Update :)

Hey everyone! :)

We've been here for about a week now and already we're sending you our second e-mail! We're guessing that from now on we'll probably try and send an e-mail twice a month or so. Unfortunately, we're unable at this time to receive any e-mail through our gmail account. If you could send e-mails to both our gmail and tmica@teachusmission.org, and put our names in the subject line, it'll guarantee that we'll be able to read what you send.

During this past week we've been continuing orientation with Pastor Joshua and JJ, the other missionary teacher in the mornings. Usually after orientation we usually do laundry or other chores until lunch. Washing laundry by hand is hard work and during the rainy season, it's hard to predict if your clothes will be dry by the end of the day. :P For lunch we have a typical African lunch made by a native volunteer. Currently, the woman that makes us lunch is the mother of Nona, one of our students
this year. Our lunches usually consist of a bowl of rice with some type of sauce, such as peanut sauce on the side. We've even had chicken and fish.

After lunch we've been going over to Bilingkoro, the village where our new home is. Slowly but surely it's becoming clean. When we first walked in, the house was boarded up and littered with bugs, dead and alive. We've both killed more than our share of spiders, ants, roaches, grasshoppers, etc. Shannon even killed a couple of lizards (they are everywhere!), but I couldn't bear to see them being killed.

Our biggest surprise came from the beehive that was in our bathroom window. Fortunately, one of our brave native volunteers, Clemon, sprayed the beehive with insecticide a few times and took care of them. Yesterday, Shannon opened the bathroom window and cleaned up hundreds of dead bees. Unfortunately, we couldn't use the honey from the beehive since we had sprayed it.

We'll be moving into our home in a few days. We've almost cleaned up the entire place except for the bathroom and kitchen. Since we've been going back and forth from Sambouya to Bilingkoro, we've greeted many people along the way. The elder in our village introduced all the children to us the other day and we shook their hands and tried our best to say hello. It's funny, because when we're cleaning inside the house, we'll hear the children saying, "Tubab, tubabo!" to each other, which means white man,white man. They often ask or mention Mira and Nara's names, the two
missionary teachers that lived in our house last year. When we leave, the children always run around to where the dirt road is and make sure to say goodbye twice.

As for our prayer requests, please pray for Sarah, Pastor Joshua's wife. She tested positive for malaria yesterday and is resting at home now. Please also pray for our luggage, which still hasn't arrived. We were told that it would be a semi miracle if it even came. The rest of us here are all healthy and eating well. Shannon's getting used to eating lots of rice at every meal, since we do eat a lot of it here.

We hope that all is well back in the US. If you haven't been, but would like to recieve email updates, please e-mail mieko743@yahoo.com to be added to our mailing list. God bless!

Love,
Shannon and Carol