Aquathlon

The boys had another sports competition at school. Why they call it the "aquathlon" and not "aquathon" is beyond me. Maybe they were trying to make it sound like "triathlon" instead of "marathon".

Anyway, the boys did good. Both Paulo and Andre were competing against kids 2 years older than themselves. I think they did it that way to accommodate Andre in the youngest group. He is the youngest student in the junior school because he skipped a grade.

Hunter will post a video later. This is all I have for now. Cute little sister with handsome daddy.

Andre's Accent

Did I mention that the kids have THICK Indian accents? They switch in and out of Kenyan and Indian accents depending on the person they're talking to. One time, Hunter and I visited the school during the day for a school activity. We heard the boys speaking to their peers, who are mostly Indian kids. We looked at each other in disbelief.

I FINALLY caught Andre's Indian accent on tape. Enjoy!

"Don't Litter"

Cool Critters

Check out this cool snail. We have several of these around outside, but I rarely see them "on the move" like this guy. Course, he was so slow I had plenty of time to find a shilling, which is about the size of a quarter, for your frame of reference.

 "cheeeeese!"

Last Saturday, we woke up late, ate some pancakes, watched NatGeo Wild, and then Hunter goes, "Yosh, I have a surprise for you...I'm not sure if you're gonna like it." Uh-oh!

THIS was the surprise:

Yup. That's a real live tarantula that Hunter saw crawling on our living room wall after I had gone to bed. 

So naturally, we decided to step outside our apartment in Africa and have our own NatGeo Wild episode. Beginning with this brilliant little gimmick.

We didn't get it on tape, but after a few minutes, the bee got in the tarantula's way. It might have stung him, I'm not sure. And the tarantula grabbed the bee and shoved it in his mouth. It was crazy!

Then, Hunter found this cool beetle in a tree.

It's a scarabaeidae beetle, (or cetonia aurata?). Hunter said in the Philippines, he saw a kid flying one of these like a kite.

So we tried it out.

In this next video, notice how the monkeys are curiously watching what on earth we are doing. When we walked it out to the parking lot, a bird flying overhead was hovering to see if he could get a bite, and when the beetle landed on the ground, a lizard kept creeping in close for his share. Poor beetle. We released him later. Hopefully we didn't mess with nature too much and he's still alive, although, he probably is still wearing a little peace of string that we couldn't remove very well. Whoops.

Sweet, eh? Fun little bug adventure morning.

Fun in a Mosquito Net

Moving Again

Seriously? This is our 13th time. I'm not kidding.

It was a difficult decision because we liked the other place, but in the end it was a better choice for our family and for the company.

So we packed everything back in our suitcases again.

And moved to Paradise apartments.

The apartment is smaller, less furnished, and not as beautiful as the old Swahili house, but we can now enjoy some major perks, like

-walking distance to school
-walking distance to beach
-security guards
-swimming pool
-free wifi internet
-GENERATOR!!!

We're happy. Of course, we've been able to feel at home anywhere, really.

Reyna will give you the tour.

Living room

Basic kitchen, but bigger fridge and new gas stove.

Big table for food and of course, projects.

Big hallway for Reyna to practice walking.

Master bedroom

Boys' room (Jared napping on the bed)

Reyna's room

I hired someone to put these clothes lines up in back. It's rainy season, so the apartment clothes lines which don't have a roof overhead weren't working for us. It rains on and off all day and night.

We have some of the same old critters as our old place, like these cool lizards:

And cockroaches. This one's body is almost 3 inches long.

But now we have some other fun critters. Like way more of these millipedes. This one is dead. I found it dying in my kitchen.

There's a group of monkeys that hang out on my front patio all the time. I tried to sneak around the side of the house to snap these pictures, but I ended up scaring them away.

This young monkey climbed on a car and started calling out nervously, but didn't want to leave the safety of the car. In the background, you can see a mother leaping up a wall with a baby attached to her tummy. Another monkey is at the top.

Oh, and these happy critters like to hang out by the pool:

I'll snap some beach photos later.