News from the frontier

As the newness of Sudan wears off and initially startling sights begin to become commonplace, it gets harder and harder to think of things that are noteworthy enough to write about. At the same time, though, I realize that the life I now lead is anything but ordinary. Francis and regularly reflect upon how our life here resembles that of pioneers: I bake bread and tend the garden, while he tries to construct and maintain our “homestead” with the most basic of tools. I like to think of myself as the modern-day Laura Ingals Wilder while Francis channels Speke or Livingstone, some of the early African explorers.

In coming up with fodder for this post, I realize I have neglected to mention that there has been some upheaval in the Mills’ pet situation. A couple weeks ago, we were driving through town when a dumptruck driver who has hauled topsoil for me flagged us down to tell us he had dropped off a tortoise at our house. Thinking that he expected payment, we gave him some non-committal answer, but he clarified that it “was a gift for madam.” After searching for a couple days (this new addition is MUCH quicker) we found our gift roaming around the powerstation grounds just outside our residential compound fence. Since we’d given up on using visual indicators to determine tortoise gender, we christened him Clare, either short for Clarence (an excellent name for a tortoise, don’t you think?!) or a nice female name. Well, two weeks passed and we found the old tortoise Morty laying more eggs, thus firmly establishing that “she” is a she. While I thought that Morty would still be ok (short for Morticia…), Francis insisted that we swap the pet names. So now the old Morty, the egg-layer with the cracked shell, goes by Clare and the new guy who is much less shy (he’s taken a liking to hanging out on the front porch) is the new Morty. It’s almost like a soap opera, huh?!

The addition of the second tortoise provided further impetus to construct a pond for the tortoises. Though they are accustomed to desert living and spend most of the day hiding in a shady spot, online sources say that leopard tortoises do like to have a shallow place to wade in and have a nice long drink. I had Peter do some excavation, and hired a mason to pour a shallow pond, and then Francis and I pushed some large, pretty stones in the surface of the wet concrete Cambridge-style. I then took LOTS of extra stones and put them around the concrete to create ramps for the tortoises to enter and exit. So far, the birds have gotten much more use out of it than Morty or Clare (in fact, I don’t think Morty likes water much at all), though Clare spent a good hour in the pond the other day. I have plans to plant bushes on one side to provide additional hiding spots and grass all around so they have something to eat, all in due time.

In other news, while I was out in the yard arranging the stones around the pond, I noticed a 10 or 12 year old Toposa girl outside our fence. Now, there are young Toposa girls passing by the compound all the time, but this one caught my eye because rather than staring in the compound at me, she was looking up at one of the trees just outside our fence. While I watched her, she picked up a rock and hurled it up into the tree canopy. An instant later, a crow-sized bird fell from the tree, which she promptly picked up and went on her way. Now, I know that for eons humans have been killing birds with stones, but I thought that it was mostly done with the aid of a slingshot. This wasn’t just a random happening—this girl was tracking her prey, aiming, and got it in one try! I was impressed. These people are tough.

In other news, we’ve now been officially moved into our house for about a week. On one of the first nights in the house, an American friend who we met in November at the safari camp was in town again, and so we invited him over for dinner, making him our first dinner guest. The meal, if I must say so myself (and evidenced by no leftovers) was quite lovely, but it was even lovelier sitting around on the couch after dinner, sipping tea (me) and port (Francis). It felt so civilized after months of living out of a suitcase.

Though we received clearance to move in, there were still a couple things around the house that the construction contractor needed to finish. As per Murphy’s Law, they showed up three days after this move-in. Even worse, it was the night before my birthday, and their top priority for the following day was to seal the grout throughout the house. So, I awoke on my 28th b-day on the wrong side of the bed, and watched as a team of people removed from the house EVERYTHING that I had just put in place. I was mad. I needed to get away, and it just so happened that Peter also had finally lined up a source for manure for the garden, and so I had a crappy (pun intended) rest of the morning collecting poop to feed my plants. The day improved a bit when I got a call that an NGO doing emergency food distribution out in the bush around Kapoeta (there was a drought last year and its effects are really starting to show now) wanted to interview me for a position coordinating distribution—more details later if it actually happens. The next step in the right direction was realizing that my sweetcorn was ready (actually, beyond ready) for picking! I’d hoped for corn-on-the-cob for a birthday meal, but didn’t really think it would be possible. Oh, what a harvest! Against all odds, I managed to reap about 4 dozen ears (only from those plants that I didn’t transplant—lesson for the future), a dozen of which Francis and I consumed off the cob and the rest which I cooked, cut off the cob, and have stored in the freeze for future enjoyment. The next day, I had Peter plant more (I’m thinking we’ll plant every two or three weeks, now that we know it works!).

Anyway, back to the birthday story. So, things improved with the sweetcorn, as well as with the mudslide that I had for dessert. To top the day off, I went online to find an overwhelming number of emails and facebook messages from family and friends, leading me to wonder who died and made me so popular?! I also opened physical birthday cards (sent earlier with Francis’ colleagues) from Mama & Papa Mills (Thank you!) and my parents (who would have thought that your voices would be heard in Africa?!). It turned out to be a lovely day.

Later in the week, the contractors finished up on the house, and Francis and I made our way to Juba where I’m writing this post. He has a work meeting and needs to do some shopping for the project, and I had my interview (went well, I think) and need to pick up some groceries. We also met up with the 5 American linemen who have been contracted to do most of the actual construction of power lines, and we’ll all be traveling back “home” in a couple days.

I expect lots of excitement in the coming weeks, not the least of which is a visit from Shana (Francis’ sister). We’re due to get the heck out of Sudan in the next couple weeks (actually, Juba was a welcome change of scenery, even if it is a dump), though I’m not sure that a trip to Nairobi or Kampala will be possible if I get this job—there is LOTS to be done in a short time. Anyway, stay posted for the latest news and don’t worry if I don’t post; just means that I’m back to being a boring pioneer...