Krismas Njema!

25 December 2009

Krismas Njema! Our first Christmas away from home and our first as a married couple was a good one. We still missed our families and Christmas traditions and snow (believe it or not!), but we made of it what we could and had an enjoyable couple of days. On Tuesday we attended the candlelight service at church and the Simonson’s invited us over for Christmas Eve dinner. We thankfully obliged and had a great time with them. We ate ham and mashed potatoes and had a mango crisp for dessert! Then we sang some Christmas carols and watched everyone exchange gifts. Dave and Eunie, as well as Nathan and Susan and John and Annette Simonson, graciously gave us little gifts. Their kindness and hospitality made us feel as close to being at home with family as was possible over here, which was wonderful.

This morning we woke up and opened stockings (which we improvised with some oven mitts) and made omlettes. Then we exchanged some gifts and went to church. It was kind of cold and rainy, so the dreariness made it feel at least somewhat more like a “white Christmas” J. We came home and watched Christmas movies and snacked on various foods all day, and really enjoyed just relaxing for a day. Zach gave me a beautiful purse made out of scrap kitenge materials and I gave him a soccer ball made out of banana leaves and some authentic African cooking tools, which he was excited to try out.

We have been invited to go to the beach with Simonson’s for New Year’s and will be leaving on the 28^th or 29^th. We are looking forward to getting out of town for few days and getting our mind off of our work. We also have never seen the Indian Ocean, which will be fun. We’ll be in touch when we get back. Hope everyone has a safe and fun New Year’s.

(The picture is of our Christmas tree and "stockings," which were actually oven mitts made out of kitenge scraps, but they actually looked really cool.)

Written by Whitney