Cobras

So there was quite a bit of stir around the orfonato last week. One afternoon right as everybody was finishing lunch we noticed smoke from next door over the wall. The wall is about 8ft high, so even I had to climb it while simultaneously hoisting kids up on my shoulders. It was quite a sight, but unfortunately, no pictures. Once up on the wall is became obvious what was going on. After all: Where there's smoke...

...there's FIRE. Say it like "FY-yuh" for a more dramatic effect. Go ahead, nobody's listening.
and more FY-yuh! Upon questioning the neighbors, we soon learned that they were burning up the ground looking for cobras. "Interesting," we thought to ourselves. We just had to know more.

So we all hopped the wall (or walked around it) in order to aid in the search. Now I must clarify, when I say cobras, I mean it as the Portuguese word for snake. What we looking for was actually vipers, spitting cobras, and mambas. People were literally saying "Here, cobra-cobra," as if they were luring the snake out of its pit into broad daylight.

There were many false alarms caused by Christina's brother-in-law Mike (who was visiting for two weeks from Seattle). Its very obvious to see Mike in the picture above because he is the only one not wearing red. And for those of you who still can't find him, Mike is the huge white guy.

California ain't got nothing on us.

What were we to use in the event of finding the elusive cobra the neighbors were looking for? After much debate among the elder members of the orphanage, we came to a nearly unanimous decision: Use big sticks to whack the crap out of the snake. I say nearly unanimous because, as you can see, my solution was to baby Dorcas as a human shield.

Like Sherman through Atlanta that fire left nothing behind. Once everybody has surveyed the aftermath (and we concluded that the high pitch sound we were hearing was the fire hissing and not snakes crying) the neighbors informed us that the reason they did not salt the earth after scorching it was because the fire was intended to clear the brush to plant crops, and not because they found a snake as we thought (read: hoped).

In other snake-related news, I want to introduce you guys to Isac-peqeno (little Isac). Isac is the kind of kid that is always doing really creative, innovative things, and always leaving a trail of terror. He's the kind of kid that when he grows up is either going to bring the next big technological revolution to fuel-injectors or will accidentally blow up the Govenor's mansion in a pyrotechnic display. Anyways, back to the snake stuff. When you are climbing trees around here, the two things you have to worry about are snakes, and falling.

Isac-peqeno was worried more about snakes. He fractured his arm and they set it in a big plaster cast. For the first day, he walked around without a shirt, and I couldn't help but laugh at the cast (I'm a horrible person, I know). He was pretty miserable for about 3 days. But now he's fine and running around and playing games. Now I can't help but laugh whenever I see him because it looks like he has one arm (again, I'm a horrible person,I know). But how often does a one armed person run around playing soccer or trying to catch giant crickets.

Coming soon: Inselbergs. What are they and how do we get rid of them.