Clothes, Shopping & Congo

Another blog of randomness...

Today was my last day off, I did laundry, went grocery shopping, cleaned, organized and started packing. Many of my clothes are ruined from the crappy washing machine and intense African sun, so some of them I am merely returning with because I want to use them to cushion the gifts I'm bringing home, and then to the trash they go. Some of my clothes are staying here simply because I can spare them and some of the staff members would like them. Since I also brought an entire suitcase full of donations and activity folders, I can fit one suitcase inside the other and only have to return with a carry-on and one suitcase! I am quite a light packer, although from previous blogs you can see that 9 outfits was a bit extreme, I'm so sick of my clothes!!!

We took two of the kids grocery shopping with us today, it's an extra treat when they are on holiday. Sometimes I am concerned that these kids live sheltered lives, they hardly get out, especially the littlest ones who don't go to school. When I am out on a walk it is very typical for me to see a four year old walking by himself with a little jerry can for water, but our kids don't know how to walk by themselves to school. It's certainly one of my suggestions on their evaluation: when running local errands always take a kid along to help them observe their environment and learn by seeing.

I was reading today about the atrocities in Congo, do you know that over 1,000 women are raped every day in DRC?! In my facebook post I shared the link (which I never do, besides to my blog) with a comment that maybe it's because I'm only a few hours from these atrocitities, or maybe because they are so egregious, but I am so flabbergasted that CNN and BBC aren't broadcasting about this from every media angle possible because the Congolese deserve as much attention as Syria and Gaza.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/27/opinion/congo-war-ignored-vava-tampa/index.html?fb_action_ids=10151327469756096&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=288381481237582