Anniversary Day

13 years of marriage…. WOW! Angie is the best and I can prove it. We took the opportunity to invite friends over to our house last night to celebrate. Anniversaries are only supposed to be celebrated with large groups of people on the 25th and 50th anniversary, but we wanted to use it as an excuse to have people over to our house. There were points throughout the day, that I wished we could have had a sitter hang out with the kids and Angie and I could have gone to Macaroni Grill for dinner, caught the latest movie at the theatre and talked for about an hour while we sipped a Star-bucks. Our day was nothing like that, but it was absolutely wonderful. While many of you were eating breakfast, I had a surprise guest stop by the house. Our friends that we were expecting were delayed, so it gave me a wonderful opportunity to visit with Ibrahim. Ibrahim was one of the first men we met on the island we live on. I have some pictures of him and his kids in one of the photo selections. Ibrahim climbed a coconut tree on our first or second day here. You can read about in the June 9th entry. Well about 5 days ago, Ibrahim came by my house unexpected and told me that his baby was really sick and he needed some money to take him to the doctor. I gave him some money and he assured me he would pay me after he got payed on Aug 1. I didn’t have any way to get in touch with him or to check on his baby, so I just had to wait until he came back. ___A_OPEN___a href=”http://www.bobbycox.org/blog/uploaded_images/Abdula-749741.jpg”___Well yesterday was that day. He came back to inform me that his baby Abdula, has a heart problem. They dont know what the problem is and are not qualified to handle this here, so they are having to take him to India. He told me that he has already asked the government to help him get there and was sure they would help. I felt so sorry for him. I invited him into the house to talk further. He told me that he would get his answer in a couple of days, but he needed to pay the discharge at the hospital. He told me that he needed about $20 more. I gave him the money and assured him that my family would pray for his baby. Tomorrow will be a day of “P“ and ”F “for his healing. Would you join me. We hope to see complete healing before the arrival in India. ;-)J came to help us with the preparations and cleanup of our party. When he came he brought with him an anniversary gift. He gave us a tea set. He really is amazing. He barely makes any money and he used (I am sure all he had) to purchase and wrap the gift. I told him that his love for us was all we needed (He says this to us all the time). Our other friends arrived and Ibrahim left. We had a great night with our friends. We BBQ’d on the beach. Naseem brought 3 red snapper, Angie and J fixed rice, roti and some chicken curry. Naseem brought 3 other guys with him. Ahmed, Adill, and Husane. They all helped build the fire and prepare for the cookout. After one guys scraped the dead leaves off of a coconut limb, the other began building a fire with dried coconuts and the leaves. He slowly added coconut after coconut to the fire. Once the leaves were scrapped from the coconut limb, the limb was trimmed into 4 skewers. It was amazing. If I could catch the fish, I now know how to survive on Survivor. While the fire was building, Naseem came into the house to prepare the fish. After cutting the heads off the fish, he told J to fry them. Yeah… fried fish heads… they say its very tasty. Soon the fish was cooked, and everything was ready. I told the men (no ladies came) that I have been married to my wife for 13 years. The congratulated me. All the men were single but Naseem. Remember at the beginning, I said I could prove that Angie was the best? Well she spent her 13th wedding anniversary eating fried fish heads and eating with her hands with 8 other men. Not exactly the romantic night most women desire. She truly sees the big picture and her love is greater than I can imagine. I am truly thankful for my wife and the gift she is to me.