Weekends of Fun!

Welll, hopefully all of you had a great weekend! It’s Sunday night here in Benin and I just got off the phone with my mom and dad and GG and am watching Season 1 of Grey’s Anatomy in the upper right hand corner of my computer while I type up this little blog post. Also talked to Megan and Dr. Henley at Milestones. Shout out to my MPC family; miss you guys!!!

Also, just killed the 153^rd ant of the night that was crawling across my computer screen. Also, the keys on my laptop hardly want to move b/c of all the insane amounts of dust that have blown into them…it’s usually dusty here but right now it’s crazy dusty from the winds blowing down sand from the Sahara Dessert. (as best I understand it at least…)

Weekends are fun around here. This weekend has been busy, as usual and also fun, of course!

To paint a very small picture of what the past few days have looked like, I’ll highlight some key points.

Saturday morning started with a morning exercise time with my downstairs neighbor, Maman Carmella. (Carmella is her first born child; It’s customary here for men and women to become Papa _____ and Maman ______ with their first born child’s name inserted and that’s what they are known as for essentially the rest of their life. For instance, we have a cook who works at the orphanage who I only know as Maman Jacquelyn, Jacquelyn was her first born child. Maman Carmella’s first name is Yvette, I do know that!) She showed me this nice path that’s about 2 miles roundtrip that I can travel easily on my own without getting too turned around and lost on the red dirt roads. The plan is to pound out many mornings on that path. We had a great time together reviewing my French verbs and their conjugations and she worked on learning the English words that correlated.

Every other Saturday a psychologist, Carine, comes to Sakete from Porto Novo, the capital city of Benin that’s about 1 hour away to meet with the children and she spends several hours at the orphanage doing various things with the kids. Yesterday was her Saturday to be at the centre and we met her there. I answered some emails and browsed Facebook during their group activity time and then when the younger children were finished with their session Alice, Rosaline and I went to the storage room to organize bins of items that we had moved over to the orphanage from the bureau on Friday morning.

A little change that has taken place in the course of what Arbre de Vie looks like over the past several months is that an adoption program has been added to the existing work that Arbre de Vie is currently doing in Benin. It’s all under the umbrella of Arbre de Vie NGO but the children in the adoption program all live over at the old bureau (which we now call Centre #2) until they are united with their “forever families”. These are young children (newborn-early childhood) who will only be at this centre temporarily until all the paperwork and legal matters are taken care of for the adoption process. There is staff there caring for the children and the staff at Centre #1 is working alongside our team at Centre #2 to try to provide the best environment and care for these children until they’re adopted to their families in Europe and the US. Okay, back to the story of the day…

We moved everything that was Centre One’s items out of the old bureau (TONS of paperwork for the NGO, files, financial information, school books, etc.) and had a lot of work on our hands (still do) with organizing all of that and finding places for it all in the new dorm/at Centre #1. Is this getting confusing yet? Sorry. I’m trying to explain it all as clearly as possible.

Either way, Rosaline, Alice and I worked in the storage room at our Centre #1 for a few hours and they were very helpful with emptying the bins and helping organize. I’m all about organizing so I love this task, trust me! In the process, I pulled out a white, round, bead looking thing and rolled it in my hands (thinking it was a bead). The white, tiny ball squished and green liquid came squirting out…thank GOD I had on gloves b/c I hate my hands feeling all gross and there’s so much dust so I wear medical gloves when I clean here. Alice starts laughing. I start freaking out.

“What was that?”

“Alice! What was that??”

“Oh my word. Why is it green? What is it??”

“Tata, it is a baby lizard.”

BARF.

Lunchtime followed by more cleaning and organizing. Ashley taught the kids how to make Rainbow Loom bracelets/rings that their Tata Emily sent them for Christmas and they loved it! I’m now the proud owner of 2 Rainbow Loom bracelets handmade by the children of Arbre de Vie. Don’t be jealous.

Off we went with a group of our kids to work together over at Centre #2 for several hours. We loaded up all the remainder of our items and loved on the children there for several hours. Our kids did a craft project with them and the young kids did so well with coloring and making signs for their living room. We sang songs. The kids played games with them. It was good for our kids to be part of this and to give back. They’ve been given so much and their lives are so radically different because of it…it will be important for them to always know and realize the importance of giving back to those in need.

Unloaded everything at Centre #1. Back to Centre #2 for the last of the items. Augustin and I went to the pharmacy to pick up medicine for 2 children in our sponsorship program who have sickle cell. Walked into the pharmacy, picked up all the meds we needed to finish what Ashley had already purchased. Stopped at the roadside market stand to pick up popcorn to make for movie night. Went to the home of the children to give them their medications for the entire month and spent some time talking with them and praying for them. Stopped to get me some COLD water before heading home to the orphanage. It’s around 8pm by this time…we ate some dinner and then started a movie for the kids to watch since it’s Saturday and all, right? High School Musical made it even better!

Ashley taught me the ropes for making popcorn for 30+ people in iron pots. She burnt her finger on hot oil. Toothpaste to the rescue from Maman Jacquelyn for the burn. Fresh popcorn for everyone. Sang along with High School Musical, duh!

Movie’s over. Head out of the orphanage which is always a 30+ minute endeavor. Tell all the kids goodnight. Hug them tight. Drive home. Sleeping tight until about 0300 in the morning when the right side of my bed goes falling off the bedframe slat and I feel like I’m legitimately rolling down a huge mountain. Scared the liver out of me. Seriously, we could have won money! Didn’t fix it at the time…just slept on an incline all night on the left side holding on for dear life.

Slept in a little this morning before church. Church at 10:30. Home for lunch. (Shoutout to Cindy for the amazing broccoli cheese soup! Tell Nancy the brand. She can send some soups over in my first package! BOMB!) Ash made broccoli cheese soup (DELISH) and JB made garlic bread (SUPERB) and then off I went to do my most dreaded task…LAUNDRY.

Now, I don’t really like doing laundry in the States even. Where I have a washing machine. Where I have a dryer. I REALLY don’t like doing laundry in Benin. But I decided to make the best of it and hunkered down to tackle my mountain of laundry from the past 2 weeks…handwashed it all and when I went upstairs to hang the last load of clothes on the line on our roof, this crazy storm was blowing in. The sky legitimately looked like an Oklahoma sky in Spring during a tornado…the wind was blowing like CRAZY and my clothes that were already on the line were being tossed all over the line in the wind and I screamed down for help and up ran Ash, Jon and Femi (he came home with us after church because he was feeling sick) and we took all the clothes off the line and brought them into my apartment. I was going to be one ticked off Tata if all my hard, handwashing laundry work had gone to waste because all the clothes wouldn’t dry because of the storm…

Off to the orphanage. Study time with the kids. Bible study time with the pastor. More organizing and emptying. Bins/Boxes. Dinner. Laughing to the point of crying with the kids. Leftover popcorn. Goodnights. Brush your teeth. Go to bed. Drive home.

Decide to hang up the clothes back up on the roof tonight so they wouldn’t be gross and musty by morning…and stinky. And I will be darned if all that work goes to waste!!! Jon fixed my bed. I threw on my headlamp that Megan my nurse friend from Milestones gave me as a goodbye gift and put those clothes out on the line to dry using both my hands without having to hold a flashlight! SCORE! Best gift ever. Delphine was along to assist Tata and bat off the birds waiting for us at the top of the stairs. And now, sleep.

Sweet, sweet sleep.

Wonder what Monday will hold?