Field Trips, Christmas, and Aubergines (pronounced: Oh-Burr-Jeans)

Back Row (L to R): JR, Olivia (the intern), Pito
Front Row: Alicia, Dan

Written by Alicia:

We officially went on our first field trip with Pito (our French Instructor) on Friday.  We went to one of the huge markets here in Libreville.  We usually take teams there to expose them to the culture, but it was a lot different having Pito and JR there to point out and name off different things for us in French.  Interesting French vocab word:  A potato is called “une pomme de terre,” which means “an apple of the earth.”  We learned lots of new names for fruits and vegetables.  We saw traditional medications (aka: herbs and spices) that some Gabonaise still use being sold.  We spotted pheasants, ducks, and chickens getting ready to meet their doom. We practiced our bargaining skills in French, and I bought a nice pair of aviator sunglasses for 2,500 CFA or about $5.00.  It was a lot of fun, but very HOT and humid!  We ended up having a huge storm that night, which cooled things down…for a little while. 

Dinner with Friends

We had a lot of our long lost Gabonaise friends over for dinner on Saturday. We had a potluck, which included chicken, rice, beans, aubergines (a purple and green vegetable), plantains, and lasagna (made by us).   They were so excited that it was our first time hanging out again since we’ve gotten back, and that Dan and I were finally married.  (Everyone here seems to love that concept.)  Don’t worry, as usual, they prayed for us to be blessed with many children in the near future.  They are big on kids here!  They loved looking at our photo albums from the wedding.  One of the nurses (Arican) is always talking about trying to find a wife, and Maman Jeanine (another nurse) slyly suggested that he should marry the woman who caught the bouquet at our wedding!  Haha.  (So, Trisha …if you are reading this, you have a potential husband waiting here in Africa if you ever want one J). 

Operation Christmas Child

Dan Typing

Some people have the Christmas tradition of filling up a shoebox with toys, coloring books, and toothbrushes to be sent around the world to a young boy or girl in the developing world through Operation Christmas Child. The Gabonese Christian and Missionary Alliance Church distributes these boxes through its 60 churches in cities and villages across the country. In our blog from our previous trip, http://www.gabon2009.blogspot.com/ we shared a story about how the generosity of Operation Christmas Child opened doors for a church to be planted in a village that had previously been skeptical of Christians. This year we saw the boxes in the warehouse at the Alliance Seminary and were in awe at the amount of boxes! This year they were given three shipping containers full of them to distribute! There are going to be a lot of very happy kids in the next few weeks!

 Half of the boxes had already been distributed when the picture above was taken, and we are hoping to see some of the boxes being distributed in person.

A few other updates:

Alicia Typing...

French is going….well.  We worked a lot on sentence structure and vocab this past week.  Dan and I are officially residents of Gabon.  We received our Carte de Sejour’s (essentially a Green Card) on Saturday.  We went to the beach on Friday, and I successfully ordered my first plate of fries on my own in French.  We are traveling down to Bongolo on Wednesday.  Bongolo is the hospital site we will be moving to in the middle of April.  Pray for safe travels and no motion sicknesses on the 8-hour car voyage.

Love,

Dan & Alicia Lewan