well, like i said in the email we spent the last week at the camp in koutiala. unfortunately we only have pictures of leaving because i forgot to bring the battery charger...ya, never leave home without it. so, there you have it. we packed up and left and that's all we have proof of.
whoops, i lied. we did get some pictures in of ellen walking on the front porch at the camp. she loved swinging open the door and heading out to look for chickens, donkeys, or cows. we had all of them in our front yard. she did take a tumble off the edge, but that was good for her. she now has a healthy fear of "the edge."
these are some pictures of one of the storms rolling in. they come in hard and fast. this one was moving at the speed of light and brought plenty of rain with it. even as we speak thunder is rumbling in the background. august is rainy season in its prime. joseph says that it will be a wet month and it could rain for a couple days on end.
on monday, july 16th we had our 2 year anniversary. my bride got breakfast in bed (eggs, bacon, mango, and toast with jelly). then in the evening we took a trip down to the river for a picnic supper (peanut butter and jelly). a storm was rolling in and it was really pretty. a good two years with many to come.
we had a little rain shower this afternoon and ellen and i decided to do a little playing. she enjoyed running and jumping in the puddles.
on sunday we took a trip out a village that worships buffaloes. they worship these ancient buffaloes that came to the area and died. when they died the turned into rocks and became immortal. today, people bring chickens, goats, and sheep sacrifice them at the foot of the rock. they do this when their wives are having trouble getting pregnant, when they need to get a job, need protection, or are wishing harm on another individual. they then tie up the rope that they led their animal with and promise another sacrifice when their request comes true. just another example of how deceived these people are. please continue to pray that the lord would lift the blinders from these peoples eyes and show them himself. also remember the 12 believers that are living in the village.
well, i guess it's official. she's a walker. can't really argue when the sandals come out and she trounces around the yard. it's actually nice because she stays much cleaner.
a quick thank you for all that have been praying. yesterday a lady came and wane ted to talk to mart, joseph's wife. the lady had been practicing demon worship and came to ask about jesus. the lord is definitely working here. it is crazy how many people just show up here to ask about jesus. praise the lord!!!
i was also going to ask for specific prayer for thursday, friday, and saturday. the evanelical church in mali is sponsoring an evangelism campaign in bougouni. the first session was this afternoon. i don't know how many people were there...hard to estimate. they said they thought about 3,ooo would show up. pray that people's eyes would be opened and that seeds would be planted for the lord to harvest.
well, the 4th of july has come and gone now. two people from our team had to go into bamako for some things and they picked up two fireworks. they were like glorified bottlerockets. basically gunpowder in a cylinder attached to a stick. the only problem was that they didn't come with a fuse. we quickly learned the malian way to light fireworks. as you can see from the picture we tied grass to the rocket. what you can't see is the fact that we soaked it in diesel first. talk about fireworks. anyway, the first one ended up being a dud but the second was a success and exploded into a big fireball. we invited three different families over. there were about 30 people here. they all really seemed to like it. ok, now for the rest of the story. the next morning while we were back in class two of the boys ran back down to investigate the dud from the night before. let it go on the record that they were strictly prohibited from this investigation. apparently they don't teach kids in malian fire school to not throw matches at gunpowder. the dud wasn't much of a dud afterall and blew up on them. tessa quickly opened up a clinic under the mango trees and got them all taken care of. the nine year old seems to have second degree burn on both of his hands and palms and on one of his legs. the other boy had minor burns on his fingertips. we dressed them up right after it happened. they boy with burns on his fingertips is basically recovered. however, the other boy has lager and deeeper burns. he has been back twice already for dressing changes and will continue to come back to see dr. tessa.
it is the rainy season and we get a good storm every other day. here is a picture of our storm watching crew. we set up chairs and watch the storms roll in. we then guess how long it will be until it is officially raining. that has been a hairy line and has been the source of much discussion. i have zero victories in the guessing of rainfall.
ellen has been getting brave. today she took 8 steps...a new ellen step record. the previous mark was 1 1/3. it is different to see her standing up more and more now. she is entering the pan-african marathon next month. training starts tomorrow morning.
the last couple days have been pretty hot and ellen and i decided to go swimming. we used the basins that are for laundry and converted them into pools. don't worry ellen didn't do any diving in the deep end and there was no running. tessa served as lifeguard on duty.
shower time. ellen really likes this shower because of the detachable shower head. it is absolutely hilarious to watch her because she doesn't realize that she is spraying herself in the face. she gets all scared and wonders where in the world that blast of water came from. just about the time she recovers, she blasts herself again. being a parent is fun sometimes.
this is a shot of the classroom. our class, world's living religions, is taught by one of the professors at the bible school we are staying at. he is our host here in mali and has been taking care of us. it has been insightful to say the least. we are learning almost too much from him. he came from a home where his father was an islamic priest. his family was also deeply involved in fetishism and animism. this has been a huge picture into the malian culture. hearing him talk really explains much of what we have been seeing and wondering about. he is going to have the islamic priest that he studied under come into class and speak to us. he is also bringing in a witchdoctor from bougouni. should be two interesting class periods. we are also taking a couple trips into some villages that he used to work in before jesus got a hold of him.
