Around the world in one day!

Okay, so I didn't actually travel to all the countries in the world, but I felt like I did---especially when I ate the DELICIOUS food. It was the school's international festival this weekend. I was in charge of the USA booth.
My amazing team and I put together quite the Old West experience: panning for gold, a real covered chuck wagon, and good western eats as well (hot dogs and cupcakes!). I tried really hard to make home-made rootbeer--even got the extract shipped to me, but in the end couldn't find dry ice, so no go. I did, however, have quite a few conversations with an Arab man who didn't know what the heck dry ice was:)
It was a fun day, but I am glad it is over. We served over 300 ALL BEEF, Oscar Meyer hot dogs, much to a lot of teenage boys' delight. I think one kid actually ate 5 hotdogs, with the buns! It is very hard to get American hot dogs here. The Egyptian kind taste like they added cinnamon to the mixture.....takes some getting used to. Plus, does ALL BEEF really mean ALL BEEF, or does it mean some beef mixed in with some camel? Who really knows I guess, but I am glad for Oscar Meyer (which I am SURE really means ALL BEEF, when they say ALL BEEF----hahahaha).
A funny thing happened at this festival: Egyptian guy came in wanting hot dog and we gave him a free cupcake too (we had A LOT of extra cupcakes because people were so generous to donate so many). As he took it, someone said, "now don't ever say America never gave you anything!" I laughed pretty hard at that one....and so did he, so I guess that is good. Foreign policy at its best! We did have a giant Obama cut-out, so that must mean we were true ambassadors.

Now for the food: AMAZING french bread with Saint Andre cheese, INCREDIBLE ceviche from Latin America and TO DIE FOR banana leaf-wrapped food packet from Indonesia, with combination of flavors inside that just was WOW:)

Ok, enough drooling.....I am making myself hungry and it is much too late to eat tonight! 3 cheers to international schools throwing international festivals and all the people who put in a TON of work to make it so good. There are some amazing countries in our world. Can't wait until we can see some more of them sometime---and eat some more great food. Oops, there I go, back to the food again. Guess I better say GOOD NIGHT.

Walking the Wadi

Wadi is a small canyon-like area in the desert. The Wadi Digla is in Maadi, Egypt and is actually one of the very few natrual protected areas in Egypt. It has some fossils, a lot of interesting rock formations, barren and vast landscape, which makes you feel a little bit alone in this overly populated area....it also has A LOT of blowing plastic bags. The 7th graders went to pick up trash and I was asked to go along as a sub. It was fun, beautiful and wonderfully cool weather. Only downside was the vast amounts of garbage! We found boots, old paint cans, a wooden doorknob, myriad of flip-flops and plastic bottles and A LOT of plastic bags (did I already mention that!).

When I first moved to Egypt and saw "the Wadi", I thought it was pretty ugly. Now it is beautiful to me. Mostly because my standards have lowered and I am more desperate for nature and natural beauty than I used to be:) I do think that there is beauty here though---look at the amazing rock formation and how erosion has shaped the earth. Very interesting.....and only about a 20 minute drive from our house. If the road conditions weren't so terrible, I would come every day (when it is cool).

Leprosarium, hail, movies and haircut

Our church group took a Saturday and went to a leprosarium outside of Cairo. Elisabeth, Josh and Brent went from our family. Everyone pitched in to help strip and paint, garden and clean a variety of other things. It was interesting and a good experience for everyone involved. Brent said it was very self-contained: its own community, complete with bakery for making bread baladi and that the people were very kind and grateful.

In recent times we have seen more rain in 1 day than in the entire year we lived here so far....including an amazing lighting and thunder storm and BIG hail. It was awesome. We were all out on the balcony cheering, along with everyone else on our street:)

(hail)

2 different movies were being filmed within general area of our apartment in the last 2 weeks. This picture is one that was just across the street in a restaurant and filmed all night. All I know was that it was about a blind, pregnant woman. I think it was a soap opera or something. Arabic soaps are really big here. They filmed all night and I was glad (once again) that our bedrooms are on the quiet side of the house!

Here is a picture of my once-a-year haircut. It looks a little like a glorified mullet, but I think it works okay. I don't have to do much to it and that was the point:)

All in all, life is moving along smoothly. Spring seems to have sprung already and the glorious cool weather has moved on a bit---today it was 95! We are bracing for a hot spring and summer, but looking forward to a trip to Petra, Jordan over spring break. We had plans to visit Israel instead, but because of the overlap of Muslim AND Christian Easter, there was not a single room in the inn, so to speak.

We are also planning to visit Idaho in the summer. All the kids have a list of things they will eat and how they will run and roll in as much grass as they can find. I, personally, may just pitch a tent in Target or Costco and call it good:)

Love to you all and a special virtual hug to Greg and Chrissy and family---who just brought home their 2 new sons from Ethiopia---glad all went well and we will keep praying for you during this time of transition.

The ONE YEAR Mark

WEll, it has been awhile as far as blogging goes (I have been doing A LOT of substitute teaching), but thought I would come back with a bang today---right on the 1 year anniversary of moving to Egypt.


(photo: our 2nd full day in Egypt Feb. 21st, 2009, with the Furmans--who sponsored us and helped us get started)


This day last year: we had just traveled for 22 hours and landed in Cairo. In a daze we loaded into a van surrounded by people speaking things I didn't understand and drove through rush-hour traffic to a hotel.....I prayed A LOT during that drive and I closed my eyes many times, sure that we were doing to wreck. After dropping the kids and Brent off at the hotel, I rode with a new friend to the commissary, braving the traffic and brain fuzz again in order to get some milk, bread and tylenol:)
That evening, after all the kids fell asleep and Brent was asleep, I laid in the hotel bed listening to the sounds off the street and wondered what I had gotten myself into. Everything was so strange and different. It was exciting, but overwhelming at the same time.


Weeks turned into months, we all kept learning new things and realized that we were braver than we thought and that people are people no matter where you go. We understand a culture that is mostly opposite of our own and we can see the value of it. Our world is expanded and we are very grateful for so many different things.



(photo: Feb. 19th, 2010---1 year in Egypt and we act just like the locals!)



Now we are all settled in routines and it feels like home and pretty comfortable for the most part---aside from the fact that it still takes 4 trips to the little auto part store to get the correct oil filter for our car:)














Elisabeth the "tiger" Rebekah the "bee" Brent and Amiee on Valentine's Day

The Lunchboxes

I’ve decided that lunch boxes kind of define my life.

At first glance, they appear to be a never-ending routine of work. You fill them, they complain about what is in them, they partially empty them, you clean them out and then you fill them….again and again it goes. Not only do they need work to fill, you have a lot of prep work to get them ready to be filled. There is bread to make, groceries to buy and fruits and veggies to wash. There is guilt and worry involved as well: is this food good enough, healthy enough, non-processed enough? Will the other children/mothers/teachers think these lunches are good enough? Will the kids open their lunch and think of a loving mother or will the whole kit-n-caboodle get trashed immediately leaving my child begging for food, looking as if no one loved them?
If the first glance were accurate, I would have quit a long time ago, but luckily, upon further inspection, I see how valuable they are. I think of my mom and all the lunches she prepared for me and how we used to go through a loaf of bread EVERY day. But now she doesn’t have any lunchboxes left to fill. They go away you see…..they are not always there needing you to fill them. And if you worked hard and put up with the tireless routine, you look back on those lunchboxes with real joy. They represent true love and a stewardship given by a loving, trusting Heavenly Father. They represent enduring love, selflessness and what CAN be.

So you see, lunch boxes do define my life….what it is, what it looks like on the outsides verses what it feels like on the inside and what I hope it can be.

New Year, Same Life:)

This is a picture of the traffic. This is a picture of the kids in traffic. Get the point?! DVD system in car a HUGE blessing:)

Here is Rebekah, smiling as usual!

Dad and Emma swimming in the middle of winter. Yeah, life is rough in Africa:)

Sarah in her natural state: a curtsy (which came right after some big ballet dance combo move)

This picture with Elisabeth in make-up explains why she will not leave the house until she is an adult....especially not with a boy!

And what depiction of our life would be complete without Josh asleep....this time with a lollipop in his mouth:) Rebekah took this picture and was particularly proud of herself for capturing it.

New Year's Greetings from Egypt

Goodbye 2009
In February we left the DC area and moved to a new continent! We live in Cairo, Egypt now and really like it. We have learned a lot so far. We haven’t learned to walk like Egyptians yet, but we sure are learning to drive like them
Here is what we have been up to all year:
Rebekah finished 6th grade, turned 12 over the summer, started going to Young Woman’s and the 7th grade. She loves to play the piano, sing, act, and make art. She just finished an amazing clay sculpture of a seahorse. She is excited because she got a digital camera for Christmas.
Josh finished elementary school and is now a big 6th grader. He turned 11 this summer and is getting tall—and getting big feet! He played soccer and basketball and is still playing the trumpet and piano. He LOVES to read and recently told me he actually likes to cook. He is doing well in school and likes Math class best.
Elisabeth finished 2nd grade, turned 8 and was baptized in the Red Sea! She is well into her 3rd grade year now and really loves it. She is an excellent reader, piano player and artist. She has set up her own “art studio” in her bedroom and paints pictures whenever she has a minute. She also played the violin this year and tried Irish Dance, which she LOVED.
Emma finished kindergarten and started 1st grade with serious excitement! She LOVES to play with “the boys” at recess and is quite the little soccer player. She reads a lot and was so happy to get The Magic Treehouse Books for her 7th birthday and Christmas. She still cracks us all up with her comments and her “can-do” attitude. Just last week she actually stopped sucking her 2 fingers! For those of you who know her well, you can understand what an accomplishment this is! Who knew that bribing her with money would work so well---thanks Grandpa.
Sarah turned 5 and started kindergarten. She loves to sing, to draw, to dance and watch Barbie movies After she read me a book recently, she ran around the house shouting, “I am a reader, I am a reader!” She is almost always happy and enjoys riding her scooter down our LONG hallway.
Brent and Amiee are watching the kids grow more each day and loving our time with them. Brent is traveling quite a bit with his work, but he is getting to see some very interesting parts of the world. He is really learning Arabic! Amiee did what all good mothers’ do when all their kids are finally all in school---she sat around reading books for a week or two! She is now learning how to play tennis and substitute teaching at the school.
2009 has been a great year and we look forward to the adventures that 2010 will bring. We feel very blessed to have so many family and friends who support and love us!
We love you all and pray that you will have a wonderful New Year!
WELCOME 2010