Top 10 Things We Haven’t Done in awhile
1. Driven a car (that might keep us from driving on the left side of the road when we return)
2. Washed & dried our clothes with electronic labor saving devices
3. Used seatbelts, car seats, or boosters (except whoever was riding in the front)
4. Drank water from a glass/cup
5. Brushed teeth from the faucet
6. Transported groceries in a vehicle
7. Watched TV
8. Talked like a southerner (we sound like a weird British-Zambian mix now)
9. Seen rain (it hasn’t rained a drop)
10. Drank a Dr. Pepper

So our travel plans have come into focus. We chose door #2 and will fly out on British Airways Saturday morning the 21st. The route will take us through London’s Heathrow & assuming there’s no strike fly into JFK/New York at about 11:00 pm. Once we arrive, the first step is to take Jeb through immigration (fortunately we will skip Ellis Island). When Jamie picked up his US Visa today, he was handed an envelope full of papers and reminded to “not open until you hand them to a DHS officer”. Then we can collect our luggage and go through customs. Waiting for us will be an old friend from Florida who has volunteered to drive us to Penn Station to catch a 3:00 am train to D.C. There my sister will pick us up as the sun rises. After a full day plus of travel, it is probably a good idea we try not to drive or we might end up on the left side of the road anyway. We were able to get a bigger refund from our cancelled Ethiopian flight than the cost of the British Airway flight, and we recognize that not only did God not only open a door for us to leave TOGETHER and EARLY but also cheaper.

We want to talk a little about what you would see if you rode the bus from Livingstone to Lusaka as we did. The first thing you realize is how barren the landscape is in the dry season. It is sparsely populated and each little town we drove through was a blink. You constantly see people selling things on the roadside-this could be 4/5 stalls lined up together or 1 stall just outside town or a solitary person with a couple baskets by the side of the road. The most common item is fruit (bananas, apples, & oranges) but you also see handmade crafts, candy, “talk time” cards, eggs, and bottled drinks. You might not have seen any signs of life for a couple of miles and then out of nowhere appears a couple roadside vendors which you fly by on the way. We began to realize how differently people view time here. When your day consists of sitting and waiting for the 3 or 4 costumers that might stop to buy bananas you just don’t get used to being in a hurry. We could have added to our top 10 list that we have not had fast food and it makes sense because they don’t seem to want fast food. There are probably a host of other generalizations that we could try to make from observing how Zambians treat time-it’s very different for sure. Another thing that surprised us was how often we saw small grass hut villages. They were often grouped together from 5 – 25 huts and you could see no modern structures or facilities w/in miles. But you almost always saw the people out cooling themselves under a shade tree, watching their livestock, guarding their stall, or doing other chores. Every now and then you see a sign for a school or business pointing down a long, long dirt road with no end in sight but usually someone taking that walk.

The bus ride back was itself very interesting, as our seats were separated by a few rows. Addie carried on an hour long conversation (mostly Addie) with a 30 something Zambian lady about our trip to the Falls. The movies this time were Nigerian made which translates to “really really bad”, but this was “offset” because they turned the volume up really loud. At one point our bus made an abrupt stop in the middle of nowhere (at this point we were used to seemingly unplanned stops for passengers to disembark or go potty). We saw people exiting a taxi van in front of us and running back toward us (we thought they were trying to catch a ride because of a breakdown). Then our bus began reversing and we soon realized we were on the scene of a very recent accident. About half the people exited the bus, including Jamie (and later Zeke to give a water to one of the wounded) to go and flip the mangled sedan over and pull 3 men out. They were a little bloody, a lot shaken, and very blessed (especially in light of the condition of the car). There was no cell phone signal for anyone to call for help, so the 3 men piled into a different car (whose, we don’t know) and headed back to the closest town. Then we got on the bus and drove on.

Today was a chance to go chitanga shopping at the Chelston market with Moya. We also stopped by the open air food market (meaning lots and lots of flies and an odd smell too – this was not a tourist market). At one point, Moya reached over and took a bite of something that looked like a bug, and so Jamie being adventurous took a piece from Moya and popped it in his mouth. He immediately bought a tomato to get rid of the taste of dried caterpillar brains. Our kids and most of the vendors thought this was hilarious. You can see a picture of the critters above.

We spent a good part of the afternoon playing at the HOM with the babies. Many of the caregivers and staff were excited to see Jeb and took the opportunity to hold and love on him. Our kids jumped right back into playing and feeding them. Zeke even carried many of them back inside for their afternoon naps. Mandi and Rayna stayed longer so they could go upstairs and spend some time with the teeny tiny babies, the youngest being a month old. Rayna got to feed one of them a bottle; it’s watching her on days like this that gives us assurance she will make a great mom.