Katie's birthday, observed

Katie's birthday falls near the end of November, after our time here is done. So, we planned a surprise birthday outing on Friday. We began with an afternoon of shopping with just the girls, then made our way to a chocolate shop where everyone else was waiting to surprise Katie.

Melissa takes our coffee orders:






















The group enjoying coffee and chocolate:

















Shoe shopping: Lizzy, Katie, and Daleen

















Me and Katie

















Hanging out at the fountain before going to see a movie:

Arthur's Birthday, Observed

Arthur's birthday isn't actually today. But we celebrated it today.

Doug and Arthur having, no doubt, a very serious conversation.

Grace and me

Baby Bahati and Cori

Winter is coming

I spent the past few days at a conference held just outside Jo'burg. It's a bit colder down there than it is here in Pretoria, and I was glad I brought my favorite long socks.

Concert

A group of us went to a concert on Friday night to celebrate my birthday. Sarah took this picture of me, in which I said I look like a lost street child. But upon reflection, I think I kinda like it.

Winterveld

Sarah, Katie, and I went to visit several different ministries today in the townships of Winterveld, Mabopane, and Soshanguve. I drove, braving bumpy dirt roads and dodging taxis and wandering goats. (I'm continuing to develop ideas for a "Driving in Africa" video game. It'll be a big hit.)

This picture was taken at the Winterveld Community Project, which serves the community with home-based medical care, a day care center, youth programs, and a lot more as well. These are some of the kids in the day care center, waving goodbye.

Esoteric

I love this categorization.

Jonas and Valrey

We spent today out in the township of Hamenskraal, painting the home of Jonas and Valrey, friends of Arthur and Melissa's.



Sarah and Tyler hard at work


Valrey and Jonas with their daughter Motlope, standing in front of the freshly painted house. I called it Cookie Monster blue. =)

Team building and...a dog

On Thursday, we spent most of the day at Kwalata, where we did a bunch of team building activities including a ropes course. It was really hot and really fun, too. In spite of the blisters I managed to acquire on my hands...ouch. This is Katie taking a picture of me taking a picture of Sarah being goofy.



After Kwalata, we headed for Pangani Pori, Daleen's parents' farm. (Pangani means "come together" and Pori means "in the bush.") We did a little game drive while we were there. This isn't the game we saw; this is the dog that followed us.

Sun City

On Saturday, we spent a day hanging out at a water park at Sun City.


















A few of us did some walking around trails and such....please note my proper walking shoes.























Spiderweb Bridge


















Group photo with monkey fountain. Who doesn't love a monkey fountain?