Our first Zambian Christmas!

We had a great rest of our trip in Zimbabwe. It was sad to say goodbye to Jona's Uncle and Auntie but we were able to be there to celebrate Uncle Des's birthday before we left and we took them out for a nice meal at 'Hillside Dams' restaurant.

From there we travelled to Victoria Falls and had booked in at the 'rest camp', when we arrived they said they had lost the key to the chalet that we were going to stay in :-S BUT instead they could let us stay in a family sized lodge for the same price! We felt very blessed :-) The rest camp was basic but lovely. They had a pool and a restaurant. We had a great 3 days at Victoria Falls looking round the tiny town, chilling and of course seeing the Falls!

Then we decided to make the lonnnng trek back to the school in Chingola. We had decided (if possible) we would try and do it all in one go to save the hassle (and cost) of one more nights accomodation.
Our journey started at 6am crossing the border back into Zambia and the first leg of our journey went relatively smoothly, it took us 7 hrs to travel to Lusaka. But once we got to Lusaka we realised that we had missed the connecting bus so we had to try and search around for another decent coach to take. There were lots of sellers hassling us to get on their coach etc and in the end we got so fed up with all the hassling that we just bought a ticket which 'claimed' to take us all the way to Chingola (another 7ish hrs) and would be leaving very soon. Well...very soon meant another 1.5hrs of sitting on a hot bus with lots of agitated customers! There's a lot more to the story but all in all it was quite a nerve racking, packed full journey. We thought we would arrive in Chingola around 11pm but then realised that the bus didn't even go to Chingola so we had to transfer on to another coach which was full to the brim with luggage and people in the aisles etc. We finally got home at 2am and were sooo relieved and thankful to God to be back and safely!!
When we told our local zambian friends which bus company we had used they laughed and said they would never step foot on those buses! eek. But it was certainly an African experience!

We have had a lovely quiet christmas here at the school. We were lucky that our friend lent us a few decorations and we used our house plant as a christmas tree!! :-)
We thank God that although we missed home and our families we were able to spend the day with friends who also remained on the school site for Christmas. We were also happy to have a traditional turkey lunch and then a less traditional braai in the evening! A bit too much food for one day but a really great day!!

School term doesn't begin until the 10th January so we still have a bit of time to relax and get ready for the new term :-)
Thanks to everyone who has sent cards, parcels and christmas merriment- it is hugely appreciated and so good to hear from those at home. Lots of love. Jona and Kerry x