plated hair and malaria

This is going to be a random blog - one which outlines some more of the random normal things that have happened lately. As I write, Laki is whining, so I whine back, trying to communicate to him to be quiet. I told him no one else is going to come to his pity party. But he doesn't seem to get the point!! He also doesn't understand the phrase "be quiet".

Anyway. A lot of the locals around here have been getting their hair plaited recently. It looks pretty sweet and I'm sure it's a lot cooler for them. They do it really quickly, which I was surprised at considering how curly their hair is! Anyway, Jair wanted to give it a go...

I think it looks pretty cool! So he sported that look for a few days, before it got fuzzy!

We went out for a day trip with Machi and a local Occupational Therapist to visit a school out in the bush. The road there was 4wd driving quality, so Jair was pretty stoked, sliding and skidding around in the ute on the mud. Thanks, once again, to the National Diaconnate Committee whose donation made it possible to help purchase a hardy Toyota Hilux!

Our mate Michael goes fishing as his favourite pastime, so he gave us a fish which we cooked. I've only dealt with fillets before so cooking a whole fish was news to me... But boy did it taste delicious!! I think I feel another episode of "Dinner at the Duinkerke's" coming up.

We had another crab visitor. While cooking the fish, I spied Laki sniffing curiously by the generator shed. He was checking out this whopping big crab (the other one disappeared... or maybe grew up). So I dutifully took a photo. No doubt someone would have found it by now and picked it up and cooked it and gobbled it up. Crab is a delicacy here!

I'd like to introduce you to two handy kitchen tools. That's right, the mortar and pestle, for crushing biscuits for my apricot fudge slice (mmmmm....). You can't really go wrong with a tomato sauce bottle (except for the hollow in the centre underneath - the crumbs kind of skirted inside and didn't get crumbed very quickly...) and the plastic container (from which rained out a large amount of crumbs). But the slice was good.

On Saturday, Jair took a roof panel off and replaced it with "plastic copper" - a sheet of corrugated clearlite. So now, we don't have a dark dismal lounge but a nice bright one. It rained on Sunday and the new roof piece didn't even leak. Good job Jair!

They even celebrate ANZAC day here, well, not with a public holiday. But a whole lot of Ausie and NZers (and interested Solomon Islanders) gather around the cenitaph for the dawn service. AUSAID funds the bacon and egg breakfast afterwards so we made sure we didn't miss out on that! First time we've had bacon for months!

After that, I felt awfully sick. I just thought it was because I was tired from the early morning for the dawn service. Achy. Fever. No appetite. Felt like spewing. Or fainting! Well, Monday morning I went to get my blood checked.... and I've got Malaria. Kevin shook my hand and said, "Congratulations! You're now officially a missionary here in the Solomon Islands!" ;)