another sandy story

Saturday I taught Sarah how to drive a stick shift. She did amazingly well for her first day. You know its one thing for someone to learn to drive a stick, but another to do that in Niger. So much more to keep in mind: animals, people, all sorts of vehicles, military police, round points, and the lovely sand.

Well the sand really caused Sarah no problems, but then as we were leaving the tailor that evening I got us stuck in the sand. What a good example I am. After locking the tires and putting the truck into 4-wheel drive, nothing happens…okay getting embarrassed. There were about 30 men standing around staring at us. I simply wave and smile. The tailor comes out to see what is wrong…hello can you see the tires? Well after telling me he doesn’t know how to drive and knows nothing about trucks, several guys come over. Two different guys attempt to drive the truck out of the sand and were unsuccessful. Whew, I was starting to feel better since I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t get it out. Then what do you know, a nice car pulls up (fancy car) and this big man gets out, asks “What’s wrong?” (in perfect, American English.) He gets up in the truck, drives it out, and walks away. I yelled “thanks” as he pulled off. Weird. But God is so good.