Thursday

Today I spent my morning in Haven 2 sitting with Memory. She usually likes to cause trouble and cry near the other language groups in the morning so I decided to grab her and work with her during the first session. Afterwards I went to Haven 3 and found Leo hanging out all alone, so we sat together and I tried my hardest to get him to respond to me. I had no success until I threw him in the air. Then he would laugh, and then go back to his expressionless face again. I did get him to smile a little when we played with the ball, but he is so good at remaining expressionless. It was then time for the big boy language session which I became a part of with Leo. The boys love going outside during their therapy time. I noticed today that they really enjoy the slide. We got a smile out of Leo and the other boys.

Because today is Thursday we had shema again. I felt bad because the girls hardly ate any of the shema this time around, now that they had experienced it once before. I would say maybe 25% of it was gone by the time I went through the line, and I was one of the last to go through. I grabbed a large portion of shema, but barely put a dent in it.

In the afternoon I worked with Joy in Haven 1. I fed her a bottle for the first half of the session, and then she spit it all up the second half. Fortunate for me, I kinda heard it coming and was prepared for the spit up. Then the poor girl wanted to go to sleep, but she had the hiccups which did not help with the spitting up situation. Needless to say, this was not a bonding moment for Joy and I...maybe another day.

The second part of the afternoon I of course worked at Haven 2. I worked with many of the children. After tea time, Curt was being mischievious so I ran after him and grabbed him and threw him upside down and started tickling him extremely hard. He was laughing so hard apparently he couldn't control himself and he peed his pants! I eventually saw it running down his leg and forming a pool on the floor, lucky for me I did not get any on me. Everyone was laughing, even the Aunties.

Later in the evening a group of us hung out in the Hamby house until we were kicked out, and then Ashley, Carla, and I talked with Justin and Webster about random things about Zambia. Justin always jokes about coming to America. Tonight he decided that he should run for President of the United States, and I am his campaign manager. We also talked about how to get a wife in Zambia. Webster paid 2 cows and $200 dollars for his wife. Apparently some wives cost more than others, but you can negotiate the price sometimes with the family. It was a very interesting conversation.

Thank you for all your prayers and support.

Ben