What news?

I’m unsure of what to update everyone on.
I’m getting strong again, so I’m getting out again. I might even go for a easy ride later today or tomorrow, on account of it being overcast today. Overcast! Would you believe it, during dry season?!
Oh, it RAINED last night. We just ran our tank dry and had to clean it. There were four—count ‘em, FOUR—fuzzy, floating mouse carcasses in there, along with a splattering of lizards and some unknown masses. This time, it really turned my stomach. Seriously, we bathe in that, cook with that… DRINK that. Meh.
Anyway, we were feeling the pinch of having no water. Life just gets instantly harder. Everything is more work. But then it rained. I laid in bed and tried to hear each individual rain drop for as long as I could, and thank God for each one. Kim was just laying there, too, happy. So now we have water—probably a third of a tank. I never been in such a situation, to be so dependent on and so joyful in God’s gift of rain.
Yesterday, I dragged myself up to Abuba’s just to sit there with her and crack peanuts. I enjoy just sitting here, trying to perfect my form. I even sort of enjoy it when they endlessly make fun of me for being too slow and inept. I don’t actually enjoy eating peanuts all that much, so it always makes me laugh when Abuba gives me two fistfuls and yells at me to “Sema!” (“Eat them!”)
That’s how the Lopit talk—they don’t ask, they demand. They’re yelling, aggressive folk. That took some getting used to. But I’ve realized that the three of us have taken up a lot of that same manner in our talking. That’s part of learning the language, I guess—you can’t just learn the words, you have to learn the form and the nuance. So it’s gotten less abrasive to my ears to marshal around my friends, just as they marshal us around. (“Mary, come and greet me! Drink this! Take this! We’re going to church. Go change your clothes and come. Give me that! Where are you going?! Why?! Fine. Go!”) You may think it’s impossible to do that and do act in love. But it’s not. It works, somehow.