Weekending

SO the power is out…again. We had it just long enough to miss it again. At least they got the water working, for the time being. There is a water tower that was ingeniously built into the center cross of the monastery. So at least I am not hauling water around all day, but with the way things have been going around here, that could change just about any day now. But I will take it over electricity, surprisingly. Lights only come in handy when it gets dark out; water comes in useful about 99 percent of the other time.

In other news, I didn’t pick corn this weekend…I helped dry it. But the Huskers won, so all is well in the world. Now we just have to show Mizzou that beating a top ranked Oklahoma team on homecoming means absolutely nothing next Saturday, except of course that they helped improve our strength of schedule! GBR, Oh yeah and I took a true RedOutAroundtheWorld photo, not like any of the ones that they have been showing during the football games of people standing in front of Memorial Stadium. I uploaded it to the ROATW website so hopefully they basket of eggs that was dropped on Texas can still be salvaged. Check the photo!

Let’s see, what else did I do this weekend… oh yeah I played soccer with a potato. That was interesting. I didn’t feel like walking back to my room from my friends’ house to get the deflated soccer ball so we made do with what they had lying around…a potato! It was a blast all things considered. Not that anyone could ever replace my siblings, but it was nice to beat up on a couple of younger kids in the whole rough and tumble department. And on that note of siblings, Madeline…if you ever come to Togo you have husband in waiting, I kinda sorta but not really potentially married you off to one of my students …oops! If it makes you feel any better I have been proposed to about 5 times (including once by one of my students - talk about a rough day at the office)!

Finally, I have failed to mention the amount of kamikaze bugs in Africa. Granted there weren’t massive buildings with a thousand glowing luminescent dealios back in the day so I can’t exactly blame them. But it is a little humorous to watch moths cruise around a candle in a frantic frenzy before flying right into the darn thing and then falling lifelessly to the ground. One occasion in particularly brought me into a giggle fit, and thus far this bug is second on my list for the upcoming “worst timing awards.” So I am sitting in mass and it’s dark out so the lights are on and there are bugs galore around them. Well it just so happened that this massive beetle (seriously this thing was almost as big as a golf ball) decided that it wanted to play chicken with the fluorescent light by the entrance. It lost the first, second, and third time. Each time it bounced off with a clink and circled around for another go. Well on the fourth try I think it finally figured out that the fight was futile. It knocked itself unconscious! I along with one other monk saw everything take place, and I almost burst out laughing as soon as I saw the thing fall to the ground after the final try. It didn’t move for about a minute or so and then struggled righting itself because it was so large. Oh I was giggling and caused the other monk who saw it (his name happens to be Gregoir as well) to start laughing at me. Luckily, I don’t think too many people noticed that one of the two white kids was now flush red after laughing in the middle of mass (which I am still attending Br Paul).