Fun in February

Well, not really. February is one of those months where the only thing that seems to be going for it is lighter mornings and longer evenings. #rollonspring  It has fled by.  Should rename the post Fleeting February, actually. Half term arrived before we knew it, along with dazzling sunshine and warm days. Sitting outside the front door in the sun sipping a cappuchino - now, that is what I call a real half term.

The welcome mid-term break wasn't all just sitting and reading. A little gardening was done - mainly preparing for some serious vege planting, cutting back a few shrubs and pulling out some ivy. We hosted friends and neighbours for a meal, feasting on the leftovers for days - always good to over-cater. The weekends had been busy with catching up with friends over meals - one particular 24 hours was non-stop entertaining - so it was good to catch our breath and enjoy the Guernsey weather.

A dear friend's death brought memories of decades - at 98, he had lived a long life and was still an intelligent conversationalist, still walking, still intensely interested in the world around him. Friends lost parents, friends passed on... a time of funerals and of reflection on life...

In the meantime, Cara Grace continues to grow and delight. Her eagerness to communicate in smiles, giggles, gurgles and various other unidentifiable noises in response to conversation and questions is completely charming: she already has her passport for her Guernsey visit in April...can't wait to meet her properly, although Skype is truly wonderful.

And February is a time to delight in small things. Daffodils, shouting yellowness in ever-increasing measure; occasional bumblebees venturing around the heather; buzzards calling overhead, competing for air space with the seagulls. Glorious sunsets. A morning of quiet fog, wrapping Torteval in stillness despite the competing roar of surf...And unseasonably warm weather... it could be the Easter holidays. #herebeforeyouknowit

Hibiscus

Daisies...in February, though, not December

Camellia

View from the Corbiere

The Prevote from the Corbiere

Prevote MP tower

Pleinmont sunset

Caterpillar nests

Journeying through January

January is always a dark, gloomy month, yet this year it has been so much easier.

Spending the first week in tropical sunshine has made all the difference. Well topped-up with vitamin D, we came back bouncing with energy (in spite of a 25 hour return journey) and recovering quickly from the time difference and beginning a new term.

(Leaving Africa was not easy. Those emotions now seem distant...a part of my heart packed away with the suitcases. I get them down from the attic to peep in now and then, feelings longing to clamber out into the fresh light of day, but there is no future for the longing-to-be-there and the -missing-our-kids feelings, save for a thankfulness for the time and opportunity. Thankfulness is a large and comforting weight to keep us all in order, a kind schoolmistress maintaining calm in the chaos of immaturity.)

Arriving in Guernsey less than 20 hours before the first school day, I hit the ground running. Straight in to a full teaching week, so was quite exhausted by the Friday and had even organised a ladies' breakfast for that first Saturday morning. There were six of us, in the end, and it was, as always, refreshing and revitalizing. Nothing I like better than spiritual conversations over coffee and baked goods of some sort. Cheese scones and cardamom twists. #favourites.

Meanwhile, Cat, Andy and Cara continuee to persevere. Feeding is sorted, but Cara slept relatively little which didn't give her exhaused parents much of a break. Prayed she would settle in to a routine soon, which, by halfway through the month, she had begun to do, sleeping longer and awake for shorter periods in the night. Phew.

Sleeping better, smiling lots. We've loved frequent Skype 'Cara dates', enjoying getting to know her while we grin like lunatics. She grins, slightly lopsided at times (a Pollard trait) whil showing off a cute little dimple on the other cheek ( an Andy trait). 'Chats' and tries to join in with singing. Cute/sweetheart/gorgeous are the adjectives of choice, used over and over again...

Back to a constant diet of Brexit anxiety - in the media, that is. I haven't taken much notice, although the antics in the House of Commons - particularly the Speaker - have been quite entertaining. Who knows what will happen? The speculation and misinformation flying around has been spectacular. Historic times, as the Government sustained its biggest defeat ever on a vote, as Politics is evident in every public conversation between MPs, as the country is so divided.

Closer to home, there are more pressing worries. Dear Lisa's father, Denny, is very ill with melanoma; Pickle's friend Howie has been diagnosed with brain cancer, with only a few months left of life: items being ticked off on his 'bucket list'; and Jonny and Adele, again, have visa issues and their sojourn in Tanzania is once again uncertain, with friends leaving/planning to leave. Including Byron and Lisa, very sadly, as they make a decision to return to California to help Denny and Carolyn; and then, at the end of the month, our dear friend Heather is diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer.

In all of this, we know that God is sovereign, that He loves us, our family and friends far more than we can imagine and that, as we trust and put all things under His care, He orders our days. Yet alongside this are the fears and worries that threaten to overwhelm. It is not in our nature to willingly accept sickness and death: we are made in God's image, for eternity and perfection, and so, as this is the only earth we know, we long for eternal life in the now....

Meanwhile, we drink Tanzanian coffee. Adele and Jonny gave us a set of 'taster' bags for Christmas.

We tested one type every day for five days, before a final tasting where we compared them all together.

All set up for final tasting. After 5 days of one type of coffee a day, it was now time to taste test all together, one after the other. #justlikewine

Results:
R preferred no3, A preferred no5 which was Rs 2nd choice. No 3 was the most expensive at 52000tzs a kg, no5 was the 2nd most expensive at 34000tzs a kg, thus proving that we have discriminate tastes.

And now...all finished. #backtoWaitrose  #TZexperience #TZholidaywellandtrulyover #sadbutthankful

During December...

I started this midway through the month, the day after my mother's birthday. She would have been 95... but am only posting now, in January, when we got back from Tanzania. (So much going on in my head and heart that, to be honest, I forgot about this post!)

Time passes.

We hurtled towards the end of term and our departure for Tanzania. I didn't add much to the post after that. Not that there wasn't time, but my heart was full of family and friends and Africa....

This month was good. Reports finished and signed off; Christmas letter finished and sent out. Decorations - only a few, as we had housesitters coming to stay while we were away - put up. Obligatory/traditional Christmas baking - always Swedish pepparkakor.

Cara Grace grows. We pray for her health, for energy and sleep for her exhausted parents. We are so thankful for her safe arrival.

We grapple with wind and rain, coughs and colds.  This is December.

Off to sunshine for Christmas...

Last days...

We spend our last days quietly, in talking, reading, discussing car repairs at great length and in admirable detail. My heart gladdens at these discussions: how thankful I am that Jonny has his dad’s expertise to draw on, along with Byron’s supportive presence just a short distance away. This is in Tanzanian terms: over one and a half hours’ drive on the other side of Arusha. At home in Guernsey, anything more than 15 or 20 minutes seems like a long safari – how quickly we adjust.

A nearby lodge – Rivertrees, the last convenient tourist stop before Kilimanjaro Airport – is a pleasant venue for an afternoon drink by the river. We marvel at the trees – huge figs sending their aerial roots down in search of water. I spot a ‘first’ – a black-backed shrike, its astonishingly bright red eye peeping out from the bushes next to us.

And, of course, there is the swimming pool. Bees perch busily on the lane dividers, some unwittingly taking dives into the water, swimming furiously to safety. Scarlet dragonflies swoop and dive across the surface, hitting it with a smack before zooming on. European rollers perch atop the tennis court fence, four of them, evenly spaced, waiting for the insects thrown up by the newly cut grass. Wahlberg’s eagles soar and call, settling in the fig near the entrance to the school. Mount Meru plays peek-a-bo behind clouds, thermals constantly forming and re-forming.

Half a dozen arrow-marked babblers invade the garden, chit-chattering, hopping around, venturing at times onto the verandah and into the living room. A couple of immature birds constantly ask for food, jumping on the others. Mouse-birds congregate on a young muringa tree, stripping the new young shoots. It’s a good thing that the muringa grows so quickly...

From the verandah early in the morning we watch a pair of white-browed coucals ponderously flapping on and off the hedge, catching insects and, in one lucky instance, a small toad which has unwarily ventured out on to the grass. Variable sunbirds, with their iridescent green caps and bright crimson breasts, flit around the acacia branches while a fiscal shrike constantly swaps between the lawn and the verandah roof. Never have I seen one for so long at such close quarters. To cap it all, we spot a tiny wren-like bird in the bougainvillea hedge: an African penduline tit. A first.

The birds have been fantastic – so many, such variety all in one place, up-country and dry country birds all in one environment. This, we think, is what Paradise will be like...

We prepare to go home with full hearts, countless happy memories, relationships renewed... and an inordinate number of tsetse fly and midge bites, with the odd small mosquito bite to add in to the mix.

Africa.

And then, it was time to leave. It had been the most incredibly relaxing time, our days filled with reading, swimming and enjoying the bird life.

Yesterday it had rained. Good African rain, first a drizzle then, under a black sky, a heavy downpour. The thunderous noise of raindrops hitting the tin roof brought back memories...

The air was fresh, the soil damp, the atmosphere calm.

Today, a cloudy morning gave way to sunshine. A last swim, while Jonny took his car to have new rear shock absorbers fitted - a somewhat stressful process, in that the wrong type had been ordered and so Jonny had to go back later. #nothingstraightforwardinAfrica

Packed up. Emma's house, where we had been staying, cleaned. A last lunch at Rivertrees Country Inn, on the way to the airport. So relaxed.

I thought I was ready to go home, back to 'normal' life. End of holidays.

But I wasn't. Oh, I had had a great holiday and felt ready for work, but I wasn't ready to leave Jonny and Adele.

Goodbyes could not be lingering. Quick hugs, then we were in the hot queue to get in to Kilimanjaro Airport and then through the long check-in and immigration process. Only an hour from start to finish.

The goodbyes were bad enough... but I was unprepared for what happened as I walked out of the terminal building to cross the tarmac towards the plane. I was overwhelmed by tears. Throwing myself down to claw at the ground, screaming to stay, suddenly seemed like an option.

I didn't, of course. I struggled to contain my tears, dutifully climbing on to the plane, quietly weeping unobtrusively as we took off past Kilimanjaro, the two peaks of Kibo and Mawenzi soaring above the clouds.

I don't understand why my heart is breaking again.

Back at Usa

Then, the next day, after a last swim in the pool: time to go back home. Only a scant three hour drive, mostly on tarmac, negotiating Arusha’s busy roads to emerge on the road to Dar-es-Salaam which goes straight through Usa River.

The grounds of Kennedy House International School are like an oasis. Turning off the main road onto a bumpy track, negotiating picky-piccy motorcycles, cars and trucks with inches to spare before driving out of the town. We return on 1^st January, Tuesday: so it is still market day. Women sit at the side of the road with piles of tomatoes carefully arranged on sacking mats; tins of beans wait to be bought; bananas, pineapples, potatoes, oranges... a plethora of vegetables.

Some of the shops are shut, including Supafast Internet. But otherwise, it could be any other day in Africa.

We leave the noise behind. The enormous gates slide open and we are once again inside a little oasis. Huge grounds, a full–length circular running track, a 25m swimming pool, silky oaks and fig trees gracing the compound.

Jonny and Adele’s house is a welcome haven: simply yet comfortably built, Adele manages their home with flair. We remember how filtering water was the norm; adjusting to power surges and low water pressure not uncommon.  We unpack from the safari, washing dust and smoke out of clothes and bedding, all the while thankful for safe travel and another exciting adventure.

The swimming pool has been a welcome ‘cooling off’ point. The birds – Wahlberg’s eagles soar over the playing field or perch in the tree by Jonny’s house; a  white-browed coucal and speckled mousebirds swoop across the lawn; black-faced Baglafecht’s weavers fly busily in and out of their nests hanging from the acacia tree; arrow-marked babblers chattering companionably together in the hedge. Fork-tailed drongos call long and loudly in the early morning as I sit on the verandah, feet tucked up on a huge African sofa made of roughly-hewn branches.

We watch the film of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society: jarring on many levels, not least that none of it was filmed on Guernsey and the scenery, to us, seems false. Yet it gives snippets of understanding the horror of life in Occupied Guernsey during World War 2 and is a delightful story of relationships developed and restored.

I find myself homesick.

It is wonderful to be here. The weather alone – the bright hot African sun, the heaviness of an approaching rainstorm, the violence of the rain itself flooding fiercely down -  this, in itself, if wonderfully reminiscent. I find myself remembering dark skies heralding the rain, a vivid picture of a life formerly lived, singly, in Western Kenya; sunshiny days filled with the delighted laughter of small children; the uniquely evocative, dust-settling smell of huge raindrops  on hot earth. This is worth travelling thousands of miles for.

More so, the time spent with Jonny and Adele, marvelling at how well-settled and adapted they are. Jonny’s ability to instantly establish rapport with the (many) policemen who stop us on the road: their response makes it look as if they are old friends, greetings so friendly that it seems almost abnormal. Where have you come from? Where are you going? Why? What will you do there? Happy New Year! I am again reminded of how important relationship is in Africa.

Adele’s creative gifting in establishing a wonderful little home, mastering the intricacies of shopping with ease and adapting to the challenges of unreliable internet, low – or no – water pressure, intermittent power cuts...

And, both of them, still highly dedicated, extremely hard-working teachers. I wonder if the children they teach and the colleagues they work with know how fortunate they are?

Lake Manyara

From Tarangire, we made our way through a tropical rainstorm - heavy, brief, refreshing - towards Lake Manyara, stopping to buy a small gas stove on a cylinder before arriving at Migombani Camp.

Stop at Mto wa Mbuu for a gas stove

Drying the bedding after the enroute rain

Morning at Migombani

Our tent just visible in the right of the picture

 Perched on the side of a hill overlooking the lake, the camp is one of the best we have ever stayed at. Lush green Kikuyu grass to pitch a tent on, super clean toilets and wash places in makuti bandas and an infinity pool with the most beautiful view across the Rift Valley.

Swimming as bee-eaters dived to collect water from the surface, African pied wagtails chattering along the edge, while black kites, tawny eagles, augur buzzards and vultures took turns at soaring above our heads, using the thermals which kicked through the site every few minutes.

Quiet, relaxed, a place to unwind after hours of driving...and play countless games of Monopoly Deal...

The stay at Migombani has been wonderful: what’s not to like about the peace of the campsite perched on a hill, views of Lake Manyara from the infinity pool? It has been a welcome respite from the constant bumping on the dusty roads of Tarangire.

The lush green kikuyu grass is thick and springy, providing the ideal surface for pitching tents and lying underneath Jonny’s car to check out the mechanics...

Adele and I find excitement of a different kind. As I open my tiny, carry-on suitcase, a small, grey, rather elegant mouse scuttters into hiding beneath the clothes. Ah.

We had heard mouse-like sounds in Tarangire, but we realise that this mouse had travelled all the way from Usa River with us. There had been a mouse in the house we were staying in, evident by the hole chewed in a cotton bag and the droppings it consequently left on the sofa. Where I thought it had disappeared into some convenient hole in the wall, it had found refuge instead in the suitcase and come along with us. Some hitchhiker. Slowly unearthing it – eventually found hiding in a shoe – it hopped out and dashed to the shrubbery. Our gift to Migombani.

After that, time to relax: swimming; endless games of Monopoly Deal; gazing down at Lake Manyara. We meet a super-friendly, young German couple, Christians working for Help for the Maasai, a small German-run charity. The expat world is small: they have mutual acquaintances in common with Jonny and Adele. They run an orphanage, he on the technical side (with an outstanding devotion to all things Toyota and extensive knowledge of planes, trains and automobiles) and she an accountant. We enjoy their conversation.

 It is New Year’s Eve, so there is dinner at tables set under the stars, with a variety of expatriates, all working in different sectors of industry and aid in and around Arusha. As well as Dirk and Sarah, there is a South African couple working in tourism and conservation; a semi-retired Swede, looking for investment and business opportunities; two Dutch men who work for a company producing airport security doors; and a sweet young French couple, with Moroccan/Madagascaran ancestry, working for the French embassy and teaching in Kampala. An interesting evening...

Tarangire!

Up at 4pm to leave for Tarangire National Park on the other side of Arusha. On Jonny and Adele's doorstep - a drive of less than 2 hours.

In the early morning, mid-power cut, we creep from our beds. The Toyota is already loaded up with camping gear, tents and sleeping bags safely lashed under a tarpaulin on the roof rack. It is still dark as we leave Usa River en route to Tarangire National Park.

Driving through Africa in the early hours is an interesting experience.

There are very few police checks and we are not stopped once, so we arrive at the park gates just after 7.30am. A huge baobab in full leaf stands sentinel. Park fees are hefty: 50 dollars per 24 hours per person; an additional 30 dollars for the vehicle per day; and another 30 dollars per person for camping. Not what we, as Kenya residents, were used to: here, all non-citizens are treated expensively alike.

Still, it is worth it. Two minutes in to the park and we encounter two large elephants next to the road, unimpressed by our presence to the extent that they completely ignore us. We manage to turn off the severely corrugated main road, driving on sandy tracks and encountering more birds and animals than we can remember.

A herd of "Swala Pala", which is Swahili for "Impala"

2 suspicious old Bull Cape Buffaloes

Lunch time siesta view

Lunchtime picnic spot- a view of M.M.B.A. 

Giraffe at waterhole

Elephant Femur

Sausage Tree or Kigelia Africana

Baobab in leaf

Lion Tracks

More tracks of Lion, plus mongoose and Guinea Fowl on left of picture

We drove without seeing another vehicle for most of the morning, until we stopped at the picnic site overlooking the swamp where one other car had stopped. Driving along the edge, the list of birds grew: marabou stork; spoonbills; yellow-billed stork; sacred egret;

Vervet Monkeys

Hippo and a reed buck in the distance

A martial eagle perches, unusually, on the ground, preening its feathers and drinking from a muddy pool. It is a huge bird. We stop to watch dung beetles busy at work, rolling huge balls of mud and elephant dung in which to lay their eggs. One beetle appears to act foolishly: he manoeuvres his ball of dung – the size of a cricket-ball – to the side of the road and seems to attempt to push it up the soft soil which has accumulated there. He fails, stopping half way up: but then starts to dig around the ball, creating a circular cavity into which, after several rounds of excavation, the ball sinks until it becomes invisible. And safe...

Giraffe stroll between the trees, oxpeckers easily visible on their backs. One old bull, however, stands in a semi-stupor right next to the road. We see an oxpecker on its breast, diving into a deep wound in the folds of the skin, other, older, scars on neck and flank.

Driving up to Tarangire Safari Lodge, we stop for a drink and the view over the plains. Nothing quite like seeing miles and miles of bush, unoccupied in the heat of the day, save for a few elephants sauntering down to the river below.

But we are not staying safely in a lodge, but camping. Memories come flooding back of so many camping trips in a previous African life...

Night fall

The public campsite is somewhat of a disappointment for Jonny: there are several buildings – toilet blocks; a covered eating area, with tables on a concrete base; and a large kitchen with sinks and workbenches, already fully occupied by safari company cooks, preparing supper for the tourist who will arrive to occupy the dozen or so tents which look to be permanently set up. It is busy, too European, for him. We agree, in a sense... and yet, here in Africa – and even elsewhere – there is safety in numbers...

There are two or three other private vehicles, and we find a spot on the edge, overlooking where impala are peaceably grazing and baboons play on a fallen tree trunk  fifty metres away. We negotiate for firewood, building a fire as the sun sets. An early night...

...and  I sleep soundly, missing the sounds of lions chuff-huffing through the bush, two leopards fighting and a lone hyena calling mournfully in the distance.

I only hear some small creature which appears to be snuffling around the outside of the tent.

The morning brings a decision: hustle out of the park before the 24 hours expires, or stay and pay for another day?  We opt for the latter, enjoying seeing more and more elephant – we must have seen over a thousand, often surrounded by several herds. A herd trumpets and complains near the campsite: perhaps the large troop of baboons we encounter on the way out were proving to be a nuisance?

We revel in the birds: red-billed hornbills, more Von Der Decken's hornbills than we can count. A huge flock of black-faced lovebirds hopping among the branches of an acacia before flying up en masse, their green bodies startling against the blue sky...

...and then, time to move on. To Migombani campsite....