been since I updated this! So much has happened I'm going to give a brief summary and then start again with more detail from today!

So..

• We've had water since the last blog and all seems to be normal with it's supply - for now!
• We had Valentine's Day (not exactly an important day for me but heh others like it!). It is celebrated as the day of love and friendship here and so it is a huge day. In school we had a big sports competition, all the kids made cards, had cakes etc - insane! Then, on Saturday night at Youth Group we had a big dinner for about 50 of us! All good fun. Here are links to the photos (Dad, click on the writing i.e the name that is in blue or red!)

School Valentines day

Youth Group Valentines

• The sunshine is finally back and we are heading into the dry season and so I've been out enjoying the sun - getting burnt being part of the process!
• Dogs are slowly calming down.
• We've had the white plastic chairs stolen off our porch and Jezebel's collar stolen from around her neck! Such a scary dog that she is!
• I've been really sick for the past 2 or 3 weeks and with the help of the internet I've been able to diagnose it as Gas Poisoning! We've had a gas leak and it took a few weeks to realise what the smell was! I am 98% certain this is the problem and we 've changed the gas tank and the smell of rotten eggs has gone and we're starting to feel better. I've had headaches/migraines for 2 weeks, dizziness, extreme tiredness etc..basically every symptom associated with it! I decided not to go to the Dr but after changing the tank just wait to see if I get better. Slowly I appear to be and so that's good! A close call me thinks!
• School has been very frustrating recently - feel free to pray for that!
• Our church has bought some more land to build their school on and to build other outreach projects etc and we had a outdoor service of thanksgiving...Here is the link to click on.... Outdoor Service
• After that service we all went to a house of a Missionary family who are friends of mine and go to our church. I get on really really well with Hollie and she had said that they wanted to host a party at their house to get to know more people from church and so asked if I would invite my friends - and so I invited along my group from the Youth Group at church and we went and had fun at their house! It was great, hopefully the first of many parties there! Hollie and Israel and really lovely and have adoable children - they have been the family who helped us with showers, laundry etc when we had no water!! Here is the link to the photos of that party.... Hollie and Israel's Party

Please pray for my health and for school - it just gets very frustrating at times!

Other than that the most exciting thing that has happened in a while was today....my first motorbike lesson! Adony comes to me for English class every week and has a motorbike...3 in fact! So said he would teach Amanda and I!! So when he came around today we took his bike onto the campo next door to our house ( football field) and he taught us. Now, Amanda has riden before so knew roughly what to do...me- not a clue!! I had pysched myself up all week so that if I fell off or had an accident I would be prepared for it! We didn't wear a helmet for this lesson, not exactly a lot of traffic around on a field.

So, it was a slight obstacle course - the horses wandering aimlessly as they do, the children having soccer coaching at one end and then as I started my turn the men's football team doing their warm up jog around said field - and not the team of my friends! This did not bode well for me. After 3 attempts, and stalling before moving anywhere, I was off. They told me not to go above 2nd gear and to keep slow. Hmmm...a good plan. However...not one I had any control over, I just went faster! I went in a straight line and all was going well, as I turned the corner not so bad and I had to change gear again...either to 3rd or slow right down to 1st...yup I chose the faster option. Now I had caught up with the men running and was pretty much just chasing them...hilarious. It's not my fault that they were going in the same direction as me. They were laughing at me until they turned around and saw I was speeding up and heading straight for them...hair flying behind me, looking quite the part...apart from....panic written across my face! Then the panic stricken look spread across their faces and it was like the parting of the Red Sea and Moses...and I drove right through the middle!! Well...they should have been running faster! I drove straight up to Adony and Amanda and still couldn't slow down and so just stopped!! They were killing themselves laughing...at me and at the poor men. Now girls don't really ride motorbikes here, certainly not young white girls...so to have one nearly run you down..??! I wish Amanda could explain it to you! But..I'm all ready and waiting for my next lesson....I might work on slowing down and control next time! But heh - I didn't fall off! All safe though - relatively.

I'll try and keep this more up to date now!