Saturday 6-21-14
Happy
12th anniversary to the most wonderful man and husband, Asa I am so
happy that I was lucky enough in life to be with someone like you. You are
absolutely amazing. If only we could have spent it together, but apart and me
at Mikumi it will be. I am used to this because of how many we have had to
spend apart, it still sucks thought.
As I
was checking my Facebook, I received so much support from friends and family
regarding the poop picture issues of last night. I feel so very bless to have
such wonderful people in my life. I figured since I had the wonderful posts
from last night regarding the crazy Mary, I should also include the wonderful
posts of today from my friends and family. The later actually are wonderful.
This was a great way to start my day.
·
Elizabeth Gubrud-Howe Who takes two
children to a foreign country and stays all alone? Who teaches at a school when
they are sick? Who is patient enough to put up with someone threatening there
children and taking dumps on there chairs. I can't believe anyone would call u
an unwanted foreigner. Give me a break. You are courageous, needed, and wanted
for sure. I have never been there....but what country wouldn't want a kind,
tough, and generous person on there soil? Sarah Clibourne
·
Liz Clibourne Thank you Elisabeth, that was good of
you. Sarah has done an amazing job and doesnt deserve that from anyone,
especially someone who was never there.
·
·
·
·
·
Elaine Titze Wow - what an unbelievable turn of
events. Sarah, you make me so very proud and I am thrilled you married into
such an incredibly supportive family. Whoever this Mary person is should be
absolutely ashamed of the comments she made on this thread. No matter how you
look at it or what spin you try to weave, what those kids did is just plain
shameful. Stay strong - you truly amaze me! xoxox
·
Don't let a little poop stop you Sarah. They need to
learn just like any kds you gotta go by the rules. Mary is whatever Mary is.
It's easy for someone to make comments they know nothing about but think they
do. That shows their stupidity to me. Keep Rockin it Girl and thanks for
helping Liz out.
·
·
·
Kirsten Nielsen Clibourne Liz perhaps new
seat covers are in the future? Human poop is tough to clean. And by the looks
of it maybe a bit mushy.
·
Sarah Clibourne Thank you so much everyone. I didn't
take it bad at all. I just looked at it as a funny laugh last night at a, what
seemed to be, crazy lady. But still, thank you all for the support you have
given me over the last two months. Everyone. I have had some low times and I
don't know if I could have done it quite as easily if I didn't have all of you.
So, Thank you from the bottom of my heart!
It
rained much of yesterday and as I sat on the computer waiting for it to be time
to leave, or to even wake the kids up, the rain started coming down again. I
really hope that it lets up so we can see some good animals, but maybe since it
hasn’t been raining much, this is a good sign that the animals will come out to
the water holes that will be evident now.
So we
just got back from our trip. It is 10:30pm and man am I tired. We started out
pretty much on time. Got everything packed up, all with high hopes that the
rain would quickly stop. We started by going up to Bismillah to pick up some
andazi. Logan had asked his friend when they start making them and he said 5am,
but when we got there they only had the chipati, and that was very greasy, as
usual. We decided to wait until Morogoro. It was pretty cramped in the truck
because of Logan’s luggage since we were dropping him off in Morogoro after
Mikumi, but the kids did great in the back together. They shared tablets,
played, and just enjoyed. When we made it into Morogoro we got some chipati and
bananas. The andazi was sold out so we found a different place. These ones were
bigger by a little bit, but they wanted 500 for one andazi, that was five times
the amount many other places, but we needed to be able to make peanut butter
and jelly sandwiches, so we got just enough for each of us to have one of
those. Then we were on our way.
The
drive to Mikumi is long, but full of great sights to see. There are the
mountains off in the distance, many small villages with children running and
playing happily. There is the occasional person bathing in the river or
sometimes stagnant pool on the side of the road. That is always interesting. I
love when we get to the point where they have these baskets, hats, mats, and
purses all hanging from the trees. Everything is woven of some kind of fiber,
but they are just so beautiful.
Last
time we went to Mikumi right away getting into the first entrance there were so
many baboons on the side of the road. This morning we did not see a single one.
It gave me hopes of seeing lions. We got in and once all was dealt with as far
as paying the fees to get in (the lady just couldn’t understand that we wanted
to pay each separately instead of one put it on the card and everyone else pay
that person), we were on to looking for animals. Again, just like outside the
park, there were very few animals, again hopes of lions. It continued that way
for quite a while. All through the day we searched for lions and sure enough,
we were disappointed by the lion. They did not decide to come out. We didn’t
get there though until noon and they are more active earlier, but even earlier
today they would not have been because of the rain. We did see many great
animals though. The elephants didn’t want to come even anywhere near close, so
no good pictures of them, but there were many giraffes and zebra, quite a few
antelope. We got a closer look at a nice big wart hog this time. There was even
this crazy looking fox type animal. It was orange on its body and its back was
grey. There were two of those just as we were leaving the park. Oh and
crocodiles. I have never been so close to a wild crocodile before. It was so
cool. Abdallah said he was brave enough to touch it, so no kidding; the guy got
out of the car and went to try to touch it. It ran off and got into the water
right as he took his first step out of the car to try, but this coming from the
man that I thought was going to poop himself at the thought of Asa and I riding
on the top of the car the last time. Scott and Logan rode the top the whole
trip this time and it made it a little roomier inside for the rest of us. The
flocks of birds were out today also. I wasn’t fast enough to get any shots
worth keeping of them, but I have the memories of the swarms of bob marley
colored birds all taking flight from a single tree as we approached. So
beautiful! Toward the end Ima climbed on top with the boys and spent the next
hour up there with them. Ayla and Jove got pretty jealous, but I told them that
he is 14 and he could be up there with the guys and they didn’t have to be.
They didn’t really like that answer. After searching for a lion for a few hours
and noticing the sun getting ready to begin it’s decent, we decided to call it
a day. We still had a two hour drive to Morogoro, a few things to do there,
then another two hours back to Berega. As we were leaving the final gate
leaving the park there were many baboons on the road. We saw some of the
tiniest little monkeys I have ever seen. They were so new they were still
hairless and red looking. I snapped many good pictures. There is one, that
although it is blurry, I am keeping it. Just as I was taking a picture of this
one big guy sitting just in this comical pose, a beer can blew right up next to
him. It looks like the baboon had tossed his beer aside and decided to maybe
pleasure himself a little. It was just too funny. The babies were still the
highlight of that ten minute stop.
The
drive back was rough. It always is. You no longer have the excitement of seeing
animals to keep you focused on something other than the fact that you have been
in a car ALL DAY. I gave the kids all some candy, which made them so happy. I
had to yell and scold Jove a few times for doing one thing or another. He is
still young and has a hard time staying chill in the car for very long, and it
had been very very long. None of it was too serious though, so that was good.
We got
to Morogoro faster than we expected which was so nice. We waited for Kevin to
meet with us and the kids all said goodbye to Logan. Ima broke down into tears
for a while. He loved him so very much. Ayla and Jove want to see him back in
America. Most of our stops turned out to be a bust. Charlene and Scott needed
to get some pots and silverware, but the only place that we knew of that was
open was Morad’s and they didn’t have any of that. I needed to go to an
appliance store because the water filter broke and I needed to get that part,
but they were closed as well. Then it was to the bank for the atm. The first
atm said it was closed; the second bank we went to had two atms. The first said
it didn’t have money, and the second when I told it how much I wanted said it
could not perform that task and gave me my card back. I tried again and asked
for less and luckily that worked, so I have some in case there is anything I
want from Monday market or anything like that during this next 9 days. I will
have to get some more out for Dar because I want to get some more touristy
things, but that will be for later.
Onward
to Berega we went. Jove was getting grumpier. Poor guy was just so tired. Scott
started to offer the kids a cookie, but it was already like 8:30 and they had
so much crap today that I said it was too late. Jove was mad at me after that
and even though he was very cold, he didn’t want to cuddle with me. That only
lasted about 15 minutes when the sleepy and cold finally overcame him and he
ended up snuggling deep into my side. At one point we hit a pretty bad bump and
Ayla went flying off of her bench in the back where she had fallen asleep. She
started to cry. Ima picked her up and helped her back on the bench, but she
wouldn’t stop crying, so I had Jove go to Charlene so I could have Ayla snuggle
with me. As the two kids slept I read my kindle. I am so glad I remembered to
bring that this way, and even more than that, that it didn’t give me motion
sickness to read while I was in a car. I feel the nausea now, but I didn’t then
and that is what matters J
The kids laying that way worked for a while, but then Jove’s legs started to
get cramped and he began to cry. I moved him onto my lap and that is how the
remaining hour of the trip went. Jove on my lap snuggled into one arm and Ayla
next to me snuggled into the other, then on and off Ima snuggling into the back
of my head. He is a forceful snuggler though. It was so funny. He would snuggle
up against me and he would reach his arm around and hold my head. It almost
felt as if he was trying to make sure my head didn’t move at all on that very
bumpy road to get back to Berega. He is such a sweet kid.
As we
got into the village we stopped at the school. He lives in the boarding and
that is right behind the school, so that is where we dropped him off. He gave
us all great big smiles and thanked us. Again, he is one of the sweetest kids I
have ever come across. Then it was to drop Charlene and Scott off at their new
for the next year house. Finally it was our turn. I carried Jove and got him
into the house, and then gathered up all of our stuff from the truck. Once we
were all cleaned out I asked Abdallah how much I owed him for his fees, or if
it was covered from Hands4Africa because of taking Logan into Morogoro. He just
looked at me and said “no, we are good”. I wasn’t sure what that meant, but I
will go with that.
I got
the kids tucked into bed and put some anti itch cream on their bug bites. Poor
Jove is going to have to have Dr. David check out his butt tomorrow. It is so
ripped up from a few spots Jove just can’t stop itching. Hopefully it isn’t
anything serious, but Dr. David should be able to prescribe something to help.
He may need an antibiotic ointment or something like that. I managed to get
everything unpacked. I did look at the kitchen and think I should wash up
dishes before going to bed, but I know that is not going to happen. I am too
tired. I also attempted at calling Asa on Skype so I could say one last Happy
Anniversary, but it is his sleepy time as well so I missed him. I was very glad
I called him when we were stopped in Morogoro, so I could at least hear his
voice for a moment. Now, I am going to go to bed. If I think of anything I
forgot because I was too tired, I shall add tomorrow. Yay, bed! J
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