Special stick

The new olive oil has arrived. We finished the picking of the olives earlier than expected because 2 of Mohamed’s sisters helped out for a few days.

The oil’s quality is excellent and the olives were rich with oil which compensates partially the low quantity of olives.

Zakaria liked going with us into the olive tree yards, but after a few hours he usually got to be very annoying because he cannot be or play on his own very long and wants to work with the tools in use. The tools not in use are not interesting.

He learnt to climb into trees, but needs assistance. Furthermore, it is important to have an eye on him all of the time as he doesn’t know yet how to react to dangerous animals like scorpions and snakes.

He told me that when he sees a snake, he can catch it with a stick and then take it ‘like that’. He has been seeing animal programs on the television in which highly dangerous snakes are being caught and handled. And during our last visit to Mohamed’s youngest sister, the children came and told their Mom there was a snake at the door. Mohamed caught it with a stick.

I tell Zakaria regularly that this is a special stick that his Dad or Khaliel have lying around. So, as soon as he sees a snake he has to come and tell us, so we can get this special stick.

We didn’t have a fall and went straight into winter, not one of the mildest winters neither. It has been freezing at night for the last month or so. Last night we had rain, but the disadvantages of wet higher temperatures are that the wind is ice cold and the sun is not really coming through.

I hate winter.