My Dad says it's called a Twin Tub

Someone asked about the washing machine. It was even more interesting with our electricity troubles, as we had it in the living room draining into a bucket that I had to keep running to the bathroom with to tip away. Not good for your back. So I spoke nicely to Becky who got us some extension cable, so it was back to the normal system today.

Basically, there's two compartments, wash and spin. So you put all your clothes in (top load), fill up three huge buckets of cold water and pour that in as well, with a bit of washing powder. It sort of rotates slowly for about 15 minutes and then you switch it to drain and the bath is filled with the dirtiest water you have ever seen. As one of my colleagues said, if only the world wanted to buy dirt, Africans would be millionaires! It just seems to seep into my clothes.

Then there's the temperamental spin compartment. Only half the size of the wash bit, so I squeeze my clothes into it in two or three loads, and then you turn on the switch timer. Only the timer doesn't work. And the spinning thing often decides it doesn't want to go very fast. I seem to have got the knack of persuading it to spin quickly (which is when it sound like a helicopter trying to take off).

Then it's back into the wash compartment to rinse with new water and no powder, then we spin again. Exciting, eh?

Clothes dry very quickly, and don't need much ironing, because they're already pretty stiff. When they do need ironing, of course, I don't ...

Since the last blog there have been some overcast days, but not much rain other than a little overnight Thursday-Friday. The clouds have to be very heavy to bring any rain to Lubango. Whilst we sit only a couple of hours from the Atlantic, all of our rain comes from the Indian Ocean on the other side, dropping its watery load across Mozambique and Zambia before Angola gets a look-in. More prayer please.

Even over just the last few days, the timetable has started to fill out quite quickly. On Thursday, Peggy turned up with a student and suggested I would like to teach him piano - now! It's very much the Angolan way. I have since got another four students, although asked them to wait a few days for their first lesson to give me time to prepare and ask a few questions! Peggy will take over most of my students when I leave. I've discovered that the church actually has a drum kit, just next door, and I could give percussion lessons if anyone's interested - no takers so far! Quite a few people have asked recently about church - I will write about that on another occasion to give it its due.

I think I will be teaching piano on Mondays at 2, but apart from that Mondays remain empty. I have it in mind to ask what else is available. It would be nice to do some ministry with children, and as the church school is literally about 4 minutes walk from our house, there may be an opportunity there. More prayer please.

I hadn't heard directly from Connie (with Hannah in Kenya) and so EMAIL'd her direct. Up until about a week ago she was feeling a bit rough, like I felt here for the first week. In the last few days she has started to recover, worshiping God who knows what He's doing! Praise God that she's feeling better!

Do please ask questions through the Comment feature on the blog, or direct if you'd rather not have other people read them! I look forward to answering as many as possible.

Thank you very much for your continued interest and support.