So I want to share the things that bring a smile to my
heart. So none of these are negatives-to me.
Do you remember Uncle Ben Kelly?
Do you remember Aunt Mariah Hertwig?
Do you remember Mama Combs?
Do you remember the twinkle in Muambi’s eyes on a Friday
night just before he released us from Study Hall?
Do you remember Uncle Plummer Smith and his glass eye and
the things he told us he did with it in villages?
Do you remember our Babas who took care of us?
Do you remember “going Steady?”
Do you remember Paper Dolls named after Senior Class
“couples?”
Do you remember learning to play Rook, Canasta and Bridge
from the upperclassmen on weekend nights and holiday nights when they put up
with the younger of us because their peers were gone and they needed a fourth?
Do you remember learning English as a Second language-
before the term even existed!?
Do you remember going across Lake Munkamba to get Pommes
Frites- served with mustard?
Do you remember the sound of a palm tree just before the
storm?
Do you remember Juke Joint and the music and the smells?
Do you remember Bobby Pruitt playing Tchaikovsky on the
piano and us begging -”Play it again, Bobby! “And he did until his poor hands
ached for days? Thanks Bobby. I still love his music because of your gift on
the piano.
Do you remember getting an ivory heart instead of a class
ring to “go steady”?
Do you remember scouring The Jungle Log to see if anyone
wrote about you?
Do you remember having strange pets?
Do you remember always feeling safe no matter where you
were?
Do you remember”Working in the Garden?”
Do you remember calling everyone” Aunt and Uncle” and
knowing them better than your blood kin?
Do you remember the smell of the first rain of Rainy season?
Do you remember toombellies/peanuts for recess?
Do you remember fighting with your brothers and sisters to
get the hard centers from the slices of pineapple?
Do you remember saving the mango seeds and making doll heads
out of them and the poor dolls always had a “bad hair day?”
Do you remember who wrote a note to Aunt Effie “ Dear Ant Efe, What shall I is do?”
Do you remember how we kids drank and ate what was almost
forbidden and went places that were forbidden and lived to tell about it?
Do you remember going to the village on market day?
Do you remember a moustache painted on a village’s Virgin
Mary Statue and the fire storm that created?
Do you remember Uncle Kemp Hobson being brought in baskets
and the Lubondai doctors saved him and got him back together again?
Do you remember mango sauce, belibeli pie and guava jelly?
Do you remember the beheaded chicken getting loose and
running briefly without its head?
Do you remember your first trip to World Mission Meeting in
Montreat and sitting on the front porch of the World Mission Building?
Do you remember the skating rink, Club’s arts and crafts,
and square dances in Montreat?
Do you remember rest hour after lunch?
Do you remember basketball games between the CS boys and the
Katubue (sp!) high school boys?
Do you remember Boy Scouts and Girls Scouts?
Do you remember Aunt Liz and Uncle Maurice?
Do you remember Aunt Lavern, Aunt Mary Talley, Aunt Jackie
Speigner and Aunt Nancy Dimwitty Morton?
Do you remember the first time you stood up to sing at
church in the USA and the words to the familiar song came out in Tshiluba?
Do you remember being asked to say the Lord’s Prayer in
Tshiluba and couldn’t remember all the words and you had only been in the
states a short time?
Do you remember the pearly white smiles of the kids?
Do you remember a Congolese lady walking past you and if
asked you could not have answered whether she had a top on or not?
Do you remember using Poinsettia juice as glue?
Do you remember ….Congo?
P.S. Make your memory list to add to mine. Post it on Congo
Connection. It’s fun! It will make
others smile too. Have a great weekend!
Love Ya! Me
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