Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Christmas wherever you are is all about what you make of it. Take, for
example, Christmas in Gamboula. How do you make a four hour Christmas day
church service a little more interesting to sit through. The answer is, you
form a choir of all the missionaries and get them to sing a medley of
Christmas songs including Jingle Bells, in front of 300 plus people. That
is good for a few laughs I guarantee, especially since no one has a clue
what we are singing. You could also get your ladies bible study together,
teach them a song in Sango and English and then sing that in front of the
church on Christmas morning.

As for Christmas dinner, ours wasn't a very exciting tropical dinner with
snake and monkey on the menu. In fact, ours was rather traditional in the
American sense. We had roast duck, stuffing, cranberry sauce, corn, sweet
potato, scalloped potatoes and salad. We stuffed ourselves with cookies and
lemon bars and yes, even Nanaimo bars for dessert. This was very exciting
for Darren and I; a) because it is a truly West Coast Canadian food, b) it
wouldn't be Christmas without Nanaimo bars and c). we actually managed to
fabricate all the ingredients necessary to make them and they tasted as
delicious and fattening as the ones my dad makes. Thanks goes to the
Lebanese merchant in Berberati for stocking vanilla custard powder in his
store. The only thing I have ever used the stuff for was to make Nanaimo
bars but I suppose one could actually make custard out of it.

Despite the holidays we are both very busy in our respective roles here,
especially since we keep picking up new ones. I am currently trying to
organize the agri office to help it be more efficient and accurate in its
record keeping and accounting. It is much the same as my job at ECHO trying
to keep my old boss organized. Lots and lots of fun. No, seriously, it is
a lot of fun. Seriously fun. Anyway...

2006 is sure to hold a lot of excitement and busyness for us. Besides
trying to complete an agroforestry manual, the agroforestry centre has 15
seminars scheduled for which the nursery will have to provide over 5,000
trees; we are planning on at least 4 months solid with the Aka pygmies in
Bayanga; Darren is working on producing a couple thousand banana plants for
distribution and I just got word of a good source of funding for a large
women's project for 2006 in which I would be completely responsible. Hmmm,
more fun. Actually, I thrive off stress and Darren thrives on picking up
the pieces of Angela as she thrives on stress.

After having spent one year here we are pretty much hooked and although we
will be going home a year from now, we have set our hearts on returning for
a longer time in the future. We are talking supplementary educated before
returning. Darren in the field of computer science (so he can be a real
expert) and me, most recently, in the field of community health
nursing/work. Does anyone know of a good program for this, preferably
focussed on the tropics? Any info would be helpful as we are
internet-handicapped out here in the wilderness. Thanks y'all.

The injustice system

When the justice system in a country goes unpaid by its government for any
length of time, I suppose it is only natural that the system devises its own
plan for paying itself. Thus, a system that may once have been just,
becomes a system of varied injustice. Lady liberty has thrown away her
scales and has replaced them with rather large pockets in her trousers.

There are some customs you learn in a foreign country that are easily
adopted, others that you adopt but they always remain a bit strange and some
that you never manage to adopt and whenever they are encountered they remain
as foreign as when you first saw them. To me the justice system shall
always be in that last category. Take, for example, last weekend. Constant
was in Berberati for the week having our agri truck fixed, buying supplies
like shovels and machetes as well as stocking up on spare truck parts. They
very moment he was getting set to return to Gamboula he had an accident in
the truck. We aren't exactly clear as to whose fault the accident was but
it seems that a motor bike with a driver and two passengers ran into the
rear wheel of his truck at high speed. The injuries were not serious to the
passengers, just a bruised ankle and some minor scrapes. The bike was
damaged but the driver didn't have a license or the proper papers of
insurance and such for his bike. Constant and his idea was that they were
both at fault and they both go on their way. Unfortunately, a police chief
(CB) or some such person happened to be on his motorbike only 5 minutes
behind them and as they were just picking up the bike from the ground the CB
came upon the scene and called the police in to investigate. (On an aside,
Berberati now has a cellular tower and has leaped into the future now armed
with cell phones. Good for most but unfortunate for Constant.) The result
of having the police know about your accident is that they have just found
their month's pay check. You see, it is a crime in CAR to have an accident.
Both vehicles were impounded, and Constant was delayed an extra 4 days while
they 'discussed' what his fine would be. In the end, after what might be a
small movie script, mostly comedy, each driver was required to pay the
police 30,000 CFA. That is like sixty dollars. What I don't get and never
will, is that they both had to pay a fine for the mere fact that they had an
accident. It is your bad luck that they happen to find out that you had
one. If the police were never informed, they would have gone on their way
as though everything were normal. Unfortunately for the other guy, he also
has to pay another 30,000 CFA because of driving without a license and
insurance.

Since the accident was partly Constant's fault and we do have 'insurance' on
the truck, technically the other driver could have filed to claim damages
from our insurance. He won't do this though, no one does. Why? Because
then you have to pay the police to write a report, then you have to pay the
court to have a hearing to process your claim. In the end, you end up
paying as much or more than you are claiming for, so why bother? Thus a
very efficient injustice system.

I have many other examples, some that make you want to cry in frustration
from the ludicrousy of it all. You can hardly believe that some of the
stories you hear are true, but they are. People who do not collect
legitimate salaries are very easy to pay off.

On the brighter side of life, I am enjoying how life always steers you back
to the things we are good at. I feel like I'm right back at ECHO today as I
became Roy and Constant's assistant in the office, devising a filing system,
cleaning up receipts and generally organizing things. I like to organize
things. Today is also the French service's Christmas special. Next weekend
is for the Sango service. Today we are treated to choirs, memory verses,
skits and, of course, food. Clarisse is in the French service so I am
looking forward to a good time. We are going to Berberati next week to help
paint a house in preparation for some new missionaries coming to Berberati.
I am looking forward to introducing Darren to my new friends there and maybe
he will treat me to a dinner out at the new restaurant in town-a Christmas
present of sorts. Will report on the trip when we get back.

Darren returns

I am happy to report that Darren has returned from Cameroon safe and sound
and a little bit lighter. His time in the north at a banana research
station was very profitable and will be of great help in our program here in
Gamboula and wherever else we go that happens to be banana producing.
Initially, Darren thought he would be learning to tissue culture bananas in
a laboratory setting. However, once he got there he found that they were
learning an altogether new and different technique. The technique he
learned is perfect for our setting as it requires all locally available
materials, is done outside, in non-sterile conditions, and the results are
still the rapid multiplication of bananas, nearly similar to what can be
achieved in tissue culture. I don't fully understand the technique myself
but I will by the time Darren has finished training me. In fact it is
something nearly anyone can learn without having to know the physiology
behind why it works.

After the training course Darren had 5 days to himself in Yaoundé waiting
for his plane flight to Gamboula. His flight in was BJ's flight home for
Christmas. We miss him at our table already but we are rejoicing with him
for his opportunity to go home for the holidays. Darren did lots of grocery
shopping for us and stocked us up on oats (to make granola), tuna, sardines,
and lots of fresh veggies like cabbage, carrots, green peppers and my
favourite, lettuce. We can freeze nearly everything but the lettuce, so
this week our systems are dealing with a lettuce overload. Not such a bad
thing and it is a nice change from eating spinach all the time. He also
bought me a gift of a can of pringles and a diet coke, both which are rare
and exciting and will make a nice edition to our next movie night.

As for work, Darren is catching up on accounting and I am busy in the
nursery. We are grafting like crazy as well as getting ready 5000 nursery
sacs for planting a high quality oil palm we bought in Cameroon from a
research station there. When we first bought them they were planted 5 to a
sac, now we are ready to divide them out one to a sac. 5000 is a lot of
sacs no matter what way you look at it. We fill sacs every other day in
order to give our backs a break. We are looking forward to Christmas and
spending it with new friends and family but I have to admit feeling a little
home sick today. Some days the problems in this place are too much for me
to handle and today is one of those days. However, I am thankful that
tonight is my prayer date with Clarisse and our times together always cheer
me up and restore hope in me.

A weekend to 'ou tere'

'Ou'-meaning to breath and 'tere'-meaning the body, is the sango combination
of words for rest. Thus, Clarisse and I spent the past weekend in ou tere.
Actually, since July we have been planning a weekend away in Berberati, the
second largest town in CAR, which isn't saying much for CAR, to visit her 3
brothers there and to wander around town, have fun and rest. I guess you
can consider it my Christmas gift to Clarisse in terms of paying our way
there. I haven't had so much yet since being in CAR. We stayed at the home
of her oldest brother who is quite the patriarch. He has worked for the
only well-drilling outfit in CAR for the last 15 years, owned by a Swedish
couple and recently handed over to an NGO to take over its operation. Her
elder brother, we'll call him Rex is now the head of their personnel and
such. He has managed to build quite a nice house, cement and metal roofed.
I was the first white person to be a guest in his house and he was so
pleased to have us. He set up two cots in the living room for us and we
slept side by side. The first morning when I woke up I had forgotten where
I was slightly as I rolled over to Clarisse and said "Good morning", in
English. She knows what it means but I quickly corrected myself. How
different it would be to not hear english for very extended periods of time.
For me it was only three days but it still felt strange.

Clarisse's other brother, third in the birth order also lives in Berberati
and close to Rex's house so we went over there to eat and visit. He too was
so excited to have us visit. He came over the morning we left to thank me
for visiting and to tell me how much joy I brought their family just by
visiting. Clarisse's youngest sibling is also in Berberati, living at Rex's
house. He is 19 and is still in school trying to get his graduate diploma,
similar to our grade twelve. Because of the cost of school most students do
not finish by the time they are 18 because they will have to stop and start
school again and again as they find ways to pay their school fees. I can
only describe him as a strapping, handsome young man with the brains to go
places in the world and the desire, but completely bound by circumstances of
poverty. While I was full of joy visiting amongst the cousins and brothers
and sisters and aunts and uncles of Clarisse, I was also filled with sadness
thinking about the future of these wonderful, good hearted, talented young
people, who, in different circumstances, would be entering top of their
class in university, but instead are left wondering about what their future
holds. I so much desire, as they do, for a future for them that is more
than searching everyday for something to eat, for money for school fees and
clothes to wear. Is there not some way to change their future so that it
includes hope for jobs, for less sadness and poverty and death and
scrounging for the bare necessities? I think if I were really rich I would
give scholarships to put foreign students from impoverished countries
through a Canadian college or university with the promise they would return
to their homes to try and make life better. But maybe that isn't the
solution either. All I know is that I can't get these young people off my
mind and I desperately want to make a difference in their lives here.

Well, back to the weekend. Saturday we arrived early in the morning after
getting a 5:00am start with Constant in the agroforestry truck. He was on
his way to Berberati anyway so we took our chance and got a ride with him.
After visiting all the relatives we set off on foot with Chris to the first
of two markets. The nearby market to Rex's house is considerably large,
though nothing at all like Yaoundé, and we wondered around looking at the
different vegetables, fabric and the various things for sale. Clarisse
bought curtains, (used), for her new addition to her house to help keep the
mozzies out. I nearly fainted as I was overcome suddenly by fatigue due to
the effects of the amoeba medicine I had just finished taking. After
resting some at a little shop selling beans and rice where we ran into
Clarisse's niece, Mesi, we continued on to her other brother's house for a
visit and some lunch. After lunch we took a short nap or siesta, which is a
total white person thing to do here but was much appreciated by Clarisse.
It was hot out and she fell asleep in an instant. When we woke up at 3:00
her relatives were teasing her and calling her white because she took a
siesta. She didn't mind though and we did the same thing the next two days.
In the afternoon Chris, Mesi, Clarisse and I went down to an even bigger
market to look around and stroll. Clarisse was in search of a few things
and I was just looking around. The funniest thing was Clarisse and gang's
reaction to the variety of cat calls and the like I get when I am out
walking around. People, young and old alike, love to call lout, "hey, look,
white person!" Or they start talking about me and don't realize I speak
Sango until one of our group says something to me and I respond back and
then that leads to more laughter and calling out 'hey, she speaks good
sango!'. I am quite used to being the centre of attention wherever I go
now, as if I am a circus act, but it gave Clarisse and them a surprise and
caused no end of laughter between us all. We found a brand new restaurant
in the area with cold drinks, cakes, real menus and satellite TV that was
beaming in a soccer game. I treated us all to cold drinks and we shared a
piece of cake that had canned peaches in it. A first for all three of them.
It was so much fun. Saturday night we sat up talking about all sorts of
things. Chris and his nephew, they happen to be the same age, go figure,
sat asking me all sorts of questions about the world of white people. It
was so much fun and once again I was so thankful for the ability God has
given me to pick up and understand a foreign language so quickly.

Sunday, we went off to church the morning and did more visiting and shopping
in the afternoon. We left Chris behind at one point and returned to the
market. When he learned we had left without him he sought us out in the
market, which isn't an easy task. He acted much like our body guard the
whole weekend. If a guy approached me and started to be a pest Chris would
step up and 'take care of him'. Given the circumstances I was glad to have
him around and it gave me lots to laugh about. I am sure Darren would thank
him. I am sure I can take of myself but it was fun to watch him step up and
take care of the white lady. Later in the afternoon Chris borrowed Rex's
motorbike and took Clarisse and I on a tour of the various cartiers and all
the way out to the airport, which is actually more than just a strip of
grass. It has buildings and a little control tower with most of its windows
in tact all the way around. The funny thing about it all was listening to
peoples comments and exclamations as they saw a white lady sandwiched
between to black people on a motorcycle. I felt much like a human Oreo
cookie. They figure the safest spot on the bike is the middle so I did what
I was told and got in the middle. I much prefer riding with Darren but the
breeze was nice and I once again provided the town with its daily
entertainment. No need to go to the movies tonight kids, we saw a human
Oreo cookie today! Chris, much the gentleman, took things nice and slow and
it was the highlight of our day.

Monday we had planned to return home with Constant but his truck was being
fixed in the ICDI garage and wasn't going be ready until Tuesday. Clarisse
had to be back on Tuesday in order to get back to work so we started to
figure out a way to get back. While we sat at the house getting our stuff
ready, Clarisse doing some last minute things at the market, Chris went in
search of a traffique. Normally, traffique's leave early in the morning but
by the time we found out Constant was going to stay another day it was
already 3:00. Around five o'clock Chris came speeding up on a motor bike
taxi to tell us that he had found a traffique with two places left but we
needed to leave in a flash (a real word used in Sango; flash). So we
mounted the bike and gave the town one more show and arrived just in time
for the departure of the last traffique of the day. A real traffique is a
12 passenger minivan that they stuff 16 people into and charge 2000CFA a
head to get to Gamboula. The inside of our's was full and had only one
person riding on the top. They can be dangerous in that they usually drive
too fast and are loaded with stuff so high that they easily tip over which
is not safe in the least. I was given a seat of honour in the front beside
the driver. Clarisse was put in the very back out my range to talk with
her. The unfortunate part of the trip was the soldier that squeezed in
beside me. He happened to be our soldier from Gamboula, currently stationed
at the customs office at the Cameroon border. He is a pain in the butt and
is always ready to harass us for bribes. Monday was no exception as he was
very drunk and had a loaded gun. He had the gun cocked and ready to shoot
the whole way, just waiting for his chance to shoot a bandit on the road.
He told me that if he had to kill someone on the way to Gamboula, a bandit,
I was not to cry. Yeah right buddy is what I was thinking. He was so drunk
he would have to stand five feet fm the bandit in order not to miss him.
After an hour of me removing his hands from my arms or leg and placing them
respectfully back into his lap he got the picture. The hardest part was
that he kept asking me question and I couldn't understand a word of what he
was saying. His sango is from Bangui, the capital, where they tend to slur
their speech and combined with alcohol I couldn't get a thing he was saying.
He was obviously frustrated and I just sat and kept silent. At the half way
point he bought some grilled beef and then drifted off into a drunken
slumber much to my relief. The driver kept asking me if I would be his
'friend'. Right! After all that I still think I would take a traffique to
Berberati again, since in the end it is worth the reward at the end of the
trip. The key is to arrive early so you can grab a window seat and then
Clarisse can squish in beside me. It took 3 hours to get back to Gamboula
and while it was good to be home we could have spent another five days with
out missing much, except Darren of course.

I think what was so neat about it was how it reminded me of my family back
home. How my dad's family tend to live in clusters in the same cities. 3
here, 4 there, and they help each other out, get together for meals and for
fun. I miss that part of my growing up and I found it in Clarisse's family.
Like my dad, she also has 11 siblings so there are many similarities. Rex
was off to another village Monday morning to retrieve some well equipment
but before he left he gave me a painting of an African scene he bought in
Bangui and a beautiful traditional stool as souvenirs of my stay with him
and his family. I could tell you all his merits and the kindness he pours
out on his family and orphans he looks after, but suffice it to say that I
am now part of a very special family that will forever be part of me. May
they feel welcome at my home anytime.

Hmmm, amoebas

Just wanted to post a quick note to say why I haven't written a longer one
in some time. Between being busy, preparing for the coming of the heads of
the project's largest donor organizations and finding a slew of amoebas
having a tea party in my intestines, I am quite tired and haven't had much
time for writing.

One note about amoebas though. Don't leave home without medicine for them,
namely Flagil. I am not sure how people can believe we once descended from
the lowly amoeba because they sure don't get along with human beings in the
least. You know you have them when a simple case of traveller's diarrhoea
feels like child's play comparatively speaking. The meds for it are
supposed to make you even sicker for a spell but so far I am resisting them
well and have only required a loss of appetite, although raw carrots sound
really good. Thanks to our neighbour I dined on a bunch yesterday but will
have to do without for the rest of the illness. You can only get them in
Cameroon and they don't grow too well here. Anyway, not to be complaining
or anything because I do feel much better, can spare the weight loss and I
am eternally thankful that a medicine against them exists in the first
place. And besides, I am told that now that I have suffered through amoebas
and the cure I am a 'real' missionary. Whew, passed that test...

The winds of change

Dry season is officially here complete with a big dip in the humidity and
ashes scattered on the porch each morning. Dry season is the time when
people start clearing new fields for planting by burning the weeds and
trees on new patches of land. I can understand why this is such an
attractive practice as the fields are quite large and doing it by hand with
the help of burning is already a long an arduous process in itself. I also
know it is dry season because I am finding myself drinking 2 litres of water
in a morning without having to go the bathroom!

As for the tree side of things, we are getting ready for a three day visit
from the head of the Food Resource Bank and Covenant World Relief, both
major donors towards Roy's program here. They have also helped us with
funds for the pygmy program. We are getting everything looking spic and
span and it seems fitting to do it this time of year as we would be have
been doing the same thing right about now at ECHO getting ready for the
annual conference. Along with FRB's visit we are hoping to hear what they
think about future work here and that will help set the tone for our
programs in the coming year. We are hoping to have funding to do a grafting
and tree propagation seminar in each village with an active agroforestry
cooperative starting in January. This would take up much of my time and
would be welcome as I love any opportunity to teach.

Darren and I are well though we are both trying to shake the tail end of
colds off. We are at the end of squash season and so we have been eating a
lot of it lately. If you know any great recipes please let me know. BJ
loves squash so I haven't had any menu complaints as of yet. Our cook,
Leonard is gone for the week at a regional church conference so I am in
charge of the house this week. I suppose I should be relishing my new found
womanhood but quite honestly I would much rather be in the garden working on
all the many things that need to be done. Besides, bending over a stove
when it is already 35 Celsius outside isn't too appealing here.

Last week was productive yet full of sadness at the same time. Living in
such a small place there are hardly things that are kept secret for too
long, including stuff you don't want to know about. While there are many
Christians here there are also a lot of people still involved in what we
would generally term black magic. While on the outset some of it seems
harmless, other practices are far too terrible to say out loud. After
hearing some of the goings on around here I needed an escape from the
reality that we live in. Us three ladies used drastic measures to escape
and we watched the first two movies in the Anne of Green Gables series. It
was wonderful, so wonderful that you hardly want the movie to be over. Jan
is away this week so we are waiting for her return before watching the last
one.

Last week's events weighed heavy on my heart; come Monday morning and as I
was by myself, watering trees in the nursery, it gave me pause to think
about my own village back home. It made me think that when it comes down to
it there isn't any difference between the two worlds we live in. We are all
humans, we all sin and we all fall short of God's glory. The things that
seem so nasty here aren't any nastier that the abuses and sins that are
committed in our towns back home. The only difference about home is that we
aren't likely to meet any of the victims or know any of the perpetrators in
our sheltered lives. I now feel more compelled to not only pray for
Gamboula but for my own home town. How funny that living here has served to
expose the inadequacies of where we come from.

Saturday I spent the morning planting manioc with Mama Paulien. It was a
lot of fun and not particularly hard work unless you are prone to a sore
back (which I am not). However, word spread quickly about the white lady
out planting manioc on a warm Saturday morning. Seems this is the first
time this has happened in these parts and I am sure I was the topic of many
dinner conversations. I guess this is to be expected. They all thought I
wanted to learn how so that I could go back home and make a big garden for
myself. Unfortunately we don't at all have the right climate for it.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of our American friends. Know that we are truly
thankful for each of you.
Ange

Finally a hero...of sorts

For those of you who know me well, you will recall that I once tried to
donate blood with near disastrous results. Let's just say that I never made
it past the initial blood-typing finger prick. Years later I tried to give
blood again during one of the Red Cross' 'Holiday Hero' blood donation
campaigns. Needless to say they had me in the computer under 'never to give
blood again'. Well, today my blood was called into action and I stepped up
to the job, donating almost a full pint to the cause of life-saving. Anita,
our Swedish administrator in Berberati, a person on whom we rely on for
many, many things, recently developed a kind of cancer like illness in her
bones requiring her to have blood transfusions every 4-6 weeks for the rest
of her life. We happen to be the same blood type and since she required two
units of blood, both Darren and I gave this morning. Darren gives all the
time back home so to him it was nothing new, but this was my first
successful time and given my history, I had Darren and Aleta watching over
me the whole time waiting for any signs that I might keel over. I must
admit that it was not an entirely pleasant experience but it sure beats
going to the dentist!

So, in light of the approaching Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons, I
encourage all of you, especially those who have never given before, to
donate blood this year. Make it your Christmas gift to your local
neighbourhood. Besides, blood is kind of like money, when you give it away
you can always make more!

Happy blood letting,
Angela

Finally Home

For those of you not on our e-mail list, I thought I would post our most
recent newsletter that went out over e-mail. Drop us alline if you wanted
to be added to our list. We only send out an emailonce every 5 or 6 weeks.

Greetings from Central Africa!
We realize it has been a very long time since we e-mailed an update to
everyone, but we hope you received our latest newsletter by mail and have
been able to check or blog once in a while. We have been on the move since
July 1 which accounts for some of why we haven't e-mailed in so long. Let
me give you a month by month look at what we have been up to.

July: We spent the month in Bayanga, the extreme southwest of CAR, working
amongst the Aka Pygmies. We did a lot of village visits, planting trees,
working with individuals in their cassava gardens, helping people access
peanut seed, as well as helping the missionaries there with a school
nutrition project for the Aka children. In a village near Bayanga there are
30 Aka children currently attending school but they lag behind for a number
of reasons including inadequate access to food in the morning. We did a
clinic on sweet potatoes and helped with planting techniques as well as
giving out planting material. It turned out to be a very significant
project for that village. We had hoped to remain in Bayanga for the rest of
our term but it will not work out for us there in terms of housing and such
so we will return in the spring for an extended stay if the Lord wills it.

August: I returned home to Canada for the month, courtesy of my family, to
take part in my sister's wedding. She is now Sarah Thorp, and it was
wonderful to be part of her day. I also had the opportunity to speak at a
couple of churches as well as a local Victoria radio station. It was good
to be home but truthfully, Gamboula feels like home more than any place
else. Darren returned to Bayanga for nearly 3 weeks along with BJ, the
veterinarian next door, and Matt, a student from the US who came out for a
month. Darren did some more work with the ag projects we started in July,
following up with villages, as well as building relationships with some Aka
men. They were able to take part in a traditional hunt with nets in the
forest, as well as fishing with large nets in the Sangha river.

September: Darren turned into a computer technician in September when he
was given 7 laptops and one desktop to put into working order. Our living
room looked like a computer warehouse for a while. The neighbours received
these computers from the US to give to national leaders in our area (the
pastor, bible school director, hospital staff, etc.). They all had work to
be done on them and Darren knows the most about computers so he volunteered
for the job, with a little prodding from me! He finished right at the end
of the month. I went to Bilolo, about 4-5 hours south of here with 2 of our
ag workers to give an agro-forestry seminar. There are 2 SIL/Wycliffe
families living there and we were invited by them. We had 75 participants
including 8 Baka Pygmies from the area. Now that we have made contact with
them we plan on going back to the Baka villages during the dry season. They
look like the Pygmies we worked with in Bayanga but they speak a different
language. Fortunately Sango is fairly universal. It was a very interesting
trip for me and I encourage you to read about it on our blog. It is
entitled 'A lesson in respect.'

October: On the first of the month we were off again, this time to Kenya,
for our mission's triennial retreat. We gathered with 136 other
missionaries from around the globe for a week of conference and a week of
retreat, plus an extra 5 days of vacation, just the two of us. We had a
fabulous time and feel more than ever a part of our mission and the work God
is doing in the world. We attended some good workshops on AIDS and on our
own spiritual formation. We heard about the direction our mission is
taking, we were encouraged to continue on in our work with excellence, and
we were able to visit and hear about the work being done all over the globe.
It was a good time of fellowship, prayer and fun. Yes, we had a lot of fun.
With a group this big NMSI was able to negotiate good prices for
accommodation and such in Kenya, so we were treated to all sorts of good
things, all in the name of fellowship of course. We climbed Mt. Longonot, a
nearly extinct volcano in the Rift Valley, visited lake Naivasha as well as
the Masai Mara, Kenya's famous game park. We saw four of the big five and
we even pet a somewhat tame zebra that was wondering around our
accommodations in the Mara, the Mara Buffalo Camp. I was less afraid to be
face to face with a zebra than I am with a horse! We finished the retreat
on the beach in Mombassa where Darren got to know some guys in NMSI well as
they played 4 hours of volleyball a day. I took the time to visit with a
few newly marrieds to give them encouragement and listen to their concerns.
We spent our extra vacation days in Mombassa, soaking in some equatorial sun
(bad, I know) and finding time to read. We returned to Gamboula yesterday
to find things pretty much as we left them.

Coming up: The next two months we will be finishing out some bean variety
trials as well as getting the gardens in order for a visit from one of Roy
and our's major donors, the Food Resource Bank and Covenant World Relief.
Lots to do. Darren will be getting things ready to start his tissue culture
project and we are all three of us writing an agro-forestry manual for
distribution to the villages we work with. The deadline for the book is
January. Yikes!

Prayer: Please continue to pray for peace in CAR. The number of reports
about bandits on the roads is increasing and we have decided to not leave
our town until we hear more favourable reports. We do feel safe where we
are but we do covet your prayers. Darren will be travelling to north
western Cameroon at the end of November to attend a one week course on the
tissue culture of bananas using methods developed by a Cameroonian research
centre. Darren never imagined that his education and gifts in biotechnology
would come in use on the field, but to the glory of God, they are just what
is needed here to speed up the production of many important plants including
bananas, plantains and spineless peach palm.

We are now able to receive mail through Cameroon. Please e-mail us for the
address. Our e-mail is bossbugs@yahoo.ca and we continue to be able to
receive text only, a couple of pages maximum. We appreciate hearing form
all of you and look forward to it! We are finding tremendous joy in our
ministry and are seeing many good fruits of our labours, both in the edible
sense and in relationships formed with those whom we serve. We are becoming
more and more sure of a long-term call to Central Africa and would ask for
your prayer regarding vision for the long term.

Each one of you is special to us and are prayed for. May God's favour rest
on each of you.
Angela, for the Boss duo.

a lesson in respect

A lesson in respect

The background: Bilolo, an average sized village, lies 160km south of us
along the Cameroon border and is home to a wonderful missionary family who
are working on getting the local language on paper with Wycliffe. The
village is in the rainforest and there are a number of pygmy camps
surrounding the village within a 50 km radius. The missionary lady also
happens to be the sister of our neighbor here in Gamboula. They asked if it
was possible for us to hold an agroforestry seminar in their village to help
the people. We gladly accepted the invitation and an evangelist we worked
with in Bayanga rode his bike 150km in order to visit all the pygmy villages
he could the week before the seminar to get them to come to the seminar.
When it came time to get things ready for the seminar last Saturday we
realized that the vehicle we had planned on taking (a Toyota truck that
could seat 5) was not available and that our only option was the project
truck which comfortably seats 2. This was a problem because we had planned
on taking Constant, the agri supervisor and Chrysler whose native language
is that of Bilolo. Normally, it is these two guys who give the seminars and
so we wanted to go down with them so they could give the seminar and we
would do the trouble shooting. With the back of the truck full of trees we
would all have to go in the cab. Not likely. So, early Sunday morning it
was decided that I would go and Darren would stay behind. Partly because my
Sango is good enough to teach in and Darren doesn't feel comfortable
teaching yet and partly because his spirit was telling him to stay behind.

The trip: On the 5 hour trip down I was neatly sandwiched between two guys
and when I say sandwiched, I mean we were literally cheek to cheek.
Constant wasn't so bothered but I think Chrysler was a little uncomfortable
at first. You can't be tense for 5 hours though so eventually he relaxed.
We arrived in Bilolo around suppertime Sunday night and the seminar started
promptly at 7:30 on Monday morning.

The seminar: We had 73 participants. Unbelievable! We had eight pygmies
representing 5 different villages. They walked over 40km on foot with
nothing but the clothes on their backs. We also had 3 guys from Nola, about
35km south as well as a few others from north of Bilolo. Amongst the 73
were a few soldiers from the village, 3 chiefs and 3 women. Quite a mix.
The first day went well and I was asked to teach 2 of the lessons. One
lesson I wasn't being too clear so Chrysler came to my rescue and we team
taught. I also did a lot of the writing on the black board since I have the
best spelling, especially when Constant was teaching (he didn't do too much
school).

Monday evening I had a long chat with Constant on the porch of the house I
was sleeping at. He proceeded to tell me his family history, about his
parents, about his own family, why he divorced his first wife, etc, etc. He
gave me some real insights into how you go about taking a wife and we talked
about me and Darren's marriage, what marriage means to us, how good of
friends we are. It was eye opening for the both of us and a good cultural
exchange. It was really dark and I could only make out his teeth so it was
hard to read the expression on his face.

Tuesday started rather loudly as we tried to get the village participants to
agree on a place to make a tree nursery. The second day of the seminar is
all practical stuff, planting trees, making compost, making a nursery,
dividing trees, and forming a bureau, or group to stay in contact with us
here in Gamboula. It seems that the village is split into two factions, the
north and the south and they have a hard time working together, or deciding
where to put their nursery. Half wanted it in the south of the village and
the other half wanted it in the north. In the end my solution was for the
group to start forming the bureau while Chrysler and I, the 'nursery
experts', went to look at each place so we could come back with a judgment
of which
site was the best. It worked very well and our decision was well accepted.
The rest of the days work went beautifully with the soldiers in attendance
swinging machetes side by side with the pygmies.

It was all over by 2:00, after a lunch of gozo and pig meat in oil. I
survived 2 days of eating only gozo and oil (no pig for me please!). We
were initially planning to overnight in Bilolo Tuesday and then head home
Wednesday, visiting villages along the way. For some reason Constant was in
a rush to get going, maybe before another rain messed up the roads. By 3:30
we were in the truck and on our way to Dede, 4 hours away where we were
going to spend the night. When we got to Yantchi, an hour from Bilolo we
had to stop at a barrier. A lady came out and asked us for a ride to
Gamboula with her small child so they could go to the hospital. Constant
said yes and here starts the lesson on respect.

I knew as soon as I saw this lady that there was no way me and her and her
baby could sit in the cab together. So I made up my mind to sit in the back
of the truck with Chrysler and give the lady the front. I wanted to do this
for two reasons. One, it was just getting dark and we were entering an
uninhabited stretch of road that for two hours took you through the
rainforest with it's towering canopy of trees. We had next to nothing in
the back so I knew I would be able to stretch out. Secondly, I wanted to
show respect to this woman and her kid by having her take the front and the
white lady take the back. Well, this did not go over very well. I climbed
into the back and right away Chrysler was telling me no, I had to take the
front seat. I, in my stubbornness, said NO. There was a group of people
gathering around the back of the truck to watch our little scene. I should
have relented but I had already made up my mind and well, I am stubborn.
Chrysler finally relented but when Constant, our driver came around and saw
me he immediately said no way Madame. I told him I was strong enough, we
discussed it back and forth and finally I promised him that if it was too
rough I would shout really loud for him to stop and I would trade places
with the woman. He still wouldn't relent so I asked him, "Constant, do you
call me Madame?" "Yes", he said. "And you call me that because you respect
me?" "Yes", he said. "Well then if you want to call me Madame, then
respect my decision to sit in the back". With that, he got in the truck and
off we went.

I had such a lovely time in the back of that truck. I found something to
lean up against, stretched out my legs and I took in the sounds and sights
of the wild rainforest at night. Hundreds of lightening bugs flittering
around lit up the night sky and lightening in the distance gave everything a
dramatic effect that made you think, wow, Lord, you are truly amazing to
have created all of this. It will go down as one of my most memorable
moments in life.

Just before arriving in Dede, our stop for the night, we were stopped at
another military checkpoint. Constant came around to the back of the truck
to have a word with me and find out if I was dead yet! He said I had put
sadness in his heart because I was riding in the back. In this culture
there are very important rules as to how you treat people more important
than you and having someone who you think sits above you on the chain sit in
the back of a truck breaks all the rules. I assured him that I was having
the time of my life; I had been singing, I slept a little and that there was
no reason what so ever for sadness!

Yesterday morning we loaded up the truck for the rest of the trip back to
Gamboula. This time we had a lot more people with us in the back, all on
their way to the hospital and I heeded Constant's wishes and rode in the
front. It also helped him save face because if the folks in Gamboula saw me
riding in the back he would have heard about it! I did however get a good
chance to talk with just him. I said that he puts sadness in my heart. He
asked me why. I said that when he calls me Madam, it makes me sad. He was
puzzled by this so I continued on to explain. (There is a word in Sango
'legue-oko'. It means a few things but one meaning is the same way, or
way-one.) I told him that we have traveled together twice, legue-oko. We
have eaten the same food, we have worked hand in hand, done the same work
and we are the same age. I told him I didn't want to sit above him, that we
are essentially the same. He finally got it when he said, 'so you want me
call you Angela?'. Yes!!!

So now we are trying to be on a first name basis. This is going to me a
hard thing for him but it is a lesson for both of us in respect. I will
find ways to respect him in his culture and he will try and show me respect
in my culture, using my name. Maybe next time he slips and calls me Madam
I'll just call him Monsieur!

Next Saturday Darren and I are off to Kenya for a few weeks of meetings and
five days on the Indian Ocean in Mombassa. We will be using internet café's
and I will try not to write so much next time.

Tiger fish! Enough said. They are abundant in the Sanga river around Bayanga.  

Giant termite salad. I convinced Darren and BJ they tasted just like bacon bits...with legs. 

Clarisse and I in our mother's day outfits. I couldn't have found a better friend. 

One Aka villages first taste of Jak fruit.  

Darren enjoying a great game of volleyball. He can still jump as high as when he was in high school. 

Clarisse with mothers and their children at the Gamboula Nutrition Centre. All of these kids are being treated for malnutrition. 

Bruno and I grafting avocados. He is in training and is already an excellent nurseryman. 

The agroforestry team in Gamboula. Mostly temporary workers.  

Our town from the air. Pretty large as far as towns go but no electricity or running water. 

Aka women teaching Angela how to process Coco (not Coca) leaves from the rainforest for supper. My favorite green! 

Tree planting in Kunda Papaye with the Aka 

Helping Aka pygmies with their oil palm seedling nursery. 

Grafting black sapote in the Garden of Eden 

What's down there--water at the well 

Women's seminar program 

Darren and Angela Boss, Gamboula 2005 

a brief detour

Sorry about the delay in updating everyone. I have
time for a brief update of the last couple weeks. We
finished out a great time in Bayanga having done 5
seminars in 5 villages and having had time to do a lot
of good one on one work with some great Aka men with a
lot of initiative for tree planting, farming and even
making fish ponds. Our truck was back on the road in
time for our last week in Bayanga to do a bunch of
travelling to some villages a little further out.
Darren also had another opportunity to spend an
afternoon viewing elephants and forest antelope up the
road from the mission. Since we are residents it was
free of charge. We felt like we really did some good
work and had accomplished a lot in our month there.
having a working knowledge of Sango sure makes all the
difference.

As many of you know, my family and friends got
together and paid for me to be able to fly back to
Canada for my sister's wedding which is this Saturday.
I am so lucky to have such great friends and a
wonderful husband who arranged it all behind my back.
While I am here fulfilling the duties of the bride's
sister, Darren is back in Bayanga with BJ doing 2 more
weeks of ministry with the Aka before heading back up
to return to work in Gamboula. The difference between
Gamboula and Bayanga is shocking in terms of poverty
levels, and the general surroundings, but the
difference between Bayanga and Victoria is even
greater!

As a matter of prayer, please remember me this Friday
as I have been invited to speak on a local radio show
about our work in CAR and the country in general.
Thanks Mom!

Will write more when the wedding craziness is over.

bossbugs@yahoo.ca

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In pursuit of honey...

As with all good stories, this one comes with a very sweet ending.
Tuesday started as any ordinary day does in Bayanga, that is until Raul came
knocking at the door to see if we wanted to join his kids and a couple Aka
on a honey hunt. While I am not into hunting large animals of the variety
that require bleeding and skinning, I have no qualms when it comes to
hunting insects. Call me biased, but hunting that ends in a sweet reward is
my kind of hunting. We all piled in the truck and drove about 20km into the
forest where we were deposited on the side of the road to be picked up again
at 3:00 in the afternoon.

The Aka are very skilled at honey hunting and are able to spot potential
hives 15 metres up a tree while walking on a vine enmeshed forest path. The
hive we were after had been spotted during an animal hunt a month earlier
and Jacques, our lead guide, hadn't forgotten where it was. Jacques and two
others flanked us in front and behind as we walked about an hour through
forest paths that you and I would have got lost on. The forest here is
quite similar in feeling to the west coast rainforest except for the
abundance of vines. You are constantly being grabbed at, tripped and
otherwise taken captive by all manner of vines. I am happy to say I only
fell on my face once and our guides (and Darren) were gracious enough not to
laugh. Even though the walk was only an hour it was still quite tiring
because of all the extra effort put out battling vines and picking up your
feet-like a good stair master workout.

When we finally did reach the tree the real work began. The hive in
question was about 50 feet or 15 metres up a very large trunked tree.
Fortunately for our guides, a large vine was growing right along side the
tree all
the way up to the height of the hive. They sent the youngest guy up to
check out the hive to see if there was any honey in it. By the time I had
my camera out he was already up in the tree, having had scaled the vine like
it was a fireman's pole. Once it was confirmed that there was in fact honey
they set about making a fire. They use a piece of dried treed sap that they
light with a match as a form of pygmy 'girl scout juice' to help get the
fire going. This is especially helpful in a rainforest where there is a
lack of dry tinder. With the fire going nicely they went around collecting
two varieties of leaves. The first was branches with small leaves that they
made two piles with. The second were long, wide, platter like leaves on
which they would eventually put the honey comb. While the fire was doing
it's thing, another
guy was out collecting vines and joining them together to make a 15 metre
long rope. On the end of the rope they attached a basket that they put
together on the spot out of even more vines. In the basket they made a bed
of the large leaves. When all these preparations were finished they took
hot coals form the fire and wrapped them up in the bundles of small leaves
and tied their packages together with vines. The two oldest guys, with
Jacques at the lead, scaled their way up the tree with a bundle of smoking
leaves in their armpits.

The rest of the process involved setting the smoking leaves into the hive of
bees in order to smoke them out. Once they were satisfied that it was
'safe' to reach their arm into a huge bee hive inside a tree they started
pulling out the combs. The good combs full of honey were placed in the
basket and the old, trash combs were thrown down towards our heads like
manna from heaven. We sat on the ground eating the comb they threw down.
Once the basket was full they lowered it down to the ground with the vine
where it was unloaded into a waiting basin of leaves on the ground. Up went
the basket again where it was filled yet again with yummy, sweet, sticky
honey. Once the hive was cleaned out of honey the two guys descended and we
proceeded to temporarily package up our honey, that is after we all had our
fill of fresh comb. I say we temporarily packaged it up because we were in
quite a hurry to move to a another location to do a good job of it. With
all that honey just sitting there we were a perfect target for those poor
displaced honey bees as well as sweat bees, about the worst part of the
rainforest.

Let me digress a moment. Sweat bees are a tiny little bee, about the size
of a gnat, a generic gnat that is, that don't sting but are attracted to
sweat. And if there is one thing you do in a tropical, humid rainforest,
it is sweat. They hover around your face, crawl into your eyes, land in
your ears, stick in your nose and generally drive you crazy. If you are on
the move they are no problem but stop for any length of time and you are
had.

So, we carried on a ways with our honey until we came to a spot where the
large leaves grew. They divided out the honey amongst us and we ended up
with 6 neat packages of honey all tied up in leaves and secured with vines.
No need for the Walmart shopping bag with all the things God made at our
disposal. The rest of the day we spent wandering the forest, picking
various fruits, well the Aka, not us as the fruits were also about 50 feet
up a tree. On our return home Darren squeezed out all our honey and
filtered it through a cloth and in the end we alone had about 750ml of
honey. It is the sweetest most unique honey I have ever had and I am most
grateful to our guides for sharing it with us. This was one of those
experiences you can't put a price on, one of those things that never in your
life you imagined you would do. It is a goal of our work here and the work
of the project that the Aka be able to retain this traditional knowledge and
the area they need in which to hunt and fish, while at the same time
becoming self sufficient in the ability to garden and live amongst the
villagers.

Mmmh, honey hunting gives such sweet rewards!

Goings on in Bayanga

Saturday: the day of our arrival in Bayanga.  We arrived in time for lunch and a party that evening for a couple of gorilla researchers that are on a one week break in Bayanga.  They spend 2 to 3 months at a time in the middle of the jungle tracking female gorillas, writing down all their observations.  Not something I would be particularly interested in, but hey. 

Sunday: We went to the local EBB church and were warmly greeted by the pastor's wife.  The pastor in Bayanga moved here a year ago after having spent 6 years at our church in Gamboula so he was eager to have us over and to hear the latest news from Gamboula.  The rest of Sunday we relaxed, being especially tired after our long trip.

Monday: The plan was to head south to visit two villages but the road was rained out.  This seems to be a chronic problem in the rainforest in the rainy season.  Go figure.  Instead we worked in the rain around the centre here, dividing and planting trees in the nursery and doing a bit of laundry in the river.  You have to enjoy camping to really get a kick out of life out here.  If you don't enjoy camping this life can seem awfully onerous and full of inconveniences. 

Tuesday: The road is a bit drier today so we ventured off with Constant, the EBB pastor and a local Aka guy who is interested in learning all about fruit trees and giving advice on planting etc.  I was quite excited to have JP with us as he is showing a lot of initiative when it comes to trees.  He has asked us to come to his garden to give him advice on planting trees and such.  He is the kind of guy you want to really give a lot of attention too in the hopes that he will help other Aka in the future with tree planting and gardening.  We stopped first in a village called Lijonbo, a village with a mix of Aka and villagers.  They have two churches, one for the Aka and one for the villagers and many people had nice big jackfruits in their yards from a previous visit Constant made their a year ago.  A big part of our job is to reinforce the work of guys like Constant who are fully capable of doing the agroforestry work but need access to the resources to do it.  We continued on and landed in the last village there is in this part of CAR.  We were on the only road south out of Bayanga and it ends at the Sangha river.  The other side of the river is Cameroon.  Here the Aka and the villagers live pretty well harmoniously, having the same church and the same school.  We were pleasantly surprised to find a group of Aka houses with trees doing really well.  Of 15 trees Constant planted last year all of them have survived and flourished, and these are people who wouldn't dream of watering their trees at all in the dry season.  God truly blessed these trees and some are even starting to flower already.  We planted another 10 trees here and we plan on returning to help them get their own nursery going so they can have trees to plant around their gardens in the future.  In another 2 or 3 years these will be very productive places food wise and will help change the course of the health of these people.  What a privilege to be involved in such work.

Wednesday: After having our vehicle briefly inspected by the local mechanic we set off north to visit 3 villages that had seminars in them last year.  After a brief stop in KP to say hi and look at the trees we headed for Wango, the site of an orchard and fish basins that a Swedish guy helped with this past year.  You can't fault people for wanting to help even though they have gaps in their own knowledge, so we took a look and made some suggestions for improvement.  We then did some 'door to door treevangelism' as we are now calling it.  We go from hut to hut asking the owners if they would like a tree planted at their house.  If they agree then we help them pick out a suitable planting place, give them instructions on how to take care of it and how to eat it and then we are off to the next hut.  When you return for another visit you can see who the people are that are serious about taking care of trees and then offer them further help the next time.  Those that didn't take of the trees get no further help.  From there we drove another further 50 km towards the direction of the Congo to a town called Liboko.  Here we were greeted by the local pastor of a well integrated Aka/villager church.  They even had a Swedish built guest house that we were able to stay in.  We had a great meal of gozo, beef (that we bought and brought with us) and coco, my favourite green that is abundant in the forest here.  Coco is a smallish leaf that grows on vines in the forest.  They collect the leaves, make a little packet of them and then cut them up really fine so that it looks like shredded grass.  Cooked with palm oil and peanut butter it makes a delicious and nutritious addition to gozo.  That night the Aka started up drumming and singing and dancing beside the church and our guest house and so we joined in the merriment for a while before retiring for the night.  It was one of those moments where there is no mistaking that you are truly living in the heart of Africa and that you know few people will ever experience what you just did.

Thursday: After bread and coffee we rounded up the few Aka who didn't go hunting for the day, including the head guy most interested in fruit trees and oil palm.  We went to their group nursery and helped them transplant about 30 oil palm seedlings.  Afterwards, we did a mornings worth of treevangelism and planted some 40 fruit trees.  I have high hopes for this village and especially for one Aka guy who is quite interested in fruit trees.  He has planted several seeds on his own initiative and has started planting trees in his own garden.  After a lunch of gozo and coco we were off for Nola, the large town half-way between Gamboula and Bayanga.  We arrived in the afternoon and took the opportunity to wander the market and get a few groceries (it is much less expensive there than in Bayanga).  I also bought a pair of orange knock-off Nike shorts for $4.00 so I could swim in the river here.  Darren and Constant took a look at the truck since we were having some trouble with it on the drive to Nola.  To our surprise we found that we were completely without rear brakes because of a major rear differential oil leak on both sides.The whole brake assembly was totally gummed up with oil.  We managed to buy some oil to top up the differential and then put it all back together in time for dinner.  Yup, you guessed it, we had gozo and coco, cooked with fish.  Their was also a bowl of some meat from some forest animal that Darren and Constant enjoyed.  I stuck with the coco and fish sauce. 

Friday: After a good nights sleep at the pastor's house we found our only passenger (the pygmy evangelist from Bayanga) and Constant and headed for Lopo, just south of Nola, in order to find diesel and gasoline to bring back to Bayanga.  We also dropped Constant off so he could traffique his way back to Gamboula.  The whole country seems to be out of gasoline (for the motor bike) but we were able to find diesel for the truck.  We made our way back to Bayanga, about 4 hours driving time, with no hassles or mishaps, just stops to say hi to Aka on the way, and stops to buy plantains and forest fruits.  We arrived in good time to enjoy lunch with the Raul and Diana.  We had a beautiful nights sleep and spent 3 hours Saturday doing our washing in the river.  I wish I could adequately describe what we saw and did during this week but it is better left for when we can talk in person.  Suffice it to say that we were filled with hope for these displaced people and were encouraged by their gentle and humble spirits. 

12 hours, 175 kilometres!

Wanted to write a quick note to say that we did make it to Bayanga and only a day late.  After getting a little late start in Gamboula, Constant, Darren, Rosa (cute 4 year old) and I started our way to Bayanga.  The goal was to stop in Bilolo, the half way point to have lunch around noon with some SIL folks doing language transcription.  We started the trip with Darren as our chauffeur and we were doing fine until we hit our first barrier.  It is a curious thing here to have border points within the country and Constant is very dutiful at making sure we stop at each one in order to maintain good relations with all the military men.  At the first stop we met a very bothersome guard who wanted to see in the back of the truck, asked us about guns, poked around the inside of the cab and then asked to see our passports.  He stalled us for quite a while but we didn't have to pay him anything thanks to Constant.  As we carried on we had to go through several more checkpoints but the road was good and I am sure we reached 60 km/hour at some points though we don't know for sure as the odometer and speedometer are both broken on the truck. 

 

We were doing fine and were making decent enough time until we reached a fork in the road.  Neither Darren nor I remembered the fork and it was Constant's first time on this road so we chose right.  There was a sign pointing to the left and it had the name of a sawmill on it.  After driving about 5 minutes down this road we second guessed ourselves.  Beware the second guess.  We recalled Roy saying something about choosing the wrong fork, ending up at dead-end, wasting a lot of time, blah, blah blah.  They key thing was, which way did he say was the wrong way? So we turned around and headed down the left hand road.  We must have travelled some 20 km down it before we came upon a sentinel who informed us that we were in fact not on the road to Bilolo but a dead end road ending at the sawmill.  So we turned around and headed back for the RIGHT way.  Up to this point Coco, our dog, who was also on this journey with us, had thrown up 3 times in the car and we had to stop each time to clean it up.  We also switched drivers at the turn around and finally ended up in Bilolo around 2:30 (2 hours later than we thought we would).  Just before entering Bilolo we were stalled again by a very drunk rain barrier guard who inisisted it had just rained and that we pay him to let us pass.  Reasoning with this guy took a while but eventually we got through.  We had a quick lunch with some missionary friends in Bilolo and were about to move on when it started to really pour.  This is a problem in two ways. One is that rain can make certain roads as slick as ice, such as the road between Bilolo and Nola, the next largest stopping point.  The second problem is that they also have rain barriers that close the road off in the event of a rain.  Fortunately, the barrier just outside of Nola was manned by a member of the EBB who Constant easily persuaded to let us pass.  It was much to my angst that he did let us pass as the worst and wettest section of road was ahead of us.  I nearly cried on the way into Nola I was so afraid we were going to slide right off the road and into a ditch, wrecking someone else's truck.  Constant did a fine job in getting us through and he arrived in the outskirts of Nola at about 5:30, just after the bac (river ferry) closed.  Constant went about trying to find the ferry operator which was interesting but he managed it and by 6:30 we were crossing the first of two rivers.  It wasn't until after 7:00 that we were on the second bac and arriving into Nola.  We knew we could go no further so we drove around until we found the EBB church and the pastor's house.  The pastor was kind enough to make us a late night dinner of gozo, meat and fresh boiled peanuts (not just a thing for Georgians) around 9:00.  The pastor's house in Nola is an old Swedish missionary house so there was plenty of room and beds for us to stay the night.  Constant ended up sleeping in the cab of the truck in order to keep an eye on our stuff.  Good chauffeur! 

 

After coffee and bread we were on our way to Bayanga and we made it here about 11:30 Saturday morning, just in time for lunch.  I can't say it was a harrowing adventure but as close as I would like to come.  I am a bit of a road wimp and would probably prefer hours in a canoe to a slip-sliding road. 

 

...Since arriving we spent Saturday afternoon unpacking and visiting people from 'the project', the WWF project in the area, seeing how we could help their development arm of things.  Sunday was a good day of rest and learning from Raul and Diana, the American missionaries here.  We had hoped to go to a village 40 km south of here but we woke up to thunder and rain this morning so we opted to work around the centre's nursery today and plan on going south tomorrow.  Wednesday we will start our way back north, stopping for the night in Wango, then a second night in Liboko, then we will drop off Constant in Nola where he will traffique back to Gamboula and we will go back to Bayanga until the end of the month.  There is no shortage of work here and no shortage of people to help.  This morning I went and helped/watched as Diana went to see a pygmy guy down the road with a huge boil that had burst on his leg.  Quite painful looking, a little disgusting and definitely reason for caution.  We are hearing reports of Ebola across the border in Congo about 100 km away and we are hearing lots of warnings about not eating any dead animals you find in the forest.  Hmm, I don't think we will have any problem with that advice.  Don't plan on eating many live ones either for that matter until we hear better news from Congo.  Don't worry mom, we wouldn't think of eating monkey!

 

Will write more when we return from this weeks adventures.

bacon bits with legs...

This is the continuing story of bobo's.
This past week we have had bobo's arrive on our porch twice. We haven't had
the desire to go out at midnight to collect them and it seems that only one
villager has had the courage to return to our veranda to collect them.
Sunday, during one of my almost daily visits to Clarisse's house, she came
out with a bowlful of toasty roasted bobo's (otherwise known as termites).
She had roasted them with a little bit of dongo (hot pepper) and they tasted
a lot like bacon bits with legs.

It would have been rude of me to have kept them all for myself so I politely
asked her if I could take a few home with me for Darren and BJ to try.
Having bought lettuce that morning I thought it was fitting to make a big
salad for lunch with bobo bits as one of the topping choices. After a bit
of discussion, Darren and BJ both sprinkled a handful on their salads, said
a little prayer and enjoyed a hearty meal, with only a few jokes about
flossing and finding legs between your teeth. I think it was cheating a bit
to hide them in amongst the salad but they each did eat a few on their own.
As for me, once I got them home and on the table I had less of a desire to
eat them than I did when I was sitting at Clarisse's, surrounded by a gaggle
of small children, all wondering if this white lady was really going to eat
termites. She did, in fact, and she went back for seconds, thirds and
fourths. They don't taste bad and the only creepy thing is the legs. After
Darren and BJ had their fill I brought some over to the neighbours house for
the school teacher's parents to try. They are visiting from the US for two
weeks. They both tried one and I even heard that her mom went back for
seconds.

When it comes down to it, what kind of bug lady would I be if I wasn't
willing to eat bugs as well as study and collect them? I am glad that they
only come around once a year though. Next month is caterpillar season.
This will be a little more challenging, especially the fresh ones. They are
significantly bigger than a termite and have all that squishy stuff inside.
I guess a little prayer goes a long way on that way.

In other news, I experienced my first snake bite victim last night. As I
was about to leave my friends house we heard that a lady had been brought to
the hospital with a snake bite on her foot. We went to the hospital to
check on the lady and to see the snake that bit her. We arrived too late to
see the snake as it was already bought and in someone's stew pot and the
lady was being treated. However, when our cook arrived this morning he
informed me that the lady died an hour later. I am not sure I have come so
close to death before, and now I am absolutely sure of why I wear boots or
shoes when I go to people's gardens. No flip-flop hiking for me. It seems
the lady was actually trying to dig for the snake to kill it for supper when
in fact she had chased it out another hole and it came around and bit her in
the foot. So, to answer everyone's question, yes snakes are here, yes they
are bad, yes they can kill, but no, it doesn't happen very often and yes, I
am careful.

This week we bid a fond Bon Voyage to the Doctor and his family as they
return to the US for a year of furlough. As well, the school teacher for
the neighbours family returns for the States after being here about a year.
We too are leaving this week to go to Bayanga to help out with agroforestry
work there. We will be returning after a month in order for me to catch a
plane bound for Canada. Yes, Canada. My loving husband has been sneaking
around finding a good flight and arranging things for me to return for my
sisters wedding. We all knew he was a great husband! I will be there for a
month and will return the first of September. I am not looking forward to
the separation or leaving Darren here by himself, but I am glad for the
chance to go home and to witness her marriage. I am truly blessed in life
with a great husband, wonderful parents and an understanding sister.

I am looking forward to writing in depth about our observations and our work
in Bayanga and will make every effort to change the names of people and
places as I have done in my previous reports. This is a beautiful country
with beautiful people but it is hard to reach and hard to hear news of so I
will do my best to give all the sights and sounds and smells that I can. If
you think of it, please pray for our travel this Friday. It is a long way
(300+ km) on bad roads in the dry season. After a rain the roads are as
slick as ice. We are bringing Constant with us for the drive and he will
stay with us for a week. He is the head agri guy and can fix a truck or get
it unstuck like a pro. He is our back up since neither of us have much
experience when it comes to African roads. Mind you, all that back-country
camping we used to do on logging roads has come in handy as far as
manoeuvring around pot holes is concerned. Thanks Dads for introducing to
back road travel. It is invaluable experience out here.
Na peko ma,
Ange
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Henry and the Golden Egg

Sorry it has been so long since I last wrote on the state of life here. We
have been very busy and we will finally take a break on Wednesday when we
take a couple days off and go to Berberati, 'the big city'. Actually, we
just heard that an internet cafe opened up there and an hour is only $2.
What a deal as far as I am concerned. I am looking forward to checking on
the state of the world. We will also have a chance just to wander around
and see what is there. Supposedly you can buy lettuce and cabbage and
garden vegetables in the market there. They may even have a few tourist
things like postcards or something.

I have been busy training a new assistant manager in the nursery at
Gamboula. I am training him in all things related to propagation, insect
and disease control, grafting and other stuff. He is a very good grafter
and very keen. He is planning on starting his own nursery at his house and
grafting his own trees for sale. I am trying to encourage him in this regard
as very few people here show much entrepreneurial initiative. Saturday, I
gave a second women's agroforestry seminar and, thanks to a recent donation,
was able to buy notebooks and pens for all the ladies to write notes (this
was their request).

We also bought a chicken Saturday and we named her Henrietta. We had her
tied up on our veranda until today. She kind of reminded me of our pet
chickens hen I was a kid. We gave her a box to hide in from the sun and
this morning when we brought her down to Leonard to kill her we found an egg
in the box. We kind of figured it was her last ditch attempt to avoid
death. We think she was thinking that if we saw her worth as an egg
producer we might not want to eat her after all. Darren said if we found 3
eggs it would be worth keeping her but one just didn't cut it. I guess he
was right. Anyway, I told Leonard we would eat her tomorrow after the
memory of Henry had faded in mind some. He just laughed. We do a lot of
laughing around here. It is like having your favourite uncle as your cook!
Today I was so tired and exhausted from a busy couple of weeks and poor
sleep that I just started laughing this morning. I couldn't get any words
out at all. He just laughed at me and I know he thinks I am just a little
crazier than anyone else out here. Oh well, people were bound to find out
sooner than later.

Today I am starting a series of workshops on grafting for the agroforestry
guys. We are going to teach them grafting 2 at a time over the course of
the week. This way there won't be knives flying all over the place and I
can have some control over the matter.

My other project right now is a going-away video for Sarah, a short-term
missionary whose time is up at the end of the month. She really does not
want to leave so I am going around filming all the missionaries and cooks
and people she knows here. I also arranged with her choir to film a
mini-concert. All of this and she doesn't know a thing. Her choir
assembled at the river yesterday, 3 km from the mission and we drove their
speakers and robes down there for them. They stood in the hot sun and sung
their hearts out and I got it all on tape. She is going to be so surprised
when she sees it. I am planning on giving it to her next week when her
parents are here and then show it to her choir. It is a fun project and
will bless her socks off I hope.

Well, better go prepare for the seminar and for bible study tonight. It is
my turn to give the lesson and I need to find a few words in Sango. Until
next time,
Angela

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Flight of the Bobo

It was the thrill of the hunt that took them.  Or was it the very fact that if they missed tonight's hunt they would be forced to wait an entire year before the chase could resume itself once more.  If the pressure of the crowd ever came into play, it did last night, during this, the flight of the Bobo.  What, you may ask, is a bobo after all?  A bobo is a generic term for flying termites, but on this particular night in question, (last night), bobo refers to the biggest of the flying termites, seen only once per year.  If you miss the flight of the bobo you have to wait again until next year and contrary to popular belief, people here aren't too keen on waiting. 

 

Common knowledge has it that these bobo's come out the day after a rain and a subsequent day of hot sunshine.  They have come out twice already.  The morning after the first flight we saw little kids picking them up bright and early as the sun rose.  Last night however, they were prepared.  At about midnight last night the frenzy began.  It seems as though the termites are attracted to light sources such as the security lights surrounding our porch.  At midnight we heard our veranda gate open (just happens it is right beside our bedroom window).  Then we heard all kinds of talking and walking around the veranda.  Upon first hearing all these voices I thought at once that we had thieves trying to get into our house.  Common sense prevailed and Darren got up to check on matters.  The sound of him unlocking the door sent the would-be bobo thieves fleeing for cover down our back stairs.  They did however, leave their shoes behind, which they so thoughtfully left on the bottom of the stairs.  While Darren was out chasing people I was on the radio hailing the sentinel to come and chase them away.  When I went outside I was shocked to see 20 people, adults and kids, on every door step collecting these giant, flying termites, with no regard for who they might be waking up, or whose house they were trespassing at.  Normally respectful people were rendered temporarily insane by the prospect of gathering a bowlful of these little critters.  We went back to bed thinking we had dutifully taken care of the situation until half and hour later we heard people on our veranda again.  Darren once again got up only to find that the sentinels, those sworn, and paid, to protect the houses of the missionaries and our sleep, had let them come back to our corner of the mission and they themselves were also picking termites.  All sense had left this place. 

 

There is a large security fence around our part of the mission but the top part of our houses are above the fence and so we hear everything that is going on in the village around us.  There is a round-point not far from our house as the bird flies, and it has a light on it.  This happened to be the gathering spot for a large bobo-party last night that we heard going on until 3:30 am.  I was almost tempted into joining the fray since I wasn't finding any sleep.  However, I figured I may be subjected to consuming a quantity of bobo's so I opted for my bed and ear-plugs.  This morning at report the ag guys assured us that the bobo's would not be coming out tonight so we could sleep well. 

 

This morning our anger and tiredness quickly turned to mush as we realized that for a people whom meat is hard to find and too expensive to buy on a regular basis, these termites are a wonderful source of protein.  And, we would rather hear a party over termites, then a brawl over elections or other such things.  In a place where North American forms of entertainment do not exist, we are forced to create our own forms of entertainment, like, the flight of the Bobo.

One of many firsts

Saturday was my best day yet! Work is so fulfilling when it is the work
your heart longs to do. Anyone who knows me from ECHO knows that I love to
give seminars, training days, talks at plant sales, etc. When you move to a
country where simple conversations are a challenge you are required to wait
until such a time as your language skills catch up with your heart.
Saturday everything finally came together for me.

While there have been agroforestry seminars given in Gamboula in the past
there is a strong tendency for only men to attend. I have been asking women
why this is since they all tell me that they want to learn about fruit
trees. The standard answers are that the three day seminars are too long,
they can't be absent from their gardens and their kids for that long, and
that they have kids to look after. This to me in understandable. So I have
been asked my a few ladies to give them a seminar on planting and caring for
fruit trees. This Saturday we all huddled under the shade of the nutrition
centre house and I taught a 3 hour seminar to 10 ladies. I have never felt
so alive here as that morning. I was nervous of my sango but it just kind
of came out. In cases where it came out not to clear Clarisse translated
into Gbaya (the local tribal language). After an hour and half of theory
and a discussion about nutrition and a compost demonstration we all walked
over to the garden of Eden for an official tour. We made our way out the
far end of Eden and into Paulien's family garden where 2 weeks previously we
had planted about 14 fruit trees. I showed them all how to plant a
jackfruit and then we looked at the advantages of mulching around fruit
trees. Since planting trees in Paulien's garden it hadn't rained but she
had been diligently watering the trees and had put compost around all of
them. I couldn't have asked for a better demonstration. When I lifted up
the compost the soil was nice and moist under it and only an inch away it
was bone dry and crusty. It was a striking example that I imagine won't
leave the women's minds. I was also able to dispel the myth that throwing
waste water on trees was bad for them! On the contrary, what a way to have
healthy trees--pour the bath and wash water on the trees. Sweep the goat
poo from around the yard around the trees rather than in a heap someplace
else. We finished just before the sun really beat down.

My agreement with the women was that I would give them each 16 trees to
start and I offered to go to their gardens with them to help them place the
trees in a good spot. They all looked over to Paulien and Clarisse when I
said that to see if they really heard what I said and to see if I really
could walk that far without dying. They both said, "yeah, she has already
been to our gardens a bunch of times." There is no better way to relate to
people than to be interested and involved in the things that shape and
define their lives. I also told them I wouldn't give them their trees until
they had prepared the holes before hand and, if they were planting them near
their house, they had to have cut sticks to make goat protection first. I
also told them to wait to plant until the day after we had rain. No one
demanded their trees right away, they were all quite agreeable. Wouldn't
you just know it that it rained the next day and 6:30 Monday morning I had a
lady at my door ready to plant her trees. She was so excited that I was
excited. I will be going to take pictures soon.

My next seminar will be in the church with a women's group that meets every
Thursday. They have anywhere from 50 -100 women show up--Yikes! The crazy
thing about all this is that we don't have any money for trees or pens and
notebooks. I am basically scraping it all together as people demand the
knowledge. Since we aren't able to be in Bayanga all the time with the
pygmies, I am engaging in ministry here as well. God however is big, and he
already knew that this was going to happen here so that means he has a plan
for it all. Very reassuring. I am the first female agronome here or that
Roy has ever heard of in these parts or in his work in Congo. In this
culture it is easier for women to be taught by a woman.

In other news, our well is finished and the village is starting to use it.
The water is quite clear and we have enough funds left over from the
official donation to build another one. There is a never a shortage in
demand for water, especially good clean drinking water.

To top off an already great Saturday, someone arrived from Berberati with
mail-yes, mail! Our dear friend Leanne mailed us three packages a month ago
and they arrived. A similar package mailed in February has yet to arrive
but that is Africa for you. We were completely overwhelmed when we opened
it up to find a 6 month supply of Kool-aid and Crystal Light. Her church,
which hardly knows us, sent us a stack of recipe cards on which individuals
in the church wrote encouraging notes and scripture. We are reading one a
day at lunch until we are through, and then we will start from the beginning
again. Talk about being blessed. At noon today we will hear the official
proclamation of who won the presidential elections 2 weeks ago. Continue to
pray for peace in the coming months. In church Sunday the pastor admonished
us saying that both candidates were Central Africans so no matter who wins
they are one of us, so we are not to go crazy and protest and lose the
peace. Hopefully everyone heard well.

If you have sent mail, be encouraged, it will get here and we will relay the
election results in the next e-mail. Darren by the way is doing well and is
starting to really bust out the Sango. He is keeping us organized
financially and is enjoying work in Eden. He filmed parts of my seminar
that we will be showing around when we get back.

Until next time, Ange
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