Field Day

Sahel had their annual track and field day at the national stadium last week. The whole school participates and is split into different teams. There were four teams this year. They invite homeschool kids from across the country to join in the fun as well, so all 3 of our girls participated. Brynn's team was the Golden Eagles. They ended up winning with the most points at the end of the day.


Kira and Elayna were on the Ketchup team. Each team came up with a team cheer that they shared to kick off the day's competition. The Ketchup team finished second.


Everyone had a great time. Our girls all ended up in the same race here in this picture. Kira's in the middle, Brynn on the right, and Elayna in the back.


Silas was pretty upset that he didn't get to be on a team. He told Krista, "I a runner." Here he is playing with his buddy, Jason. They got to do their own little race on the track in between the other races.


The whole school community pitches in to help make the day a success. People help run the events, time races, measure jumps, etc... Kira and Brynn's teacher snapped this picture of some of the kids still having a good time at the end of a long day. You can check out her blog here to see some really creative things our TCK (Third Culture Kids) have been doing at school!

SIMAIR Returns to Nigeria

SIMAIR started in Nigeria over 50 years ago. Here's one of the SIMAIR hangars at the old airport in Jos, Nigeria, where SIMAIR was based. In the early 70s, SIMAIR began basing planes permantly in Niger. SIMAIR Nigeria closed it's doors in the early 80s. Flights continued to Nigeria from Niger until the early 90s. Since then, SIMAIR hasn't returned to Nigeria because of many logistical obstacles. A year ago, a MAF Cessna 182 with a diesel engine like ours passed through Niger on it's way from Europe to Congo where it was put in service. We parked the plane in our hangar overnight and provided lodging for the two pilots. In talking with them, we learned of the agent in Europe that they used to get their flight clearances for their trip. We contacted him and discovered that he could help us get flight clearances to fly to Nigeria. We typically get 3-4 flight requests a year to go to Nigeria, but until now we've had to say we can't fly there. About a month ago, we received another request to fly to Nigeria. With our newly discovered contact, we decided to give it a try. Two weeks of emails back and forth, scanning documents for Civil Aviation, and eventually we received landing permit numbers for two flights last week! Ian broke the trail on the first flight, flying two passengers 3 hrs to Abuja, Nigeria. They then drove 2 1/2 hrs to Jos for 3 days of meetings. The drive from here to Jos is 2 full days of exhausting driving over some very rough sections of road.


I flew back to Abuja to pick them up after their meetings were finished. Here are some pictures of the flight. Nigeria is south of Niger, so they get more rains for a longer period of time. Things are noticeable greener there. I took off early in the morning into the rising sun and dust in the air. Just on the other side of the border I flew across the section of ponds and streams in the picture above that collect during the rainy season.


The terrain is fairly flat coming across the northwest part of Nigeria, with a few hills here and there.


As you get to central Nigeria where Jos is located, the terrain rises to a 3000 ft high plateau. Abuja is still west of the plateau but gets the weather that builds over the plateau.


A broken layer of clouds covered the central part of the country, which meant I had to do the instrument approach into the airport in Abuja. Once on the ground, I was met by two handling agents who took my paperwork and money and headed off on the mile walk to the tower to file the papers and pay the bills for me. A fuel truck pulled up and I was able to refuel quickly. I then headed into the international terminal to find the passengers. An airport worker escorted me in and helped us negotiate security back out to the plane with the passengers. I was hoping that the handling agents might be done with their part by the time we returned to the plane and we could be on our way. Wishful thinking...


Instead, I took the passengers to the executive lounge to wait in the shade. They each found a piece of shade on the ramp under the wing and horizontal. About 30 minutes later the handlers returned and we re-entered the terminal with them to have the passports stamped. We were then free to go after 2 1/2 hrs on the ground. Initially, the tower would only clear us to fly the instrument airway back to Niger, which would have added 30 minutes to the return flight. I pleaded our case, but they weren't budging. Just as I began to turn on course to intercept the airway, the controller cleared us to fly direct to Niamey instead! We landed back in Niamey 3 hrs later in mid-afternoon.

Overall, we were pleased with our first flights back to Nigeria after so many years away. The passengers were happy that the flights enabled them to meet with Church leaders in Nigeria about a possible partnership in the work in Niger. They were especially happy about not having to drive 4 days to/from Jos!

Cowgirls and Fairy Tales

Tuesday each class at school chose their own theme for Spirit Week. The grade 1/2 class chose a theme of cowboys. Here are our two cowgirls dressed up. Krista helped them each make a stick horse to ride and we found two cowboy hats at a little store near us.


Wednesday was athlete day. We missed taking pictures. Kira wore a Red Sox shirt and Brynn wore a Patriots shirt. Train them up right! Thursday was fantasy day. Kira went as Little Red Riding Hood.

Brynn is Rapunzel with her long hair that Krista made.

Hippie Day

This week is Spirit Week at the kids' school. Every day is a different theme. Today was hippie day. Here's Kira sporting her hippie costume.


Peace and love were floating all over the school.


Brynn missed hippie day at school because she was sick. She still wanted to have hippie day at home, though. She didn't get the full costume on, but she did get a hippie hairdo and wore her skirt.

Monsieur Bon Bon

We recently completed the annual inspections on our planes. We're very thankful for Maynard who's been coming out every year for the past 13 years to sign off the annual inspections for our planes. He's a huge help. Our friends here all love him too. He's become known as Monsieur Bon Bon (Mr. Candy) because he always brings lots of candy with him to hand out. Here he is pictured with our guard/hangar helper and his son and younger brother.

Load 'em up! Sights from the Road.

It's always interesting driving around the city and across the country. People here are very talented at maximizing the capacity of vehicles. Here are some common everyday sights we see as we drive around. In the above picture, you can't see the vehicle... just a bunch of men on it. There's a pick up truck underneath them somewhere.


These vans are used as bush taxis. They are notoriously loaded on the inside and outside. Anything you can think of can go on or in them. Furniture...

Supplies... motorcycles...


chickens...


sheep...


Sacks of food...


Any more space? Maybe one more sack.

Another common sight is piles of wood bundles along the side of the road. Most people cook their food outside over a fire, so wood is sold everywhere.


Trucks come by the wood depots, load up with the wood, and take it to the towns/cities to be sold.


Each larger village/town will have a market day each week. On the market day, these shelters in the picture above will be filled with people, animals, and stuff to be sold. People will walk from miles around to go to the market day.


The activity of the market day in this town is overflowing into the main road that goes across the country.
People and trucks everywhere.


Need some meat? Get it while it's fresh.

Galmi is famous across the country and even some surrounding countries for its onions. These are huge burlap sacks full of onions. Each sack weighs about 300 lbs. Every year, we buy 2-3 of these sacks of onions. We fly them in to the city when we have room on the plane and distribute them amongst the police at the airport, traffic controllers, workers at the Department of Civil Aviation, etc... If we haven't brought them onions for a while, everyone starts asking us when we're bringing onions again.


This truck is loaded with sacks of Galmi onions.

Another common sight is broken down trucks... sometimes overturned trucks. Amazingly, they somehow manage to get the trucks righted again. We recently flew four people in to the city because a truck like this one had overturned and completely blocked the main road across the country. There was no way around it for hours, so we got called to fly out and pick up some folks trying to make it in to the city.

Sally the Camel had One Bumpy Hump

While Krista's parents were here, we took a trip to Galmi and spent a few days there. One of the highlights of our time there was taking a camel ride. Some of the men from town brought camels by one morning to give us a ride. Here you can see the camels waiting by the gate to the airstrip.



The wildest part of riding a camel is being on the camel as it stands up and then lays back down again at the end. When it stands up, it pushes up on its hind legs first so you pitch way forward. Then it pushed up on its front legs. Notice the man in the gold colored robe. He owns the camels and has been giving people these rides for years. He's missing the lower part of his right arm from the elbow down. How'd he lose that? Years ago, an ornery camel decided to chomp his arm one day. One of the surgeons (it happened to be our head mechanic's dad) at Galmi fixed him up after the incident.


4 adults each with a kid, made for a fun ride up and down the airstrip. Here are Papa and Brynn.

Nana and Kira.
Silas and daddy.


Strolling down the airstrip.