Happy New Year!

Lulu having her 24 hour ecg.

Happy New Year to everyone!

An eventful Christmas for Horlicks who went to the vet on Christmas day and had pancreatitis! Too much cheese and sausage at dog training... oops

Wonder whippets

The boys have passed their Kennel club Gold good citizenship test! Unexpected but pleasing!

Quasimodo

Hi everyone
I have been hobbling around since Sunday with knee pain. Anyway suffice to say it is coming from my back (T11 & L1)to be precise. So no lifting, gentle walks etc. Supposed to be going riding today and tomorrow, well today was out but am hoping tomorrow will be ok - need to strengthen those core muscles!

Above are a couple of photos of amazing quilts from the festival of quilts in Birmingham, the Frank Sinatra ones were so good! The lady who made the african quilt also made the "Best in show" quilt as well. I think shes from Holland.


Poor little (!) horlicks was stung by a wasp today, and was a very injured solider all afternoon!

I am going over to England on saturday to see mother who is not great really so hope I can sit by then!

Update on 4th August

Tim went over to England to see my mum and his 2nd cousin Pam. My mum is now in Christchurch hospital, having spent 3 1/2 weeks in Bournemouth hospital. She had a stent and angioplasty on Monday. She also went for a home assessment today. Various things are being bought over next Tuesday such as a hospital bed and a care package has been arranged for her. She sounds very weak and is quite frail now. Karen has done sterling work sorting lots of things out ! Hope she has a good time in France.

The pups and Lulu & Homer have had a quiet day, walks on the beach, little jobs at home (clearing out my shoe cupboard) if anyone fancies a Black cowhide Jaeger handbag let me know! Wonder if I could sell it on ebay!

I need to upload some pictures ......

John Stott

Kinsale

Lynn riding @ East Cork Equestrian Centre

We were sad to hear the news of John Stott's death at the age of 90. He made difficult christian doctrines clear and accessible. Tim met with him and other young curates in a book club many years ago at John's flat in London.
He wrote about 50 books, Basic Christianity and the Cross of Christ probably being the most famous. He was pastor at All Souls, Church Langham Place, near Oxford circus, right next to the BBC!

Christians do not grieve without hope, the reason for this is because of all that Jesus achieved through his death and resurrection. Not only did John Stott preach these fundamental truths of the Christian faith but he himself believed them with conviction. We will miss him but rejoice that he has gone to be in the presence of the Lord Jesus and that we will see him again, and we are thankful for all that he has done and for all the lives he has touched over many years of faithful ministry.

Wet and windy

Hi everyone
We are back in Northern Ireland where it is wet and windy and really quite cold. However after the dust and heat of Afghanistan I must not complain. The dogs all survived kennels and did not need any visits to the vet. a whole month without seeing a vet - truly amazing.
My mum is in hospital so I am popping over again this week. Karen has been holding the fort and doing sterling work on social services/hospital/legal front.

Nothing much to report really, I am hoping to do a bit more riding especially as the physio said today she would encourage it - good for the back as long as I don't fall off!

Hi everyone, here are some photos from Cork! Tim is at Garryvoe Beach! Then there are a couple of the local, very noisy peacock! and some of the pigs/piglets here at Ballymaloe. A shame to think they will end up on a plate.

We have had nearly 4 weeks here. Tim is working hard on isaiah and his blog (tganderson.wordpress.com) . I have been working on snapfish.co.uk trying to create photo albums from New Zealand and Kabul. I have also had some riding lessons, which has been great. Tim has been out hacking with me a couple of times!. We went sailing from Kinsale yesterday afternoon for a couple of hours - a very pretty part of Ireland. I am missing the puppies and Lulu and Homer of course!

London! We went to London last week for 2 nights and stayed near Buckingham Palace! We met up with family and a friend and went to the theatre to see "Wicked" ( pre Wizard of Oz), it was very good. I enjoyed London, it was great to walk thorugh green Park and up to John Lewis Oxford St. tim Went to St James' Park and saw the Horse Guards practising.

Well we return to N Ireland on Saturday. As yet the dogs have been fine with no trips to the vet. Although the pet plan claims have just gone in so I expect there will be an enourmous excess bill to pay!

Belfast to Cork

Hi
We arrived back home safely. I haven't been too well on the gastric front for most of the week. despite this we had a lovely evening with the Thompsons on Tues and I had a great evening with Heather, Ruth and Helen at the Bay tree on Thursday night.
Friday was rushed, trying to sort out everything for a month before leaving for Cork. Homer developed diarrhoea on Eed evening so we had a trip to the vet!
Anyway all the pooches were taken to kennels friday afternoon and we left for Dublin and arrived very speedily 2 hours later at the Crowne Plaza hotel near the airport.
On Saturday we left at 10am and arrived at Middleton 3 hours later. The new motorway makes a big difference.
We went to Middletyon evangelical Church this morning. It meets in a hotel. The Pastor; Andy is english, and was preaching on Amos 3-4.
The weather was very wet this morning. However we managed a rather blustery walk along the beach at Garryvoe this afternoon.
We have had a lot of trouble with getting online. There is wifi in the cottage but despite connecting, we cannot get the internet up. Tim has an O2 mobile braodband thing! We are now ion the conservatory at the hotel making use of the wifi there - it works! So I am hoping to spend time uploading photos of NZ and Kabul to snapfish to make a couple of photo albums.

Hopefully going into Cork tomorrow afternoon and visit the English Market!

Bumps, bruises and bugs

Hi
I am writing this at Heathrow airport, we landed from Dubai at 2.30 and our flight to Belfast is 8pm! A very nice lady has just given me a mini facial with some amazing beuaty products (no parabens, silicone etc...) The very helpful pharmacist has set me up with dioralyte  (to reyhdrate me) and motilium. I haven't been very well since thursday night (vomiting) and still feel quite rough.
I also fell down a marble staircase on Thursday and have really bruised my leg.

The journey back so far has been uneventful.


The photos belwo are of Herat: The citadel, friendsds in Herat, a chadori (??) shop- the blue veils that the ladies wear otherwise known as a burkha, Chicken St Kabul.....

The guys who run the scarf shop!

Lynn in a scarf shop in Chicken St Kabul

Forgot

Forgot to say we were all sitting in the mens part of the airport! Otherwise poor tim would have been sitting on his own for hours with all these Afghan men! There was a small ladies and childrens area but bunged full. There was a bit of staring at us from the men but we sat in a corner and faced away! The men were glued to the TV in the waiting area, we discovered it was because of the NATO airstrike that killed civilians.
Apologies for the spelling errors in previous post!

Bombs

There were 2 bombs in Herat the day after we left, one a suicide bomber very near the office where an old freind works. The other was with whats callled the PRT, an army base of itlaian soldiers who go into an area and buikd hospitals and schools etc.
We spent from 2pm until 9pm at herat airport waiting! It was very very hot and sweaty in the "terminal" but we are thankful that we didn't have to wait outside in the sun like many people on our flight. It shouold have been a morning flight but we were rung and told to go in the afternoon! We made it back to the house in Kabul for about 11.45pm! The airport was closed by then so we all had to walk a long way down the road to a roundabout where all the cars were! This is typically an afghan experience. One gentleman at the airport in Herat who spoke good english told time that they were in the 13th century here. Which apparently is true as they use the lunar year!

Yesterday was a quiet day, I am quite dehydrated, because of the altitude you don't feel sweaty as it evaporates so quickly from the skin, so I have to drink more/

Today we are going to Chicken St, apparently this is a very famous st in Kabul and there has been a book written about it! Will let you know!

Hirat

The citadel in Hirat about 600 years old. Undergoing major renovations (think it's funded by the Aga Khan but not sure), we saw our first camel in the garden here

view from top of the citadel

Minaret and tiles from the Blue Mosque

Me in the carpet shop

View from the mental health projhect we went to see just outside hirat

Rickshaws in the city, don't see these in Kabul

Very hot here in Hirat, been bitten by mozzies. We also went to the blue glass shop. Hirat is renowned for it's blue glass, a very thin rugged old man sits in a very small shop dripping sweat, and blowing the glass, it was incredibly hot in there with the ovens going! Poor thing. He learnt it from his dad.
Carpet shopping was fun, you have to take time over it!because of the whole method of buying, bargianing etc
We have met some of the team here and been looked after very well. Last night we had dinner with an old friend from London who has worked here for many years.

We fly back to Kabul on Kam air (reputed to be owned by a warlord) hopefully this afternoon. The next few days are quite busy, seeing some of the projects in Kabul, visiting the International school, a midwife run clinic, various meetings, .......

Food: we went to the 1001 nights restaurant where you sit on carpet and what seems to be a bedstand to eat. It was kebabs, but more iranian type of food becasue we are very near the border.

Afghan Images

Hi! Yesterday we helped the Campbells with a leaving do for one of the youth leaders! Lots of fun and teenagers running riot!

Today up again at 3.45am to get to Kabul airport and fly to Herat! We arrived in good time and then had to wait on a gravelly bit of ground (reclaim luggage area!) until they bought out our cases on a truck! Interesting.
we are staying at the team guest house. we were taken to the Blue Mosque, built 800 years ago. It is more conservative here so Joyce and I have to wear long black coats and the heat is stifiling! Beautiful tiles and designs! We also went to the blue glass shop, the area is famous for the glass which has lapis in I think. Tonight we had a meeting with some of the team members and now I am off to bed!
Some lovely photos are on Tim's blog! Link was on my last post!

Heat, dust....

HI, we have had great difficulty with the internet over the last two days!! I have tried and tried to upload photos of our trip to Bomyon and Band-i-Amir to no avail! You can see some on Tim's blog which should be at wordpress.com, http://www.tganderson.wordpress.com/ this should be  alinkl to it. Sorry about that folks, its very frustrating

Band-i-amir

Forgot to say we flew back over Band-i-amir or the the lake of the ruler/king! A most amzing series of azure lakes surrounded bu hills of what looked like dry sand. Its the minerals in the water that make it so equisite. It is truly an amazing sight!

Bomian, and Band -i-amir

Well the trip to the Ministry of the Interior must be the fastest on record. We got to the other side of town and did the minisrty, got our visitor registration cards and were back in 1 hour 10min! A funny little place!

Yesterday we got up at 4am and went to the airport (lots of security checks!) and flew with PACTEC to Bomian (pro Bomyan) where the Taliban blew up the Buddhas some years ago. A lovely place, very green and rural, surrounded by snowcapped mountains. We were in such a rush I went out of the house in flip flopis and had to buy a secondhand pair of trainers in the bazaar with the help of Zaminali our translator and guide! We had quite a bit of climbing to do so it was just as well. The area is where the Hadrassa (?) people live. They are descendants of Ghengis Khan and much looked down on, they are a very peaceful people and slightly mongolian in appearance. The place where the Buddhas were is amazing and lots of little holes in the cliff face where various people have lived in the past, refugees etc!
I will put some photos up later! We had to rush back to the airstrip much sooner than we expected so we all got in a taxi and went round to what is called the Red city or City of screams, a very historuc place, Ghengis Khan slaughtered all the people there which is how it got it's name.

I am now off the the language school to meet some of the teachers! and then to the bazaar!

A view of Kabul from the car. You can see all the phone masts on the hill. Under the T the infrastructure was destroyed so it went straight over to a mobile sytem when they were overthrown a few years ago.

Another view from the car

Me in appropriate dress  with OD the dog and mini trampoline

Yesterday was a quieter day, today we go to the Ministry of the Interior to get our exit cards sorted. There was no-one at the desk at the airport when we arrived. Tomorrow we go on a day trip. Still very hot and the dust is amazing.

Shopping & security

Today is the weekend! We were took us shopping, Tim was bulllied into buying a set of traditional gear! The men's shalwar  kameez, photo coming soon! I bought a couple of headscarves - some very glitzy ones out there! we then went to the Bush bazaar, little lanes of ramshackle shops filled with american army stuff and random things. Not many foreginers there. Then to the Bird Bazzar, a little lane full of birds in cages, a couple of pigeons were killed in front of us, but I didn't look. There were a couple of craggy men with hawks on thier arms. It was really busy and poart of a really big bazaar which you would get lost in. We went out this evening to the Red Hot Sizzler, an american style restaurant. Apparently you can get wine in a few places, you ask for a pot of the special tea! and it comes in a teapot and you pour it into a mug!
 There is a "buddy" system in place, soemoen is told where we are going, who is going when we get there and when we leave and when we get home. Also because of the incident in the east of the country and various other intelligence certain parts of the city have been put off limits certain people until it's reviewed on Sunday.
I am hoping to put some photos up but the broadband is slimline here!

Thunder...

Yesterday we had a big sandstorm, clouds and thunder and a bit of rain. It was very oppressive and both Joyce and I had bad headaches. There is so much dust! The roads are very rough and quite badly damaged. This area was shelled a lot in the past, but is now a bit more up and coming.
 I went to the school at lunchtime and we dished up takeaway pizza, burger etc for the children. I met the teacher, Sarah, and some of the mums, from all around the world. Jordan goes to this school. We also ended up having lucnh with an australian lady from Tasmania ( Maria).

We went our for a meal in the evening and met some of the workers here and their children,. Also the doctor  who poppped round. She gave advice on altitude sickness symptoms..
Today I have had an upset stomach, not nice, Tim is ok and spent the day in the office working on his comuter. I went to the  guest house and looked at some local embroideries whilst Joyce had a language lesson (dari), I bought 2 shalwar kameez tops. It is very hot out here and some of the things I bought with me are far too warm. You have to cover up, so lots of layersmake it warm

I did some ironing this afternoon. Joyce had to go to the other side of town with Jordan to get new specs for him. I had hoped to go but because of my tum it was best I stayed put.

We have had some lovely fresh mango, and aslo pomegranate juice. Tiim and the others had a local dish from a street stall for lunch, like a batter pasty with potato and chive in. It looked lovely, but Joyce said not for me today!
A local dish is being prepared for this evenuing, curried beans with naan and yohgurt and mint!

We picked up there was an incident in the North of the country, but so far ok here. Everyone very security conscious.

Hot Hot Hot

We have arrived! Kabul is surrounded by mountains! The airport had large numbers of military planes/helicopters on the gorund. Security was very evident. Joyce met us, but we had to walk quite a long way to meet uo with her, through lots of barbed wire ...The drive through town in rush hour was an experience. There are no rules of the road, everyone goes for it. It is very dry and dusty here and extremely hot.

The house is quite big, and there is a lovely little porch with geraniums in where Tim is sitting to do some study. The little jack russell OD (that's her name) is making friends! The walls that surround the house have barbed wire round the top. A minister from the Government lives at the end of the road so with the security it is quite quiet.

We had a lvoely meal of chicken, rice and naan bread last night, with fresh mangoes and watermelon. Then we went for a walk round the street with Martin, it was quite nice outside but very hot in the house. I hardly slept, however Tim was out for the count.

Breakfast was fresh Naan, a typical Afghan brekkie is to eat Naan dipped in a mix of buffalo creamand srpinkled with sugar! It was actually very nice, if fattening.

Joyce is out at the School this morning, but is taking us to see the office tonight and then we all go to see another family this evening.
We also have to go to the Ministry of the Interior and queue for hours to get an exit card! There was no one at the airport desk to do this on the way out.

We are not allowed out of the house unless we are accompanied. Also there was a 5.9 earthquake a couple of days ago.

Every evening all those who work in the area for the organisation have a team leader who radi'so round to check everyone is ok.

Some photos coming! Tim is taking them as I forgot the lead to download them from my camera.

Big Adventure 2

Had nice day walkiing miles round shopping mall yesterday, and a trip up the tallest building in the world, Burj Khalifa (see below). It's been very hot, 42c, the pavement could fry an egg. There is just so much money here, and the city is really strange, bit like a Tale from the Arabian nights, the Tower of Babel also springs to mind.

News from home, Colin was taken off to hospital on Friday night, slow pulse rate and sounds dehydrated, anyway he is now back in Silver Birch, thanks, Karen, Jenny, Tom alistair, anyone who had a hand in getting him to and fro!

Burj Khalifa - truly amazing
Poor Mylo is sick. Homer needs a biospy of his gut. Poor Karen probably needs 2 weeks in the Bahamas.
At Dubai airport waiting for Safi flight to Kabul!!!! Pray on.

Tim & Lynn's big adventure 1

This started yesterday. We flew from Belfast City to Heathrow and then on to Dubai. Flight all ok but spent most of the day in bed with a terrible headache. But! I recovered enough to manage a visit to what must be the biggest shopping mall in the world; The Dubai Mall. It's is incredible, a real temple of shopping worship.
We are also very near the tallest building in the world, it's all lit up at night and looks like an very tall icicle. I think it's 3x taller than Slieve Donard. We hope to go up to the observation deck tomorrow. IN front of it every hour there is the most amazing display of "dancing fountains" to music. It was spectacular.

Homer has been at the vet having a barium test. He has to go on and have a biopsy of a bit of his bowel, probably next friday.

I hope to keep you all up to date with our big adventure! We are in Dubai tomorrow (Sunday) and fly on to Kabul monday.

Dumfries

We are now in a little hotel near Dumfries! Tim has starteds his sabbatical and given me a lovely card with a chicken on the front wishing me a "Happy Sabbatical"! Not too sure there is a commercial market for cards for sabbaticals!

We are thinking of going to Glasgow tomorrow night to the Tron for the evening service, but it's about an hour and a half to get there.

Tim & Lynn at Doubtful Sound, South Island NZ!

Homer, Mylo & Horlicks

Homer's trip to the vet

Homer had a busy day! Lots of x rays and an ultrasound. He is now on 6 huge capsules a day fro his pancreas as it is not working as it should. he is to be kept from eating soil and grouting for 48 hours!!! He may need barium tests next week to establish if he is bleeding from something in his gut.

He seems quite chirpy on it tonight and is endlessly hungry, partly because of his pancreatic insufficency!!! Horlicks has been a bit of a horlicks today, running dementedly round the garden and attacking Mylo at any opportunity on his walk. Poor little sweetheart!

Haven't they grown!

This is Homer, the sick one!

Whippet Wonders 2

It may take a while to get the hang of this blogging thing! Today one of the whippets chewed up my wedding shoes which had been kept safely in a cloth bag for fourteen years! Distress!! The other sad thing is that Homer (miniature schnauzer) has to go to the vet tomorrow for an ultrasound scan and various tests. he is anaemic and may be bleeding from somewehre in his gut or a tumour.

Generally the idea is to keep you all abreast of what happens on our travels over the next wee while. I am not sure there are many postcards in Kabul - good idea for a title of something; "Postcards from Kabul"...

Whippet wonders 1

The whippets, Mylo and Horlicks are wondering what on earth is going to happen. They are not wandering but their owners are! And without the whippets, a sad day. You might ask where the owners (Lynn & Tim) are off to? Well; Scotland, Kabul, Co Cork and Donaghadee! So who is going to look after the whippets??? Well thats down to Karen (Lynn's sister), chief dog and chicken sitter.