7 quick takes

03 May

7 quick takes

Who knew that a pretend flee market is this much fun?

Good morning! Are you cold too? Here, it’s sweater weather for sure here. The wind is wild, the lake is angry, and it is cold enough to wear long pants and a sweater. I would prefer to stay in bed with a good book and a butler who brings me tea whenever I ring a bell, but I guess that’s not the best idea since there are also two girls who need me, so I did get up. We went for a walk on the beach to warm up and now the girls are making a stop motion movie, so I have time for a quick blog. Happy reading!
I order my blogs by date and when I saved this file, I realised it is May. MAY! How did that happen? How did this year, that feels like it started yesterday, quietly fly by and bring us to May already? Since we have always lived far from friends and family, we have always had quite a lot of visitors and trips and my years and months were marked by those. 2 months ago since someone left, 1 month to go before someone comes. Those comings and goings were clear markers. They stood like beacons in my year, and every other thing that happened could be placed around those in my memory. I am missing those beacons. Without them, it feels like the year is just running, and I can’t tell what happened when. And now it’s already May.
It’s not that nothing happens though. We have a lot of exciting things and our days are never boring, it’s just that I never remember the dates when something happened while my brain finds travel dates somehow important enough to store. Like the past weekend; it was filled with activity and nice things. On Friday we went to Lilongwe for our monthly shop; we stayed for the night because we had a birthday party to attend on Saturday. There was cake, a jumping castle, a pool and other kids to play with, so the girls were happy. And when kids are happy, their mother is happy too.
Yesterday we went to a sailing regatta. A friend of ours needed a second man on his boat and asked Hartmut to come with him. The weather was stormy and watching the boats get ready and make their way through the waves was exciting. Watching a sailing race from the shore is a little confusing as you can’t really tell what’s happening, but the girls were jumping up and down when we saw Hartmut’s boat approach the shore, which was also the finishing line. ‘Pappa is winning!’ I saw how the other boats were still far, and going in another direction, so I quickly realised there was something else happening. Unfortunately, their boat broke, and they had to pull out of the race to avoid a bigger disaster. It was a fun day nonetheless, and I am glad that we get to experience such a wide range of unexpected activities here in Malawi.
Last week was Dutch ‘Kings day’ and because I want to raise the girls with a sense of what Dutch culture is, without living in the Netherlands, we could not let that pass by unnoticed. We donned our orange clothes that we found in the second hand shop, prepared some Dutch food and played all the games. The best part of the day (according to both the girls and me) was creating a picture that made our Kings day celebration seem much bigger than it actually was and seeing how many people on social media really believed it. The girls love jokes like that and are already planning to create a similar picture with a different theme so be warned ;-).
I was working on my laptop when Doris came to me. ‘My wobbly tooth is very wobbly. Can you pull it out?’ I asked if she was sure, and she was, so I did as she asked. ‘Thank you!’ she said, and walked away. This girl never ceases to amaze me in how she goes about life. Events, no matter how big or small, don’t really change her mood. ‘Don’t you want to see what your tooth looks like? Or see your gap in the mirror?’ I ask. She quickly glances at her tooth, looks at the gap in the mirror and goes back to play. I love her.
The girls are done with their movie, so I need to help them to edit their pictures into a movie file. It’s about a war between the rich people and the poor people and the poor people win because the rich people are bad. Interesting. Anyway, I’ll do that and wish you a happy new week!