We were in the market bright and early this morning. In fact we beat most of the vendors this morning. Today was our big buying day for the seminar. We bought 900 pounds of rice, 300 pounds of beans, 100 pounds of gari (dried cassava) and 36 toe sacks to put the grain in. Then we bought nutmeg, garlic, palm oil, soap, pot scrubbers, salt, mosquito coils and matches. We also hauled out the oil, tinned tomatoes, hot pepper that we bought earlier in the week along with the serving bowls, cook pots and stirring spoons.
We took 3 truckloads of stuff to Kulkpeni to put in the storeroom. They got the storeroom cleaned and scrubbed yesterday so the floors were dry today. The room still smells like bats but so does the church building and all the other buildings at Kulkpeni.
While we were in the market we walked past the meat market and an idea hit me, I would make the recipe our daughter Charity sent us a couple weeks ago for Chinese Braised beef with pickled mustard greens. The recipe sounded delicious! To make the soup I needed beef leg bones and fresh beef. We took a detour into the meat market. The first leg bones I tried to buy had lots of flies circling them; when I asked if this was today’s or yesterday’s meat I found out that it was yesterday’s meat so we passed that by and went to the guy that was selling meat that was slaughtered today. I got a couple of nice leg bones and then I spied a long piece of tendon from the leg; I asked if I could buy that too. By now even Zorash thought that I had lost my mind. When we first walked in I noticed 2 full necks on the cement table. I really wanted the neck bones too because they make such rich broth but in the past I have never been able to buy the neck because they are not supposed to be sold. Traditionally the necks from all the animals that are slaughtered are to be sent to the chief’s house. When I asked if I could buy one today I was told no but then a little later I was told that I could buy half of the neck. Half a neck is better than no neck! Hey, I think I just made up a new proverb! Or should it be a bird in the hand is worth 2 in the bush? When we got back to the mission house we got out the battery powered saws-all; put in a new blade and cut the bones into four pieces that would fit in the stew pot. Supper is ready and the soup is a success! We will eat well tonight! The soup is filled with rice noodles.
Timothy Niligrini tried the loud speaker system and it would not come on so we hauled it back to Yendi and dropped it off at Mr. Adams, the fix-it man’s shop. He called later this afternoon and told us that he had it working; he had to replace the transformer. We picked it up on our second trip to town to buy rice. We want to give the workers a gift of rice and oil before we leave. We bought the oil yesterday and we wanted to buy the rice this morning but the lady we were buying from did not have enough for us. She had gone to one of the neighboring villages to buy more and when she got back to Yendi this afternoon she called Zorash and we met her in town to buy the rice to give for gifts.
Please keep us in your prayers.
In HIS Service,
Steve and Kandie
