The sun does not shine every day...

Yesterday Sunday it rained, with thunderstorms, most of the day. On Monday it was still wet but we needed to go shopping. First to a Supermarket for the necessities of life, coffee, jam, honey, green peppers which are now in a dish and waiting to be roasted, butter, milk, eggs etc. And then some unnecessaries but nice. Having said that, it is not true. Ann is coeliac and therefore so many desserts she cannot eat because they have flour in them. So we called into the Pastiçeri Milan for meringues and lokumb that Ann can eat, (and a zup for me). There is no photo of the zup, a small trifle, because I have already eaten it!!

Then through the rain to a coffee shop, and then on again through the rain to the market. Here are the peppers ready to be cooked.

Here is another zup, just to show you what they are like.

After lunch on Tuesday we went to the church building to see Ilir and look at the building work they have done. On the way we met a funeral cortège. As it is a Muslim culture here, people are buried the next day after dying. You can just tell your employer you need the day off and every understands the situation. There was a long line of cars following the coffin and then two bus loads of people. Many people don't have a car, and so a bus, provided free of charge by the bereaved family, will take you to the bereavement parlour, the only way I can describe it, where after filing by the coffin, you are given a free meal. Another reason why a lot of elderly people go.

In the evening we had a meal at Ilir and Rudina's home, with yet another wonderful meal cooked by Rudina. Here is Rudina with her youngest daughter Abigaila. Ilir and Rudina have two other daughters, Sara and Eliada who are both now as tall as their mother. They are at that stage of teenage life!

One of the things Rudina cooks is this, below, aubergines with tomatoes, onions and garlic in olive oil. I cannot describe how yummy it is.

Ann in the kitchen with Rudina and Abigaila.

We have had quite a lot of rain since we have been here. The mountains around Elbasan are high enough and the nights cold enough for it to snow on the mountains, and so in the morning we can look out from our balcony at the snow capped mountains.

Now it is Thursday morning, and I will send this off quickly as Edi Morava is about to come and pick us up on our way to Pogradec. There we will finalise the accommodation for our 18-30's weekend in July. We have held a Youth Camp in Pogradec for the last 8 years but now time has come to hold an 18-30's weekend as those who once were teenagers and came to Camp have grown up! They have been to college or university, have jobs and are moving on in their life and their needs have changed.

Do pray that we find as good place just right for the weekend and for safety as we travel. Tomorrow Friday we travel to Tirana and meet up with Miranda to go through all the preparations for the up coming ladies Conference UNIKE. Please pray for this, all the ladies who will come and our ladies from Bracknell who will come with Catrina Benham.

Bekime=Blessings.

Ken

 

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