Malaria and other maladies

The first draft of this post was like 'whiny whinety whine whine whiiiine', so, I deleted it.

Here's the summary: David's been sick (for weeks) and Abram and I have been sick, and we're all exhausted- like, really exhausted- and every non-essential thing in my life has been thrown out the window, leaving my to-do list looking something like this:

Keep David alive
Brush my teeth
Make dinner maybe

And in the midst of battling malaria AND bronchitis, Davidy decided to cut two teeth

They're there. I promise. You try taking a picture of the inside of a grumpy baby's mouth!

making this the easiest/hardest teething session ever, as in, we didn't even notice (or if we did, we attributed it to his not feeling well already).

Davidy continues to be a delight, even when he's sick. He will cough his little brains out, throw up on you, then give you a smile that will break your heart, and crawl off to play somewhere.

He's crawling now, and learned to pull himself up, cruise around furniture, and climb up our (two) steps- all in just a few days' time. He's starting to get better (thanks to our new pediatrician, one round of malaria meds and two rounds of antibiotics) and loves eating fruit, veggies, and pureed chicken. He's still very outgoing and loves being held, although when he's not feeling well, he really prefers Mama.

Just your typical Sunday at church.

Abram has been extremely busy, because in addition to teaching and doing interviews for his paper, he's been sick himself, and has been caring for me and David as much as possible. He's working really hard, and I am loving attending his Genesis class (when I'm able) and watching him at work. He's such a good teacher, and I honestly don't think I know anyone who is as passionate about the Old Testament as he is.

Also he's one of the most hands-on fathers I've ever met or married.

I am not exaggerating about my to-do lists lately, but under 'normal' circumstances, I have enough to keep me busy- even when Davidy is healthy!- with Visible Grace stuff, helping teach English here in TZ, trying to stay in touch with family, and hosting dinners, prayer meetings, and birthday parties here in our home.

Sometimes David comes with me to help with NTC's English class.

At the beginning of May, David and I flew over to Dar-es-Salaam to attend an AIM women's retreat. It was lovely to spend time with some friends we had made last year (when we lived in Dar last summer) and to soak up some girly time. The retreat fell on Mother's Day weekend, and for my first (ish) Mother's Day, my friends watched David while I took a long, hot shower and read my Bible. What more could a girl ask for?! 

David slept through craft time at the retreat. Also, he looks fake. But he's not. 

David got to play in real grass for the first time- and he loved it!

We were blessed with a chance to go to the Serengeti again a few weeks ago with some friends of friends who were visiting. A safari is always a great diversion from our real lives, and we feel grateful to live so near to all this wildlife, and for having a car and being able to drive others around!

I hope I never never never grow tired of these guys.

The school year is rapidly coming to a close, with graduation only a few weeks away! After that, we are looking forward to hosting our good friend Lindsay, and then taking her up to Nairobi to visit our kiddos at Visible Grace!

One day soon I hope to find time (hahaHA) to blog more than a quick, 'here's another picture of David, did I mention I like giraffes?' update. I have so many thoughts and feelings, and I know you're dying to hear them, internet. Till then, here are some more pictures of David. Again. 

Spring Break

A solid month has gone by since I've written anything, and here's the thing: I have thought about or planned to blog almost every single day for the past 4 weeks. I have major respect for any mother who gets anything done. Anything. Did you brush your teeth today? You are awesome. You showered?!  And your neighbour didn't have to come over and hold your screaming baby? I don't even believe you.

Me? Cry? Never!

Anyway- lots has happened in our crazy, boring, exciting, busy lives. Here's a brief update.

April is a holiday for the college where Abram teaches- most of East Africa uses a year-round system, where schools are closed in April, August and December. The month has gone by quickly and I can hardly believe classes will be starting again on Monday. It's been a nice change of pace, and a chance to get to spend more time together, and to travel a bit!

Last week we were in Nairobi, visiting Visible Grace and some of our friends in the area, as well as doing major shopping (dark chocolate, decaf coffee, gluten free soy sauce, rice flour...).

Me: Thanks for being so generous and letting me buy so much stuff, and not complaining about it!
Abram: Well, I haven't totaled it all up yet. I'll complain later.
Me: ...Oh.

(He didn't complain, though. He's so generous. Abram would live off of $3 for the rest of his life, I think. Whereas I'm like, "well, in order to be truly happy, I need a hand mixer Jesus." I've never met anyone as content and non-materialistic as him. It's so annoying admirable. One of the many things I love about him. It also makes it hard to think of gifts for him!)

Er...as I was saying, we were able to visit the kids at VG, attend a board meeting, go to our (English speaking!) church, and visit a few of our friends. We also got a chance to dress Davidy in some of his 'winter' clothing, as it's rarely cold enough in TZ for long sleeves, let alone SWEATPANTS. You guys. I submit to you that few things are cuter than a baby in sweatpants.

It's always bittersweet for me to visit the VG house, because I miss the kids so much, and part of me still wishes we were there- but, I am happy/reluctant to admit, I think the entire ministry is doing better without me. Steve and Judy, the house parents/manager, are doing an incredible job, and we are grateful and impressed every time we talk with them or see the work they are doing. (Clarification: I'm still involved. Just in a very different capacity. I do not, for the record, miss Rita waking me up at 5:45 every morning.)

Rita: So innocent, so sweet. So loud.

I miss them. A lot. 

Raising 11 kids and holding a 12th: The best house father ever, Steve.

Everyone was of course delighted to see David and meet him for a second time- many of the friends we saw had visited us in the hospital when he was born! It was really cool to realise that, if we live in East Africa for a while, these people will know him throughout his entire childhood- watching him from newborn to toddlerhood to...adolescence?! Who knows. It's hard for us to be away from our families and home churches, but God has been good to bless us with 'families' here in Kenya and Tanzania. Davidy has American, South African, Canadian, Tanzanian, Kenyan, German and British (and more!) aunties, uncles, grandmas and grandpas. We really do feel supported and loved! And we are seeing the truth in the African adage "it takes a village to raise a child." (No, Hilary Clinton did not coin that phrase!)

Learning to sit with his cousin Charles (and yes, he's licking him. I don't know.)

Cousin Precious. And the aforementioned sweatpants.

Almost everyone we know had a baby last year. Seriously. Everyone.

Now that we are back home, we have a few days to settle in and get back into a routine before school starts again. Abram will be teaching a class on the book of Genesis, which I plan to attend/audit. I am looking forward to learning more about the Bible, as well as watching my husband teach! Thanks to a lighter teaching schedule this term, he will have a lot more time to research, read and write for his dissertation.

The view from our porch. It's good to be home!

We always enjoy a change of pace, and a chance to visit friends, but we are looking forward to life 'as usual', as well. This term should be a good one, and one of our good friends from Oregon is visiting at the end! Hurry up, Auntie Lindsay!

Thanks for a great pic, Jere!

Balancing sorrow and joy

Life here has been really heavy lately, and it's hard to know what to write about, or how to write it.

Some things are really too awful to even be discussed, but here are some highlights (or lowlights) of this lenten season we find ourselves in.

In what should be the rainy season, we have had almost no rain at all. This means crops will almost certainly fail, which means people will go hungry, and that more and more people will show up at our door, asking for food, work, help...anything.

It also means more illnesses.

It also means more funerals.

One of our good friends was recently fined by the village for not having a toilet on his property. He does not have a toilet because he cannot afford it, (they use their neighbour's), so he was basically fined for being poor. We paid his fine- which was minimal- but he needs a toilet. This is a basic human right.

One of our other friends is ailing and may be dying. He lives outdoors, and I would assume he has chronic malaria. He seems to be fighting an infection, but resisting treatment. I am not sure how much longer his body can hold out. And I'm not sure about the state of his soul.

Another man in our village has been very sick for some time. He was able to get treatment and medicine, but is still too sick to work, and is relying on the charity of others to keep food on the table.

On top of these things, we have good friends and family members who are fighting constant battles with malaria and typhoid, a friend who was robbed, a friend whose house is falling down around him and his four children, and many, many people- too many to count- who want their children to go to school, but cannot afford to send them.

Last week, Abram threw me (Ashby) a surprise party for my birthday. I felt so loved and celebrated, with a tinge of guilt- I'm sure most of our friends here have never had a birthday party of any kind. But our friends enjoyed themselves, enjoyed the cake and popcorn, and Abram pointed out that our village needed some kind of celebration, something to bring joy and laughter into these dark days. We can choose guilt, or joy. We can experience both sorrow and joy- they are not, apparently, mutually exclusive.

At the end of each day we relax in our home, which is much too big, and we eat food- we always have enough- and we play with the worlds' cutest baby, and we go to sleep under a secure mosquito net, under a secure roof. We don't feel guilty for these things- they are blessings from God- but we wrestle with the normal questions: why us? why them? why?

And we go about our routine, Abram teaching and researching, Ashby nursing, cooking, changing diapers, answering the door- and the not-so-routine, like when our car acts as an ambulance and our living room acts as a sanctuary. And we hope in our baby's future.

David continues to be a blessing to people. Our neighbours have begun calling him 'a child of the people'. Half a dozen women call him Grandson, and he may or may or may not think he has six parents. A common sight in the mornings is for a neighbour, or Abram's Tanzanian sister, or whoever happens to be at our house,  to be walking around with David in their arm- as they water our tomato plants, or carry ladders from our garage, or talk on the phone, or answer the door. We are thrilled that David will hopefully grow up to be comfortable in our community, and to know our family here. We are also pleased that people can take comfort in him- what is more therapeutic than a baby who trusts you so completely that he relaxes into your shoulder and falls asleep?

Maybe this is why God gives us children.

Safari

I have lots to write about, but very little battery time left, soooo....

Here are a few shots from a safari we went on a couple weeks ago! (A perk of living in our village is that we are 30 minutes from the Serengeti!)

Normal

We've been home for four weeks now, and are finally getting settled into a routine, which means that I'm getting settled into my role as Homemaker and Stay at Home Mom and Missionary Wife. 

This means cooking and playing with the baby and texting my sister and answering the front door and going to church on Sundays and reading To Kill a Mockingbird with Abram in the evenings. It also means being watched all the time, struggling with language and friendships, forgetting to buy enough vegetables on market day and having to stretch the menu for a couple days at the end of the week. Abram is home in the afternoons, and he's so good with the baby, but I'm supposed to be letting him work, and shouldering most of the babycare. I do get to attend one of his classes (eschatology), which is fun because it hurts my brain and gets me out of the house three days a week.

Sometimes my life is frighteningly normal and I fear I will get bored, and it's probably something other mothers can relate to: diapers and diapers and dishes and...diapers. Did I brush my teeth this morning? Where did I put my phone? Did I wear this shirt yesterday? It's fine, but I forgot it has spit up all down the shoulder, but it doesn't matter because there's no one here to notice, but-- did I? I honestly can't remember.

But there are other days where I realise that our life is pretty bizarre. Filling up our bathtub with water to wash the dishes in later, because the pump is broken. Wondering which language David's first words will be in. Curtsying when I run into the school principal. Changing David's diaper on the steps outside of the church building, with about forty witnesses.

We tuck a mosquito net around my son every night as he goes to bed. We boil or filter all our drinking and cooking water. People bring fish straight from the lake, which is outside our front door, to our kitchen, and our friend Mary cleans the fish, guts them and fries them for dinner. A friend of ours lost his job because he is a Christian, so Abram is giving him work any way he can: cutting grass and planting tomatoes and washing the car and watering our lime trees. The mangoes are fresher and larger than any in North America. The rice we eat was harvested down the road.

It's a strange contrast. On any given day, if you ask me what's on my mind, the answer could be 'trying to figure out what to make for dinner', or it could be 'wondering if our friend's son/baby/mother will live through the night'. Will we get enough rain for the crops to survive? Will David get malaria? Will our neighbours have enough food to feed their family? Where did I put my phone?

 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

I'm writing this at a restaurant in the town of Mwanza, the nearest city to us and the nearest source of fast internet. David is in his car seat, on the table, casually gazing at the largest lake on the continent.

I know it looks like he's facing away from the lake, but he's not. Promise.

I want to romanticise his life; I brag about his passport stamps, his first safari, his friends from many countries. But we are not the first couple to raise a baby overseas. He's not the first baby to visit Lake Victoria. I'm not the first person to blog while my baby naps. He may or may not appreciate his life, and he may or may not grow to love Africa as much as we do. (Don't you take your homeland for granted? At least at first.) I would love for him to grow up as an 'African boy', barefoot and tree-climbing, and maybe work or minister here when he grows up. But I would also love for him to know his grandparents, and to crawl around his aunt's kitchen floor. Both have their perks.

Our decision to live here comes with its privileges and sacrifices and difficulties and rewards. This is not a novel concept; every couple makes choices that have their pros and cons. Every family has fun memories and adventures and every homemaker has experienced joy and boredom all rolled into one. Every mother has changed diapers in unusual places.

As I process this, I am grateful for routine, grateful to be home. Grateful that we have just enough adventure to mix up the tedium of a 'normal' life.

Come to think of it, I wouldn't mind taking a nap here, either. Or...taking a nap anywhere.

Doing his best hippo impression.

Studiously ignoring the elephant that is maybe 30 yards behind him.

Safaris and lake resorts are fun, but let's face it. We spend most of our time here, changing diapers.

Settling In

We are finally home, after 10 flights, 20 hours in the car, and four thousand disposable diapers (gross).  Now I'm attempting to blog, nurse David, and upload photos on a very, very slow internet connection. Why didn't I make time to blog while in North America, Land of the Fast Internet? Why? Why, Ashby?

In the past few weeks, we visited friends and family in four different countries. We went to a rehearsal and dinner for a wedding in Kenya, we celebrated Thanksgiving in America, we celebrated Christmas in Canada, we celebrated New Years back in Kenya, and we drove from Nairobi back to Tanzania without air conditioning. (It's summer here!)

We spent New Years Day with the VG kids. Precious, Peter, 

Jane and Mariano were unsuccessful in fixing our A/C.

This is Canada. It is not summer in Canada.

As soon as we got back to our village in Tanzania, we all three promptly came down with bad colds. Welcome home!

Our time in Ontario and Oregon was wonderful, exhausting, overwhelming, went by too quickly, and will be cherished forever- I got to meet my nephew, you guys. And Abram and I got to go on a date. ALONE. We miss our families already, but we are glad to be back home, too.

Because I was sick and in bed for much of the time, it took me at least a week just to unpack our (many many MANY) suitcases. I wish I could say I enjoyed the process of sorting through all our wonderful gifts, but between the heat, the fussy baby, and the sinus infection, it was mostly a blur. BUT. We are feeling so blessed by our friends and family: our suitcases were full of clothes and diapers and toys for David; natural/gluten free/whole foods for Abram and I; books for all three of us; new (!!) clothes for me; etc. We may not come back to the US or Canada for a couple years, so we are very excited to have all this stuff to help make our home feel more homey.

Speaking of homey, I have on my to-do list to give you guys (that is, my sister) a tour of our house! Stay tuned!

Abram has a busy term ahead of him: in addition to research and interviews for his dissertation, he is teaching three classes at the Bible college here. I am auditing one of his classes! I leave David with our friend Mary on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday mornings for a couple hours and get to sit and listen and learn things about the end of the world (dun dun dun...). It's exciting to get out of the house a bit, I've wanted to learn me about this subject for a while, and it's a great opportunity to get to know some of the students a bit more.

Besides taking the class, my goals for now are to get settled into our home, raise David well, support Abram in his work, fine-tune my Swahili (my grammar is getting worse...in English AND Swahili. Mommy brain, anyone?) and be a blessing to the many, many visitors we have on any given day. Last week I counted, and we had seven different visitors in a two hour period. In other words: right now, my ministry is our home. (Almost every day, someone observes me feeding David WHILE answering a knock at the front door WHILE cooking dinner, and then asks, 'so, what do you do?')

 

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, etc. 

I am going to try try try to update our blog every couple weeks. This is mostly dependent on fast internet, so I can't promise anything!

Happy January, friends!

Here are a few more pictures; mostly of Canada: