The Cattle are Lowing
The second verse of “Away in a Manger” describes a pastoral scene where the animals are all gathered around baby Jesus. “The cattle are lowing, the baby awakes, but little Lord Jesus no crying he makes.” Now after being in Mozambique and camping next to lowing cattle, braying donkeys and bleating goats, I’m quite amazed that the baby Jesus doesn’t awake crying; but he was the baby Jesus and perhaps that was the first miracle – that he didn’t wake up crying from all the animal noises.
Our Christmas did not involve lowing cattle (thank God!) but we saw plenty of other animals of God’s creation. Christmas tends to be a lonely time for anyone who is far away from family and familiar traditions. So when we were invited to go with some friends to a nature reserve in South Africa near Kruger National Park, we jumped at the chance.
We went with six other people—a Welsh couple, a Brazilian-American couple, a Dutch woman and a Brazilian woman. We drove all the way to the park and stayed at a beautiful lodge in the reserve. The website of the lodge promised that animals would come into the yard. We were not disappointed. Christmas morning, we woke up to zebras in the yard and later that day, Joél was able to feed them. We also saw warthogs, mongoose, vervet monkeys and two jennet cats. One day we drove around the park and saw a herd of zebras grazing near 6 giraffe.
One day we went to Kruger National Park. National parks here are not like the ones we have in the States, where you can get out and hike. Here, you stay in your car and drive around, looking at wildlife. Wildlife we saw, maybe not as close as Canon sees it, but we all had our cameras and binoculars out when we saw something. We saw: impala, warthogs, waterbuck, crocodiles, water buffalo, hippos, elephants, rhinos, zebras, lions, wildebeest, baboons, vervet monkeys, eagles, a tortoise, bats, vultures and various exotic birds. It was great. At one point, we even saw a number of elephants bathing. While we were leaving the park, three male lions caused a traffic jam because they were walking from one side to the other marking their territory.
Christmas day we celebrate using parts of everyone’s traditions. We had a barbeque (Brazilian tradition) with Christmas (fruit) cake (Welsh) and pulled poppers with prizes inside (British). Joél and I had brought hymnals so we sang some carols and talked about various traditions. We also exchanges gifts amongst us.
It was a really good way to celebrate Christmas if we had to be far away from home. For those 9 days, we were family and now after we’re back in the Chimoio area, we have good memories and stronger relationships with each other.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
The second verse of “Away in a Manger” describes a pastoral scene where the animals are all gathered around baby Jesus. “The cattle are lowing, the baby awakes, but little Lord Jesus no crying he makes.” Now after being in Mozambique and camping next to lowing cattle, braying donkeys and bleating goats, I’m quite amazed that the baby Jesus doesn’t awake crying; but he was the baby Jesus and perhaps that was the first miracle – that he didn’t wake up crying from all the animal noises.
Our Christmas did not involve lowing cattle (thank God!) but we saw plenty of other animals of God’s creation. Christmas tends to be a lonely time for anyone who is far away from family and familiar traditions. So when we were invited to go with some friends to a nature reserve in South Africa near Kruger National Park, we jumped at the chance.
We went with six other people—a Welsh couple, a Brazilian-American couple, a Dutch woman and a Brazilian woman. We drove all the way to the park and stayed at a beautiful lodge in the reserve. The website of the lodge promised that animals would come into the yard. We were not disappointed. Christmas morning, we woke up to zebras in the yard and later that day, Joél was able to feed them. We also saw warthogs, mongoose, vervet monkeys and two jennet cats. One day we drove around the park and saw a herd of zebras grazing near 6 giraffe.One day we went to Kruger National Park. National parks here are not like the ones we have in the States, where you can get out and hike. Here, you stay in your car and drive around, looking at wildlife. Wildlife we saw, maybe not as close as Canon sees it, but we all had our cameras and binoculars out when we saw something. We saw: impala, warthogs, waterbuck, crocodiles, water buffalo, hippos, elephants, rhinos, zebras, lions, wildebeest, baboons, vervet monkeys, eagles, a tortoise, bats, vultures and various exotic birds. It was great. At one point, we even saw a number of elephants bathing. While we were leaving the park, three male lions caused a traffic jam because they were walking from one side to the other marking their territory.
Christmas day we celebrate using parts of everyone’s traditions. We had a barbeque (Brazilian tradition) with Christmas (fruit) cake (Welsh) and pulled poppers with prizes inside (British). Joél and I had brought hymnals so we sang some carols and talked about various traditions. We also exchanges gifts amongst us.It was a really good way to celebrate Christmas if we had to be far away from home. For those 9 days, we were family and now after we’re back in the Chimoio area, we have good memories and stronger relationships with each other.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
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