7 quick takes...

It has been a while since I wrote some normal quick takes but here we go, 7 snippets from our life.

1. Let's start with saying that we are generally all well. Hartmut is finishing up my oven (things take always long here, and for this project he did not go to the shop but sourced all the rocks, clay and sand that he used in the wild, around the lodge. Pretty cool. ) and coordination the renovation of our luxury chalet. I am trying all kinds of recipes (yesterday's egg curry was amazing.) and training the kitchen staff. The girls are mostly in the imaginary world that only exists in their heads but seems to them to be as real as the real world. We have one more week here before we take the boat to Nkatha Bay for a marketing and shopping trip. It has been more than 6 weeks since we were there and I am looking forward to some dairy and faster internet so that we can call family.

2. We had heard about it but it still took us by surprise. The lake had been wild and stormy for a few days and when we finally woke up to calmer water, we also woke up to a beach on our doorstep. It happened just before Sophie's birthfay and she is convinced that it is God's birthday present for her. The beach is dreamy, as if it came straight from a holiday postcard. Clean sand, lush green trees and creepers on the side, clear blue water. It is never quiet. From where I sit I can see the waterfall, tumbling almost 10 meters down into the lake whilst making a roaring sounds, drowning out any other noise. The girls play, they use sturdy wooden seedpods that they find on the beach as scoops to build castles and towers. They let sticks and leaves drift in the flow, created by the waterfall. I sit on my kikoi, read a book, eat bananas. A big kingfisher flies accross, then perches on a rock on the side of the beach. Butterflies flutter around. This beach is the best surprise and we will treasure it for as long as it lasts.

3. The lodge is covered by a roof of tree tops that make it a cool, shaded place. We never quite know how hot it is until we step out of the cover to walk to the village. It also makes that at night we never quite know how many stars there are unless we step out onto the big rock in the lake, in front of the lodge. The rock is one of the best places to spend the evening. It soaks up the heat of the day to radiate it at night, warming up our bodies as we lie down to stare at the milky way. We talked about making a fire place there, to make the long evenings even more comfortable but our to do list is long and we did not yet get to it until last week a tour guide came with a honeymoon couple. They were both keen for some physical activity and asked if we had any projects they could help with (we obviously loved these guests). We spend their last evening at the lodge on the rock with a nice fire in our new fireplace. We had bread on a stick, lukewarm beer and nice conversations and know for sure that this fire place will be at the heart of many more memorable evenings.

4. It happens more and more lately. While I am cooking I quickly run 'upstairs' (our house is a bit higher on the hill than the rest of the lodge so we always call it that.) To get a few fresh herbs or some salad. Our garden is coming along and we are slowly learning the tricks. Our courgettes looked great but after harvesting we found out that the inside was already eaten by caterpillars, it's a constant battle to keep the grass hoppers out of our salads and we just cannot get the spinach to grow but the radishes have been great and the mint and coriander are thriving. It is so nice to be able to add some more flavour to our meals.

5. The map book for Africa is open. Next to it a 12 year old edition of the Lonely Planet for East Africa, presumably left by a traveller passing through the lodge. Some sections are torn out, probably the parts about the places where he went or still wanted to go. Not ideal but without internet better than nothing. I make columns in my notebook. One for dates, one for destinations and one for mode of travel. Mbeya, Kisumu, Kampala, bus, train, boat. Sometimes a question mark because information is missing or old and therefore not reliable. The departure date is 5 months away so I still have time but I like planning so that we know which information is missing when we have faster internet. We are invited to a wedding in Kampala mid-December and are planning to travel there by public transport. Straight accross Tanzania by train through national parks and wild forests to there where Africa meets the Indian Ocean. Then up north to Mombasa in Kenya where the coastline is lined with coconut trees and picture perfect white beaches. After that to the west to spend some days in Kisumu, where I lived my first year in Africa. We will cross the border to Uganda and explore Kampala. I cannot wait to show the girls the market where I bought clothes and food, the place where I lived. We will eat some 'rolex' that I used to buy after work (which made me gain a lot of weight) and 'kabalagala'. The wedding will be great, Sophie and Doris will love the big dresses and beautiful decoration that will be there. I am looking forward to go back to the church where I used to go. Their choir sings with so much joy and passion that it would make me cry without fail. The way back will be the tricky part. They say there is a boat to Tanzania but it's not a ferry so you need to ask the captain nicely if you can board. If you bring some money a crew member might give you his bed. The other option is to take shared taxis around the lake, over bad roads to places that cannot really be found on the map. And then all the way south through the interior of a country that does not have money for roads. We hope that rain season comes late, because muddy roads will make that last part challenging. Or maybe we will do the entire trip the other way around and skip the ocean. Who knows. For now I just love dreaming and reading up about all the possibilities.

6. My laptop is a bit temperamental. Hartmut says that it takes after it's owner. We share one laptop. It's an old one that we bought second hand from a friend but it works fine. Well, worked fine, until we got here. The hours that we can use it are already limited because we need to charge it and that can only happen when the sun shines. But since an ant family decided to make it their home while we were sleeping just after we arrived here, something funny happened and it does not always want to switch on. We have figured out that leaving it in the sun for 15 minutes to warm up helps, but not always. And some days it does not even need to warm up at all. I am happy that we do not need to use it daily because it would drive me nuts. And because it's such a hassle we only switch it on when we really need to work on it. Oh well, it gives us more time to enjoy the life outside of the screens while we really hope that the laptop will last while we live here.

7. I don't know when I will post this but I am finishing this blog while I am in bed. It's 3:45, pitchdark and I cannot sleep. We did not have guests this week (the first time that we were just with the 4 of us since we arrived) and we had some early nights (embarrassingly early) so I think I have overdone it on the sleep. We want to get up early tomorrow (today?) but the sun won't be up for another 2 hours so I better try if I can sleep a bit more. The church that we started visiting has a camp in Khondowe, a village 5 kms north from us. The congregations are all small because the villages are small so they often go to visit other congregations for a weekend. We want to hike there to visit for a bit and it's better to hike early before the sun is hot. I will try to get some more sleep because otherwise I won't enjoy the hike. Have a great day!