Yesterday I spent all morning finishing tidying Tim's room and the study/guest room, and cleaning, and making up beds so everything was ready for four young men who will be staying here for the next few weeks, mostly doing youth work in the neighbourhood. I took it slowly, had a cold drink every hour or so, and didn't get too over-heated. The first person arrived yesterday afternoon and has been out most of the time since then.

In the afternoon we put the air conditioner on in the living room and I read email... the a/c does seem to be working a bit, although not very effectively. Still, it reduces humidity (which can get high in the afternoons) and keeps the room slightly cooler than the outside so it's better than nothing. Since we're hoping to buy our own house within the next year or so, it's probably worthwhile trying to keep this one going for the next couple of months rather than installing a new one.

Today I had an email from Dan on the Doulos - the bulk of it is included in today's update on his blog. I was very pleased to hear from him - it seems such a long time since he left, although it's only a week. He wrote the email on Monday but for some reason it didn't arrive until today - very strange. However the ship left Tanzania on Monday shortly after he wrote, and arrived in Mozambique on Wednesday or Thursday, so perhaps they didn't send outgoing mail until this morning.

I won't be blogging next week since Richard and I are going on a mini-cruise of some Greek islands - which might sound like an expensive luxurious holiday, but isn't really - these mini-cruises run weekly from Limassol, which is about an hour's drive from here. It's our treat to ourselves in celebration of our upcoming 25th wedding anniversary.