Last visit to Granny's

Sophia and me

Doug and Tseppo, thumb wrestling

Sarah and me with Winnie and Sophia

Nthabiseng, me, and Tshegofatso (I've finally figured out how to spell their names...)

Farewell party

When we arrived at Granny's, the family had a surprise farewell party planned for Sarah and me.


We also celebrated Granny's birthday together...here's me and Sarah with Granny:

And here's one of the plates we were served, Emily telling us that if we didn't finish our plate, we'd have to stay here in South Africa.

The family looking at the photos and photo album we brought as a goodbye gift:

McDonald and his garden

McDonald is a friend of ours in Soshanguve. He runs a car wash...with a garden. =)

Dancing at Granny's

Road Tripping

We have eleven people from America visiting here for the next couple weeks on a "Road Trip." Today I joined them for part of their first visit to Soshanguve. One of the places we went this morning was a day care center, where we had fun hanging out with the kids (who, as usual, greeted us with shouts of "makua!" = "white people!").


















Sign outside the day care center


















Connie entertains the kids with bubbles























Katie plays with a very smiley little girl

InnerChange

Today I spent the day out in Soshanguve with the InnerChange team, hanging out at Granny's house and Emily's house, visiting various friends and neighbors, learning more about the history of Sosh, and concluding the day with dinner at Granny's house. I had to say goodbyes to the team as they'll be out in Sosh until Wednesday...and I leave for Mozambique on Monday for a week off.


Hanging out in front of Granny's. I'm not sure about my expression here...but I love the light in this photo.


"Today I am Nanny Emily." Emily with Luc & Petunia's daughter Bahati. (And a crazed-looking Tyler in the background.)


Carissa with Annie, one of the InnerChange team members, who's visiting us from London.






















"Pizza Imonati." Granny sang her pizza song for the camera. Please note how she's playing air guitar...

Kitty

Sarah and the family cat at Granny's. Its name is Kitty.

Sharing life

Sarah and I gave Granny's family some "homework" last week. We're going to take time on Friday to share more about our lives with each other. To help do this we asked them to make a life timeline showing important/significant events, using pictures (something that NC had all of us do at the beginning of the year). Granny, Annah, and Sophia had already finished theirs and were so excited to show them to us. I'm excited to hear each of them share their timelines on Friday!

Lobola

Today I went out to Soshanguve with Sarah and Doug for what we thought was going to be a wedding for Champagne (one of Granny's granddaughters) and her boyfriend July. We had misunderstood, and instead of a wedding, today was the lobola negotiation. Lobola is like a dowry--it's the money that a man or his family must pay to the prospective bride's family. We were told that July's family would be arriving at Granny's just before sunrise, but we opted to go ahead and come a bit late...we arrived at 9:30 instead of 6:00am. And, the family had not yet arrived. There was some miscommunication between the families, so as things turned out, July's family still hadn't arrived by the time we left just after 2:00pm. But we had a great time hanging out with the family, hearing more about their cultural traditions, and even seeing Granny kill two chickens for the meal. You might not want to look at the last of these photos if that last thing on the list bothers you...

Me with Champagne's daughter, Sofatso


















Laundry on the fence...and Doug's car. The boys had fun washing the car while we hung out with the family.


















And...not for the faint of heart...the freshly decapitated chicken.

Building progress...and another birthday

Ma Ntabiseng's house is almost done!


















The team has been hard at work:























And, we celebrated yet another birthday today: Lungile turned three. =)


















I'll close with a beautiful African sunset:

Building and Birthday

We have a team here from California who is building a house for Granny's next door neighbor, Ma Ntabiseng. I got to hang out with them today and see the progress being made...as well as pitch in doing fun things like moving bricks. Here's Megan hard at work with the mortar, while Sarah looks on.



Back at Pangani tonight, we celebrated Carissa's birthday. Here she is, sitting in her favorite spot in the whole house. She's laughing over the calendar we made her, with pictures of each one of us wearing the arm brace she had to wear after her horse-riding injury back in March!

No Hawking

This is one of my favorite sights on the drive to Soshanguve. Without fail, you can find the hawkers set up all around the no hawking sign. If they weren't there, I might just miss my turn. (I've been meaning to take this picture all year. This one is thanks to photos I stole from the Road Trippers.)

More Dancing

Here are a couple pictures of me with Emily, stolen from Carissa's camera!

Dancing at Granny's

We took the Road Trippers to visit Granny's family for dinner and a bit of African culture. They taught us a couple of traditional dances...and then there was just plain dancing!

Pizza party!

Granny's daughter, Emily, as well as a neighbor of hers, are planning to start selling pizzas as a business in their neighborhood in Soshanguve. A bunch of us brought out pizza makings this afternoon, and Daleen taught the women how to make the dough.


















This is Anna, one of Granny's daughters, making pizza dough. She'd never made or eaten pizza before...and greatly enjoyed doing both tonight!























As we made pizzas, the kids played outside, and later called us out to hear them sing (a good morning song and "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" were the program for the evening). After the singing, they danced for us. Of course!

Good Friday

Friday evening, several of us went to Soshanguve to observe Good Friday at Granny's. Us girls hung out with the kids while the adults watched The Passion of the Christ. This is me with Precious!

Township sunset

Precious

On Wednesday, we had a time of worship & Bible study led by one of the NC staff, Doug, who's been involved with this family for a couple of years now. Here's one of the kids, Precious, with Doug's huge Bible!

Kids in Sosh

The photos have been more -ish than daily of late. I apologize. I've got a few for you now, though. I spent Tuesday through Thursday of this week staying with a family out in Soshanguve. Here's me with a bunch of the kids.

Uthando

On Friday, Carissa, Sarah, and I did an assembly at Uthando Primary School in Soshanguve. This is the three of us with two of the teachers. Dorothy, next to Sarah, was our translator for the assembly.