In the Family way...

Shortly before I took off to teach a month and a half ago... my dog had just finished up her first cycle of being in heat.

Not fun.

I felt like a particularly hard-nosed warden as I locked her down day and night, chaining her to poles and chasing away her male suitors.

But I figured it would be worth it in the end not to have to deal with puppies.

Unfortunately, toward the end of her cycle --basically the last day or so-- I got lazy. I decided to let her out of her prison (aka: my house) and let her soak up the sun (while chained to my back porch).

I hadn't seen any suitors in a few days and thought her scent must have changed.

I was wrong.

After taking my eyes away from her for about 10 minutes, everything got errily quiet. So, I went out back to check on her.

Her chain had gotten stuck in my outside pipes and she was cornered by three male dogs. One was stuck with her... if you get my drift.

After almost a month of watching and worrying to avoid this very thing... I managed to mess it all up in 10 inattentive minutes.

Ugg.

Not sure if she could get pregnant on the last day of her cycle, I speculated on the probability of puppies with my neighbor and friend, Sarah.

As we debated the likelihood of it all, my dogs nipples changed.

I worried over them, insisting that she must be expecting. Sarah --always the rainbow to my rain-- suggested that I was overthinking it.

I didn't get to speculate on it too long, as I took the offer to teach a week or so later and left my dog in Sarah's care.

Every now and again, I'd return for a quick trip to Maforga. Initially, I didn't see much change in my dog's physique, so I started second guessing my initial pessimism.

However circumstances with my car prohibited me from returning for the last three weeks. By the time I got back, my dog was unquestionably 'in the family way'.

She is huge!

She waddles. She drools. She steals food from kids.

And have I mentioned.... she's HUGE!

Since I know the day she conceived, I can make the fair guess that she will deliver any day. If websites are to be believed, she will give birth on Wednesday June 10th.

Do EDDs on dogs vary as well? What happens if she goes post-dates? Do I have to induce her?

I will confess that I'm every bit the midwife to my dog as I am to women.

I rub her belly until she groans with pleasure and drools. I feed her every time she looks at me with those pathetically drowsy eyes until she falls into a food coma. And well... I basically let her be as cranky as she wants to be at any time day or night.

Just today, I was able to palpate one of her puppies. It kicked me (tehehe).

And I'm even contemplating shaving her belly so I can listen to their PHT (puppy heart tones).

This is going to be my first time dealing with puppies. I could use all the advice you can offer.

Not All Storm Clouds Rain...

In August, I made a purchase of a deep freezer. It's small and fits in the corner of my kitchen, allowing me the privilege of buying meat once a week --rather than having to buy it day after day.

After pricing things out, I discovered it was heaps cheaper to buy an animal and have it dressed than to buy it in the supermarket.

(I'm not ready to buy it from the outdoor market yet... the flies and blood stained wooden counters somehow throw me off.)

So I asked around and found someone who was selling pigs... and went to meet him.

Chris is a Catholic friar from Louisiana with a background in agriculture. He's been working in Mozambique for about two years and was disappointed to find out that very few Mozambicans are willing to eat pork.

However, I was not upset by this news because it meant that he had an excess of pork... and was more than willing to off load it for cheap.

How to buy a pig in Mozambique ~

Day one: Meet Chris and select the white beast for execution. Ask one of his workers to butcher it in exchange for all the offal and feet.     ---What a bargain! 

Day two: Go pick up my shaved and slaughtered pig, then notice a number of goats for sale... ask about the price of goats and a broken container. Take home my pig in nice happy sections and pile it neatly in my freezer --with the head on top staring through the zip lock bag! 



Day three: Go back for a (live) goat and the broken water container (which Chris was willing to part with for free and will be used, God willing, in an aquaponics project).

Easy. Peasy.

After buying my goat, I asked the Chris and the other Mozambican staff for name suggestions (since she was intended as a pet rather than dinner) but no one was willing to name her. But as I was about to leave another friar showed up, Andres from Spain, and he suggested I call her "Storm Cloud" since her white and grey coat resembled the stormy evening quick approaching.

I agreed that would be a good name for her... and quickly dubbed her Nebulada (or Storm Cloud in Portuguese).



We piled her on the trailer, tying her to the inside of the broken container and off we went. But instead of raining... this Storm Cloud bleated.
         ---She bleated all the way home!

Clearly... not all Storm Clouds rain.

Bonus: I'm happy to announce Nebulada is pregnant! I watch her belly expand with interest wondering if she'll be my first Mozambican delivery!
  
He he he... We'll just have to wait and see. Won't we?

A Blue Ribbon?

On the way to the garbage pit the other day, I stumbled across a snake in the grass.
    --Literally.

I was almost on top of him before I noticed the opalescent blue of his skin and stopped to process.

There was a long delay in my brain as I flipped through the rolodex of “blue things”... and “long, skinny things”.... and “things lying in grass”. But even after a good 20 seconds, it still hadn’t come to a definite conclusion.

It had never seen anything like it... and so naturally my brain made a new rolodex card and informed me that the best guess was “snake”.

SNAKE!

At this news, it mounted the appropriate alarm, shooting gobs of adrenaline through my veins, and causing my body to jerk back with an involuntary jolt.

High on adrenaline, I was then alert enough to ‘play possum’. So I froze in my gum boots and waited.

Absolutely nothing raced through my mind.

Nothing.

All I could do was stare at this thin, blue, ribbon-esc thing in the grass and hope it wouldn’t bite me.

I was transfixed.

An embarrassing amount of time went by before I realized it was dead.

Its head was intact... and its body was whole, but its tail was unnaturally short. Something had chewed it down to a crumbled nob, then just left it there.

Eventually, I leaned in to inspect it closer and saw slight indentations on its body, as if something had knocked it about... or squeezed it about its center.

Had you been there you would have laughed at the loud sigh of relief I made.

Then somehow my feet worked again and I continued down the path to the garbage dump.

However on the way back from the dump, I decided to pick it up and take it home.

In my brain, Logic argued with Reason insisting that ‘since it was dead, I should just reach down and pick it up with my hand’.

But Reason would have none of that and started screaming, “No! Whatever you do...you never touch snakes. NEVER. Especially ones you don’t know.”

And again... I stood there hesitating over the lumpy, half-chewed beast.

Eventually, Reason won the argument and I found a long stick. Using it, I picked up my new blue ribbon by its middle, and carried it home with me.

Half way home, Lumpy, the white pregnant cat, came to greet me. And I laid the blue ribbon in front of her thinking she might enjoy a snack.

She is always scrounging for new treats and often comes to beg.

However when she approached my “gift”, she too did the same involuntary jolt, jumping back a good three inches.

Hilarious!

Apparently, even pregnant cats have their limits and this was it! She would not eat it. Instead, she sat several feet away and watched it out of the corner of her eye.

Eventually she left it undisturbed on my porch for one of the orphans to find.

He he he...

Life in Pictures: June & July

 

This beautiful chameleon was brought to me by Danny, my neighbor's son. He remembered from my last visit that I like them. But learning from past experiences, I decided not to bring him into my home (there are fortunately not enough bugs for him to enjoy inside). Instead, I placed him on the tree out front. He stayed four days, then meandered off. 

This funeral procession left the local hospital. Driving slowly behind, we could hear them singing worship songs. Remarkably, the deceased was in a real hearse.

It is tomato season right now... but despite the massive amounts being sold on each side, no one has discounted them. They are, in fact, MORE expensive than ever. I wonder if Mozambicans street venders fully grasp the concept of supply and demand?

Yummy tomatoes!

Not long ago, Nana (the lovely septuagenarian in orange) had her children visiting. It was the first time all four of them have been together in a long time. As a result, we called them forward at church and prayed over them all.

New Pets!

 
While cleaning my new home the other day, I came across some mystery egg shells. They were WAY too large to be spider eggs... and infinitely too small to be crocodile eggs.

What were they?

For the life of me I could not say. So I gathered up a few and put them in a jar. Some were starting to hatch and I was sure to find out quite soon.

One day later, out emerged the tiniest gecko I've ever seen.
    --So darling! 

I was going to 'hug him and pet him and call him George'... but blast it, those buggers can climb! And he was out of his make-shift cage in seconds flat!

Live long little gecko! May you eat all my mosquitoes and never be eaten yourself!

House Warming Present

This morning a white cat with pale green eyes came to visit. She meowed until I went out to greet her. Only then did I discover she had brought me a half-dead lizard as a house warming present.

When I didn't eat it but rather encouraged her to enjoy, she ate with gusto leaving the spasticly wiggly tail as dessert.

As I watched, the tail jumped and bounced like it was still full of a frantically desperate life.

But not for long... Yum!

Zootoria!

During my stay in Johannesburg, the lovely and most hospitable Naaktgeborens, (aka: Calvary Chapel Johannesburg’s pastors extr’aordinaire) invited me on one of their family outings.

We went to the zoo.

The Naaktgeboren clan at the zoo.

Now as for zoos, I can take them or leave them. But a chance to spend the day with the Naaktgeborens... well that’s a whole other matter. When they invited me to join their impromptu day at the zoo, I was eager to go.

Not for the critters... but the fellowship.

We didn’t go to the zoo in Johannesburg (which I assumed was our destination), instead we went to the neighboring city of Pretoria which is about a 45 minutes drive from CCJ.

Pretoria is South Africa’s capital city and boasts of many sights... only one of which is their zoo.

We got there by late morning and immediately started rambling about the place. Monkeys, anteaters, and white-handed gibbons were some of my favorites.

Hungry Hungry Hippos!

I was also pleased to finally get a close-up look at the hippopotamus and gorillas. However, when the leopard got a close-up look at us... I confess I was considerably less pleased. There was something deeply disturbing in that steady stare as the leopard expertly hid behind the foliage and watched us pass.

She was inches away and barely visible. Yikes!

After lunch we decided to take the telepherique up to the top the the park. And from our high and wobbly perches, we could see lions and tigers... and bears! Oh My!

No... seriously. We saw several female lions; both white and regular bengal tigers; and two bears sleeping with their feet in the air.

What fun!

When I stop to think about it, however, I occurs to me that these three animals represent The Large and Ferocious of three distant continents. The lions are mostly seen in Africa. The tigers are only seen in Asia. And well... those brown bears are decidedly North American, for sure!

I wonder if that's what makes that song in the Wizard of Oz so funny?    Hummm.

But I digress. Back to the zoo!

Fun fact: male seahorses gestate their young.

Of all the places we visited that day, I must say I liked the bird sanctuary the best. The chirps and songs that livened up the soaring canopy at dusk was majestic.
       -- God’s original symphony.

And of all the animals we saw that day, the crocodile definitely won the Funniest Face award. With those close-set eyes and wicked grin, he looked too stupid to do anything but lie there and soak up the sun.

I’d hate to see that grin in the wild, though. It’d be decidedly less funny then! All in all. I’m glad I went.

Thanks Naaktgeborens for inviting me!

Leopard Attack?

The other night a man in his 20's was brought in from the village. His head was sliced open, his right arm was punctured, and he was bleeding excessively.

As Dennis sutured his skull, I causally asked what had caused his wound, assuming it must have been another motor bike accident. But it wasn't.
-- “He was attacked by a leopard,” my translator explained in disbelief.
-- “A leopard? Really? Are they even around here?" I asked stupefied and scared. I had heard of hyenas... but leopards? Honestly... a leopard??
Once I got over my initial surprise, I said, “Tell me the story in detail. How did it happen?”

 By this time Dennis had already closed off most of the foot long wound on his head. A thick gauze bandage covered the man’s face leaving only right eye uncovered. He searched my face in fear but didn’t speak. So my translator asked his friends to relay the story, instead.

As they spoke, a half dozen people slowly inched into the room to hear as well.

He was fishing by a river in a far off village when he passed next to a large bush. He heard something and turned to see a leopard pounce on him, taking him to the ground. The beast swiped his head in the process cutting a wide, ragged wound from his left eye socket to the back of his skull. Then the animal turned quickly and sprang on him again. This time grabbing his arm he had raised it in his defense. Then without explanation the leopard left as quickly as he came.

Since he lives so far away, it took him all day to reach our clinic --all day with the muscles in his skull protruding and various holes in his body tied off with old rags.

I asked if I could take a few pictures and he nodded but still didn’t speak. After each picture, I flipped my camera around so he could see what we were doing. He had to lower the gauze to see them, but he did it readily and thanked me afterward.

I don’t know about you but if I had been twice attacked by a leopard, I would not have been so brave!

Dennis was able to sew the wounds closed leaving proper drainage to prevent infection. Please pray he heals both physically and psychologically from this attack. Thanks.

Update: Jan 29 2012
I saw him today and he's healing well. The wound on his head is not septic. Please continue to pray.

Millipedes.

Our shower is of simple construction. It consists of a spout and nozzle fastened to a concrete walled cubicle with a door. A quick turn of the nozzle and lukewarm water sprinkles out, washing the day’s dirt away.

It’s nice --especially compared to the alternative (aka: the bucket bath).

One of the fun parts about showering here is you never know who’s going to be showering with you. Some days it’s the flying termites. Other days it’s the frogs.

Yesterday it happened to be a 7 inch millipede!

I washed the soap from my eyes, turned around... then jumped! I had almost stepped on him.

I confess he startled me, but not much more. Frankly, I’m confused when someone expresses a fear of the mini legg-ed beast.

He doesn’t move fast. He doesn’t bite. In fact, other than curl up in a ball when prodded, I have had little luck getting him to do anything noteworthy.

Let’s face it, he’s a boring bug.

So why write a post about him? Why, indeed!

I think it has to do with the fact, that I came across a fancy yellow stripped one the other day. His features were more exotic than his chocolate-brown brothers, so I took a picture.

He looks pretty good, doesn’t he? I wonder what he’d taste like?

Katydid.

Can you spot him? He's hiding very well....

He looked wildly out of place in our observation room. His bright Spring-green wings positively shimmered in the dim light and caught my eye. He was beautiful.

So after checking on my patient, I reached up on the pole used to keep the mosquito nets in place and cupped him in my hands. This made the women in the room titter in nervous laughter; but I’m used to that.

Fighting and flaying he tried to get away but his exoskeleton wasn’t designed for speed. Although he flew a few feet I was able to catch him again with ease.

Beautiful. Intricate.

Walking toward the compound with him in hand, I looked for a better home for my new friend --something with leaves. The vine covered wall of our dining hall seemed perfect and I let him free.

But not before I got a picture.

This guy is easily 2 inches long. When his wings opened for his escape it reminded me of a para-glider diving off a cliff.

Smooth. Steady. Strong.

Not sure what to call him, I looked him up on the internet. The pictures I compared with him say he’s a Katydid.

Any entomologists out there that would disagree?

When I admire his fine markings and his exact coloring for camouflage, I’m impressed. Truly God made everything perfect and good!

The heavens declare His glory... but so do the Katydids!

Animal Orphanage

There are a number of attractions to see in Kenya, not the least of which is its amazing wildlife!

Kenya is home to a number of animal orphanages. I am told they get most of their animals from illegal animal trafficking. They are able to release many of the animals back into the wild but many of the Big Cats (lions, leopards and cheetahs) can never be re-integrated.

Instead they endure hours of baking in the sun, sleepily watching as tourists pass with cameras in hand.

What they must think of the show... I can only imagine!

Stripped hyenas and civet cats have little havens next to a whole mess of lions and one eerily large ostrich.

(Honestly, I didn’t think they could get so big! Now I see how people could saddle and race them! But riding one looks like a disaster ready to happen. Images of bull riding mixed with a chicken with the speed of a pedigree stallion jumps to mind. Just saying.)

I got to have a monkey eat from my hand. Which was fun. I like monkeys.

And we almost got to hold a 3 month old lion cub... but in the end couldn’t be arranged. The guide would have had to sneak us in and well, the bosses were watching. We came at the wrong time of day.

It was worth it, of course.

Oh... and I even saw a Zee-donk!

What’s a Zee-donk?

It’s what you get when a donkey and zebra fall in love.

Think grey body, pointed ears and stripped legs. Beautiful and unique, but definitely an Oops.

Technicolored Wildlife!

Lizards in the Mohave desert (aka: where I’m from) are brown... a dull brown with horny spikes. But in Sudan, lizards are a fun kind of different. Technicolored different. In fact, they come in stripped blue with patches of yellow!

If you ask a herpetoligist (aka: lizard-geek) you’ll learn this lovely animal is called a Nucras Caesicaudata, better known as the Blue-tailed Sandveld. It is easily identifiable by its blue tail and hails from the land of sand and sun -- like Sudan.

I just call him beautiful! I'd love to have one as a pet... but I think the cats keep eating them. It's hard to say... They are pretty hard to catch! ha ha...

One Depressed Dog.

When Suzy and the kids left on Friday, Ouchi, the happy-go-lucky-wag-my-tail-till-it-hurts dog started sulking. At first she just moped and wondered the compound aimlessly. But then it escalated. Each day something new was destroyed. She chewed the stuffing out of couch pillows one day and gnawed through her leash the next. 

What can I say? She has lost her spark for life.

Today wasn’t so bad. She played football with the boys and ran about cheerfully. She has even decided to eat her food again. Stacy says she’s moping as much for Jane (our cook that returned to Nairobi after 6 months) as she is for the kids. I think she might be right. Ouchi’s life is either in the kitchen or chasing kids.

Hopefully she’ll snap out of it soon. But who knows, it might take them all coming back for her to bounce back. We’ll see.

The birds of the air... the beast of the field.

Me and My Badger. Any suggestions for a name?

This land is full of exotic animals of every shape and color. I love living with so much variety of life. Some of them are dangerous – like the snakes and scorpions. Whereas others are just fascinating and fun.

Last week our hen hatched a few chicks who chirp and scurry in the cutest of ways. We put them in the kennel with the Dik-dik and together they seem content. The Dik-dik is admittedly a bit harassed.

Well, last week a hawk spied them and came in for a kill. Suzy was able to scare away it the first time but when it tried again later that day, it was caught instead. Sabet was able to trap it against the fence. It was beautifully sharp and wasn’t much happy with its predicament.

Suzy suggested we feed it to the dog because it’d just come back for the chicks. I asked to keep it instead (or at least until the chicks grew up enough not to be threatened) and Sabet agreed. So I put it in a cage in my room and dreamed of building an aviary, etc.

But by the time I got back from work, the chicken coop was reinforced and I was free to release the hawk. It made me happy to send it back to the wild but a little sad too. I was happy to think I might get to have a hawk as a pet.

Not long after (or was it before), little Jeddie (Suzy’s and Sabet’s boy) caught the resident hedgehog.

Yup. You read that right. A hedgehog! Hedgehogs are adorable! Pointy but adorable. I named him Horacio and was fully ready to keep him but he wouldn’t eat anything I gave him. I couldn’t let him starve. He’s just too cute. So we liberated him. We still see him hanging out around the toilets some nights. So I still think of him as a quasi-pet. 

Then today after church the kids were playing with a ‘skunk’. Skunk? I had to see for myself. For a skunk it had some strange markings – too many strips. It also had claws. Claws? That’s not right. Then of course the tail was all wrong as well. I’m no expert but I’m confident it’s not a skunk. It hasn’t sprayed us once.

But it’s small about the size of a kitten. As I considered what it could be I remembered seeing a badger not too many years back while living in Europe. It’s teeth are still nubs and it can’t bite or claw much of anything. It’s a baby something… why not a baby badger.

It hadn’t eaten in a day or two (according to Sabet), so I tried to give it milk by syringe. It fought me at first but then figured out it was food and ate its fill. He fell asleep in my hands immediately after—snuggling into me and making me smile.

This one I’m keeping because he’ll eat and I have no idea how to find it’s mom. Right now he’s asleep on my floor under a cage, snuggled up on a pile of leaves.

Badgers are noctural. I wonder what tonight will sound like. I hope he doesn’t do his screaming thing again. That would be just heartbreaking! He has a call/scream that gives me a chill.

Anyone want to bet I can teach him to walk on a leash?  He he he

Cats in a bag!

So procreation isn’t just among those in my antenatal care program. Those of the feline persuasion have been busy as well! Apparently, what started out as one cat, a year or so back, has multiplied to about 7 trash-raiding-scrangy beasts!

I’m told the main ‘mama’ is named Sasha. She has had a litter every six months or so. So now we are truly infested. They are on counters, eating out of dishes, turning over trash cans and meowing like mad when barred from the dinning hall.

I understand that a cat’s got to eat. But come on! If only the Sudanese considered them food like the Filipinos! (Wait. Do Filipinos eat cat? Or is it just dog?)

I’m on a campaign to gather them in a sack and drown them in the nearest river. I figure a watery grave is somewhat poetic and a VERY appropriate way for these mangy beast to die. But I’m getting a lot of resistance.

Even though they are feral and too nasty to even touch, we are suppose to somehow find them ‘adorable’ and call them ‘pets’.

Now lest you think me a heartless-cat-hating fiend, let me tell you, I’m a ‘cat person’. I love cats. I’ve had wonderful cats as pets and loved on them in style.

These are not cats. These are worm infested pests with fur that MUST DIE!

My new plan is to bag them and send them on our next outreach to Maloney (a town we do medical outreach to in the country). I figure we can release them in the country. That way we are not drowning them, we are freeing them from their dependency on our trash cans.

Perhaps they can be adopted by a nice family out there… or eaten by hyenas.

I prefer the latter.

Hyenas Bite! Literally....

At dinner one night, our guard called the staff for an emergency. The report was something about a hyena. Hyena? That got everyone’s attention. I decided I needed to find out.

When we got to the clinic, a man was splayed out on my prenatal bed, obviously in pain. He had made a make-shift wrap around his foot which was dirty from walking. He had a walking stick laying beside him- apparently for his ridiculous limp.

Unwrapping the bandage showed a foot gouged out on the top with two deep puncture wounds beneath. We could actually peel back the filleted layer of skin and see the tendons of his toes beneath.

It was over a day since his attack so we couldn’t suture. Instead we irrigated the wound, dressed and bandaged it. The man had to work very hard not to call out in pain. I wouldn’t have chided him if he had. It was painful just to look at!

The story told us was the night before he was tending his goats in the field. The men here sleep in tents out with their cattle and goats. They are rural shepherds much like I imagine King David was in his day. They are always ready to fend off predators – whether they are wild animals or cattle raiders.

Well, this night, he was asleep and a hyena came calling. It reached inside (supposedly for the goat) and got his foot instead. He was pulled several meters before the hyena gave up and went away. I’m sure he fought him off in every way possible too.

What a way to be woken in the night!

What the heck is a Dik-dik?

Imagine a miniature deer with fir much like a wild hare. Make sure you keep it small in your head, sort of like an emaciated cat with ridiculously long legs -all awkward and skittish, skipping around daintily,barely touching the ground. Glue grape sized protruding orbits for eyes and a wee bit of fluff for a tail and there you have it… a dik-dik!

I mentioned to Suzy about how it must taste like rabbit and she cringed. I guess she has a soft bone for family pets. I figure it can be eaten if necessary but is unlikely to satisfy a child.

The resident Dik-dik here on the compound is named Bambi. She looks like something that stepped out of a fairy tale and has an infected eye. It oozes gunk and should come out. Any vets want to come out and do a little surgery? You could save Bambi!