Christmas is in the Air!

Merry Christmas!

It's December in Tanzania, which means that you can now go to the village and buy mangoes for 30 cents. And pineapples for a dollar. Sweet deal!

It also means that it's Christmas time:
and that we are busy making our stockings to hang by the window,

drinking hot cocoa at night and putting our scissor skills to work making Christmas tree decorations out of free Airplane magazine pages. Paper chains, woven hearts, snowflakes...

Yesterday, I finished knitting my stocking, so it's ready to hang and bulge with packages of home roasted peanuts, fruit, and encouragement notes.

It’s been a wonderful Christmas season. It’s been very special to spend it over here with all the girls… we are quickly becoming a close-knit family. It’s like having 16 sisters.

Also, the weather has taken it up a notch:

It’s getting very humid over here. Sweating a lot.

We’ve decided the only time you feel fresh and clean is immediately after a shower. …Within the hour you’re fully drenched again. It’s a – unique—feeling.

I wrote a silly poem about it:

“I’m dreaming of a white Christmas, just like the ones I used to know”

What does a winter kiss feel like?

I’m starting to forget

the frostbite toes

and rosy noses

and frosty inhalations.

The creak of ice

the chill of bone

all this is starting to be unknown

when I have lived in this foreign home

and all I taste is salt

and all I feel is sweat

I’m swimming in my own ocean

over here

and I’m tired of getting wet.

What does a winter kiss feel like?

I’m starting to forget.

We sing a lot of Christmas songs, are having fun finding letters from overseas on mail delivery days!! Thank you all!

We decorated the dining room with snowflakes and stars… it kind of looks like a children’s art classroom!

And of course, the hospital is amazing. We’re really enjoying it and getting more fluid with our skills.

May you have a fun, creative, love-filled, Christ-centered Christmas!

Here are some photos of us in uniform…

Here is a team photo of us looking mighty official.
And here are my roomates and I.

We are 10 to a room.... nice and cozy!

We're still loving working at the hospital... it is crazy that we have less than a month here now.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year ....... from East Africa.