This weekend, the kids and I spent some time talking about how they felt about the transition to Africa and how they felt things were going. As as starting point, I wrote down a few open-ended questions and encouraged them to respond. Here’s what they said:

We like: ugali, fresh fruit, lizards, the weather, having lots of kids to play with.

We don’t like: spiders, ants

We miss: pizza and ice cream (figures their answers were all about food!)

Biggest difference between Africa and America: weather, people

We wish: people spoke English

Things that are easy: “Not much is easy”

Things that are hard: getting water

We like to eat: ugali, sweet and sour beans, beef, roasted corn

We don’t like to eat: greens, plain avocadoes

Additional comments?: “It’s nicer than America!”

I’m sure I would have answered a lot of these questions differently, but I can’t say the answers surprised me. I was surprised to have the majority of the children all answer virtually at the same time that they wished people spoke English. It is certainily difficult to communicate with a limited understanding of Swahili, although we are grateful to know several folks who speak at least *some* English. We’re learning Swahili, but probably not fast enough for any of us!