Tree Clock!

i started typing:
I HATE TYPICAL, BORING SOUVENIRS THAT EVERYONE ELSE HAS
and then thought that might be a bit heavy-handed.

how about this:
to remember a trip, i prefer finding items that are unique

it was difficult to find something unique in Malawi because all they seemed to make was wooden animals. Wooden hippos, wooden elephants, wooden zebra, wooden giraffes, wooden everything.

My trip didn't include animals at all--- in fact, the one time we went to see baboons at a baboon park, we saw ZERO BABOONS. So, buying a wooden zebra for a few dollars to remember my experience in Malawi didn't seem right. Especially since all it would do is collect dust on my desk because I rarely dust. Even though I have asthma, and probably SHOULD dust, to shield myself from sneezing more than I already do.

Anyway.

For 3 weeks I searched for something unique, something that would speak to me. I wanted something that I totally loved. Not just a set of wooden elephant coasters.

One day, I saw a guy who made clocks. Unfortunately they all had animals dancing around them, or African women with jugs of water on their heads. I saw the stack of clocks and PRAYED THERE WOULD BE ONE WITH A TREE! A BONSAI TREE! PLEASE!

No tree clock.

I initially gave up and walked away, disappointed at the selection and the lack of creativity I was seeing. Especially since I hadn't even seen ONE REAL ANIMAL! AHHHH!!!

I saw one of the vendors hand-carving some...animals... and got the idea to see if he could hand-carve my tree clock.

THE ANSWER WAS YES!

We looked across the street together at a huge tree with red flowers, I drew a quick sketch on a piece of paper, and he said to come back in a week.

and i did, and i got this.
hand carved by this man's brother, Frank.

praise, the, Lord, for an absolutely un-boring, un-lame souvenir.

WHEW!

a ceiling and a door-----

in Malawi they use what they have.

they do not waste,
they are creative,
they are inventive,
and i love it.

2 random Africa photos that I really like-

Candice and her pet

this little chicken was a gift to Candice from the woman on the left.

unfortunately, Candice saw the gift as a PET, whereas they meant for it to be dinner. so Michelle and Kyle took it from her

wowey.
shannon

at a restaurant for lunch,

frank, our miracle-worker, hilarious, talented driver.luke, an avid artist who hates trendy glasses

me!the place.

the bathrooms in Malawi

if only we could do such glorious things with dried grass.




- shan

red and blue

Breakfast in Malawi

tea, honey, peanut butter, jam, bread and bananas if we were lucky.
every morning, it was one of my favorite times.

:)
Shan

standing on a church roof. eeps

One of the things that we did on our weekend breaks in Malawi was walk to this local church to climb on the roof and hang out. It blew my mind what was legal in Malawi that would never, ever be allowed here.

on our way up, Danika and I pretended to be giraffes.

Here's Luke and Danika, our LEADERS!

and then to continue with the Danika theme, here's Danika and I on top of the church, praying silently that we wouldn't fall off while taking this photo.

i was way too scared to go all the way to the other side (walking on that metal thing), so I stayed on the side of safety instead of death, pretending that 'I'm getting some photos of you guys! sorry, but i can't come over there right now.'

yes, i'm semi-afraid of heights,
Shannon

one of the most beautiful places i've seen.

this was in a Malawian village called Herema.
it was breathtaking,
we were surrounded by mountains,
and we got to meet so many beautiful people who lived here.
eeeeee. loved it.


- shan

Rice Sale---------

On the way to one of the villages, we stopped at the market for groceries. This man was selling rice, and his family was off to the side watching. I asked if I could take a photo of his family, he agreed, and then we talked for a while.

i love the simplicity of the life they live.
growing the rice, selling the rice...

rice sale,
Shannon

Prepare to be sicked out.

Yes, sicked out.

I learned that term from my friend Heidi, and I think it's especially appropriate for what I'm about to share:

MICE ON A STICK.

While I was in Malawi, our translator, Edwin, wanted to stop and buy a snack. He had our driver stop in the middle of a little village, and he got out of the van and bought some mice. You know how we buy.... hotdogs? Well, Malawians buy mice. And they eat them as casually as we eat Twix bars. Just, a little snack. No prob.

They were perched on the dashboard of our van for the next two days. Two, days. Bouncing along, as we drove for hours along the bumpy dirt roads of Malawi.

we got used to the smell after a while, i think

possibly

here's to new experiences. :)

anybody have a gross food experience they'd like to share?

Baptisms in Malawi-------------

I'm going to be posting little moments that were meaningful to me from my trip to Malawi. Here, we all walked down the hill to this river to baptize 13 people.

So meaningful-------so good

Africa

My trip to Malawi, Africa happened during the month of July. I've been back for about six weeks, and have let my thousands and thousands of photos sit by themselves for a while---untouched. Thank you to everyone who has expressed interest in these-- I'm grateful for your graciousness as I've let them ruminate a little bit.

The purpose of the trip was to share the story of Jesus Christ with the people of Malawi. We went to 15 different villages to show them a film about the life of Jesus, and shared our own stories of faith with the people we met. We sang and danced, participated in lots of 4 hour church services, ate goat and rice twice a day, slept under mosquito nets each night, played with millions of kids and experienced life in a completely different culture. I went with a group of 8 other students from my school, Biola, and it was incredible to see God use a group of ordinary college students to impact people in the middle of a village halfway around the world.

the black and white photo at the top and this one below are 2 of the 15 times we showed the film. sometimes we would have 30 people show up, and sometimes there would be more than 500-----

one of my favorite things about Malawians was their reactions to seeing their photograph on the back of my digital camera. they had never really experienced getting their photo taken or seeing digital photos come up on the camera screen. Here is a woman posing for me, and the next photo is her reaction to seeing it-------------------

!!this little girl has been on my mind ever since we arrived home from our trip. she was so curious and sweetly sweet

aww here we are. :) i love her!!!!!!!!!!!!

as we ate breakfast one morning, i looked outside through a hole in the wall of our hut and saw these little kids

this is Felistar Bwana,
a woman I hung out with a lot-----

this is a scene we arrived to at one of the villages

one man was so sweet and let us sleep in his housemy polaroid camera came to Africa with me///////////

i let each person keep their polaroid because they hardly had any photos of their families. they treated them with such delicacy. this woman wrapped hers in a piece of cloth and put it in her bag to take back home.

inside of a restaurant where we ate lunch one day,a family inside their home-a pregnant woman cooking-

and one of her friends,babies tended to be really scared of the camera since they'd never seen one before, or perhaps they were scared of ME and my whiteness which they'd also never seen before,

i love how these ones look like paintings
in a grocery store aisle,

on a doorstep,

our bus arriving to a village late at night

i love this one because he's being lit by our bus' headlights.

whew.
it feels good to get some of these UP! I'll continue to post little stories, show photos of my team, and let you in on fun little times like the day our translator bought a skewer of ten grilled mice from a Mouse Vendor and stored them on the dashboard of our van for two days straight--eating them as snacks--just like we'd eat a twix bar.

and then there was the time that our generator burst into 4 feet of flames and our bus driver, frank, miraculously put it out within minutes and our generator still worked afterward.

things like this.
-----------------shan!