Rock Art, Chaos and Dik Dik

As a way to celebrate Christmas as a team and take a little "holiday" our team drove about 2 hours to see the Kolo rock paintings. The dates on these paintings apparently are anywhere between 100 and 10,000 years old... Nice date range huh? Despite the lack of knowledge on the paintings, the day was a success. You have to take a crazy drive up the mountain, go on a gorgeous hike even further and finally you get to see rock paintings that have been there for... well, lets just say awhile. The rock paintings were cool but the adventure was definitely in getting there!

A rock painting of three women with a traditional hairstyle for celebrations.

Our family at one of the resting spots.

The fog had completely set in as the rain began. Here, Thailie and Mat have reached the top despite the rain.

Safe on Mommy's back, under my rain jacket, Nia peeks out to see if the rain has stopped.

Redefining the "Baby Bump" Kim and I kept the little ones dry as we made it back to the bottom. (Kim is carrying Gideon and Rachel's little girl Sarah.)

We had a church service at the top and shared a lunch together. It rained off and on most the day, but for us, this just added to the fun!

We sang a few Christmas songs and Gideon brought our Christmas message.

Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were this week but they will be in their own post.

As part of our Christmas decorations we have a cross up with the verse Matthew 20:28 "The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many." This has really got me thinking about what we are doing here, challenging myself as to whether or not my actions and priorities are motivated by serving. Well, after our team day, a bunch of girls came by our house and clearly wanted to hang out. Due to the busyness of the last few days our house was a mess and I just wanted to get things accomplished - I did not want a bunch of rowdy kids in my house only to make the mess worse. Then I remembered the verse and I thought about how opening my home is a way of serving. So, the kids hung out, filling our living room, I wasn't able to get anything done but really, it is fun to have them here.

Our neighbor lady stopped by to see what all the chaos was about. It definitely doesn't make sense to them that we let the kids just hang out at our house.

Thailie's let the girls braid her hair line way they do theirs.

Hmmm, somehow hers looks slightly different than theirs - and came out after 20min.

A little while later, a lot of the kids headed out but a few of the older girls returned. I was beginning to prepare dinner and trying to get a little cleaning done. One of the girls saw I had cabbage and offered to cut it, the next saw my broom and offered to sweep, they came into the kitchen and it wasn't long before my floors were swept and mopped, my table full of dishes was cleared and cleaned and my dinner was prepared and cooking! I felt very thankful and blessed. It felt like I was rewarded for choosing to serve and love rather than keep my house clean. They cleaned faster and better than I could have on my own and we built relationships in the meantime!

On Friday the team went into Kondoa for a supply run. The girls and I tagged along this time to take Nia to the doctor there. About a month ago she had hurt her arm and then just re-injured it Christmas Eve. From what I've seen I think she had a pulled elbow. Mat and I are thinking it was out for a few days but went back into place the night before. Since we were going to Kondoa, and her arm was still bothering her we decided to take her in and see what our African hospital experience would be like.

They said it seems like everything we thought was probably the case and that it now was probably just strained muscles and ligaments. They gave her a super fancy sling and sent us on our way. We were surprised to learn that it cost us nothing because children under 5 are free! Although the hospital was nothing close to what you would encounter in the States, it seemed they understood us, were knowledgable about the situation and were able to provide a course of action for us to take. Now the only trick will be getting Nia "the tornado" to keep a sling on for a whole week! Ha!

Nia with her high-tech sling and medical chart.

We found this sweet bike in Kondoa - too bad there is no way Thai could tote around Nia on the Busi roads.

There are more differences to driving over here than just driving on the other side of the road. Trying not to hit random animals and livestock is just one of the other ways that it is different. Unfortunately we are not always successful. This trip took out two chickens and a dik dik! Since the dik dik is wild game, at Peter's request we turned around to get it.

 

As he approached the dik dik, it started to jerk; it was then that Mat was able to break in his new knife by finishing off the dik dik.