Changes

Something we were told by friends who have been to Africa before was to come with the expectation that anything that can change will. Something else they told us was to be prepared for ‘Africa Time’, a concept that involves phrases such as ‘now’ and ‘now now’ to differentiate between what is happening sometime in the next few hours and what is happening sometime in the next half an hour or so.

We have adjusted well to Africa Time.  We quickly learned that when someone you were expecting said the words ‘I’m coming’, it meant they may show up anytime in the next few hours... or not at all. The idea of time being flexible and unable to dictate life to the extent it does in our own cultures creates a sense of laid back acceptance of the ebb and flow of life.

As we were warned, in the past couple of weeks we have experienced a number of changes here at Refilwe, all of which happened very fast. In almost direct contrast to the usual way of doing things, in the space of a week we had 5 new children, a new Godparent family, another Godparent family resign and amongst the chaos we were given 24 hours to completely move house (For once Africa Time waited for noone!). The above picture shows our new house- it's up the hill about 30m away from our old house, has a double sink (which beats the tupperware bowl we used to wash dishes in for the past 5 months!) and a back door. 

Change is not always enjoyable, especially when it happens so quickly. I would say we've adjusted well, overall. A double sink goes a long way.