The Mustard Seed: Random Stories and Bike Ride Pics

Hi All,

We survived first semester!!!!!!!!!!!!! This week is our break, and we will start second semester on Monday. So, I wanted to get caught up on a bunch of blog posts. This is the first post, and there are three others below (Including Ethiopian Christmas, Foreignee Christmas, and Cultural Day).

Also, below is a link to one of my friend's blog. She is also in Soddo, and made a video (on her blog) of what it's like driving around town here. Thought you might like to check it out! www.girlsjourneyinafrica.blogspot.com

For this post, I thought I would share some of the random things my kids (and/or I) have done and said. Also, Paula, Sophie, Stephanie, and I took the motorcycles out to the country to visit a beautiful family, so I included pictures from that trip. So let's get started...

Random Stories
In one of my 3rd grade classes, I was teaching about conversation questions. I had the question, "What do you like to do for fun?" and then one student brought up the question, "What do you dislike?" To which the shortest girl in the class (She is sooo cute. When I look at her, her eyes just sparkle and a huge smile comes across her face. And when I have everyone stand up to pray at the beginning of class, I am always tempted to ask her to stand with the rest of the class, but then I realize she IS standing-she's just so short…so precious!)…anyway, her hand shot up, eager to answer the question, "What do you dislike?" I called on her, and she stood up (as they always do to answer), and she said with her smile and big twinkling eyes, "I dislike carrots!"....Aaaaahaahaha! What?! Who would think of that? It was great :)

Today I had my first ever cappuccino, and it was delicious...it tasted like coffee ice cream, but warm - yummy :)

One of my CUTEST little girls (not even technically one of my students because she is in 2nd grade) told me she loves me...except they are not very good at pronouncing the letter "v", so it was more like she came over and whispered to me at the end of break time, "I lub you!"...Too cute :)
One of my little 3rd grade boys (who knows a good amount of English – he says it’s from watching “films”) came up to me, walking around with his chest poofed out and his arms at his side, elbows slightly bent…with fists clenched. When I looked at him like, “What are you doing?”…He responded, “I am being a strong man!”

"Today, I made an iphone speaker out of a toilet paper roll...what are you doing with YOUR toilet paper rolls?" - said I during dinner conversation the other night…Because everything is a commodity here, we don’t throw much away. As a result, I have accumulated quite the collection of toilet paper rolls. On Pintrist I found this cool idea to make an iphone speaker with one. So I tried it out, thinking it could help in my classes when I want to play a song but the highest volume is barely loud enough for everyone to hear. At one of our American dinners, the topic of toilet paper rolls and collecting them came up.

Random food craving: pigs in a blanket with ketchup...also, cottage cheese on the side - yummm :)...I don't even like hot dogs that much!

During Rosary (many times I reflect on how much help I need in order to learn how to love properly), I had this thought of maybe “it’s not about ‘how many’ you love, it’s about ‘how much’ you love.” I just thought that was a good thing to ponder.

We went for dinner and Christmas cooking decorating with our American friends…I am so thankful that we found those people, they are great! And when we hang out with them, it’s like a little piece of home. This time things got a little complicated, though. It started to rain, so we left the house with Sophie (she was going to drive us home), but the rain SUDDENLY got really heavy…to the point where her car wasn’t going to make it up/down our hill (not paved = dirt + lots of immediate rain = slick mud), so she was going to drop us off at the bottom of our hill so we could walk the rest of the way. However, as we were driving the power went out…you want to talk about DARK when the power goes out here! Well, we didn’t think it a very wise idea to walk in the dark, so after a bit of an adventure, we ended up staying at her house for the night. I guess this was just another lesson in the book of “Teaching Jenna how to be more flexible with things.” Haha!

Random cravings: egg salad sandwich on croissant…and grilled cheese (the grilled cheese has been nearly daily, recently)

The other day, I scored THREE goals from the defense position in foosball. I usually always play offense because that’s what I have gotten good at, and the girls have learned that we loose when I play defense. My skills on the defense have definitely been improving.

I am just so full of love, I just don’t even know what to do with myself! This week, I have been playing handclapping games with my little girls at school – they are so precious, and they hold my hand wherever we go (to read in the library, or across the school yard to sit down, or walking back to their class after break is over) and look up at me with their big sparkly eyes – oh, I just love them!...Then during Rosary with the kids yesterday, I ended up sitting between two little girls (probably approx. ages 7 and 4) and walked up the hill with them after, each holding one of my hands. The 7-yr old got close, and looking up at me and whispered like a secret, “I lub you” hehe :) Oh geez, how precious are they?! I sang them the song I know in Amharic, and once we reached the top of our hill, I pointed out our monkey (we have a monkey on our compound that the guards have been taking care of) to them and they just did this giggly dance (you know like when kids see something they think is funny and surprising). They are just too precious, in my heart!

I did a lesson involving playing the game "Go Fish", which went over surprisingly well. So, I'm thankful for that! Also, pretty sure I discovered why I was having a slight ant infestation in my bathroom sink (because I was leaning over the sink to eat my cookies, as to not get crumbs on the floor). Now that I have decided to not do that anymore, the ants are gone. Thankful for that! Also, I think I've found the trick to making my shower not leak anymore (I just don’t turn the knobs so tightly when I turn the water off), so thankful for that! Thankful for my hair finally getting longer since I cut it (now that it's been 2 years!). Thankful for the delicious mango juice of Ethiopia!
The other day, some of my girl students told me they like my toenails! Hahaha! It's not even like they are painted or anything, they just are what they are = probably not even well-maintained, haha! oh geez!

I have discovered this most DELICIOUS hamburger! It is sooo good...probably on the list of top 5 in my life!...It was as follows: bottom bun (bun resembled challah bread), mayo, onion, pepper, large tomato slices, thin burger patty, fried egg, ketchup, top bun...plus, probably the best fries I've had in all of Ethiopia! When we eat out, an entire meal for three people ends up costing a total of approximately $7.00.

Been craving cheese, crackers, and summer sausage...and warm apple pie with vanilla ice cream.
Some of my students found me during Oratory because they had stayed after school for a soccer game. They wanted me to sit with them, so I did for a few minutes. One of my boys was, I think, trying to tell me that I am a “black man.” All of the other students were like, “No, no, white!” And I was like, “And actually, I am a woman!” He responded, “You white woman.” I said, “Yes.” Then he said something along the lines of, “I chocolate man!”…Aaaahahaha! I just laughed!

We have been making juice recently. Ethiopian juice is the absolute best! It is sooo delicious. Basically they just put fruit and water in a blender. It’s super thick (almost like a not frozen smoothie) like Naked juice, except for here it is really inexpensive because the fruit is so abundant. This time we made plumb/banana/mango juice. Yummmm!

Paula and my new favorite phrase to use is "why not?!"...because many times when we ask people here a question, the answer is never really clear...for example, "How are you today? A: fine, and you?...Do you think it's going to rain? A: Ok...Do we need to make tests for our classes and give our students grades? A: sure...Do we need to be at Oratory tomorrow to help with the kids? A: sure, why not?...Do you think we could get some ketchup to go with our french fries (called 'chips' here)? A: sure, why not?....aaaahahaha! It seems like everything just ends up being "sure, why not?"...and we're like "ok, so does that mean 'yes' or 'no' then?????"

I was teaching one of my 3rd grade classes, and many of my students suddenly became distracted at something outside the windows, which were open. At the same a large gust of cool air rushed in. It was so forceful that it blew the map off the wall. When I looked out the window to see what was going on, and in response to the kids frantically trying to get my attention saying, “Miss Miss!” and pointing out the window. I saw what appeared to be a really skinny, really tall brown tornado. It was looked like it was just behind one of the other buildings on our compound. I freaked out just a little bit and turning to one of my students, who speaks quite a bit of English, said, “Um, is that okay?! I mean, do we need to leave or something?!”…In my moment of panic, I was trying to think of a potential evacuation plan, or if everyone just needed to immediately get on the floor and take cover. Thankfully my student responded, “No, no, it is okay…That is normal…It is just the dust.” Sure enough, after a couple of minutes it dissipated. After taking a couple of deep breaths to calm myself and a couple of chuckles from everyone, I explained to the kids that we don’t really have that where I am from in America. The only kind of swirly wind I am used to is really dangerous – like it is so strong that it destroys buildings and picks up cars and cows (as I tried to illustrate on the board), telling them it is called a tornado.

Bike Ride
Sophie and Stephanie drove us to a family’s house in the country on their motorcycles – it was great! They are friends with this family because they basically saved the son’s life when he was born, since they are nurses, and have just kept in touch. This family was BEAUTIFUL!!! This is now the second for-real Ethiopian mud house I’ve been in – that alone is always an experience. Their daughters, and even the mom, grandmother and aunt were just gorgeous. There is something, I realized today, very captivating about these women who are so full of life, so natural (no makeup, but also not jaded by ‘modernness’), so loving, so feminine, but at the same time you get the impression they have probably worked harder in their life time than most people probably would have in 50 lifetimes. It was just all around a wonderful trip :)