Friday, October 5^th was my 25^th birthday. On Thursday, my roommates took me out to dinner, and when I got home a bunch of my friends were waiting at my apartment to throw me a surprise party. It was so fun! Some of them felt bad for not bringing a gift, so they went into my room (before I was home of course) and wrapped up some of my belongings. So for my birthday I got a pair of flannel pants, strangely similar to the ones my mother sent me last year. I also got a framed picture of my sister and me when I was 16, then another framed picture of my best friend and me in front of Mt. McKinley.

On my birthday, one of my students made me a cake, and we had a little celebration in my biology class. Everyone at school was wishing me happy birthday, and after school Heather, Kayla, and headed out to Mayers’ Ranch to hang out with friends for the weekend. My parents called me as we were driving out to the ranch, and that was when I got the best birthday gift ever. But in order to understand the true significance of this gift, you have to understand a little about my family.

When I moved to Kenya, a little over a year ago now, my parents moved from their home in Anchorage, to Bend, Oregon. My dad took a pastor job there. My mom had a temporary job with the school district in Bend, but it ended in April. She has been looking for a job ever since. She finally got hired just a couple weeks ago, but that hasn’t left my parents with a few thousand extra dollars to come visit their daughter in Kenya. When my parents called me on Friday, they told me that a man from my dad’s church gave them $3000 so that they can come visit me. Unbelievable. That knocked my socks off. And thus concludes my story of the best birthday gift ever. Ever. Ever.

On Sunday (October 7^th) my friend Astrid invited me to go on a game drive in Nairobi National Park. She borrowed a big Land Cruiser, and we left in the early morning hours to look for animals in the park. We (well, Astrid really) drove for about 20 minutes and then got stuck in the mud. She called the emergency number that one of the rangers had given us in case of such emergencies, and, in typical Kenyan fashion, no one answered. We waited for an hour, maybe longer, sipped coffee, and enjoyed each other’s company. Once we were “rescued” (see pictures below), we didn’t get stuck again. We saw giraffe, zebra, buffalo, gazelle, impala, and even a rhino. All in all, it was a great day. Had we seen a lion or a leopard, it would have been a grand slam day, but a great day was good enough.

I am trying to upload pictures for you, but the internet is too slow. This blog entry will have to suffice for now.