Hello again! We're still alive!

Hi all,
Time is flying!  Halloween and Thanksgiving passed so quickly and Christmas is rapidly approaching.  We are in a perpetual state of summer here, so it's hard to believe it's December.  We haven't posted anything in a long while, so we'll try to tell you about the important things.  Let's start with Halloween...
Adam told us his mom really loves to decorate for Halloween and that he was sad that he wouldn't be able to see his housewith all the decorations this year .  So, Ream and Leah made signs and banners and put them up to surprise him.  He was so happy and surprised when he came down in the morning and the kitchen and dining room looked like Halloween!  We also wanted to carve Jack-o-lanterns, but there aren't any pumpkins here in Togo.  However,  we did find something that looks like small round watermelons growing near the garden and thought that they might work.  Turns out, they worked just fine for carving but they taste so terrible!  They may have been oddly green, but we had Jack-o-lanterns for Halloween.  Leah even made popcorn that we tossed with cinnamon and sugar to help make it feel more like Halloween.  In the end, it may not have been just like at home, but it was really enjoyable for all of us to celebrate together.  Halloween isn't celebrated here, so people looked at us a little bit strangely when they saw our green watermelon-o-lanterns.  We attempted to explain the whole concept of Halloween and how and why it is celebrated the way it is at home, but we don't think anyone really understood much past the fact that it's a tradition for us.  It must be one of those things you have to experience to understand! And now, gli Italiani...
Two Italian surgeons, Antonio and Gabriele, arrived the first week of November.  Also, for two weeks in November, a couple from Italy, Paulo and Eva, came to teach Italian at the school.  At first, we weren't sure what it would be like to have four more people living with us, but it has turned out to be so wonderful, like having a big family!  As for our surgeon friends, Antonio is in his 70's and Gabriele is 36, and both are general surgeons.  Antonio has been coming here for one month at a time twice yearly for the last 3 years to perform surgeries for the people here.    Most of the surgeries done here are for hernias, but occasionally they will remove tumors and perform other soft tissue procedures.  All the surgeries for this year are finished and Antonio has just returned to Italy, but Gabriele has decided to stay here until the end of January to perform minor procedures that can be done with only local anesthesia.  We are very excited he is staying!  When Eva and Paulo were here,  Ream and Leah were happy to have another girl in the house, and the guys had Paulo to help them do manly things like causing mischief (ed. note: no actual "mischief" or any other trouble has been shown to have been caused.  Any mention of said mischief is solely conjecture and hearsay.  Comments or inquiries can be directed to the proper authorities.  Thank you for your time and understanding).  Thanks to Paulo's amazing cooking skills, we now know how to make gnocchi from scratch.  It has been so nice having other people living with us and sharing this experience, even if it is only temporary.  Now, on toThanksgiving...
Because it's not a holiday here and we all had to work, we decided to postpone Thanksgiving  until the following Sunday, and then because we hadn't had a chance to go shopping for the foods we needed, we postponed it again until December 1st.  When we had finally made all of the necessary preparations, we invited all of our Togolese friends and began to do the actual cooking.  We had turkey, mashed potatoes, macaroni and cheese, green bean casserole, gravy, dressing  (AKA stuffing), mixed vegetables, and "sweet potato" souffle.  Since there are no actual sweet potatoes here, we thought we would have to go without (alas, also there are no cranberries, so we didn't have the traditional cranberry relish).  However, on one of our trips to the big open market, we found a large squash that, while we had no idea what it would actually taste like, we thought we'd buy one of and just give it a try.  As it turns out, it tastes a lot like acorn or butternut squash and it made a beautiful substitute for sweet potatoes!  It was hard for all of us to be away from our families on what, for each of us, is usually a very family-centered day, but it was really fulfilling and joyous to be able to spend it with friends we have made here.  Also, we all had a chance to talk to our families on the telephone, so that made it a little easier as well.  Onwards with this narrative, toDecember...
December has been already and will continue to be a month of celebrations for our little family.  Besides the big one (Christmas), Leah's second annual 29th birthday was the 14th, Gabriele's 36th birthday was the 15th, and Ream's 24th birthday is the 31st. Of course there is also New Year's, but we'll be celebrating for Ream already.   There is not much in the way of entertainment here, at least not the types we have become accustomed to at home, but we seem to find great ways to celebrate special occassions nonetheless.  Sometimes "entertainment" can also equatae to distraction from the true reason for celebration.  The most important part of celebrating any of these holidays is to spend quality time with people that we love.  As such, we have celebrated each holiday quite well!
We are taking pictures all the time and hope to be able to post some.  Our Christmas present  to everyone, such as it is, will hopefuly be multiple blog posts (with pictures?!?) over the next few weeks.  For now, enjoy some photos that Gabriele (and also Tim) has taken over the last month.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/nz6voi8iyu9aqzg/FQKCZ2bK9U

Look forward to posts about:
Leah's work at the dispensary
Our gardening project
Beer in Togo
Cooking and eating local food
The roof/lounge/thingamajigger of our house
Funny quotes from Africa
People we have met
And of course, photos (we hope)

As always, we love and miss you all, and your support and encouragement has been and still is so important to all of us.  Thank you for making it possible for us to be here!  God bless you all.

-Tim and Leah