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- Zorah with the Christmas tree.
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- Alex and Zorah with Christmas headphones on…life is good!
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- Linda sitting in front of the faux fireplace we made so Santa could visit us in Beirut…roasting some marshmallows!
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- Denny ready to share our Christmas morning cinnamon rolls….wearing his new arabic hat!
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- Monastary in Kozaya vally on the way back from Cedars
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- Linda in the Cedars snow..
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- Dad on the look out over the Cedars
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- More peaceful snow scenes
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- Mountain view from the bus
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- Alex overlooking the valley at Khalil Gibran Museum
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- Family with the valley behind at Khalil Gibran Museum on the way up the mountains to the Cedars
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- Khalil Gibran Sculpture
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- Dad back at the apartment having fun playing Tap Tap Mahna Mahna (Muppets) on the iPad.
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- One of our local fruit guys
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- Dinner with Dad at our place
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- Zorah’s birthday cake from early December….
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- Trip to Tunis and Carthage in early December
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- Zorah at Carthage
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- Dad on our 2nd Christmas morning with all the prezies he brought from the states!
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- Dad trying out a sweet lebnah breakfast sandwich on the way to Anjar and Baalbeck.
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- Dad and the family just before he gets in the taxi to the aiport off to Kolkata!
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- Entering part of the Baalbek site
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- More from Baalbeck to realize the enormity you MAYBE will see Alex as a tiny gray spec just to the right of the 2nd column at the base.
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- Dad with Sister Cyril in her little office, although seems Dad’s face to the right doesn’t show in this photo…she has several cats that mill about the campus.
Well we’re having a great Christmas break. We were able to buy a fake Christmas tree for not too much money, and we’ll be able to use it again next year here. The real ones that we saw cost $100 US dollars for a 5 foot one, not in the budget. We had a lovely Christmas morning here and made cinnamon rolls and shared them with neighbors, like we used to do back in Lansing. Kids opened presents and we played games and watched a movie.
Dad also came to visit us on his way to Kolkata for a three month stay. He’ll be helping Sister Cyril at the Loreto Sealdah school there with her Barefoot Teachers program, training thousands of teachers for India’s new Right To Education (RTE) reforendum which states all children have a right to be educated…so with millions of kids there needs to be thousands more teachers trained…Sister Cyril was asked by the government to assist. Dad is helping by assisting to create some teacher training videos!
While Dad was here we went on two day long tours around Lebanon. One was up to the mountains to see the Cedars of Lebanon and the snow! Along with Becharrah and Kozayah our tour info here. The other one was on New Years Day to the Bekaa Valley to see the incredibly huge roman ruins of Baalbeck. The excursions were very nice and included wonderful traditional Lebanese meals. On dad’s last evening here we enjoyed a nice Indian meal at a local restaurant on the water. Then he visited school on Wednesday, and even sat in on some of Alex and Zorah’s classes….that all went well and we were very glad to have him here!
I finally read your blog for the first time earlier this month. It was so good to catch up, but have not shown it to the kids yet. I (we) so want to skype with you – do I have the number?, what is the time difference? Also my kids aren’t good at skyping don’t want to stand in right place so you can see them but we all miss you a lot (okay I will be honest – we miss all of you but you know we spent the most time with Zorah so we REALLY miss her). I knew she was a great sitter but I keep realizing more and more how lucky I was (and hopefully will be again when you all return). Sounds like things are going well, I am so glad. What a wonderful experience (and even the tough times can be looked back at fondly and you guys are so good at just plowing through and looking at the bright side) The kids are getting big of course – Shamiya will be 4 on March 3rd. Let us know when and where to skype. Thanks! Renee