Travel in Rainy Season

This was on our way back from Nkolbikon after we had been camping for a few days. We were anxious to get home and eat cereal and take showers. This truck full of sand was completely blocking the road and left us no way to get by. Fortunately for us, these guys had been digging themselves out for a while and were just about to try moving the truck forward again. We were only there about 5 minutes before the truck was on it's way!

Nkolbikon - Part 3

Here's Nathan with Sufaio, our VIP (see his hat?), who helped Nathan with the Likano times. We told Sufaio what a VIP was and ask him if that was him, and he said, "Oh no, that's my cousin" and pointed to one of the girls about his age. ??? Maybe we didn't explain well. Anyway, Sufaio did a lot to make us feel welcome, and introduced us to all of his extended family. It was actually his step-mom's family that we were staying with this week, and they who fed us lots of plantains and cooked greens. On the last Likano (Oral Storying) night, Sufaio actually led the meeting. Nathan introduced the story, and afterward, Sufaio wrapped it up with questions and restating the main points. It was encouraging.

One of the cool things Nandry and I noticed right away in the village was a heart-shaped tree. It stood out really well against the sky, especially at night when all the stars were out. Oh, a side note, this was the first time I ever saw (and realized what I was seeing) the Milky Way. In our area, where we live, there are so many trees around it's hard to see much of the sky at night but this village was a fairly open area in the middle of the forest.

These kids were loving the camera and thinking of all kinds of poses and places where I could take their picture...in front of a door, next to the plum tree, wearing a basket on their head...but for some reason, I thought the most random was this one: "take our picture in front of the corn we planted".

We had a great time. When Nathan asked Sufiao what everyone thought of us, he replied, "They are surprised that you eat Baka food, but I told them we (the Baka) eat it all the time and it hasn't killed us yet!" :)

Nkolbikon - Part 2

Nathan was in Nkolbikon for 3 nights and set up camp for us to join him. He bathed in the river with the guys and carried his own water up to the camp each day. He is pretty amazing and I'm positive that there will never be a picture of me doing this!


Here is what our camp looked like. Nathan dug a "potty" pit next to where he parked the truck and put up this structure for us to have our own private toilet and place to wash off. It was interesting to have the tire of the truck as our toilet paper holder. I was impressed too, even though I'm sure they thought we were crazy, they respected our privacy!

It rained our second day there. The river of mud ran right under a portion of our tent. Fortunately, only a little water got into the tent, but it was from the rain above, not coming from the muddy flood below.

We all were at least 2 inches taller and a couple pounds heavier with all the mud that stuck to our feet. Nandry, Boaz and Asher finally had enough and shed their shoes and went barefoot.

After sitting around watching the rain, the boys decided to play in the mud. The Baka kids had a little more sense then our boys, but it was entertaining nonetheless to watch Boaz and Asher slip and slide and get muddy hand prints all over each other. I wish I had a good picture of that!

After the rains stopped, and we were still sitting around, we got out balloons and they were a hit! It was so neat to see the splashes of colorful balloons amid all the brown mud.


The kids seriously had a great time. It was so good to see them enjoying the Baka kids. The thing that Nathan and I remark about this picture below, is Asher is 6 years old and the Baka boys he is walking with are probably more like 10 years old. It truly is amazing how big we are in comparison to the Baka.

Nkolbikon

This is the pre-trip tent testing picture. We set it up in our yard to make sure everything was ok with it and our kids and our neighbors had a great time in the mongulu na mbungeo (foreigner's hut).

Nathan left on Monday for a Baka village about a 50 min drive down the road. His goals were to establish relationships with the Baka of that camp, start sharing some of the Baka Oral Bible stories with this group and get ready for the kids and I to join him there for a few days.

Nathan said there was alot of sitting around during the days for the folks who didn't go out into the forest for hunting and gathering...so lots of time to practice his language skills and ask lots of questions.

These guys are sitting under their cooking shelter, which looks like some day is going to possibly be finished into a house. The guy on the right is Bado, the traveling musician of our area. He has actually been in our neighborhood for a while now and went along with Nathan for the ride. He is blind and is always sitting around strumming on his stringed instrument (Iyeta) and making up new songs. We really enjoy his music...and we've noticed more and more he is starting to learn and add to some of the Baka songs that sing praises to their Creator, or other songs that tell of Jesus' death on the cross.
I don't have any pictures of the Bible story times that are done in the traditional Baka style (called Likano) because they would start gathering for these around 8pm and the only light besides the millions of stars was a dim lantern. The Baka LOVE singing, and before Nathan would even get to play the stories (we have received them in mp3 format from a SIL missionary who wrote them and recorded them with a local Baka story teller) they would sing for over an hour.
More to come...

My Youngest is 6 Years Old!

Asher turned 6 this past week. Wow. Not sure what else to write. We celebrated his birthday back here in the bush and did some games outside with the Baka kids. It's kind of a tradition for our family to do water balloon activities for Birthdays.

This is Nathan's namesake watching over the bucket of water balloons. He's really starting to warm up to us and didn't cry the entire time, even when his balloon burst.

After water balloons, Nathan got out his home made bubble mixture that he's been perfecting for the last month and everyone blew bubbles for a while.

And then for a cake, my strange child insisted on a Walrus theme...so I did my best with what we had. :)

And what Birthday party is complete without Pin the Tooth on the Walrus? Seriously.

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