News
March
ON THE MOVE!
In my last letter, I was not aware that I would be moving very shortly. I found out in January that the flat I'm in is no longer available. I therefore prayed and hoped for a new place to go to that would be nearby and preferably near to the church, on the bus route, with the same doctor and bank and the same rent! Now I thought that was impossible. Anyone who knows HGS will understand why … but then after the evening service, I was introduced to Diana who lives in the house next to the minister (which is next door to the church and about 500m from where I am now). She takes lodgers and one of the rooms was free - so I went to see it. I could see it was a very nice place with a lovely family owning it - but what about the rent? She quoted a price which was almost exactly what I am paying now! To which I had to say to myself 'Oh ye of little faith!' - Oh, and when I left the house, the bus went past and stopped just across the road!
(Please note, the picture uses artistic licence - I actually have a 'little' more luggage than that!)
WRITING WRITING WRITING
My original plans included finishing my thesis in March - but as you can imagine, I was somewhat worried about achieving this once I knew I had to move. But we managed to negotiate. My current goal is to finish around the end of May and then to have my viva at the beginning of October. This is much more doable, but I am still writing furiously. It sounds illogical, but I am basically writing my thesis backwards - so I have more or less done chapters 4-6 and I am working on chapter 3. This chapter is taking longer than I thought. It is on the same topic as my MA and I thought it would be easy to transfer information, but I've discovered that I've learnt more since my MA and this means that I no longer agree with myself! I suppose that is a good thing - but it is taking longer to reanalyse everything. I think I'll get there in time though.
Teaching
If all goes to plan, I hope to go to the Wycliffe Centre in High Wycombe in October to teach Phonology on their autumn course. My viva will actually take place after I've started there, so I will need to return to London for that - and then, any corrections that I need to do on my thesis will have to be done in the evenings while I'm teaching - but hopefully there won't be vast things to change.
Chad
If all goes to plan next year, I hope to return to Chad in January. 
I will
be based in the capital as a linguistic consultant - but I will of course be
keen to find out how the Kera are getting on. I have heard from Jackie, who is
presently studying for an MA in Canada. She and her family have had some health
concerns, but they are doing better, and she is really enjoying the course. She
reports on the Kera that they did get one harvest that wasn't too bad, but their
main harvest did not go well. So they are probably getting hungry again around
now (which is the start of the hottest time of year). They are really
appreciating the New Testament and using it well. Kuuri is training further in
the Central African Republic so that he can work on the Old Testament
translation as exegete. He is really enjoying his course and his results reflect
that.
You may have heard the mention of Chad in the news as the situation in Darfur
continues to affect Chadians on the eastern side of the country. The other
reports of something brewing in Chad seem to have calmed down - although no-one
really knows what might happen next. So I keep an eye on Reuters and the BBC for
up-to-date information.
Singing and Posters
As I said above, I've been furiously writing my thesis and not doing much else, but I do have a few things to distract me - one of those is singing in choirs - including the Collegium Musicum of London (you can check their website). We recently did a concert focusing on the freedom from slavery anniversary. To my amazement, I saw a couple of Wycliffe members in the front row of the audience. I thought Liz Raymond was in Africa - she was one of those who first got me interested in Wycliffe. I found out that Liz and Tim travelled from the Wirral to visit friends in London for the day and that their friends decided to treat them to a concert. So they were surprised to see me there too! They have since returned to Africa.
Another distraction was the UCL poster competition. I entered this competition two years ago - and did rather well, so I wasn't sure whether the judges would be kind to me this time with a new poster - but they were! I was joint winner of the Life Sciences section. There is another poster competition coming up, but I'm trying not to get too distracted…
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