I woke up this morning at 7:45 and went running with my sister Christiana! I don't know where running has been all my life, but it really clears the head. It's not AS enjoyable as night-walks, but it was good nonetheless! And running with someone is so much easier than doing it alone. Time passes more quickly and I don't think I get tired as easily with someone beside me:-)
It has been so great having my sister Christiana here and spending time with her. I feel like I never really "got to know her" that well growing up. If that's possible. I don't know, just didn't feel as close to her.... maybe it's that we were pretty different from each other. I was always the "quiet one" in the house, and she was more talkative and dramatic. Of course I have always loved her, but now I'm getting to know her better, and it is a lot of fun! We went to the pool the other day, just me and her, ... I brought along a book, but I never picked it up. She and I just talked, and it was a great time!
Lately I have felt pretty unproductive, and felt like life is on hold for me,...that time just froze as soon as I got to Congo (because you really feel like you are on another planet over here)... but ... I am seeing that this isn't all true. I am spending a LOT of time only with my family, and I am so thankful for it.
I exercise a lot out of lack of better things to do.... watch a lot of ALIAS (i'm on season 4 and have one more season to go before i can leave here! haha),... sit and read, play tennis, take walks, play pingpong, and spend a lot of time at the pool. Yes, I'm getting a tan!
My favorite new thing is to take night-walks. Like I mentioned before.... walks by myself late as night. The later, the more interesting, I think. One really good memory I have of my first authentic night-walk was with Zaq, one of the last nights I was in the States before moving to France and beginning my life of adventures! We had just finished a movie, and I think we started taking a walk at 3am. He lives in a big neighborhood, so it was pretty weird walking down streets lined with dark houses.... you feel like everyone is asleep in the world except for you- and the person walking with you of course. Zaq and I have been best friends for so long, so this walk was really awesome. We had a lot of times of silence because neither of us knew what to really say. I was leaving for France and Congo! Didn't know how long I'd be gone... there wasn't really very much we COULD say.... but it was still awesome just walking and talking or sharing the silence. We went to the little neighborhood park and sat on the picnic bench. Sprinklers were going off all around us. We sat on that picnic bench for I don't know how long, but there again was a little more of that silence. And i cant remember it being awkward. It was 3am, and we were in this park. haha! Funny to look back on, but such a memory. It's always stuck with me but I never got very serious about trying to take a walk at night by myself recently. Sometimes I do it at college, but I have my phone with me... so it's quite different! Zaq tells me it's kinda like therapy for him to go walking at night by himself. Well, last week or something I decided to go out at 10pm. Yeah, not quite 3am, but it was dark, nonetheless!
The American School's campus has 2 soccer fields (1 is like a smaller practice field down nearer to our house), a tennis court, basketball court, pool, lots of houses for teachers and some missionaries (like us).... so much/ it's quite a big campus. The disappointing part of this walk was remembering how they leave lights on everywhere... the tennis court had lights, the basketball court had lights... i'll explain that later. So the stars were out all big and bright. Couldn't see the moon, but it was a very clear night! I first went to the small elem. soccer field and lay down in the middle of it, so i could stare up at the stars. I just lay there for a few minutes and thought. I thought of places I should walk to, and things i needed to think about. I walked to the elementary playground where there are swings. I love swings..... and I have a happy memory there, so I swung for a while and just remembered and thought some more. The more places I walked, the more memories I remembered. It made me miss certain things and certain people. ...I made my way up to the bigger soccer field and went to the middle of that one and lay down. The lights from houses and the court were pretty annoying. Bright, flourescent. ANd then I started hearing lots of cars. I tried to drown out the light and noise so I could just lie there and talk to God and listen to the bugs... I don't know how long I lay there because I didn't bring a clock. I wanted to just forget time and stay out as long as I felt I needed to. After a while I walked to another place and climbed a tree. Then I kinda felt weird because I could look over the wall that is around the whole campus and I could see the chaotic street. Climbed down and decided to go back to the first soccer field where it was quieter and there are only a few lights from the tennis courts there. I sat down on the edge of the field under some bamboo trees and palms. I didn't care how dirty i was probably getting. I just sat there and remembered. And thought of the future. And even cried a little. It made me feel lonely, but at the same time, in my loneliness, I could sense God was right there, and I knew He was reaching out to me and hearing my cry. He knew what that cry was all about and He knew how everything would work out for me. He knows how everything is still going to work out. Looking up at the stars always makes me feel so small, so insignificant, but it reminds me of the kind of God I serve and long to worship. He sees each one of us. Cares for every one of us. Loves us each unconditionally. "There is nothing we can do that will make Him love us less." I love that. I heard that in a video we watched at youth group this Sunday. It's easy to forget. But that's the kind of Father we have!
Tonight I took another walk, and it wasn't AS amazing... and it wasn't an hour long like my first, but it was definitely worth it. I saw a snail as big as a cell phone making a trail through the sand, I watched the clouds cover and uncover the half-moon, I gazed at the stars again...the beautiful stars. I swung on those swings again. I'm thankful I decided to do that! Tonight I had a towel with me so I could lie on the grass without itching like mad because of the weird grass bugs or maybe it's the grass itself... anyway! i was lying on the towel, and a guard approached me. Side note -- this school has a bunch of guards -- people who stay at the gate, and also people posted all over the campus who patrol around just to make sure everything is safe. They have walkie-talkies,.... and i guess they are supposed to make me feel secure, but whenever you forget something at the pool or even at the basketball court, you can be pretty sure that it will not be there when you come back. We think lots of these guards or workers steal. Now I'm not one to judge, but someone is doing a lot of stealing. Just ask me how many things I have lost here... of course it's always my fault... but it's just sad. All that to say, I don't trust the guards COMPLETELY. Anyhow, I saw one coming towards me and he spoke to me in French. Asked me if I was doing GYMNASTICS?!!! Maybe he thought my towel was more like an exercise pad? I have no idea but i was definitely not moving in a gymnastic way. :-) It was hilarious ... so I told him no... i was merely on a walk and was looking at the stars and sky! He was good with that answer, but asked my name and when he walked off I heard him say "it's Eva Shepard." So now I will always be known as that queer one who does gymnastics in the middle of the soccer field. All by myself! Hahahahaha...and What must they think when they see me Swinging by myself?! At night! I guess I must look VERY odd. And maybe they think I just have no friends and no life.....which is pretty much true----JUST KIDDING! :-p
I got inspired the other day and pulled out the guitar so I could write a song. I don't get those inspired moods too often so it was exciting to sit down and really finish a song! Now it doesn't sound so good, but just the fact that I wrote something ... yeah I was pretty happy with that. I hope I'll get in a mood like that again and write something decent. Worth showing people. hmm... will that EVER happen? Worth showing someone?! haha! We will see. Right now life is so happy. And i think that's why I had an "inspiring moment." lol
Wow, it's now midnight, so ...seems like a fine time to head off to bed or something. I find it hilarious how much I write here and never get any comments. Well, I don't know what
Not sure if I got EVERYTHING out --Nnnnope! i definitely didn't. I'll save that for another one.
Monday, January 14, 2008
thinking...
Friday, January 04, 2008
Thursday, January 03, 2008
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Holidays and such in Congo...
This Christmas Eve and Christmas we broke a few traditions! First of all, Christmas Eve, we didn't get to have a candlelight service at Church. That was pretty disappointing to all of us, but my dad couldn't get the committee to let him have a service:-( Apparently not many people wanted to have a service. We had our traditional potato leek soup (yay!) for dinner, and rolls...:-) YUM! Then we all sat around and ate some homemade ice cream and each opened one gift (that's one of our old traditions). Sometimes we try to open the smallest looking gift on Christmas Eve so we can save the bigger ones for C. Day! ;-) This year the power went off before dinner was ready... but only for like 2 minutes, thankfully!!
In the morning we gathered in our pjs in the living room to open our stocking. Mom and Dad came out in their matching Congolese shirts and served us some juice! We watched (and videod) dad opening his stocking because he always has the funniest reactions and is always excited about no matter what is put in his stocking.... and then we all opened ours at the same time. How we usually do it. Breakfast followed, and we enjoyed homemade EGG NOG (thanks to Sarah!), and sweet rolls (another tradition broken-- normally we have baked apples, but this is Congo). Dad was eating a hard boiled egg and was getting quite frustrated trying to crack it open! He's always funny trying to do his eggs. After breakfast, we opened gifts... and this time mom said we wouldn't try to open in order of age. We would just open one at a time, whatever random order we wanted! But we still pretty much took turns. We don't like opening all of them all at once because it's fun to watch people's reactions. Especially when people are opening a gift you gave! All the stuff my family gave me was really neat, and probably my favorite gift i got was from my mom -- She bought some zebra print material and took it to a purse shop where they made it into a messenger bag for me!! And a matching one for Colleen-- they're fun! Very African :-)
I gave my mom some homemade stationery--like thank-you cards-- and she loved them, but while we were passing them around (after we had just said that they were from when me & my sisters made cards at thanksgiving), my dad saw them and goes "Oh, we're these made by some handicaps?" ahahahaha! We had a good long laugh about that....:-) We decided to have our christmas dinner later, like at 7pm because at 2:00 we were invited to a Christmas caroling slash christmas cookie get together at the #2guy's house in the US Embassy. He and his wife were really friendly, and we sang all the Christmas carols we knew around the piano! It was pretty fun -- then we had cheese and crackers, cookies, cakes.... drinks.... then at home we had to get the food altogether and ate finally a while later. Surprisingly our African turkey was some of the best turkey ever, and although the sweet potatoes i made were a lot dryer than normal, we had most of the same foods we normally have every Christmas.
Christmas flew by and soon it was New Years. On New Years Eve, Theo went to the youth group party to show some support and represent us, and Christiana went out with a few singles. The rest of us went to Elaeis for dinner. I had a tasty Hawaiian chicken salad... but why am I talking about all these details? Not really the point. Yet. We all had good dinners and then headed to this restaurant called Chateau Margot which is known for their amazing desserts. They were booked for a party, but they said "If you don't mind being all by yourselves, we have a private room inside you can eat in!" .... did we mind? NOT AT ALL! So we Took the chance and were shown to this room with a big table and big, nice leather chairs.... pretty blue walls, a few big paintings,...and AC (always a big plus) .... Our server was SUCH a sweet lady. Very polite, you didn't feel awkward while she was in the room because she didn't stare at us... and she was very formal and you knew she had been trained well. We ordered a few coffees, and they came in teeny cups on their own indiv. trays with a very small cake beside. Then we ordered our desserts-- me and mom got Creme Brulee, Dad got some creme filled pastries with ice cream and chocolate sauce, and sarah & colleen got Mousse au Chocolat. They came beautifully displayed.... presentation was gorgeous! ANd they tasted even better than they looked. if that's possible. haha! DELISH.
We got home around 9:30...then watched some Alias, paused it at midnight, broke open some sparkling cider and toasted! Sarah did a little dance... then we went back to Alias, and then bed!
New Years Day we had this Congolese guy pick us up with a mini van to take us to thie place called Gandayala, a picnic spot on a river that flows into/out of (?) the Congo River. The van we squished in smelled of fish because it had been used to transport some people who must have been carrying fish!! Ew... but anyway, about 1.5hrs later we got to the spot and realized my friend Chaima was behind us with her family! WHat a coincidence -- she was picnic-ing there too! ... We planned on staying the night there because my dad thought he had reserved the cabin for the night. When we looked at the cabin, there were only 2 bedrooms, and including the 2 couches downstairs, only 5 beds (just one was a double bed). We had been promised enough for 7 people and it was supposed to cost $50. The guy there wanted $100, and he didn't even have our reservation!! We were fed up, and decided it probably wasn't worth the money so we'd just picnic and have a boat ride! I hung out with Chaima til she had to eat lunch, and then we ordered food from the restaurant. Plantains, chicken, shish-ka-bobs, fries... expensive, but not bad! Then we went on the motor boat -- only our family. It was so neat!! Took a 30min cruise upstream, they let us get out and swim, then we went back.... it was so relaxing and fun! -- And quite beautiful!! And we could actually took pictures, which was GREAT! After the boat ride, we just hung out on the shore and grass, waiting for our ride to come back which wasn't coming til 6... so we had 3 hours. We took naps, played cards, and just talked and it was fun! Very relaxing as i said about the boat...the whole thing was relaxing. Even though there were some pesty people who wanted to sell us wicker furniture or charge us to take a picture of the baby crocodile they were carrying around.... or to play guitar & sing (even though we kept saying PLEASE GO AWAY!!) and get some money from us. That part was just kinda funny! Oh Congo.
On the way home, we sung songs from Disney movies and other musical the whole way back! it was probably pretty annoying for our driver, but great fun for us! What a good New Years Day!! Not much comes close to beating good family time. I loooove my family!!
