Always changing plans

Orcxance's day off (Sunday) did not go at all as we planned and hoped. Even so, we still got some family time with an outing to another town where they had some interesting animals; peacocks, jungle hogs and antelope.

There were also some very big trees and logs and we fed the antelope some leaves.

Orcxance found a friendly statue:

We finished up the evening with a picnic lunch on the pavement.

Princess

Princess was our first family goat. Although we’ve had other goats she was the first one we bought and kept here at our house. Molly chose her name.

She was very sweet and friendly and definitely my favorite. She came to us pregnant and gave birth to Boss who is now grown.

Unfortunately Princess came down with some unknown sickness a few weeks ago. We came home from Brazzaville to find her very weak and ill. We gave her dewormer which didn’t do anything for her. Orcxance tried hard to help her; he hand-fed her pieces of bread when she wouldn’t eat anything else, turned her loose to graze at will, and went and found the livestock vet to come give her medicine. Apparently a lot of the president’s cattle have been sick and the vet had been tending to them so he seemed to know just what to do and told us if she wasn’t having diarrhea she would be fine and the medicine would work. But that was only false hope. Even after two days of ivermectin injections and a vitamin supplement injection she only grew worse and a few days later we lost her.

Brazzaville

We ended up staying a few days longer than we wanted to, but we survived the hot, sleepless nights and managed to get bus tickets home for Sunday.

Because the car needed lots of repair, Orcxance stayed behind to see that it got done. Our week had its challenges but there were some highlights too.

Thursday evening we went with the boys to get Silas from the airport. Waiting for the flight to come in:

Orcxance got back from Kinshasa on Saturday morning

Jordan and Willie

Faturelle and Molly

We went back to the same ice cream place this time with Uncle Silas

Daicha and Molly having a cold drink

Silas assisting with the pondu effort and Molly helped wash dishes

Aunt Joseline offered to do the girls’ hair. First it needed to be unbraided and then Faterelle combed it to a frizz!

Ci Gusta: It’s Good! A visit to the Italian Ice cream shop and playground

This place was amazing. Nice air conditioning inside and a beautiful, clean shop with so many flavors of ice cream.

There were also elaborately decorated cakes and other baked goods for sale. I didn’t get any pictures of the cakes but here’s a few pics of the ice ice cream selection.

Many and I both got tiramisu and chocolate with chocolate brownie. It was so good but if I’d realized how much it was I would have just ordered one scoop. We finished it anyway! I let the girls pick what they wanted and they chose chocolate because of the Thunder Cake story. I got them one scoop to split and it was plenty!

After enjoying the ice cream we went outdoors to the play area. It was pretty hot and sunny so it was nice that one section of the play area was shaded. The girls enjoyed their first experience on a playground. (Technically it was Molly’s second but she was too young to enjoy a playground much when we were in America).

They absolutely loved it and got to burn off all the sugar energy. It was a very happy few hours spent and so much fun being able to give the girls a special treat and fun and new experience.

In the future I think we will make a point of coming here every time we come to Brazzaville.