“There are days when I wake up, look in the mirror and get so frustrated with my hair. Whenever he hears me in the bathroom fussing with my hair I’ll hear a ‘click!’…and when I turn around Mario is taking a picture of it. He loves everything about it: the texture, the curl, the coils. […]
“You guys should do township tours as a family. A day spent with you, and our teen birth rates would go waayyy down.” – Michael L. Yesterday we went to Sedgefield Market on the N2 with our missionary compatriots. Marshall and I are the only ones with kids. Everyone else in the group is a […]
Because it darn well ain’t the classroom of the present, that’s for sure. See this shack? This is an appendage to the YMCA/Church/theater. This is where the kids are supposed to be having lessons, once it’s ‘cleaned up’. Nuh uh. This room doesn’t need cleaning up – it needs a torch set to it. There […]
Eii A-Fri-Ca! Just when I thought South Africa possessed more sophistication than the rest of the continent, The natives have gone and proved me wrong! Now that I have earned the confidence of the women’s inner circle, they give me snippets of what’s really going down in the community. Sadly as fate would have it, […]
It would be a stretch for me to say that I ‘love’ anyone of my South African kids, in the sense that we understand love in the West; but it would certainly be fair however to say that they have arrested my heart. I’d heard the term “arrested heart” before, and never really understood what it meant. […]
American Reader: You know how it is, don’t you? Our country has this innate ‘can do’ spirit that is so formidable that it sometimes comes across as obnoxious. For whatever reason, we largely believe that we can solve the world’s problems…even though we’re hardly able to solve our own. Amazingly, there are just enough people […]
I would never insult your intelligence, Reader, by assuming that you are unfamiliar with South Africa’s apartheid past, so suffice it to say that it was brutal to say the least. Apartheid was a wicked, insidious regime that made portions of America’s civil rights struggle look like a scene from an animated Disney movie. Fortunately, […]
It’s not hard to fall in love South Africa, and now that I’m here I can totally understand my husband’s lingering attraction to it. When you live in a place where beauty surrounds you, it’s not hard to leave your old Western life behind and fail to give it a second thought. However, before […]
Yay! ‘Sister Adjoa’ has come! When you live in Africa, it is imperative to have some sort of household help. This will be in the form of a house keeper, nanny or gardener, and if you’re really balling, you’ll have all 3. Not only is it important (and very helpful) for a ‘foreigner’ to have […]
This house and I are in a toxic relationship. I know exactly how Heath Ledger felt in Brokeback Mountain. Well, not exactly. One of the best things about my stay in SA so far has been this house. Ironically, it’s also been one of the worst. You see that behind me? That’s a rooftop […]
The churches in Plett are either established denominational churches (the Anglicans seem to have a strong presence here) or a disorganized smattering of miniscule congregations. None of the Americans that we know really GO to church here – I’m guessing because it’s not really their flavor – and does their own thing on Sunday. One […]
I’ve discovered that it takes about a week to settle into any new environment, and I’m happy to report that we’re finally settled! But can I confess one thing before I move on to the ponies and rainbows? My confession is this: I dread rainstorms in South Africa. Previously, the thought of a night spent […]
I wanted kicks, and I was not disappointed. First of all, let me go ahead and admit that every day that I have spent in the Western Cape has been akin to a goofy, feel good, B Christian movie. When we pulled up to the after school facility (which doubles as a church/community center/anything you […]
On Monday morning Marshall and Michael went down to the rental agent’s office downtown to give them our list of “observations”. She was aware of all of them. When Marshall asked if someone could come in to repair the water damage and paint over the mold, he was told ‘no’. But she at least made […]
Marshall had been researching properties for us to rent a few months before we left Atlanta. Of course the nicest one we saw had a pool and hundreds of square feet per person; and the worst had 1 toilet, no sink and we’d all have to sleep in the closet. Fortunately we found one that […]
We spent our first night in the country at a bed and breakfast called The Lily Pad. The owner’s name is Mandie, who incidentally shared the same name with Aya’s pre-K teacher. This pleased Aya to no end, and she spent a good part of the night asking Ms. Mandie as many questions as she […]
Jo’burg As far as airports go Oliver Tumbo is pretty nice. As far as African airports go, Oliver Tumbo has to be the nicest by far. It modern and well planned. I compared it to Kotoka in Accra – the ‘Gateway to Africa’ – with its leaky roofs and cramped quarters, and was happy to […]
Atlanta I left Atlanta on a really sour note. I was still enraged by the bumbling incompetency of my church, and further enraged by Marshall’s apparent nonchalant attitude toward that incompetency. When my face silently, but plainly bore the evidence of my displeasure, I was informed that at some point I would have “to get […]
I used to be an insufferable pessimist. How Marshall ever endured as long as he did is truly beyond me. Heck, how I survived that long is beyond me as well. My life hitherto to my healing (because I’m a firm believer that depression is a disease) was motivated by fear. I had to do […]
Dear Readers: I’ve come to a really tough decision today. This is going to be my last blog entry. I’ll be shutting down M.O.M come tomorrow. The blog has been a huge part of my daily life Ah, screw it. I’m not going to give a sappy, ridiculous explanation. Who even cares? Thanks for sticking […]
Douche Bag is an amazing human being – and I don’t mean that in a complimentary way. How someone has managed to bungle their way this far through life with such stunted mental capacity and have achieved any modicum of success gives credence to the story of Forrest Gump. However, unlike Forrest who at his […]