Last night I'd got to the end of Saturday before the waves of exhaustion swept me away. There's been so much to do and take in these last few days that sometimes it's a struggle not to go to bed before teatime.
On Sunday morning we attended the service at Hillcrest School Chapel. Once we're settled we intend to worship in a Nigerian church but it seemed a good idea to go for the familar the day after we had arrived and was a good opportunity for James and Ruth to see something of the school before their entrance exam the next day. It was the right decision. The banner at the front was "Shine like stars" which is a verse that has been occuring to a friend of mine whenever she thinks about what we're doing. The first song was "Open the eyes of my heart Lord" which we'd had at our commissioning. A bit emotional but more of God's kindly confirmations to us.
On Monday we were back at the school for the exam. Whilst James and Ruth were busy working, Fraser and I achieved our own minor triumph: we managed to make the half hour walk from the school to the guest house all by ourselves without getting lost, and we got back to the school again! It was lovely to see the MA family en masse at lunch time at school. Whilst in the UK Jamie Oliver is campaigning for healthy school meals, at Hillcrest you can get delicious food freshly cooked on barbeques but this food is all fried. We had sooya (thin bits of beef with a spicy coating threaded onto sticks) and cooked on the fire with copious quantities of oil, accompanied by raw red onion and masa (soaked rice ground to powder, mixed into a paste and fried). I don't know if it was a good thing that the portion was left next to me as it was all too easy just to keep eating. This was the only booth open in the holidays but from today the lady who cooks "puffpuffs" (doughnut holes) and fried Irish (potatoes) will be there. I know why Nigerian clothes are so free flowing.
Both children passed - James has gone into grade 8 and Ruth into grade 6.
Tuesday was another busy day as we were taken over to Bukuru to meet Dr Tersur Aben, Provost of TCNN. Fraser would have been quite happy to have been let out of the car at the library and left but sadly the library was locked. Most of the staff had been given the week off before the beginning of term on Monday. We were taken to see our house which does need quite a bit of work done on it before we can move in but we all felt at home in the place and want to be there as soon as possible. As it's been unoccupied for quite a long time there is a maize field in part of our garden but once that's been harvested we can reclaim the land. I'm already thinking about the crops and flowers we could grow. I know we'll be happy there as not only are there at least four mango trees but also an orange tree and a cashew nut tree. My prayers answered and then some. I intend to plant some papaya trees and banana plants once we get there so we'll have to stay in Nigeria for quite some time.
Dr Aben took us out to lunch at "McHez", a Nigerian fast food place. Our first proper Nigerian meal was very tasty and rather spicy. The bitter greens, moimoi (a sort of beancurd wrapped in a leaf and baked with a hardboiled egg in the middle), catfish, dumplings, soup (more like stew) with catfish again, fried rice and spicy chicken were served in huge platefuls so everyone tried a bit of everything. We're going to enjoy Nigerian food. We had gone upstairs for a bit more privacy to talk. In true Nigerian fashion the television was turned up when they realised where we'd gone. There's no concept of noise pollution here.
I'm nearly up to date now as this morning we were up early again to take James and Ruth for their first day at school. The 8:05am start isn't that hard to get used to. All parents are invited to the chapel service which was more like a DEC Sunday meeting than a school assembly. It was great and we were reassured to see James and Ruth both chatting to people as they came in. Things have started well.
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