Traveling to Hope Africa University we experience a six hour time difference, which “flips” half the day and half the night.
And so it was that at the end of our first day in Burundi this year, we found ourselves nodding off into deep sleep about 7 pm. After fighting off sleep for an hour, we finally gave in and went to bed. Both of us slept very soundly, for what we thought was a long time.
When we finally awakened, I checked my Smartphone for the time. It read 5:30. Since it starts getting light here at 6 a.m., we decided to get up and get an early start on the new day. Darlene took a shower, and we both got fully dressed. I opened the curtains to let in the morning light. For breakfast, we had bread and peanut butter sandwiches (sounds more like lunch, but that’s all we had at hand, not yet having been to the grocery store!). And Darlene made each of us a large mug of strong Burundi coffee.
Grateful for a good night’s sleep, we resumed our work of reading masters’ theses as we downed our sandwiches and sipped at the hot coffee. About 45 minutes later, I realized that it was still dark and there was not yet any birdsong. I looked at my wristwatch. It appeared to have stopped. So I asked Darlene to look at her watch. Both read 1:15 a.m.!
We decided not to drink the remainder of our coffee, but to continue working for a few hours. At 3:30 a.m. we went through our nighttime routine once again and returned to bed. Once settled in, we both had a hearty laugh at ourselves. Then we fell asleep again. We slept (not so deeply as before our mid-night break) until 6:30 a.m.… arising once again, this time to sunrise and birdsong.
:-)
ReplyDelete