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As I woke up on Sunday morning the 17th of March in Yabello, I felt how dusty my bed and also the whole room were. My dust allergy disturbed me that day and I had forgotten my tablets in Dhadim, so there was no way of sleeping another night there, although it was planned like that.
Even tough of my dust allergy reaction, I went to work in the office with the two Swiss girls the whole day, only a break for Lunch. In the evening Sebastian, he is a brother in Yabello, brought me to Dhadim, where I finally could take my tablets and take a shower.
Because I didn't sleep much that weekend, I was still quite tired on Monday morning, as I went to the kindergarten. Nothing special happened there, so I can tell now, how a normal day looks like.
I normally get up between 6.30 and 7.30, depending on how tired I am and what I am going to do that day. I take my daily cold shower, because there is at the moment no hot water in my shower and go for breakfast, mostly something like cornflakes, sometimes fruits or whatever there is on that day. At 9, I go to the kindergarten till10, because they have break between 10 and 11. During that hour, I play sometimes with the kids or go up to the house to drink some tea, eat something or do something else. From 11 to 1.30 there is kindergarten again and when the Children get their lunch, I also go to the house and take lunch with Boniface. Sometimes I have to cook something, because I told our cook not to prepare something or just part of it, so I can do it the way I want it. Lunch and Dinner are mostly rice and potatoes, chicken, sometimes carrots, beans or other vegetables and tomato sauce. Lately, I often make soap. After lunch it is really different. Sometimes I don't do anything, sometimes I go and help Sister Ancia with teaching the kids in the afternoon in front of the church and then I play with them and some other youth and a times I do something for Boniface or one of the sisters. Between 6 and 7 I take another short cold shower and often do my laundry then, because during 6.30 and 7 the others have their prayers. At 7 Dinner and after finishing, we watch TV or talk or work on the computer. Mostly around 12 I go to bed.
On Tuesday, the Kindergarten was exhausting, actually not the Kindergarten but the children, because they didn't want to listen or to sit quietly.
I came a little bit late to the Kindergarten because I first had to discuss something with some people and as I came, Sr. Ancia went shortly to the clinic to get some gloves. She needs them to apply some medicine on the children head against some kind of disease.
So I came and the cook was just looking that the children were quiet. She went and I started teaching them the English letters. One of the children, it is the most intelligent in the class, told me that they didn't pray yet. Every morning they pray and after that the go out to do some exercise movements and sing a song. So he told me they didn't pray, several times, other girls in the class tried to tell me they had already but I didn't understand and I thought that boy would speak the truth, so I let them pray. Then I finally started with the English lesson. Sister Ancia came back and she told me as I asked her, that they had prayed already. For that kind of lying to me, we sent the boy strait home. But actually, the grown ups lie that much and the children just copy, but I was still angry at him. One example once in the car, we gave some people a lift and one of the woman spit in the car as I watched her, so I told her not to do. Then she said, she didn't spit and even the woman next to her said she didn't, but I just watched her doing it. That kind of lying, you find it everywhere and it is quite hard to know if the people speak the truth or if they are lying again.
But anyway, after the break, Sister Ancia and I changed the places of the children. They all had to stand outside and I know a bit which children talk much with each other and which less, so I arranged them that I would be a bit quieter in the class. One of the girls refused to change her place, so Sr. told her to sit where she was ordered to sit. After she refused again and again, she was sent home.
It is quite hard to send them home because of that kind of things but we have to do, because with 50 children, if they see that we don't do anything against it, all of them start doing what every they want to do.
In the afternoon, I was alone, because Boniface was somewhere in some parishes. I didn't do much.
On the 20th of March the children were really nice in the Kindergarten, so our punishments from the day before worked. After the break we went to the TV room with them and showed them a DVD of Addis Ababa where some kinds sing and dance some songs for children. The kids were really fascinated and liked it a lot, because normally they never watch TV.
Because it was Ash Wednesday, there was Mass in the afternoon. During Mass, everyone got a cross out of Ash and Water on his forehead together with the blessing of the priest, Abba Boniface. After finishing mass, we went to Yabello, Boniface had another Mass there and I had some computer work to do. Boniface had in total 6 Masses that day, because the two other priests Abba Anthony and Abba Iede are not around.
As we drove back to Dhadim, we took a bride and her bridesmaids together with the husband and some of his friends with us. The husband is actually a teacher and they celebrated their wedding in Dhadim in the school. I don't know if they were already married and just the party was that day or if they married that day, but there was a party with food and drinks and loud music. The drinks were by the way just soft drinks and tea I guess because people here don't drink alcohol. Only old man are allowed to drink alcohol, but I thing now days also woman drink, but youth and children are not allowed. Or something like that. There are a lot of drunkards in Dhadim and surrounding arias, but they are all grown up. But anyway, the bride and her husband and a friend of the bride and a friend of the husband were sitting somewhere higher then the rest, but they looked quite bored, because no one was really talking to them and they didn't do anything besides sitting there.
On Thursday we went out with the children on a field next to the kindergarten and played some games. They wanted to run a lot and play with the ball or just with Sr. Ancia and me. In the Afternoon, Sr. Ancia always gives some extra lessons for the children in front of the church and sometimes I help her. Today I came after finishing and so I played with them and with a Ball. Later I played also with some kids from the school hostel; we played some kind of volleyball and football.
After I took a shower and washed some clothes, I went to bed at 10.30 because I was so tired.
The next morning was the morning of the 22nd of March. That was a Friday, and on Fridays we take the Kindergarten kids to the church where Abba Boniface teaches them. After that we released them into the break and I went back to the house to do some computer work, because we went to Yabello at around 12 o'clock to bring the teachers and to do some other stuff like using the internet.
At 3 o'clock we were already on our way back, with the rain it takes around 45 minutes to reach Yabello. Actually, it didn't rain that particular hour but the rain destroys the roads. We were already late because we should have been at 3 in church for the Blessing of the Cross and then the road just before the village was blocked by a river, which was to big to cross by car. So we had to leave the car, take of our shoes and walk trough the river and up to our house and the church, which was about 10 minutes walking. Then we first had to wash our feet and eat something small before we went to the church. The Blessing of the Cross was something different than normal Mass. We took the Cross and walked from picture to picture. During the time we walked they sang a song, at the Picture itself we prayed and I don't know exactly because I didn't understand that much. But I understood that they were praying to the holy mother Maria. The pictures told the story of Jesus.
After the Blessing of the Cross Boniface and I went to Haro Bake together with some youth, because there was a youth program going on. We went there because Boniface had to celebrate Mass at 6, at least that was the time he told me. As we passed Jolcasa, the youth there was still in front of the church, so I knew I t wouldn't start at 6. I was with the youth, mostly the youth from Dhadim, because I know them. As we saw the youth from Jolcasa appearing on the street, we went to greet them. That means we ran towards them, and we ran back with them, singing and dancing. After some more singing and dancing it was time for Dinner. I ate a bit with them, they made boshe, that is something out of Cornflower and I guess oil and water, and there was black tea with sugar. Of course, we ate with our hands and we washed them before eating. It was quite normal to feed each other and to share everything. After finishing it was something past 8 and finally Mass started. Boniface and I stayed to watch a bit of their program after Mass and went home in the dark.
Saturday the 23rd of March was for me more like a Sunday; I slept quite long and did a lot of washing together with the kitchen girls. Later I helped them with the land, we ploughed a piece of land and sowed some corn and beans.
During the whole day some plumbers where there and repaired everything, because almost every sink and shower and what else is connected with water was leaking or broken or soon going to break.
During Mass on Sunday there were not a lot of people there. It was quite usual. After Lunch I went to play with some Kids for some hours, we played the whole time with the ball and they taught me some games. After that, I had to wash these clothes because they were extremely dirty and I smelled really bad, so I took a shower before I did anything else. During the night there was a lot of rain again. It is raining a lot actually and there are a lot of stupid insects flying into the light and candles or into the toilet. But there are not a lot of mosquitoes; in fact, I only saw two and these were flying during the day. The whole country is changing, the landscape looks really different and the roads are getting destroyed, so we have to drive sometimes during the bush and there are even times when it is raining or when it just rained that you are more sliding than driving.
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Mama Geweldig. Modder, regen en op blote voeten door het water lopen, plezierreisje? Ik geloof dat het nog een spannend avontuur wordt. Ben benieuwd. Tot gauw