Oh Holy Night Thank God There's Peace and Quiet...

I think I am subconsciously craving Christmas cuz I have had 2 kinda Christmasy titles.

Anyway...MY PARENTS ARE HERE!!!! Woot Woot!!! I was terrified they were going to have trouble getting to their hotel cuz they arrived at night and a driver in town was getting them...and I didn't want him to rip them off. I had been assured he wouldn't, but you never know. I was told they should pay no more than K150,000
My parents told me they had paid $100.

WHAT!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!?!? That's K500,000. This is also known as a Rip Off. Bah! However, we figured it was ok, cuz it was late, raining like crazy, and an hour and so minutes out of town. Sooo, a $100 for there and back? Ok....ok.
Still a little much but at least they got here safely and the driver was nice. I am so happy they are here. I wish Jet could come, but Krista’s mom sent me a stuffed animal dog to represent Jet. That made me explode with joy!

We went to Livingston with some of the other youth. Mei and Shalom have left, and I miss them already and it's barely been a week. Thankfully Shalom lives here till she goes to school in January, but Mei. Ah, it's weird without her.

Anyway, Livingston. I forgot my rain coat, but by the grace of God it didn’t rain! We went to Victoria Falls and the water was low so we were able to walk across the river which was bascially just rocks. After the rainy season, that part is flooded and you definitely can't walk there. We had a guy guide us across it. I think he was an illegal tour guide, and you can't pay them, but he was quite helpful.
We got right on the ledge. Um....it's high. Colleen went in August and bungeed from the bridge, which is about the 3rd highest jump in the world. If I had jumped, I think it would have been more of a fall off the bridge cuz I went unconscious due to extreme fear.

We also went to this traditional dance at the Arts Cafe called "Dancing Around Zambia" and it covers 4 out of the 9 provinces. It was so good! One of the songs they did was a version of a song some of the girls at Banani sing so were excited about that.
This Cafe is sooooo freaking cool. They basically want to keep the culture alive and have workshops from 11 to 5 for only K50,000!! That's $10 for stone carving, wire sculpting, drum making, and other things. SOOOOOOOOO COOL!!! We didn'get to do it, but three youth stayed a day later than us and they did it. Jealous.

There's also a museum that explains the beginning of Zambia and the people in it. It was really interesting and explained the traditions and ways of life of the people. It seemed to really emphasize how technology has tried to kill its culture and takes many of the young people from the villages to the bigger cities, which is sad. I feel it's important to evolve and progress materially, but you also need to equally progress spiritually. A little mixture ain’t bad.

We went on a sunset cruise and saw crocodiles and a ton of hippo’s. Then the boat ran out of fuel and we were stranded for a bit, but the view was awesome so we didn’t really mind waiting for our rescue boat. We stopped at an island with another boat and had some snacks. We left after the first boat did, and we noticed someone standing on the shore. We went back and it was a guy from the first boat. Poor guy and had been deserted!! Well, we left him there and kept going.

Just kidding. We picked him up and took him back to the dock. He was really funny and said if he’d had to, he would have climbed a tree and just flailed around till someone saw him. He did look like a guy who would do that and enjoy it. Bahaha!

Three of the youth stayed at another hotel, but stayed with Colleen and me so we could all do the walking safari. Three squished on my bed and two on Colleens. It was cozy, but the bus rides to town have prepared us for that. We saw a ton of elephant dung! Pretty much made the experience. Haha! We didn’t see any elephants, but we did track down (uh, our guide tracked it. We aren’t quite that skilled yet) a rhinoceros, and saw warthogs with babies! So cute. There were a lot of impala and such. The giraffes were pretty awesome as well, but lighter than what I’m used to. The guide said there was a problem of inbreeding and that’s why they’re lighter and smaller. They’re bringing in some new ones in the next few years to help fix that.

Just to clarify, in this place there are no lions or leopards or predators which is why we can walk there.

The prettiest birds are here as well.

The last night, we went back to the Arts Café and they said we could watch the dancing again for free. SAWEET!!!
So we watched the dancing again and talked to some of the performers. They’re on Youtube and EVERYONE should watch them. They have had 4 companies tape them professionally, and each time they never get a video. Ridiculous. The owners, who are from Canada, want to take them there and see if they can get taped there…and not get ripped off. Psh. I want them in Oregon! And then North Carolina.

Before we left, we said goodbye to the hotel people who were simply amazing and so friendly, and to the dogs that I befriended who were adorable, and to our cab driver who was kind enough to pick us up and drop us off at our hotel which is 15 min. outside of town AND didn’t rip us off. He was a cute short man named Joe. Colleen and I called him Joe Fresh cuz of the store in Canada. He wanted Krista’s number though….no no Joe.

But he still visited the other youth at their hotel. Haha! So creepy and so funny.

Oh! When we were going to Shoprite, a man started talking to Colleen and I and after about 10 min. asked us if we went to Church. Colleen said we didn’t go to Church and we were Baha’is. He just kind of “ahhh’d” and told us to have a nice day and walked off. Bhahahahahaahahah! We gotta kick out of that! We now know the secret to getting rid of men!

Joe asked us the same thing when he dropped us off and I told him we have Feast every 19 days. He didn’t walk off, but he did give me a little fold out card thing talking about Jesus. It was a really cool card. Aw, Joe.

I loved Livingston. So much. I think I could live there. It’s just kind of expensive, but that’s ok. I’ll make friends with everyone and visit a lot and stay with them.

Well, before all this happened, I said goodbye to 160 girls. More like 140 since the seniors already left on that fateful day that gave me food poisoning. May I just say the symptoms between malaria and food poisoning are dangerously close? They took me to the hospital, the one I was told NOT to go into cuz I would get diseases, so I could get checked for malaria. Well, about 5 other girls came with me and we left around 10 pm and got back around 1 am. And I couldn’t get checked cuz they were out of testing supplies, so they told me and Krista, who was also sick, to come back in the morning. The doctor said they wanted to check as soon as possible cuz malaria is much more severe in foreigners because they don’t have the immune system for it. I really couldn’t imagine feeling worse, but I knew it wasn’t malaria because I absolutely REFUSE to get malaria. Roya, how did you survive?
So, it turned out to be food poisoning and I was fine in a week. But seriously, if malaria is worse than that…I think I’d just simply beg for death and jump off the Vic Falls bridge.

BUT! Back to the girls leaving, I introduced my parents to some of them and said my goodbyes. Ah, I am going to miss them. One of my girls is for sure not coming back next year, and she’s so sweet and I love her and I am going to miss her SO MUCH!

On Wednesday, Shadon and I did a little activity with them. We wrote a persons name on pieces of paper and got everyone in a circle and passed all the papers around till everyone had written something nice about everyone. We figured since they all hate each other, this would be good to end on, and you know what? Every comment we read (we collected them after so we could check for any mean comments) was nice except one that was really good till the end so we just crossed off the last part. But I was quite happy they did so well! One girl came up to me and said she had learned an important lesson. Even if a person nags and nags and nags, at least they are very determined. YES!!! Thank you for seeing the good in something bad.

On Thursday, we gave each girl her paper and we were going to give them lollipops and sour worms, but there had been a little incident on Sunday. Shadon and I had planned a scavenger hunt which would lead them to the big Common Room so we could watch a movie and eat food. I gave them lollipops then, and then Colleen came and I had to go to junior youth group. Nura and Shadon stayed to watch over them. When I came back, I only had 4 lollipops left and I knew I had had at least 15 when I left.

I was pissed.

One girl asked if she could have one and I said no cuz they’d been stolen. She said she knew a couple of the girls who had done it cuz they told her. I didn’t want this to be a blame game, but I went and talked to the girls anyway. One seemed to have no clue what I was talking about, another said she took one, and the last said she’d been given one and didn’t know it was mine. Bafreakinglogna. She said the girl who took one gave it to her, which really confused me cuz they are not friends and never talk to each other. I knew I wasn’t getting the whole story, so I said they wouldn’t get anything on Thursday and talked to them about stealing. Then, Shadon and I decided we wouldn’t give anyone anything cuz more than one had been taken and we told the girls they wouldn’t get anything unless people stepped up and took responsibility. No one did and no one got anything the last day, but the one girl who said she was given one talked to me a lot more after I talked to her on Monday. I think she wanted attention, which wouldn’t surprise me cuz I feel like a lot of the girls here are neglected. As in, their parents feed and clothe them, but that’s all. It’s really sad.

However, even with the bit o’ drama, I love my grade 8’s so much. They’re such good people. They just need to see that. They all have so much potential and I hope in grade 9 they really start believing that.

Ok. My junior youth group is AMAZING!!!!! There was an end of the year party for the children’s class and JY group’s last Friday. Our JY group prepared a song to sing and can you guess what song they chose? JUST GUESS!!!!!!!

SEASONS OF LOVE!!!!!!!!!!! Seriously!!! My JY’s know a song from RENT?!?!?!? You have got to be kidding me. If there was no other reason for me coming here except that, I would be happy. Humphrey and Shuton taught the group the song because they knew it best, and it was rough right up until the performance. They did really well. Ah! You just can’t believe how flippen stoked I was that they knew that song!!!!!!!!!!!

We also had a fundraiser a couple weeks ago. It was a cinema and we watched Alvin and the Chipmunks 2. It was a lot of fun and the only disappointing thing was that the parents didn’t come. Next time, we’ll get them there. Hands down.

Also, a few weeks ago, we had Awards Night. It rained so hard that you couldn’t really hear anyone who was talking. After, I went and stood outside and was pretty much drenched in 5 seconds. Then Mecrice came running up behind me and was screaming for me to run. So we ran…right into a flooded area of the ground and my feet got soaked but I was too busy laughing to care. Oh my gosh it was so much fun to run through the rain!! It was so loud and the thunder seriously sounds like bobs exploding and the lightening lights everything up! You could read a book! I think when I go home and am in a thunderstorm, I’ll just think someone dropped a book or something.

Ahhhh. Nothing like an African storm.