Emma Update

She is just a walking fool! Last Monday she decided it was time and suddenly released her grip on the table, chairs and bath and struck out into the spaces of the house. We were so thrilled and watched her with tears in our eyes. True to her social form, she walked mostly towards people, giving the Mpala folk as much of a thrill as she did us.

On Tuesday and the rest of the week she changed her mind and decided crawling was easier. On the weekend she gave it another go and has really taken to it. She walks most places and has found that it is most convenient when you need to carry things. It is so convenient that she is carrying around hilarious items, like the trash can and laundry basket, both of which are far too large for her.

Her walk is a little shuffle, where each knee bends awkwardly and the foot crashes to the floor to be dragged a little ways. It sounds like we have a very tiny zombie careening around the house. She has little control so sort of aims herself in the direction she wants to go and gets faster and faster as she goes along 'til she falls against the couch, your legs etc. I think her right leg is stronger than her left as she tends to pivot on that leg and so quite often just wonders in circles around a room. We managed to post a couple of very short videos on the picasa site - if you don't have the link, email me.

Monty Python was wrong

My Mother's shower in Namibia is the kind that makes you sing. Volubly and for the entire glorious time it takes you to get clean. I sang "gone fishing", "cheek to cheek", "morning has broken" and a favourite - "the bright side of life". It is HOT, there is pressure, the light shines in through the window, and the towels are fluffy and dry.

There was nothing to sing about in this evening's shower. It was the opposite of a singing kind of shower. It was a shower in which songs run down the drain and into Grevy Houses' septic field, never to be heard again. You won't even be able to find their lyrics on Google.

The water trickles, nay, it oozes from the nozzle. It is lukewarm, not cold so that you can complain with pride about having a cold shower. The parts of your body which stick out of the water (ie: most parts) are vulnerable to dive bombing and large mosquitoes. The water is weak-tea coloured, leaving you in doubt as to whether you are actually getting clean. The last and final insult is that here is another country where towels do not dry from day to day, but instead are clammy to the frail and beaten and bitten skin.

There is no bright side of life to this shower. Monty Python should go take a hike.

Ups and Downs

Mpala has given me a pavlovian response that is interesting to note. Sitting at the computer this evening I heard the crack of branches outside. I sprang up and raced from window to window trying to see the elephant. Usually the sound of cracking branches means that somewhere there is an elly browsing. Today it was the sound of the Askari building the fire for our donkey boiler so that we could get hot water. I was momentarily saddened that there was no elephant but quickly bouyed by the idea of a hot shower soon to come!

The Ordinary amidst the Extraordinary

Elephants visited us again this evening. This time early enough for Emma to be awake and see them. They moved in from the ring road and munched their way around the house, feeding on trees, grasses and our last houseplant - evicted from the house for being a spider hider.

The Elephants had no fear of being close to the house and we could see them really clearly, so clearly that I was afraid they could see us inside the house and would get upset, but luckily they did not seem bothered by us.

After watching them for about 20 minutes Emma became bored and it was getting to the time of evening where she is irritable and almost ready for bed. I realised I was going to have to bath her. It seemed strange and irreverent to do such a mundane activity as a bath when the house was surrounded by at least 25 elephants. She splished and splashed happily oblivious to my ponderings and discomfort. It was also disconcerting to put the lights on so that she could have her ten minutes of quiet play and reading before bed. Turning on the lights made us visible and the Elephants out in the darkening dusk hidden amongst the bushes.

Emma nursed and then I swung her to sleep in my arms, humming Hobo's lullabye and listening carefully to the swish and crunch of grass being torn up and eaten just outside the bedroom window.

The evening and the visit ended with K and I playing a game of speed scrabble at the dining table, tete-a-tete, while listening uneasily to a tummy, a very large tummy, rumbling somewhere outside and close by.

New Friends

Each day towards the evening our new friends arrive at the house. Mostly they sit in the tree and look sideways at us but occasionally they come closer.

The most friendly is a chap I have named Deckens as he is a Von Der Deckens Hornbill. He is the one who taps on the windows at ungodly hours. Although recently Emma has claimed all the ungodly hours for herself and 6am is considered a lie in. Deckens has a wifey who I have uninspiringly named Vonder. He also has two buddies and their wives who all hang around in the trees being hopeful. I have been rewarding their hopefulness with handfuls of muesli but they are too shy to come and get it off the porch and they wait until Em and I have retreated indoors.

Of course the problem with Deckens and his entourage is that Spiro is taking inspiration from him. Yesterday while we sat having lunch admiring our partially completed fence he came along with two pals and ventured with his backup onto the porch, clearly hopeful of crumbs. I had a stack of stones handy though and quickly sent them packing. This week it will be my mission to trap Spiro and transport him elsewhere before he teaches bad manners to all the local squirrels. I do feel twinges of guilt about this as, yes he is quite cute and also it was another human who taught him his bad manners but it must be done before he climbs inside anyone else's pants.

In the vein of new friends, we have taught some of the Mpala permanent researchers how to play scat, and I think they are addicted already. This bodes well for the long evenings that we have left in Kenya.

Emma update

Man she is adorable! I know I am biased but seriously, there is nothing else this cute! Even the baby elephant that came through last week is not this cute.

She is cutting two new teeth, soon she will be sporting four on the bottom instead of two. The left one has broken through and about a quarter of it is showing. Emma's favourite toy is once again the crochet hook and the drool runs down it while she chews on it and pulls the hook part against her gum.

Most exciting is how hard she is working on walking. She took two steps from the bath to the sink on her own during the week and K and I were thrilled and held our breath while she did it. Then today she took three steps, falteringly from a chair into open space but fell down. She did try again later and again fell down but I really think it won't be long now 'til she is motoring around on her own. Thankfully, they are in the process of building a fence around our porch so we will be able to spend more time safely outside in the cool air looking at all the birds (and squirrels).

plumbing

Well the Monday following our amusing plumbing, the boss man turned up to look at the loo for himself. He took one look at it and figured out what the problem was and then within five minutes had fixed it and fixed the other running loo. Totally spoiled my fun with the other chap and his cohorts.

Revenge is sweet

Same night as the squirt gun incident. It's 1:36am and all are asleep. Ratatatatatttatt! Spiro on the roof again. Tatttatttatt! Emma stirs. Rattattat! She wakes! Ratattatt! I nurse her and she goes straight back to sleep. Rattattatt! No reaction. I call this a draw. Spiro 3 - 2 Tasha still.

En Guarde!

Emma and I were sitting on the porch feeding the birds. We had five hornbills, three males and two females, two male weavers and one female, a host of sparrow weavers and a morning thrush. We also had Spiro. He ducked and wove his way down the branches and then snuck down the trunk and across the ground. As soon as his feet touched the porch I squirted him with my water gun. SPLAT!! *insert evil and even maniacal laughter* He ran back the way he came and kept on going! ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Tasha 2 - 3 Spiro ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

Baridi

Priscilla has a horror for all things cold. I have told you before of how she is always inspecting Emma and telling me how she needs socks and shoes and a jacket and hat, indoors. Well we got socks and she now wears either those or shoes and generally a jersey since it has been chilly in the mornings.

I have now introduced a whole new "crazy Americans" or possibly "bad parent" for her. Emma is getting new teeth, the next two on the bottom are coming through and we are in full combat pain mode. One of our most effective tools are the frozen chew toys. I took one out of the freezer and gave it to Emma. Priscilla watched me closely, then grabbed the toy and felt it. She gave exclamations of horror; "Baridi! Baridi!" Baridi is the Swahili word for cold. I pantomimed that it helped with the teeth but she just kept telling me, repeatedly, how cold it was. I decided to exit stage right and took Emma with me, chewing on her icy toy. Leaving Priscilla to shake her head in dismay.

All is peaceful. The birds are playing in the grass, the dikdik are grazing at the edges of the driveway and Emma and I are watching it all. Spiro stalks us down his tree, twitching from branch to branch 'til he is in our faces. Then he flicks his tail arrogantly as if you say ne, ne, you can't get me. I use my new found weapon - a baboon bark. Usually it stops Emma from sticking her fingers in plugs and it chases off the monkeys. This time it's an impressive bark, it holds all my aggression towards this rat with a fluffy tail. The dikdik flee in terrified bounds, the birds take to the skies and Emma's bottom lip first trembles and then parts to emit a wail which is followed by heart-rending cries. Spiro laughs at me and saunters back up the tree. Tasha 1 - 3 Spiro. Botheration!

and for this week's entertainment...

Our toilet has not been working. For three days now a chap has been trying to fix it. On the first day he came in with a plastic bag of things, set the bag down on the floor, put one hand on his hip and scratched his head while gazing dolefully into our cistern. He did this for about ten minutes. The he carefully laid out all the items in the bag on the floor. These were mostly tools and bits of plastic usually associated with the ball cock that makes the cistern refill. Then he put his one hand on his hip and gazed dolefully at his equipment. I was becoming concerned at this point that I might be more qualified to fix my cistern than he was. Eventually he went to work.

Within minutes he came back and asked me if we had a hammer. I gave it to him but was puzzled as to what he planned to do with it. Thankfully he just added it artfully to the items laid on the floor. Then he asked me for a spanner - a 24 or a 23. We did not have that and so he went to fetch it.

45 minutes later he returned with the spanner and after, yes, some hip, scratch and doleful gazing he returned to work. At the strike of 12 o'clock (lunchtime) he came and declared it fixed! I said great and flushed. Something plastic flew up into the air and water fountained out of the hole left behind. He scratched his head and said he would come back tomorrow.

Tomorrow held much the same hilarity except the water gushed out of the bottom of the cistern. And on day three the same. On day three he brought reinforcements. First one other person came and scratched their head and then a third. I am now truly impressed by my toilet. It must be so complex and cunning to still not be working. Tomorrow is Sunday but I look forward to what Monday brings for us and the plumber.

Thank goodness we have a second loo in the house or this would not be amusing in the least.

Ellies once more!

We have been back at Mpala for less than a week but have had many elephant sightings! The herd has been hanging around for the last couple of nights making trouble in the neighbourhood. They pulled the pipes off the walls of the house next over from us so we are even more appreciative of our shower than ever.

Two nights ago K and I were preparing for sleep when we heard the unmistakable crunch crunch of something with extremely large teeth eating trees. We hopped out of bed and there right outside our window were a couple of elephants. The moon is full and we could almost pick out flea bites, we were that close. One moved around the house and we followed to the spare room where we had not closed the curtains. We both felt very exposed standing in our pyjamas at the window with the elephant a body's length away but thankfully, with concrete between us. The last didn't prevent the thrill of terror that went down our backs when he froze, glared at us and waved his trunk threateningly. We stood as still as possible and tried not to breathe until he decided he had given us a proper scare and carried on with his munching. He wasn't a large elly but nonetheless filled the window and it was both a relief and a disappointment when he moved off into the underbrush.

Make Love Not War

Turns out that that is what the ghecko's were doing. Jack is maybe Jackie in fact, as we have come back to many wee jacks and Jasons prowling our walls for tasty treats. Also Jack(ie) and Jason are now inhabiting the same curtain without howls and crashes as before. Unless... and dare I suggest it? Jack and Jason are more forward thinking than many Kenyans and have simply adopted the bairns in the month we were gone?

Warmth from unexpected places

Making the bed together with someone is ritual like. Opposite each other with a pattern of mirrored movements somehow makes me feel bonded to the person across the sheets. The flick and smooth and pat and tuck while you talk of something else always warms me. It is something that spans across all bridges, recently for me; sex, age and language. Each person brings to the bed making their own life as it has been. Priscilla tucks the sheets in tight against spiders. For Keir it is all unnecessary since you are just going to mess it up again anyway but he does it because he loves me. For my Mom the pillows are decorative, above the duvet and handy for leaning against to read before the afternoon nap. As a parent there are so many things where perspective has changed, and now I look forward to standing across from Emma and seeing how much of each of us she will bring to this small daily piece of life.

Close encounters of the porcine kind

On Friday an old friend's mom picked us up and took us to our first petting zoo. There were Alpacas, goats, cows, rabbits, guinea pigs, geese and ponies. All came rushing to the fence to be fed and we could steal a touch. The scariest was edging past the male Ostrich who was fluffing his wings in our direction and giving us the (beady) eye in a very unfriendly manner. On the other side of the walkway from the Ostrich was an Emu. Emu's are well known for their aggression and he was doing his level best to rid us of our eyes as well. Between the Ostrich and the Emu someone is going to come a cropper.

The highlight of the trip for me were the warthogs. We walked up to their pen but they were hiding somewhere and we couldn't see them, so I called; "sooeeee, here pig, pig, pig" and they came running! It was amazing to be able to touch their rough little snouts as they pressed against the fence. It's like stroking fine gravel that is slightly wet and they made little "ungh! Ungh!" noises of content when scratched behind the ears. Emma couldn't get enough of them and with some trepidation I let her touch them too.

Another maybe first word?

It's possible that Emma is saying "Oh Look!" It's a lot like the "kitty cat" where she could have said the word but it could also just be that she is miming our sound. This afternoon she woke up from her nap, looked at the cat, pointed and said very clearly "oh look!" Then she looked at us to make sure we were paying attention and said it again, still pointing. Also - just a photo of her enjoying outside with her Uncle. Lulu is under the bush to the right of them.

The New Outdoorsman

Emma is going to be an outside kind of gal. Whenever she is fussy, all one has to do is go outside and she settles, even just a quick walk up to the gate of the complex will settle her. The wind in her hair and the sun on her face makes her so happy. While I was hanging washing the other day I put her down on the grass which is a bit sparse and dry. Which is perfect for a small person to play with dirt, stones and sticks. She gets such a kick out of wondering around the garden looking in hiding places for the tortoise. Her Uncle has declared that Emma has named the tortoise "Lulu". She also named the bushes, trees and birds Lulu but apparently most especially the tortoise is Lulu.

Where are the wild things?

Emma has taken to growling when she is playing with us, or when she wants you to play. This morning Granny was lying on the couch. Emma spied her from the other side of the couch and cruised along 'til she reached Granny's feet, growling all the while. Then she grabbed Granny's big toe and bit down... luckily just in play but the growling was too adorable. With all these teeth we are going to have to play close attention when Emma goes ggggrrrrrrr gggrrrrrr.

Emma Update

Emma is babbling away in her own language all the time. The other day at two in the morning when she lay between my Mother and I while we hoped she would go back to sleep her words were: "Lordy, lordy, Lordy." In her carseat she cries repeatedly; "Ehhhhhhhhhh" and when she sees the cat she says perfectly; "Ittickya At" Which we translate for her into kitty cat. She will sit on your lap and have long conversations where only she understands the story and she loves to sing along with "how much is that doggy" and "jingle bells".

She also stands on her own a fair amount, and of course cruises around holding onto furniture. Walking is not far away and she gets quite a thrill from holding your fingers and walking, especially if you are chasing the ittickya at.