Rukia

[Sharifa (Rukia's mother) - Rukia - Me - Keith - posed just outside their home in Kibera (their home is the turquoise painted wall...the front door is just out of the photo on the left)]

Yesterday I got to once again spend time with the most beautiful teenage girl I know.  Our team headed to a project on the outskirts of the Kibera slum, the largest slum in East Africa, and the home to my sponsor child, Rukia.  We listened to a program about how the project directors run the program.  We took tea.  I met the mother of my mother's sponsor child Issac.  I met my friend Sunny's sponsor child, Joseph Maina.  And then I went to Rukia's house.

Keith had already visited her home in May of 2009 on another trip and I'd seen some photos of the walk through Kibera.  But you can't prepare yourself for the crowds, the smells, and the narrow bee-hive-like pathways until you walk them yourself.  Our little group consisting of me, Rukia, Keith, Nick, Triss, Stella, Tony and a project worker walked through the bustle of the main road and then ducked through a nearly invisible tin "gate" then walked through narrow alley after narrow alley...I wondered how many years it had taken Rukia as a child to learn her way through this network of passages on her own...and then we turned a corner into a quiet nook and saw her mother dressed in a beautiful traditional purple gown waiting for us.

We all crammed inside their tiny house...Rukia's mother Sharifa had obviously cleaned for the occasion.  Although she has a one room place in the slum, it hasn't stifled her decorating taste...lace curtains across the window, a lace curtain dividing the single room in to half...a lace doily on the small end table on which she'd displayed the framed picture of Keith and I that I'd sent with him as a gift in 2009.   Stella, one of our Compassion graduates, jumped right in as translator and we spoke with Sharifa about Rukia, about the rest of the family (10 of them live in this one room), about how happy she was that we had come so far to visit, about what she wanted us to remember in prayer.

She said that since Rukia joined Compassion that she has become much more obedient as a daughter, has begun to take on responsibilities helping to care for the two young nieces that Sharifa is raising after her daughter-in-law passed away, that her entire character and attitude has improved, and that she does not act like the other children in the slum.  Rukia's birthday is today, so I gave her a necklace to celebrate (she's 14 now!) and we sang "Happy Birthday" which has about 5 verses in Africa.  :)  We prayed.  We laughed.  I almost cried on any number of occasions.  At one point I asked a question and Stella translated Sharifa's brief answer: "She is just so very overwhelmed at it all."

Leaving them there was so difficult.  Sharifa has been there, in that very house, for 15 years...and for the past 12 has been a single parent since her husband died in a traffic accident.  But their hope gave me encouragement.  Sharifa hopes that her older daughter would be able to go to University.  That Rukia would realize her dreams of being a doctor.  She told Keith and me that she was so happy for our marriage and wished us many blessings.  Somehow...in that uncertain environment, they were happy and hopeful.  And I am happy and hopeful.  Happy that this beautiful family has become a part of our family, and hopeful that Rukia will be yet another triumph in breaking the cycle of poverty. 

[Just another angle of the photo from the top.]

Masai Country

So it's actually Wednesday morning here in Nairobi, but I'm going to ask you to step back in time with me to Monday afternoon when we visited the Masai lands.  I'm just going to give you a brief overview and then post pictures for you to enjoy as I think that's the best way to communicate this beautiful culture.   I think the thing that struck me the most was the disproportionate amount of work the mother does.  Throughout the day they kept telling us all the chores the mother has to do (which we did for her the day we visited!  What a learning experience).  She washes the dishes, cooks the food, she builds the very house that the family lives in, she fetches the water, she collects firewood (which is really cow dung), she raises the children, she collects and burns any litter that might be around the grounds of the family compound.  She milks the livestock.  From what we could tell, the only tasks the men do are keep the cow pen clean of dung and stand out in the fields and watch the goats, cows and sheep graze.  Momma has an awful lot of work to do!  We spent a morning helping the family with their chores and then ate lunch and watched a program where the women and children sang for us and put on a drama depicting a Masai wedding ceremony.  The landscape was so beautiful that I think it was difficult for me to remember that this was just another face of poverty, albeit a picturesque one.  When we helped fetch the water, it was approximately a 3 mile round trip walk, half of that carrying heavy jugs of water.  They said that the women sometimes make that trip 2 or even 3 times a day depending on the needs of the family.  And while to us Americans it seemed like such a beautiful and simple way of life, we were reminded that theirs is a difficult cycle to break.  Most of the children will grow up and remain in the community without opportunity to attend University or pursue other dreams.  It was encouraging to see the work of Compassion in this community and the faith of the Masai!

 

[Our group arrives at a Masai home for our home visit.]

[Stella, a Compassion LDP student and Compassion graduate, laughs as they show me how to carry water!]

[I found this to be a much more suitable water carrying method.  :) ]

 [Unlike the Masai men, Keith was happy to help out when I got tired of carrying water.  I taught him everything I knew about water carrying technique.  haha.]

 [The patriarch of the Masai family we visited shows Keith the best way to shovel cow dung.  Apparently it's quite an art.]

 

[Our home visit team (me, Keith, Nick, Amy, Stella, and Boniface) with the Masai family whose home compound we visited as well as the pastor of the church and a Compassion project worker.]

 

[Some of the mothers of Compassion children sang songs for us in their brightly colored garb.]

 

[I believe these ladies were the church choir, but there seemed to be a good deal of overlap.]

 [At the end of the day, we divided into teams of two and each planted a tree outside the Compassion Project office to commemorate our visit.  I hope to return to see a tall tree in that spot one day!]

Maina

So I'm about to get things a little out of order....but hang with me.  I've still not blogged about yesterday which was our visit to Masai country...but I just had to blog about Maina quickly.  Maina is sponsored by a good friend of ours, so we had requested to meet him and had brought a gift for him from his sponsor.  Unfortunately poor Maina met the front of a Nissan last Thursday on his way home from school and ended up with a terrible scrape across his forehead.  Thankfully, there were no other injuries except the obvious of what you can see, and he seems to be bouncing back quite nicely.  Keith took this video today right after we gave him his backpack.  If his giggle doesn't make your day, I'd venture to say you don't have a soul. 

Safari Walk with our kids!

So since I'm a day behind now due to the exhaustion that set in last night....It's Monday evening here in Nairobi, but I'm going to be blogging about our Sunday.  I'll try to write another post tomorrow morning  to get us back on track....so be sure to check back either LATE Monday evening (CST) or early Tuesday morning (CST)!  Or else, you'll just have multiple entries to read at once which is perfectly OK too.  :)

[The team on the bus headed to church and then to the Safari Walk on Sunday morning!!]

We started out Sunday morning by attending Nairobi Pentecostal Church - Woodley.  I was surprised at how "Western" the service was...the entire thing was in English and after the third Michael W. Smith song, I'd about forgotten that I was in Africa at all!  (I filled out the visitor card and this afternoon received a lovely email from the outreach team inviting me to please visit anytime I happen to be in Nairobi!  Love it!)  Post-church-service lunch was spent at Nairobi Java House which is sort of a cross between a Starbucks and a sandwich joint....well, and I had quesadillas while another guy had chicken curry.....so I'm not sure how to classify it.

Of course what we'd REALLY all been waiting for was time with our sponsored children.  We all drove to the "Safari Walk" just outside the city which is truly one of the best zoos I've ever been to (and I've been to the Memphis, Ft. Worth and San Diego zoos...so, you know....I've seen a few...haha.)  All the animals are African animals and the habitat is completely natural.  The bilingual Swahili/English signs are really informational and you walk on a boardwalk through the whole thing which makes you really feel like you're walking through the animals' natural habitats.  Keith and I had arranged for his sponsor boy, Tony from Dandora, my little girl Rukia from Kibera and my mother's sponsor child, Issac...also from Rukia's project in Kibera to meet us there.  It's truly an amazing thing when a child who up until that moment has just been a face in a photo, a name on a letter and a $38 withdrawal on your credit card every month comes running at you with a smiling face and a hug the strength of a vice grip, and you realize that this "good thing" you think you're doing is far beyond that.  It's a relationship...and it's changing the nature of that child's very existence.

 [Our Compassion "family" inside the Safari Walk park.  Issac wasn't so sure about all the group photo taking!!]

Keith has sponsored Tony for almost 6 years now and has met him several times, but was amazed at how tall he has grown in the year and half since they last saw each other!  Tony is an incredibly kind, good-natured (tall!) and gentle 14 year old who is at the top of his class.  They enjoyed catching up and talking about Tony's family and how well Tony is doing in school!  He wants to be a doctor and he is in the top few students of his class!

 [Tony and Keith.  I think next time we see him, Tony will totally be taller than Keith!!]

I've sponsored Rukia since the spring of 2009.  Keith got to meet her shortly after I began to sponsor her, so I've been blessed with many pictures and a few videos from that trip, but was thrilled to finally get to meet her for myself.  She stuck to me (literally...she wouldn't let me further than a few inches away from her) like glue and seemed as equally really-excited-but-not-sure-what-to-do-with-her-emotions as I was.  We talked a good bit (English is her best subject) and giggled even more.  I get to visit her home tomorrow and I am so excited to see her again.  When I asked her what her favorite sport was, she replied "futball" (soccer).  When asked if she owned a "futball" she replied, no....but that she'd much rather have a bicycle.  :)  At least she's honest.

 

[Rukia was super sassy stylish in her beaded sandals she bought with extra money I'd sent her family as a gift.]

When my mom wanted to sponsor a child, I was excited to find one in the same project as Rukia!  Issac is super smart, but was really quiet all day.  It wasn't until we were giving them their gifts that I found out that part of why he'd been so quiet was that he was disappointed when I showed up instead of my Mom...who sponsors him!!!  He dreams of being an engineer when he grows up.  There were several university students with us who had been Compassion children growing up, and one of them took a few minutes to really encourage him to work hard in his studies so that he can go to University and achieve his dreams.  He seemed to really take her words to heart and she promised to go visit him and talk to him some more about his future which was awesome!  I really hope my Mom gets to meet him one day!!!

 

[Issac and I after a long day of animal spotting and gift opening!]

There is so much more that went on with the kids and in my thoughts....but that's all I've got for tonight!  Please continue to pray for our trip!

Jonathan & Ryan's points of view

Hey guys....because I didn't get a chance to blog yesterday, I'll link you up with Jonathan Whitt...a guy who did get to write about meeting his little girl, Martha (he's also got another post or two about our trip).  Very cool stuff.   http://www.oldtokens.com/

I'd also recommend checking out Ryan's blog as well.  I've got some great trip mates! 

• http://heytherejohnryan.blogspot.com/

Blog Links

To give you a little background on this trip, Keith is the trip leader from Compassion International and the group with us consists completely of employees of a fantastic Birmingham-Alabama-based ministry called Student Life that runs summer camps for teenagers.  Student Life is a ministry partner of Compassion and they promote the work of Compassion at their camps in effort to find new sponsors to sponsor children in the Compassion program.   The group with us are some dynamic folks...all with a passion for the Lord, social justice, and a world view that understands that when Christ said we are to take care of the poor, that he meant all of them....no matter their geographical location.


That being said, I thought I'd link you up to the blogs of some of my trip-mates as I know we'll all see things differently, we'll each remember things that the other forgot, and in some cases...we'll even be in different places such as home visits where they will document things I wasn't even present for.  So this first blog I'll post is from a guy named Bo.  You can read his blog at http://bobe85.wordpress.com/
Check it out.  It's great!  More will follow.

Mathare Valley

This is the view out of my hotel room window!!!

Well, I'm exhausted (and a little sunburnt) but absolutely in love with the Kenyan people! We did our first project visit this morning to the Mathare slum which is the second largest slum, population wise, in Kenya. (Kibera is in first place). We had an amazing time at the project this morning. The project director spoke and gave us some information on the area and then a few children gave various performances. When it was time for the children to perform, a kid named Nelson was put in charge of being the emcee and this kid was hilarious! He totally could have been a circus ringmaster, or we decided that he will some day host a Kenyan late-night talk show (ala David Letterman). First, a boy sang, then another boy recited scripture verses and then a small choir came and sang a few more songs. Then Nelson asked for our group to perform so I got the opportunity to do play a song on the violin (which was really cool because almost none of the kids and most of the project workers had never seen one in real life) and then our entire group got up and sang Amazing Grace together. After the assembly ended, we were served tea and broken up in to groups where we observed the classes that the children participate in on Saturdays. Keith and another boy and I sat in on a "cognitive" class for 12-14 year olds where the topic of the day was how to make a good decision. The teacher, Kelvin, was a really dynamic young guy. Those kids are blessed to have his instruction and example.

 [The kids sounded great singing for us!!!]

After class time, we broke into three groups and did home visits. Keith and I, along with several others in our team, visited the home of Ann, a 17 year old girl who lives in the thick of the Mathare valley. We aren't sure where her parents are, but she lives with her older brother and his wife Tabitha, her younger sister, and Tabitha and her brothers three children who are 11, 9, 7, and 1. Ann and Tabitha were both very shy, but were excited to have us visit their home. Ann loves to sing and said she dreams of being a pilot someday. She is in class 8, which is the last year of primary school and is about to begin her four years of high-school. She won my heart a bit. The trip to their home required a long walk through narrow passages filled with wet stinky sewage and then across a bridge over a river. The views from the bridge were incredible, but unfortunately there was also an illegal brewery operating in plain view and our country staff advised us that it was not safe to take photos in that area. Even though I've been to that place, and walked the alleys, it still seems surreal that people actually live there and that it wasn't a movie set. I think it will take me a while to process what I saw and smelled. I've spent the day thinking through lots of things that I won't blog right now....and may never blog about.

[Entering the Mathare Slum...you can see that it stretches on for a while.  We walked a good ways before we got to Ann's home]

 

[Ann's sister-in-law, Tabitha, holds her 1 year old boy in the home she and her husband share with his two sisters and their own four children.  The baby didn't know what to think of me.]

[Ann and I on the grounds of her school which we visited on the way home from her house]

 

[Keith and I loved meeting this boy, John, who was as hilarious as he was smart. ]

 

After the home visits we got to serve lunch to the children at the project. I was thrilled to be stationed behind a large bag of chipati to hand out! (Chipati is a thin, soft bread, sort of like a thick tortilla or pita bread, or the naan that is served with Indian food.) It was hard not to eat it all myself! It's one of my favorite foods! Then we ate lunch at the project and luckily, there was a whole stack of chipati for us too, so I might have eaten 3 of them! We also had beef and mashed potatoes and rice. It was all delicious.

 [Serving one of the Compassion students a piece of chipati. Mmm Mmm, Good!!]

After returning to the hotel, (and having an hour to take showers!!!) we all ate a lovely dinner in the hotel restaurant, and then we all went our separate ways, and Keith and I were happy to be able to return to our rooms at 8:00pm! It will be lovely to get a good nights sleep before tomorrow's activities! I am so excited because tomorrow I'll get to meet Rukia, my sponsor child!!! Be sure to check back as I know I'll have lots to say tomorrow night. :)

Blessings, from Kenya

If its Monday....it must be Arkansas......

The auditorium....before the audience arrived! What a great venue!


David and the rest of the band rehearsing for the show!

Whew. So I’ve clearly (again) fallen behind on my writing. So much has happened since my last entry that there is no way I could possibly try to catch up in detail….so I’ll give you a brief overview:

July/August: Spent a fabulous month at the JH Ranch serving in the worship band as well as on the high ropes courses. It was an amazing time again to see so many lives radically changed, including my own (again!) and to spend time with friends new and old and get in some good ole fashioned camping and such!

September: Got to spend a wonderful week in Colorado with my dear friend Mary-Hall and her husband August (the man, not the month). Keith was out there as well for some meetings the first part of the week so we got to explore Rocky Mountain National Park, the first snow of the year on Pikes’ Peak and take a tour of Compassion (Keith’s company) Headquarters.

October: lead worship at a few wonderful Outback America events……but most notably, KEITH AND I GOT ENGAGED ON OCTOBER 11 on a Ronnie gig in Asheville, North Carolina. He took me to the Overlook at The Cove, the Billy Graham training facility and got down on one knee. It was the most perfect proposal that I can imagine. For the entire story, check out our wedding website here.

November: In the midst of lots of wedding planning and traveling, I started a Fall/Christmas tour with Christian singer David Phelps. It’s a great gig….lots of nice people…but whew! Learning all the music is quite a challenge! Keith and I were also blessed to get to spend an entire week in North and South Carolina visiting his entire family for Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful visit and I got to meet (amidst a gaggle of aunts, uncles and cousins) Keith’s Grandmother, Dad, Step mom Dreama, and older brother Brian, the 4 members of his family I hadn’t gotten to meet yet. They were wonderful and it’s at Dreama’s request that I’ve decided to return to my blog once again. You can thank her, or blame her, however you want to look at it. ;)

And I guess that brings you up to snuff on my life, in short, over the past few months. At present, I’m sitting on stage at a church in Texarkana, Arkansas in the middle of sound check (It’s taken me about 4 hours to write this blog installment because I keep having to stop and work. Haha.) for our second Christmas show of the tour. We kicked it off last night at “The Pentecostals of Alexandria” in Louisiana and are excited about another great show tonight. Christmas is such a fun time of year for me because it’s really the only time of year that I get to sing anymore…and while background vocal parts are always a challenge, it’s fun to dust off my vocal chords and give it a whirl. Speaking of….I think I’m needed onstage again. J Keep checking back…it’s going to be a busy December and I’ll be blogging along the way. Merry Christmas!

Hellooooooooo,Sacramento!

So I don't have much time to post, because my friend Kim and a few other Ranch staffers are on their way to pick me up (with In and Out burger for me to go...might I add) ...but thought I'd let you all know that I've arrived in Sacramento! Thus begins a 4 hour trek to the Ranch! I'm so excited to be here! I'll have an update with more news soon....but for now I wanted to let everyone know I'd arrived....and to remind you to check back!
Blessings!


I mean...I'm here for a month! Cut me some slack! :)


blogging in the baggage claim. I'm a girl on the go!

"Let's Go to the Movies" :The sequel

So today I'm packing like a madwoman trying to figure out how to get everything I'll need for an entire month (including bedding) into two suitcases. However, since I've been on a blogging roll as of late, and I'd hate to break my streak now...I figured I'd post something for your viewing pleasure to amuse you until my first California post which will be sometime either Sunday night but more likely Monday.

Here is Episode Two of Emily's golf cart tourism future. In this episode we learn about the various trees that inhabit the woods. I'm not sure what happened to the British accent she was using on the previous day, but this video contains some sort of funny voice, although I can't quite determine what sort of voice/accent it is. :) Hope you enjoy this peek into our 4th of July with two of my favorite girls!




Watch out for that tree, Uncle Keith!!!

Rollin' on the River.

For those of you (my parents) who have actually followed our entire vacation via my blog and thus are eagerly awaiting the exciting conclusion..my apologies that it's Friday and I'm just now getting around to putting up Wednesday's post. But to be honest...I've been completely exhausted and this is the first second I've gotten to just sit down and type. So...without further ado....

Since Keith and I decided we needed one more day of vacation, we drove back to Columbia Wednesday morning to go tube the Saluda River. Keith found Palmetto Outdoors through Google, made a reservation, invited his brother Mark, and off we went. Well...sort of. The story is a tad more complicated and amusing than that. When we arrived in Columbia at 1 pm (we'd called on the way and made a 4pm reservation for 3) it was overcast. Nay, thundering and stormy. We were pretty determined that we wanted to tube the river, but Keith (and I really...if I'm going to be honest) was worried that tubing a river during a thunder and lightning storm wouldn't be the best idea. Especially since we've seen all too recently what lightning can do. So we called the tubing comany. No, they said, they didn't think there were any storms on the radar. We'd be fine to tube at 4. We called Mark. Mark claimed that he and their other brother Brian had tubed the river in the rain plenty of times. ("In fact, most of the times we've gone tubing it rains. Once we had thunder and lightning but we just climbed out of the water onto some rocks. We'll be fine.") Keith and I, not entirely convinced this was safe, but both too excited about tubing to cancel unless forced, decide to forge ahead with our plans. At the tubing office we are greeted by the most thorough, professional teenage boy either of us had ever met who laid out the 3 rules of the company:
1. Always stay in your tube.
2. Always point your feet downstream.
3. Never stand up in whitewater.
We fill out waivers and surrender Keith's drivers' licence as collateral. (He asked if Keith was the "group leader" and then continued to refer to him as such...much to our amusement. What did we look like...a youth group?) It's 3:30. He tells us the shuttle will meet us at the parking lot where we leave our car at 3:45. We go straight to the parking lot. Mark meets us 5 minutes later. It's now sprinkling. We wait. The shuttle shows up at 4:02. It's a small bus...the type used by most churches. We climb on board to find that half the bus is filled with kayaks and tubes. The professional teenager is behind the wheel and assures us he's "driven a motor home before." 3 other teenage employees (one of whom shows up on an offroad skateboard wearing a wetsuit) and a middle aged man who appears to be the owner climb on board with us. They are all going kayaking together while we tube. We drive about 3 miles and one of the boys announces that the back door of the bus has swung open. The half-clad wetsuit surfer boy climbs like a monkey over the various asundry outdoor gear and pulls the door shut. We arrive safely at the put-in spot where the professional teenager walks us down a path, reviews the 3 rules, tells us to "hug the right" (side of the river that is) and points at some large rocks. "You can put in somewhere down there" he says and leaves. Keith, Mark and I have all been supressing laughter (I didnt' suppress very sucessfully) this whole time. We clamber over the rocks and put our tubes in the freezing cold water. It rained part of the 2 hour trip...but we didn't have any thunder or lightning and thoroughly enjoyed our trip over all. We'd recommend it...but would caution that organization and punctuality might not be this particular company's strong suit. However at only $15 a person and with the free shuttle service...it's a great deal.

Bring it!


Get ready......'cause it's comin'!


The water was FREEZING when we first put in...and I was trying to postpone my butt getting numb until the last possible moment.


The first rapids we came to...this picture was taken just before Mark flipped and ended up in the drink.


Keith and I chillin' out on the tubes!


Rule #2: always keep your feet pointed downstream. This was Keith's view of the river.

Keith's wallet and driver's licence were in the drybox of the middle-aged owner guy, who took about 20 minutes longer than we did to get down the river so we had a bit of a chilly, wet wait at the end...but not too bad. We said goodbye to Mark (again) and headed back to Keith's mom's where she'd run a hot bubble bath for me in the garden-sized tub upstairs. It was as if I'd visited a spa...she'd also lit candles and had relaxing music playing. I curled up for about 45 minutes and relaxed and read a book. We ate a yummy dinner of crappie fish that Ms. Pat and Rick had caught in Lake Murray and grilled squash from their garden with homemade vanilla ice cream and fresh peaches for dessert! I went straight to bed after dinner, exausted and super-relaxed from my bath while Keith got his turn to visit the spa. We left Thursday morning to drive back to Nashville and had a relaxing drive through Asheville, NC and the mountains on the way back. I hope you enjoyed our South Carolina vacation.....stay tuned for my California adventures beginning on Sunday!

A fast boat and an old house

I just realized that I'd never bothered to post a picture of our hotel, so I thought it would be a good way to kick off today's blog. If you ever visit Charleston, we highly recommend it. Among many perks...the location couldn't possibly be better. There. Commercial over. :)

Our first activity today, a boat ride on the Thriller speedboat, we agreed might have been our favorite thing that we've done our entire trip! The boat is a high speed catamaran (double hull) that leaves from a dock near the battery and then takes approximately an hour long tour through the ocean past, Ft. Sumter to the Morris Island Lighthouse where the boat turns around. We then headed back to the harbor and sailed past Ft. Moultrie, the U.S.S. Yorktown, and the Cooper River Bridge before returning to the dock. Barbara, the tour guide, struck a great balance between dispensing interesting facts about what we were seeing, and being quiet and letting us enjoy the ride accompanied by 80's rock music. Her husband, Mark, was the boat captain, and did a great job of steering us through some fantastic waves! A MUST if you visit Charleston!

Keith and I on board the Thriller....check out the spray behind us from the boat! (The sunglasses were borrowed....I do not actually own these!)


Some of the big waves made your stomach flip-flop! LOVED it!


The Morris Island lighthouse. It's in dire need of repair due to erosion and such. If you'd like to help keep the lighthouse around...check out this website.


A full length view of the Thriller...back at the dock after her morning jaunt.

After the Thriller, we pulled through Starbucks for a snack and then on to Middleton Place mansion and gardens. We wandered through the gardens for a little bit and then took a tour of the house. The house was actually originally the southern wing of the original mansion...built as a guest wing for gentlemen who stayed on the grounds. The rest of the mansion was burned and only this wing was rebuilt and became the main house. We then ate lunch at the garden shop cafe and concluded our visit with an approximately hour long self-guided tour of the gardens. The gardens bear the distinction of being America's oldest landscaped gardens. They are absolutely beautiful.


The "Wood Nymph" statue in the gardens at Middleton Place.


A view from one end of the "Reflection Pool."


Keith stands on a limb of one of the countless huge "live oak" trees on the Middleton Place grounds.


The cypress bridge...one of the spots I loved the most.

We concluded the day with take-out from TBONZ Gill & Grill, and ordered the same Ahi Tuna and grouper sandwiches that we'd ordered the other night and a marathon of Deadliest Catch, The Office, and the Colbert Report.

OH! And I almost forgot! We were supposed to drive back to Nashville tomorrow morning, but we're having so much fun that we decided we needed one more day of vacation. (we're not very good at going home....if you remember this also happened when we went to Hawaii in January!) So instead we're getting up and driving back to Columbia to go tubing down the river...something I was dissapointed that we didn't have time to do last weekend. We're then crashing with Keith's Mom and Rick for one more night and heading back to Nashville on Thursday instead! Which means....dum dum dum da dum....one more day of the blog from South Carolina! Enjoy!

Fired up about Folly Beach!

First things first: a little blog housekeeping to attend to. So that you all might maximize your blog-reading experience and get a little edjumication, I've added a new feature to today's blog, and gone back and edited yesterday's blog. Anytime a building, historic site, or excursion is mentioned I've made the name of it a link to either the official website of that place or thing or at the very least a Wikipedia page so that you can pick up random bits of useless trivia or perhaps be assisted in planning your very own Charleston vacation. OK. That being said, on to the events of today.

Keith and I decided that after our late-night ghost hunting adventures of the previous evening, and since we are on vacation afterall, that we'd really enjoy it and both sleep in this morning. We got up in time to grab breakfast at the hotel, but then didn't get around to venturing out until noon-thirty this afternoon. We stepped outside our hotel and found a pedicab at the corner and asked him to drive us first to Starbucks (we have our priorities straight for sure!) and then to the waterfront so we could find a mansion to tour. Our cyclist cabbie did just that..and our day had begun!


Our cabbie was a marine biology student from the College of Charleston. It was his first day of work and we were his second fare ever!!


Keith and I in the pedicab in front of Starbucks.

We had our pedi-cabbie drop us off at the Battery (also called White Point Gardens) where we took a stroll under the live oak trees on paths that were made wide enough for two ladies in hoop skirts to walk side by side. We then headed north again up the waterfront along the sea wall until we reached the Edmonston-Alston House where we stopped in to take a tour. The house was originally build buy Mr. Edmonston and then sold to Mr. Alston, whose descendants still own the house (one of them lives on the 3rd floor to this very day!). The Alston family and their friends gathered on the various porticos to watch the first shots of the Civil War in 1861 between South Carolina soldiers and Ft. Sumter, in the harbor across the street.

Keith and I standing on the sea wall with the Edmonston-Alston house in the background (the pink and white house just over my shoulder).

After our home tour we continued along the waterfront until we came upon the Old Exchange and Provost Dungeon and decided we'd like to take a tour of that as well. Many historic events happened in this building...over 250 Charlestonians and other men were held prisoner by the British during the Revolutionary War, although the space was originally a storage area for various cash crops such as cotton and indigo. Tea was also stored and hidden there during the Charleston Tea Party and various pirates were also rumored to have been held there. The original Charleston sea wall runs directly beneath the building and can be seen in the dungeon. Upstairs, the building boasts two more floors of historic rooms...including where the U.S. Constitution was ratified in South Carolina.

Keith took this fantastic picture in the Provost Dungeon.

On the stroll home we passed the Market Street Winery, a local winery. They were having a tasting so we stopped in and got to have a sip of five of their wines. All of their grapes are grown in South Carolina in their own vineyards and other types of fruit are purchased from local growers. We'd recommend the Lord Ashley Elderberry or the Shaftsbury Blend if you decide you'd like to try some Market Street Wine.

I was pretty proud of this photo that I took of the bottles of wine for sale.

Since it was raining when we got back to the hotel we figured we'd hop in the car and hit some further-away sights instead of walking in the rain. I'd wanted to see the Citadel so we went there first. Fortunately, the rain stopped as we pulled in so we hopped out and took pictures from the Summerall Field (the main lawn in the center of campus). We also found the Howie Bell tower to be unlocked and climbed to the top of it to see the "organ" that controls the bells. (I'm not sure that we really were supposed to have access to that...but no one stopped us...and it was cool. After we left, we joked that we should have played Happy Birthday or Pop Goes the Weasel or something on it just for fun.) We also visited the Chapel and took pictures in front of the "Daniel Library" which I thought was cool.

The Citadel.

After the Citadel, we drove over to Folly Beach for a simple stroll on the beach (and of course had to stop for Italian Ices on the way from a street vendor!) that turned into the event of the evening as you will soon find out. We had to park outside the gates of the Folly Beach park because the parking lot had already been gated closed for the night. Keith had his camera with him (as always) and snapped some great pictures of the salt marsh on the bay side and a beautiful house that I liked next to the entrance to the state park. We had a nice quiet walk on the beach...hunted for sea shells and splashed our feet in the warm salty sea for about 20 minutes before we headed back. It was quite the dramatic end to the day!

Keith took this picture of a pelican at Folly Beach.


Keith picks up sea shells on Folly Beach.


A view of the salt marsh and the house I thought was so beautiful.

When we reached the boardwalk again, we looked up to see that the roof of the beautiful house I'd liked was on fire! We hurried through the parking lot and were soon able to see that the fire department and police were already on the scene. A small group of neighbors had gathered and since our car was blocked in, we hung around until the fire was out. The owner of the home was home alone out on her balcony and unaware that lightning had struck her house and set it on fire. A family renting the house next door was walking back from the beach and saw the roof on fire and called up to the woman who had the presence of mind to shut off all the electricity before exiting the structure. No one was injured and the fire seemed to be confined to one corner of the roof, but Keith and I couldn't imagine the extent of the water damage from the fireman's hoses. Fortunately, the fire was put out about 30 minutes after it started. I'm sure we'll see it in the paper tomorrow.

Keith's initial distance shot of the house on fire.

A closer shot of the burning house.

You can clearly see the corner where the lightning hit the house.

Firemen were on hand from the Folly Beach, James Island and Charleston Fire Departments.

Keith's passat is dwarfed...and blocked in by the James Island Fire Department Truck and the EMS ambulance.