the cole tree: July 2014

Friday, July 18, 2014

Mollusks in the field

Yesterday morning brought such beautiful weather with its overcast skies and cooler breezes, that I decided the day was perfect for a little motorbike ride around the nearby villages and mountains. Nathan had taken the kids around a few weeks ago and thought it would be fun for me to take them sometime. So off we started, the kids and I, but only a hundred or so yards from our house, we noticed that we had a flat tire. Happy for us, as I pulled the bike over to the side of the road, we saw that we were just across the street from this little shop.

This shop shows one of the things I love so much about shopping here- open air, random assortments of things for sale. The man out front of this shop ran across the road and pushed our bike in for a quick ten minute, seventy-five cent tire fix, and we were off again. We were a bit overcharged- the usual rate is around sixty cents. :)

The kids sat on the little stools and drank boxes of chocolate milk from the shop next door.

Everyone knows our kids around here, and the conversation was typical of how they go these days- your kids are cute, the youngest one is the cutest, can we take him home with us? Elijah doesn't care- he's a big five-year-old and definitely doesn't want to go home with anyone.

The main road through our village was okay, but the side roads were hard to navigate. On occasion, the kids got off the bike and found their own path through the mud.

As we turned onto this road, Elijah called out for me to stop the bike so they could rinse off in the mud puddles. Haha! I rinsed off my own sandals too as I had also sunk deep in the mud.

The water buffalo were also enjoying the mud puddles today.

As we were heading down this road, two water buffalo suddenly emerged from the bushes, running across the road right in front of us. I felt Elijah jump in his seat right behind me, and I was glad we were sauntering along at a slow crawl on the motorbike.

Could we have a more beautiful view? It lifts my spirit every single day.

And it's just down the street from our house.

A couple of folks were heading out to work further down in the rice fields.

This little spot right along the road was perfect for a lunch break, so we stopped here. Zach is handing off his helmet to Elijah before he climbs the ramp.

We ate lunch and then the kids did some school up here. Sitting in this little hut and listening to the kids tell me about the Fall of Rome, the geography of the ancient Assyrian empire, and the major groups of invertebrates was something else. What a great little schoolhouse.

As they were telling me that mollusks are one of the main categories of invertebrates, they noticed that there were large snails all over in the rice fields. They spotted 25 or so sliding around down in the rice field below us. Cool beans. Some days the school day is just plain fun.