Snow!

For all of you who assumed we would be sweltering away in Africa:

Yep, big snowstorm here on Saturday! We woke up in the morning to a drizzly rain, which suddenly turned into large flakes of snow. Our plans to climb the mountain behind TTL thus put on hold, we confined our movements between the house and the safehome (luckily, they keep the babies pretty warm, and nothing cozier than holding a swaddled baby in front of a gas heater!). Since our room is not so well equipped (i.e., freezing cold) we borrowed a little electric heater from Nthabaleng. At the end of the day we began preparing dinner in the kitchen, looking forward to a cozy night with our heater and maybe a movie on the laptop.

Then the electricity went out. We ran to grab our headlamps from the room, meanwhile marveling at the transformation of our surroundings into total blackness, except for the now exceptionally bright stars. Still, hard to appreciate the beauty of the snow and stars when you are contemplating a night with no heat. Anyway, retrieved the headlamps and resumed cooking dinner on the gas stove, which by this point we were huddling around for warmth as much as anything else. Here’s a short clip—us a little slap happy at being snowed-in in Africa:

(TIA—This is Africa. Thanks for the very useful phrase, Conor! Just bet you didn’t think snow would be part of it!)

After dinner we made tea and climbed into bed with as much clothes on as possible and played some cards.

The morning was gorgeous, the skies clearing up and the snow just beginning to melt.

The electricity was, thankfully, back on. Now, two days later, the snow is almost gone, just a chill in the air remaining.