How exciting!!! On Saturday, Tirana - the capital of Albania - had an earthquake that reached 5.6 on richter scale. I've never been in an earthquake before, so I didn't really realise what was going on until it was too late. First of all the crockery on the table started shaking, and so i thought that it was like a kettle boiling making the crockery shake. But then I realised the kettle wasn't on!! Then my chair started shaking too. I thought it was a train or a subway train, but then realised where I was, as they don't really have neither trains or subway. Then it was over!

I was in Tirana taking my fiance to the airport. Unfortunately I won't see her now for another month. She had a good time here, and bless her little cotton socks - worked very hard on her projects here too.




We visited a family in Berdenesh, which when we last visited the newborn baby was tiny. This family have a sad story indeed. The mother was left to die whilst giving birth to the baby, as they couldn't afford the "payment" to the doctors. She bled to death in the hospital, and no eye was raised. The doctor is still practicing in the hospital, and no compensation payout was given to the father. The father is out of work, and struggling to make ends meet, and they live in a two "bedroom" house, which is in fact just two rooms. In that house is the father, his new wife (I'll come to that in a sec), the grandmother, the sister, and 5 children. The new wife I mentioned earlier had a dream a few weeks ago, where the dead mother (her best friend) came to her and said in the dream "take care of my children". So despite her family's protesting, she went ahead and married the father in order to be able to take care of the kids. We took the family some clothes, and some gifts donated by someone in the UK, and they were very grateful.

We also took some amazing photos of some of the Albanian scenery... Here are just a few...



Finally - the most fun thing I did in the last two weeks was to visit the "shtepi oficare". This is where the old people come to hang out, play games, drink coffee and, on thursdays, get a quick checkup from a missionary nurse here called Jo. She checks their blood pressure and blood-sugar levels. We had a great time, as the old people are so friendly and full of life here. I even joined in a game of dominos, slamming the domino on the table each time!!


I would finally like to offer my condolanses to the families of those who died in the Virginia Tech shootings. I was watching "Bowling for Columbine" just two days before, and am perplexed how this sort of incident could happen *again* in America. Very sad.