Wow! Half way through January!

Dear Friends,
Greetings from dusty Malakal.....! I am doing well in my little town. I have a houseguest for now, a fellow Presbyterian Co-Worker, Sharon, who is staying with me. She is teaching me things like the art of making charcoal fires and cooking over said fire. I have "suddenly" become a huge advocate of Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts and Camp Fire Girls! I say, "let them learn these important survival skills before they grow up and need them!"

I worshipped today at the church where I have chosen to be in community. It is a small Nuer church with a woman pastor. I was made to feel very, very welcome. I hope to be moving to a new home by the end of the month and this church is quite close to the new home. For this morning getting there included a 20 minutes walk and then some more after I was met by a friend who showed me the way. When I had gone before to preach we went by taxi and I had not a clue how to get to the building.

The church is in a small neighborhood and I discovered this morning it is very close to a branch of the Nile River! I believe it may be the White Nile that is here in this part of South Sudan. The White Nile and the Blue Nile join in Khartoum, Sudan, I have taken pictures of that joining. But today's sighting was of one of the branches. There were naked people taking baths in the river so I did not go close up.....if someone has no source of water at home and getting water to said home would be a major undertaking, then bathing in a nearby river seems to be a good solution.

In my new home I will have a source of water, however I will have no water inside of the house itself. This is going to take some getting used to. There is an outdoor building with two rooms, one of which has a traditional toilet and the other is simply a big room with a drain, meant to be, I assumed, a bucket bath (aka shower) room. I have asked if the owner would install an actual shower in it and a Western type toilet seat on the traditional toilet. I think that jumping from the frying pan into the fire all at once as far as living more Sudanese might be too much for me.

I will have my solar cooking, electricity at night as I am still in the area of Malakal which receives electric, and I am learning to cook with charcoal on a charcoal burner. It is somewhat similar to a barbecue in the states, it has been suggested to me to stock up on three or four bags of it during the rainy season as it won't be available then. The wood is too wet during rainy season to be able to burn it for charcoal. I have learned that charcoal is a major cause of deforestation because the wood is burned to create it. I am also figuring out that coal is a totally different product as it is dug out of the deep earth. I am not particularly happy about contributing to deforestation, however there have to be alternatives if electricity is not available and the sun is not bright/hot enough.

I think that Malakal is getting more used to myself and Sharon. We are being greeted by more people as we walk to market and walk about the town. It can be nice to be remembered. The children also seem more comfortable in talking with us. It will be strange to be here alone again when Sharon leaves, perhaps it is all the better than I am moving to a new home and will have something to keep me busy for a while, besides teaching too!, making it into a home. I have dreams of cushions on the floor of the veranda, which will be my living room and office, and pictures somehow gotten on the walls. I looked for furniture today. It is very high priced in the market so I am going to have to find another way of obtaining it. In Khartoum I probably could have put the word out and found used furniture to buy from another ex-pat, there was a lot of passing around of homes and furnishings there. There was also a much larger ex-pat community, more like the size that was in Nanjing, China when I was there.

Blessings,
Debbie