Market Trip

We've been deposited in Nairobi for a couple days to "adjust" and "relax" and "get over jetlag." We are relaxing . . . but adjusting and jetlag might take more than two days. I slept until 6am this morning . . . not too shabby, but not too fantastic either.

I've been making friends and playing with the kids and getting out on every trip possible. I actually don't need to buy much, but I like the bartering and helping out others. Yesterday we went to the "Maasai Market," which is twice a week at a mall in Nairobi. Megan and I made some purchases there last year so it was familiar territory. This time I was able to say "no money today, just pictures!" to the hagglers . . . and take some time for conversations.

Shukas (Maasai blankets) and Kikois for sale

Baskets from Tanzania (Iringa Baskets!)

Earrings

New friend, Bernard

Conversation:
Bernard - Oh, Erica-America, I will just call you America. Obama or McCain? You are going for McCain.
Me - Oh, how do you know that?
Bernard - Just look at you. You are voting for McCain. I can tell.
Random guy - I like McCain.
Me - Why? I thought all Kenyans like Obama.
Random guy - I like him because he is old. Old is good.
Me - Yes, he is Mzee (old man). But did you know he is like 70?
Random guy - 70? Oh. That's too old. I like Obama better now.

And . . . politics in Africa.

I've Arrived!

As I write this, I'm in that slightly dizzy state that comes with jetlag . . . but I'm thrilled to report we all made it safely, and ALL my bags are here! Which, if you know me, is no small miracle.

Try to imagine 25 people unloading at Newark airport. I don't think we ever did a total luggage count, but if everyone took only their allotted three bags/person, that would be 75 pieces. And we definitely rang up the extra baggage costs on this trip - I checked 5 extra bags for a total of 8 pieces. It took a moving truck just to get the bags there, as modeled by Frances, who will be teaching 2nd grade at RVA:

And unloading presented new challenges of getting all of the bags carted up to check-in. My stuff is in the left corner of this picture:


Fortunately these missionaries are of the kind variety and everyone chipped in to get everyone else into the BA line. Which was really long. I combined my stuff with another family and every time the line inched forward a foot or so, we'd start the routine of shuffling 7 carts up in line. At one point, a fire alarm went off, to add to the already chaotic mess. So, check-in took HOURS. I had plenty of time to scurry over to American Airlines lost baggage and claim a bag that had been left when I flew in on Wednesday. So it was with great joy that I finally checked 4 action packers, 2 suitcases, and 2 duffel bags all the way to Nairobi.

(Juli playing the cart-shuffle game with my stuff)

We flew Newark-London, said goodbye to part of the group who headed to Dar es Salaam to drop off their stuff before coming to ABO. We'll see them tonight. Our three hour layover went by quickly, I spent the rest of my Starbucks gift card, and we got on our last flight to Nairobi. At this point I was feeling pretty exhausted and kept falling asleep, so that I'd have to ring the flight attendants for all the meals I'd missed. And can I just say that airline seats are getting closer together? They are! I am a small person and I had about 6 inches between my head and the seat in front of me. Which might explain why, when it was time to disembark, I ended up wearing one flip-flop of the guy in front of me. He turned around and said, "This is an interesting situation. I think you're wearing one of my shoes." Sure enough, on my right foot was a brown flip-flop about six sizes too big. It was just so CRAMMED I couldn't see!

A million hours later, we had claimed all our luggage, dragged it outside the airport, loaded it up, driven to Mayfield guest house, unloaded it, carried all down and around to sit outside our rooms, showered, and crashed. I slept about 10 hours and now I'm struggling to stay awake to make it to lunch. *yawn. Thanks for your prayers. I'm so thrilled to have all my bags!

Next time, in Africa

So, June 27th - DDAY! - will be here in 32 minutes (departure day). And I'll be on my way to Africa.

We'll fly through the night on Friday, arrive in London early Saturday, and arrive in Nairobi 10pm on Saturday night. Sometime around midnight, Nairobi time, I should be crashing in a bed at Mayfield guest house, surrounded by my eight checked bags and large hiker-backpack carry-on. At least, that's what you can pray for.

I'll be in Nairobi until July 2nd, when we'll travel to Machakos for three weeks of Africa Based Orientation (ABO). If you remember, this is where I did the children's ministry last year, but this year I'll be going as a real missionary. That is finished on July 22nd, when we'll go back to Nairobi and I'll go on to Kijabe! I'll spend over a month there before school starts in September.

If you want to know how I feel about leaving . . . well, it's been a roller coaster. There is a certain baggage incident that I may relay at a later date, or you could ask my Charlotte friends or my kind, supportive parents to tell. The moral is, God is faithful. I am limited (and forgetful) but God is faithful. That has been a nice lesson to relearn.

Today I was having a little cryfest after talking to my family and my grandma. I was frustrated by my sadness, feeling that this should be an exciting moment, but I just couldn't get past the emotions of leaving, saying goodbye. (My least favorite word in the world). I was really in the depths of despair. In the midst of trying to talk myself out of it, I looked out at the enormous pine trees on the front lawn. From my spot on the picnic table, they all but filled my view. I thought to myself, I should go in and get my camera. But no, my lens isn't wide enough. Do you see the life metaphor there, or do I need to spell it out for you? My life lens just isn't
wide enough right now to see the whole picture. And as a wise friend told me, I would be too overwhelmed if I could see it all anyway. God gives us what we need, when we need it.

And, after another hour of crying, I felt better. :)
Lots of love. Look for the wide angle.

Contact Me! (or mail me a package)

There are several ways to get mail to me in Kenya.

1. The old-fashioned way. aka THE BEST WAY. This is where you go to the post office and mail a package to Africa. My address is:

Erica Anderson
Rift Valley Academy
PO Box 80
Kijabe
Kenya
00220

Important: On the customs form, claim the sent items at a garage-sale value. I will most likely have to pay a 'duty fee' on what is sent, and the less expensive it seems, the better. I've heard this method of mailing is fairly reliable. I'll let you know. **** DO NOT SEND BOXES **** Send flat-rate envelopes. If it doesn't fit, split it into two envelopes. Rumor is boxes never arrive, and envelopes come in a short amount of time.

2. The new-fashioned, slightly strange way.
To save you money, send the package to me via the home address.

Erica Anderson (RVA)
c/o Africa Inland Mission
135 Crooked Hill Road
Pearl River, NY 10965

They will save the package until they accrue a certain amount of weight to send it air freight to the AIM International Services in Nairobi. Then I will go to Nairobi and get the package. However, I will then pay $7 for every kilo the package weighs (that's 2.2 pounds.) This process can take more time, but it is more reliable. However, there is the extravagant pickup fee for me. This is recommended for tiny expensive items (ie diamond earrings. JK)

3. To send really heavy things, ie furniture or a box of books, you could send those to the above address and specify they are ocean shipment. This could take up to 6 months to arrive, as they will wait for 800 sq feet of shipping to accumulate before sending a container, which will then meander around the ocean and finally arrive (we hope) in Africa. Umm, if you're going to send me furniture, we should talk.

Other contact info:
email: ericacanderson@gmail.com
cell phone: (011) 245 7 3549 2826
house phone: (011) 254 20 3246 253
skype: erica.c.anderson

Weekend with the Fam

How quickly I lose steam while blogging, or maybe I've just been busy! You know, family time, it can be exhausting. Especially when your morning starts with the dog being dumped on your bed by Mom, already dressed in her running clothes. The woman is a little Energizer bunny. I was dying on our run - but I blame it on the coffee and cinnamon roll I had before we went. Good excuse, right? For my mom to last longer than me? She was proud and demanded I take this picture "for the blog."

Saturday we celebrated Father's Day with grilled stead and a rousing game of croquet in the yard. Rousing because our yard is sloped, my family is competitive, and despite it being the summer solstice, we still ended up chasing poison balls around the yard in the dark. It was beautiful though, perfect weather and more fireflies than I've seen yet this summer! Our neighborhood is a good mix of trees and open spaces and the fireflies were going to town. My mother, however, prefers to smell them. Try it sometime . . . I don't really know what she's talking about . . .
Sunday after church (and packing), we went to a Redhawks minor league baseball game. Our little Bricktown ballpark is adorable and, on a Sunday, sparsely attended. We went with some friends from church (and some out of towners) and had a nice time . . . nothing like a ballpark hotdog to say "summer!"

Today's big activities included pedicures, the "perfect book" hunt, and a trip to the drive-in. I know I'm going to be having some down time (long flights, quiet nights) in the near future and my biggest fear is having nothing to read. I blew through A Tree Grows in Brooklyn in 5 days this week. (I love Francie!!) And lately I've been on a secondhand kick - it is 'greener' and I have some romantic notion that a book is richer if it's already been read once. So anyway, we browsed some used bookstores for a thick good book that would supplement Emma, which I'm reading with three girlfriends. So what did I end up with? Gone With the Wind. It was long, and cheap, and I've been told - a classic. When I'm sitting under a thorn tree in Machakos 2 weeks from now, I'll let you know how it's going.

So besides packing, that's what I've been up to. I'd rather not dwell on the packing, it gives me a stomach ache. More on my baggage situation soon.

Midwest Living

Events of the Day:

Mom takes me on a tour of the garden. Besides the abundant summer flowers she's expertly planted on the patio and in the yard, she also has taken on a few vegetables and herbs: tomatoes, peppers, basil, oregano, and mint. She's very proud of the mint. "It's like, oh, I'm out of gum! Have some mint!" Cute, mom.

Buying a shower curtain. Macy's doesn't have the one I like for sale, just on display, which the clerk refuses to sell. Instead, he calls a different mall and assures us they have it and will hold it for us, but just for today. We go to the other Macy's, which is boiling hot and deserted in the housewares section. When the oldest employee alive finally shuffles to the front with our hold, it's the wrong shower curtain. The manager appears and, finally, takes the shower curtain off the display to sell to us. It's very cute, worth the trip.

At the dinner table, we start talking about spiders. I recount how Ryan cried once because we saw a giant camel spider in our car, but then could never find it. When the story is over, I spy a strange blob on the ground by my chair. I bend down to wipe it up - it's a smashed spider. Big. Missing some legs, which are on the ground next to it. The next second finds the spider on my brother's dinner plate, subject to examination, and me perched on the back of my mom's chair, sick to my stomach and too afraid to stand on the ground. Much family yelling ensues, mostly centered around the identity of the liquid on the ground around the spider. Did the dog throw it up? Or did one of us accidentally smash it as we sat down for dinner? Still unknown. (Tucker is fine.)

My proudest moment - getting a new drivers license. Good riddance to the old, which was a vertical "under 21" issue that I hid behind credit cards in my wallet, so unattractive was the picture. Whenever I had to show my ID (say, at government facilities), the checker would spend 10 minutes trying to find my birthday even though it said "under 21 until 8-10-2005" in big red letters. If I was lucky, the guy might even comment on how decent I looked now compared to the picture. So . . . happy to be rid of that thing. My grown-up license will last until 2012. Same as my passport.

Productive day in OK.

Oklahoma!

Driving from Charlotte to Oklahoma means getting to I-40 (Asheville) and going west forever. And waking up the next day and doing it again. Really, the trip was a smooth one and I managed to catch up on some of the sleep I'd been missing over the past two weeks. My dad is the greatest- he got braces Monday (per dentist orders), got in the car, and drove to Charlotte to get me. Then packed the car and drove back. He can't even eat regular food and he's driving cross-country . . . without an atlas! I was shocked by that, until he pulled out the trusty Cracker Barrel map, the one that has every CB in the country on it. All well and good until we were eating dinner at a Cracker Barrel (they have applesauce for my poor father) somewhere in Tennessee - and neither of us knew where. Dad made a guess and we were jubilant about our progress - until the waitress informed us we were 30 miles off. Oh, well.

My dad loves books on tape when we travel. He had finished one and was halfway through one of the Bourne series when he picked me up. That was good, definitely held your attention, and the reader did great accents. Dad let me pick the next book - and when he vetoed a Jimmy Carter memoir, we settled on one of the Mitford series. My dad complained about it, but even though it took 3 chapters (3 cd's - 3 hours!) for Father Tim and Cynthia to leave Mitford for their summer sabbatical, my dad can't deny he was chuckling at all the funny parts. That Father Tim!

We left the mountains of NC for the hills of TN for the flatlands of Arkansas and Oklahoma. The only place of interest we stopped happened to be Checotah, the home of famed Idol winner, Carrie Underwood. I woke up to us pulling off the highway and Dad slowing to avoid two trotting creatures - a mangy dog and what had to be a coyote. Oh, Oklahoma. Then we spotted a thick black plume of smoke pouring into the sky from behind the gas station, and a seemingly unconcerned couple running a garden hose over the fire, which was concealed behind a large black pickup. It wasn't until we left that we could see for sure that it wasn't the pickup on fire. Strange. That's Carrie Underwood for ya.

And, it's good to be home.

On the Road

Leaving. Rough. I mean . . . really, REALLY rough. Consider two tips I've tried to incorporate into life over the past two weeks:
1. Sunglasses. They hide puffy red eyes.
2. Waterproof mascara.

Two years doesn't sound like a long time, but it is long enough. Long enough to put down roots, to invest in others, to allow them to invest in me. The problem with this investment is that parting is painful. But there is joy - joy in knowing that a sad goodbye means hearts have been touched. I have been BLESSED by friends that feel like family. You know the kind? What a gift!

I wish I had pictures of all those I've left in Charlotte - they are all deserve a tribute. I'll be busy writing cards for the next week. But these dear ones have endured buckets on my part, and sweetly shed many of their own. Roommates - they know the good and the bad, and still love you for it.

(sunglasses)

(Meg goes home to Idaho)

My dad drove for two days to get to Charlotte, pack the van, and hit the road again. Currently we're in Tennessee, anticipating a full day of heading west on Interstate 40 tomorrow. To be honest, all that joy I wrote about above is eluding me . . . parting is such sweet sorrow, but sorrow still!

contact info

I'm (finally) in the process of compiling a list of those who might like updates . . . if you'd like to get occasional emails, just send me your address to ericacanderson@gmail.com or just reply here!

thoughts on teaching

(Disclaimer: Here I go being super-sentimental about the last day of school. You might want to skip this one if you're not into teaching.)

Proud to be a Raccoon - Summer 2006

Today was my last day at Reedy Creek. Only two years there, but they were my first two years of teaching! 360 days devoted to walking those halls and educating those children. Where the glamor of influencing young minds was dashed by the reality of classroom management, and then bolstered again by sweet students who care, and - finally - get it! Conflicting emotions - I've experienced more stresses and angst within those walls than any other building on earth. But tipping the scales to the positive are innumerable moments - small and large - that make Reedy Creek a special place to me.

There is nothing in the world like being a first year teacher. The whole teaching scene was much different than I had pictured it - even my student teaching situations were nothing like the reality of this school. I wondered if I was cut out for this environment - was it normal to cry (repeatedly) in the principal's office? Apparently I had a lot of learning to do, but fortunately there were teachers willing to share their lesson plans and management skills, and administrators willing to back me up and help me out. And I am so grateful!

While I dreaded the start of year 2, I am so glad I came back. This class allowed me to break away from the monotony of the pacing guide and do (gasp!) novel studies and math investigations, biography reports and random visits to the pigeon loft. I know my skills as a teacher have improved, in large part due to the people around me who volunteered their expert knowledge on everything. I'm going to miss working with a team next year when I'm the only teacher on the grade level.

So that is a mediocre explanation of why I felt the tears start to come as I walked out the door of that building. This school will always have a special significance, as the place of my first job, where I learned how to teach. (Look at the pictures - you can tell I grew up, huh?)

June 2008

and . . . action!

Field day. Wonderful for so many reasons. I'm going to miss these kids . . .