Dr/Mrs/Auntie/Teacher/Chef/Mommy Karrie

Oh she's wearing lots of hats these days...

I just wanted to give props to my wife, particularly as she has been pulled and stretched in so many different directions recently.

"Teacher" Karrie, working at the school with the 4/5th grade class.

And now, she's playing single mom as I've had to make another trip into Windhoek overnight.

Thank you honey, just for being you...

-Steve

Movie Nights at the Graham's

We watched "Lilo and Stitch" a couple weeks ago, and then "Spiderman 3" a couple nights ago. Many of the children in the picture are staying on their own right now at a house nearby. We've been doing our best to keep an eye on them and make sure they have everything they need. You may think that "movie night" is a highlight for them... but I have to say it's more of a highlight for me!


The word "ohana" comes up in "Lilo and Stitch" pretty frequently, which apparently means "family" in the language of the Hawaiin people. The story is about orphaned siblings - with just an older sister raising a younger sister - who find a delinquent alien creature they think is just a rude, ugly dog who decides he wants to be part of their family whether it's a normal family or not. I promise, the movie selection wasn't done intentionally. They picked it out to watch, and they'd never seen it before.

But, man, the parallels are striking. They are from families torn apart by disease and poverty, and the older ones are basically raising all of the little ones themselves, and it's not easy. And I KNOW they would all give anything to be in a permanent family. They never turn down an invitation to come to our house. Never. We're doing all we can to watch out for them, but I wish we could do more.

I'll tell you what, if I could just adopt them all we would - they're absolutely great kids! I hear that they might be moved to Windhoek to stay there at the end of the year. I know that's best for them, but I love these kids... and I'll miss them terribly when they go.

-Steve

P.S. And also, Karrie made cookies with them the other night. It was their first time ever...

Living here in Namibia is like living in a huge zoo...

... or maybe a combination Zoo-Daycare center. :-)

I'm not sure what this zebra was doing here at a fence along the road [almost the entire country has fences along the roads to keep the kudu (moose-sized deer-like animals) from running out into the road], because it's not a game park and they tend to live up in more northern areas of the country.

I'm guessing he was tame, because when we came to a screeching halt, pulled over, walked right up to the fence, he just came right over to us. He was so excited that he almost pulled the fence down as he was leaning on it.

Special Delivery

Karrie got to play the role of midwife (kinda) recently. She accompanied our Afrikaans' language tutor to the hospital for the birth of her baby, and was sort of a labor coach for her. Well, the nurses at the state run hospital there didn't seem to care too much, and there was no doctor to be found. After a while, well, they had a baby. Karrie was glowing following that experience, to say the least.

Chriszelda with her new son "Imanuel" at one day old. He's pretty cozy!