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28 May 2007 - 15:13missing

mary in murle beads

mary wearing tradition Murle beads.

a week ago sunday we had a big ol party. Mary has just finished recording all her music and has begun working on making some videos as well. So we invited a bunch of sudanese friends over to the house and started shooting video with people singing, dancing and enjoying each other’s company for her song called “missing”. We had several of tribes of sudan represented: Dinka, Nuer, Murle, and Shilluk, not to mention a few kenyan tribes and some western ones as well (American & Dutch). It was lots of fun, especially when we got all the people up and dancing in our living room.

hope you enjoy some pictures:

early in the day with a living room full of children

shilluk ladies and a murle

singing with style

she is getting tired right about this time

the mijerium - “mijerium” is my phonetic spelling for an arabic word which is used for a person that is a bit too smart or clever for their own good. but he is really cute, aint he?

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23 May 2007 - 22:23kolpich and rambo

a cousin, second cousin, or uncle. im not really sure which. somehow a relative to my wife, and a relative that is closer in relation than others. figuring out my wife’s family structure is a very difficult thing. relatives are mainly referred to as brother/sister, uncle/aunt or father/mother. The father/mother is normally left for the actual parents or at least their actual brothers and sisters if the actual parents have passed away. But the others can be used for just about anybody. The man that is the son of your father’s brother’s wife’s sister can be called a brother. When in fact he is a very distant cousin with no blood relation. But then again there probably is some blood relation because, albeit a very, very distant one.

the point of all of this is that Kolpich, a relative of Mary that she refers to as uncle when but i think is actually a cousin , has been staying with us for the past two weeks as he recovers from an operation he had on his hip.

about three months ago, according to him, he was trying to assist a woman who was being attacked in the middle of road and managed to step into a deep hole and broke his hip. He will only grudgingly admit to the fact that he was on his way home after attending a big celebration that involved a large amount of inebriating beverages and that this may have been one of the factors as to why he stumbled into the hole as he went to assist the lady in distress. This all happened in Sudan where medical facilities are still lacking tremendously. He has suffered quite a bit and only found out three weeks ago when he came to Nairobi for treatment that he had fractured his hip and dislocated his leg. He went for a major surgery to fix it all and has now been recuperating at our place.

his favorite pastime is to watch “Rambo - Part III”. Can’t remember the exact title, not sure if that is really necessary. In this episode of Rambo, he is in Afghanistan fighting russians and saving his commander with the help of Afghan rebels. I believe these days they are refered to as “Taliban”.

I guess with the current situation in the world and America’s involvement in locations like Afghanistan and others (Iraq), this movie strikes me as a little funny. A hollywood testament to the fact that about 20 years back, america was supporting these rebels because they were fighting Russia. Wonder who we may be supporting or fighting in the next 20 years.

This got me to reflecting about the situation in Sudan that has been dragging on for the last 20 to 25 years as well. I was talking with a man once that has been fighting and involved with the southern forces fighting the north. When the war started in 83, the Islamic North was receiving support from the U.S. because the rebels in the South were receiving support from countries with alignment to the big enemy of america at that time. Somewhere along the line, things got swapped around and the US began giving support to south and declared the north as the bad guys. (Please if my history is way off here, someone can feel free to correct me).

kolbic loves Rambo. he is really impressed with his strenght and his warrior ways. he also enjoys identifying all the various weapons that are shown throughout the film. I think it takes him back to the “good ol days”. myself, i’m getting a little tired of the movie. The only thing I find halfway interesting is the beginning fight scene where rambo has a fight with a man who looks very much like the comedic actor Jack Black.

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18 May 2007 - 11:13sick week

colds and coughs and all those wonderful things are floating through our house at the moment. from the baby to the baba. (I’m the baba):)

update

about four weeks ago we got news that Henry, Mary’s brother, had passed away in Juba, Sudan. it came as a very big shock. He was only 23, was planning to come to nairobi for school and his wife had just had a baby boy. he was attacked and beaten on his way home by a man he had argued with earlier in the day. He died shortly afterwards due to an internal hemorage from a blow he had recieved to his mid section. We found out almost a week after the fact. That day and the following few were not very good ones in our house.

Mary and the wife of Henry then travelled to Juba and spent a week there with family. Mary then returned here to Nairobi and the wife travelled to the home of the mother to console and bring the news to her.

While all of this was happening, I stayed in Nairobi and took care of getting us all moved out of the house and into our new place. it is very nice. Lots of room, fairly decent location and a very nice big yard. At the moment we are sorting out all the new house problems and quirks. The really annoying one is that the upstairs never has enough water. I’m a little smelly at the moment.

i’m still looking for employment on a long term basis. however, I have been able to do some small freelance jobs here and there which are currently helping to keep us afloat. Mary has just finished recording her music. When I can find a decent internet connection and can figure out how to post them, I will put up a few of her songs.

abrizaa is growing everyday. He has finally mastered the art of crawling and is quickly learning how to get into anything and everything. if he decides he wants to get his hands on a thing, he does not give up easily in obtaining his goal. And if we managed to thrawrt his endeavor, he makes sure we are fully aware of his unhappiness with the situation.

here is some picture goodness:
abarizaa

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