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Dr. Claudia R. Wintoch is
part of the apostolic network Harvest International Ministries (HIM - founder Ché Ahn).

Pray for the writing
of Claudia's first book in the next few months.

Monday, July 26, 2010

Family Vacation Day 1

I'm sitting in a comfy chair on a nice veranda next to a swimming pool, surrounded by a few hills, in the middle of nowhere. No internet, no noise, just the wind, birds, and frogs. If it wasn't for the abundance of mosquitoes...

I took my computer with me, hoping for an internet connection, but I'll have to survive three days without - a first, I guess. Still, I can write my blogs and upload them later.

Departure time was 8 am, and so I had to get up earlier than usual to get everything ready. There's a lot to think about when you leave with all the kids on a 3-day vacation - 4 adults and 12 kids. Swimming gear, games in case it rains,...

Since we don't have a day guard right now, Paul asked his friend Oumar to stay on the base. Fanta and her 2-year-old are staying too; Fanta would not enjoy it, and little Jonathan is still too young to come along.

Oumar came on time, Saloum came as well, as well as the two kids of our night guard who already spend all day on our base, but Fousseni didn't show up. We were able to leave not long after 8 am - in two cars.

Thankfully it's not very far. We had to go to the main, paved road first, leave town a little, and then drive another 4 kilometers on a little unpaved road. I was driving one car, and Eva the other. All the kids were excited about our vacation.

We arrived at the camp before 9 am, and sat down at the long table that had enough space for all of us. Neither the tent for the kids, nor our rooms were ready yet. So we sat down to wait, and started our vacation with prayer.

Then I thought this would be a good time for the bike ride. Eva, myself and the little ones stayed behind, while Christian and Paul left with the rest of the kids. They had enough bikes for them all, though Christian (who's nearly 2 meters tall, i.e. 79 inches) had a hard time with the "small" bike. After an hour and a half they already returned. It seems that not all of them really knew how to ride a bike, and some of them were simply out of shape.

In the meantime those who stayed behind first moved all the kids' stuff into their tent once it was ready, and then we went to the swimming pool. Our two rooms - Eva and myself, Paul and Christian - were not ready yet.

The little ones couldn't wait to get into the pool. So we all changed, and I started blowing up all our swimming pool "goodies".

It didn't take long before the bike ride people returned, and quickly changed to join us in the pool. Soon it was total mayhem - so many kids, with so much stuff, all in the pool that wasn't that big. Unfortunately the area where little ones could stand was very small.

About an hour before lunch we all got out, got dried up, changed, and met back at the big table. It was time for us adults to finally get to go to our rooms. They have these cute little bungalows, and they put another bed into our room so Sarata could be with us - the only girl. The bungalow is not tight, so bugs can fly in easily. At least they had the mosquito nets.

We arrived at the communal table before it was time, and went to the kids' tent. Unfortunately we found that they had left (handicapped) Hama and 6-year-old Bakary in their all alone. Bakary still had his wet  swim trunks on! We weren't happy. The kids had gone off to discover the campgrounds. Great. We told them that was not acceptable, and Paul moved into the tent with them, leaving the room entirely to Christian.

It was finally meal-time, and we were all very hungry, ready for something good to eat. Thankfully they brought out self-made bread first that the kids enjoyed.

Then we had grilled beef with fries and salad. It was absolutely delicious! The kids loved it, and we could all have eaten more.

The children then went to their tent for a short siesta. I was totally exhausted myself, and so I left Christian and Eva there to have desert and went to our room. Sarata was already there, trying to sleep, and I did likewise. It was pretty warm, and it took me a while before I fell asleep, but I did sleep a little.

At 3 pm we had to be at our meeting place for the botanical hike. They have a lot of different plants in the camp, and somebody was going to explain them all to our kids. Not a cheap endeavor, but I was hoping it would be worth it.

Well the supposedly 3-hour hike lasted just half that time. Two guys were with us, and we stopped every couple of meters at a tree that they explained to us; especially their medicinal purposes.

I was totally amazed when we found this lonely rose in the middle of nothing. What a beautiful picture!

Dark clouds started to gather, as we continued walking towards the hill. Finally the first droplets of rain fell from heaven. We ignored them and continued.

We started climbing up the hill, and the rain increased. We reached this beautiful platform up there where we had a good view from, and now it was raining pretty hard. Eva was concerned for her camera, as she hadn't brought its case with her.

But we still had much ground to cover and continued up the hill. The rain subsided a little, but then increased again.

We were close to this rock formation when the rains started pouring down from heaven. We were running towards the rocks to find some cover. We stayed there for not very long before the rains let up again.

We continued on our way; now we were close to the peak. The lessons had ended.

We had Hama with us, and the poor guys alternated carrying him. At one point I asked Hama jokingly whether he was tired. First he said "no", but then he corrected himself and said, "a little".

By the time we were back down the hill, we were all soaked. The guides asked us whether we had any questions, but nobody didn't. Suddenly the rains got worse again, and so we ran towards our rooms.

Some kid wanted to go into the pool - I guess the best thing when it's raining and you're wet already. A few decided not to. I changed into something dry and joined them by the pool. While a few were in the pool, a few us played games under the roof that kept us dry. We still had 2 hours until meal-time.

We had told them we wanted dinner at 7 pm. We were all gathered before that, being very hungry. I decided to play a group game with them - Bible Outburst. That way time passed nicely. 7 pm came and went, 7:15 pm came and went, and 7:30 pm came and went. We finally asked, and they had thought we were eating at 8 pm. Great!

It was pizza night, but still, it was nearly 8 pm before the first pizza came out. Most everyone was starving by then. I thought the pizza was absolutely delicious, but interestingly the new kids didn't like them.

Us adults we decided to get a bottle of wine together, and it was also very good. Paul tasted it, and liked it to all our surprise.

Some of the kids were very tired - Bakary had a hard time staying awake before the meal already. And Hama was in a hurry to go to bed. So we did our family meeting right after the meal. We talked about the meeting, and then I went around the table, placing my hand on each kid and praying. Then the kids went off to their tent to go wash up and go to bed.

Sarata stayed with us. We talked a little longer, and then went to our respective rooms as well. Sarata changed, brushed her teeth, and went to bed. I was extremely tired, but got the computer out anyway. Instead of writing the blog, I ended up showing Eva pictures from the beginning. She enjoyed seeing Sarata as a baby, and Hama when he was still little. At 10:30 pm we both said it was high time to go to bed.

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