Part III - the longest post ever!

Brace yourself for the long haul! Here are the rest of my pictures from AFRICA!!
Jamie, Wendi, Joni at our luxury raised tent.
Here I am stealing a pretend drive in the safari vehicle.

A huge herd of cape buffalo.

A giraffe and some zebra at the watering hole.

Poor tall guy, just trying to get a drink.

Still thirsty...

Another thirsty giraffe coming over.

2 giraffes, trying to get a drink (which was totally cool to watch, by the way.)

Here come the buffalo...

and there go the other animals...

A crocodile, just hanging out on the side of the watering hole (different watering hole - not the same one as above.)

A good close shot of the cape buffalo. Pretty scary, eh?

Me trying to figure out what to do in the bathroom. There's a hole and there's a sprayer...what would you do?

A beautiful impala, posing for me.

A weaver's nest. They spin (make?) these cylindrical nests on the very end of a branch and point them outward to avoid their eggs being eaten by the tree-dwellers. There were tons of them in this tree and were pretty neat to see.

Close up of this guy's head. I love zooming in even farther on the close ups. It's pretty darn awesome to see them so close.

Mr. Baboon, hanging out on the road sign.

Changing positions...

and trying to jump in our windows?! We were sure that he was going to take a leap into the car. Needless to say, we rolled them up. Apparently they have problems there with baboons getting into cars and taking things. I guess they like all the treasures they find.

A little bit closer shot of some warthogs.

I'd never seen a giraffe-crossing sign before.

Or one of these...

There were always people on the sides of the road making and selling things. This particular village liked to display their things on the trees. Baskets, mats, bowls anyone?

The people carry all of their things on their head. Yeah - they really do. Even the little kids. We asked John why they use their heads so much and he said, "We use what we have. You have cars, we have heads."

People carry some of the biggest loads there. Here's a bike-full of some grass or plant. And this is a small load.

This is a huge head in Jacob's shop that is carved out of ebony. I was so interested in how ebony grows...it's bark on the outside and the real dark wood on the inside (just like the giant head shows). It was amazing to watch these guys carve things.

Here's mom doing part of her job at the mailbox.

"I'm in Africa!" says Wendi.

"Me too!"

Some of the cutest kids on the beach. They loved to smile and pose, then come see the picture on the camera. They would laugh and laugh when we showed them themselves on the screen. So cute.

A big creepy crab on the sidewalk at our hotel.

A shoutout to my baby.

The sunset and some fishing boats.

Me, trying to be an artistic photographer.

The cute girls again.

A fisherman (?) in his canoe.

Sunset over the palm trees.

Me, Jamie, and the Indian Ocean.

Jamie, being a goon.

Candlelight dinner on the beach with my 2 sisters and parents? Absolutely. Although I was wishing for a Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger about then.

Who's the bomb? We're the bomb.

Breakfast on the beach.

Remember the post that I complained about my lawnmower? I didn't mean it.

Flip-flops and the ocean.

Me taking a dip in the warm, perfect ocean...although I could have done without the little stinging jellyfish.

Trying to keep my Fanta upright and insulated.

Mom, doing missionary work? Close enough. :)

Me and Jamie, posing for our soccer portrait in Tanzania.

John and Elder Kenyon at one of the Church's water projects.

The water projects that we went to see were all at schools. I was real interested in what their schools were like, so we poked our heads in. John came in and gave us a lesson in Swahili. I'm thankful for my windowless, Jazz-blue classroom.
This was the sickest thing ever. John took us to the fish market to have an experience. The experience was literally stuck in my nose for 2 days. Yuck - it was so gross. I hate fish anyway, right? Add that to people walking barefoot through the piles of fish with flies on them and the juice leaking up on my flip-flops and the fish heads and guts all over the place and the guys yelling at me for taking pictures....I really hate fish now.

All the heads and bones and whatever else.

That face about describes it.

Some huge fish looking up at me.

Yeah, I probably swam with these guys.

Another water project at another school.

A math classroom!

You can't see the floor here real well, but there was a huge hole in it and it was totally warped. The desks weren't as nice as mine either.

Another view of the water project (collected from the rain) and one of the classrooms.

The girl's bathroom at one of the schools. Yikes.
John took us to his shamba (farm) to show us what a traditional Tanzanian person lives like in a day. This is one of his village's water holes, they literally dig down until they get water. While we were there a couple of kids came down with a jug to fill. And yes, it is as dirty as it looks. He said that he wouldn't get sick from it, but we definitely would.

This is another one a bit further down the creek bed.

He had one of his neighbors climb a palm tree to pick some coconuts. This guy just shimmied right up there. It was incredible.

A little higher...

and higher...

and on his way down.

This old guy showed us how to take the hard shell off and open a coconut.

Then he carved a little spoon out of the shell so John could get some of the meat out of the coconut. Right there before our eyes...in like 20 seconds. Holy cow. I don't think I could get up, run to my silverware drawer and pick up a spoon in 20 seconds.

Trying the coconut water (it's only okay).

but it's fun to have pictures taken of me drinking it!
I decided if that guy climbed right up the tree that it couldn't be that hard. It's that hard. This is as high as I got. I think I could have gotten a little higher if I had my running shoes on. For sure if I had some track or golf spikes on. :)

We met the lady and kids that live in this house. Yep, what you see is what you get. She told us (through John translating) what she does on a normal day. The women work really hard there doing all of the farming, the cooking, and caring for the children. She would die if she saw the homes that we live in.

John was cutting some kasava for us for lunch.

When we got there they had khangas (wraps) for the girls to wear.

I decided to try my hand at helping to fix lunch over the fire in a smoky, million-degree tin house. I wasn't very good at being an African woman.
Here's our red snapper (smelled just like the fish market) and ugali for lunch. Mmm, fish market.
Ugali is made from corn meal and water. It is cooked until it is stiff like mashed potatoes.

You take a piece with your hand, squish it into a ball, and enjoy.

It wasn't bad; it tasted about like white rice.
Then Christina dolled us all up with head wraps. We asked her how many different ways she knew how to tie those on heads. She said some huge number like 2,000. She was probably being serious too. They looked so much cuter on her than on me. My face clearly needs my hair to be somewhat successful.
Caleb lives in the little house on the shamba with his little brothers. Their parents live across the village. I'm not sure how old he is...maybe 14? He was showing us how to peel a coconut using bare feet and a pick ax.

Christina cut it open...

and showed us a cool little machine that grates the meat from the inside.

Looks cool, looks easy. Not so cool, not so easy.

They mixed the grated coconut meat with water to get the cream and milk out of it.

Then mixed it with the kasava (the root thing that John was cutting a few pictures back). It was pretty good and tasted like stringy, smoke-flavored potatoes. Did I say I wanted a Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger at the beach? I really wanted one here.

They showed us how to roast cashew nuts.

The oil leaks out of the shell and helps make a good flame.

Then you smash the outside off with a knife or root...

Caleb concentrating...

Grace, Christina, John.

Me, trying to open the cashews.

Yeah! I got one! Thanks, John, for a great day at your shamba.

Dinner at Addis in Dar, an Ethiopian restaurant.

The missionaries after dinner at Mom and Dad's house. They were so cute and fun. One of the elders even click-talks. Awesome.

One last game of threes before we left to come home. (In Tanzania with Mom and Dad, that is. We played for like 7 hours at the Nairobi airport waiting for our flight. Really, we played longer than we slept for the next 2 nights!)

This one's for you, Grandpa John. John Deere is even in Tanzania!

My only proof that I've been to England!