The Saints go Marching

I have enjoyed listening to the drums in the mornings. Some mornings a man plays a trumpet while the students play the drums. I assume he is a teacher. Some of the kids can march so well.

School Time

Almost all children start school here at a very early age - 2 or 3 years old. Since most mothers work outside of the home, the children go to a day care or "creche" as they call it. The school behind our apartment is a very nice private school, and the children look quite sharp in their dark navy and white uniforms with red accents. The girls wear white anklets and black shoes. They rotate classes that have a sport day or P.E. classes. On their P.E. days, they wear a red, yellow, blue or green t-shirt and shorts. Their morning opening exercises include a rousing drum ceremony.
Sometimes the pre-school age classes have a swim day for about an hour once a week.

Recess time with the nursery helper giving them a ride on the merry-go-round.

Many of the older girls participate in a group similar to Girl Scouts every Friday. They wear these horrible, brown sack dresses. They work on crafts and I've noticed that they help with the young children.

I really enjoy watching the children playing outside from our apartment window. Now they have ended their school year, and it is so quiet out back. I will take home lots of nice memories, though, of the Abiola International School.

Lawn Mower vs Grass Cutter

This is a Grass Cutter - not quite the same thing as a lawn mower. Elder Lynch snapped this photo yesterday when he was coming back from Ijebu-Ode, (Ih-jay-boh-day). She wasn't happy that he was snapping her picture. We have also seen them selling these delicacies by the side of the road. They refer to this as "bush meat". There are many different critters that are considered bush meat, but basically it is wild game. This rodent is as large as a big cat and is supposed to be quite delicious. The cost? She wanted 1000 Naira, which is less than $7.00. We pay more for a little chicken, but it's all cleaned and ready to cook. This guy is still all hairy, etc. No thanks, I'll stick with chicken. Look up Grass Cutter on Google. Someone says it's considered a delicacy?

Super Family Home Evening

This was the super group that came for a Super FHE last Monday. Brother Chimezie, 2nd counselor in the Bishopric, brought his family. Elder Krupp taught the lesson, and I did an activity. Many of them brought food, and they stayed and ate while Elder and I went home. We stayed later than our normal 7 p.m. We like to keep to the mission rules and be in before dark. We really enjoy hanging out with these young adults and will miss them when we leave. They say they will also miss us. I hope some of them will email us and include us in their lives. We had hoped that one of them would marry while we were here. That hasn't happened, but some are engaged or getting engaged soon and getting married next year. We hope we have set a good example in that department.

More Glorious Women in Faith

Lots of volume doesn't always mean lots of great sound. Some of these preachers really like to hear themselves, and they go on and on. No singing talent is required here, just lots of enthusiasm.

Glorious Women of Faith

This group of women come together once a month or so. They meet out in the yard of the Abiola International School right behind our apartment. This meeting had the mics and speakers going and they have had some special speakers or preachers there this day. It's quite fun to listen and watch their doings.
Clapping, singing and dancing or walking around in a circle seems to be part of the celebration.
This is VERY typical African clothing. Four of these women have on a simple pullover top and a wrapper (skirt). The wrapper is just a piece of fabric. You can see the selvage edge (white strip) around the bottom of the wrapper. This is totally acceptable and normal. I really love all the colors and prints they wear.

Sequel to Noises in the Night

Sister Krupp (Linda) is standing beside the large tank that was leaking. The leaking created a pond and the pond attracted the frogs that made the horrible noise in the video of blackness and the frogs' horrible noise. The large tank is repaired and is standing properly on the concrete base we showed pictures of in a previous post. This is the back yard of our Mission Building. The concrete slabs cover access to a system call a "suck away". We think it works similar to a septic system. It seems to work well and there is never any noxious odor indicating what the system does.
View of the tanks from the other side. This gives you the perspective of how much larger the damaged tank is than the one on the concrete support box. It holds 7500 Liters, however much that is in gallons.
These two pictures show the hole made by the plumbers to correct a water leak in our new building. We have lived in it eight months. We noticed a significant leak in the southwest exterior wall some weeks ago. The building folks thought it was being caused by Air Conditioner drain tubes leaking. The Air Conditioners were shut off and the water continued leaking. The next solution follows the normal African "fix-a-building-process." First, bash a big hole so you can see the problem. Next, you fix the problem. And, then lastly you patch the bashed in hole and re-paint.
One of the plumbers climbed their ladder and took this. It's supposed to be close-up, but doesn't show where they are working on the leak. We'll know in a week or two if they repaired it. The side of the building will dry out. That's how we will know they repaired the leak!