Breakfast at Sea Sept 7

 September 7, 2010


This morning Paul and I were to meet in the dining room for breakfast at 8:00. But when I got there his table was full. Desmond Tutu and Leah had just been joined by Dara, a student from India who goes to school in the States. So I joined them even though I had not finished the second book, Made for Goodness. Remember, I had planned to wait until that was accomplished. But there they were sitting by a window with room at the table.

We spoke about Dara’s plans and what we had done in Spain. Dara had to leave for class and Paul joined us. We talked and at one point, Paul said to Leah, Desmond wife “Behind every great man there is a woman.” And Arch responded, “Leah would say she is beside me.”

Now Paul asked them how they met. Turns out Lea were his friend’s sister who he had known for a long time and had been in their home many times. “How did you ask her to marry you?” Paul asked. The Tutu’s looked at each other and smiled. He said, “I went to her house and told her my mother and father thought I should get married!” That caused great laughter at the table! “How romantic,” Paul exclaimed as he stood up at the table –laughing at him. “You didn’t even say “to her how much you loved her!” More laughter.

I added to the hilarity by telling them that after Paul and I had been dating almost 8 months, he asked me what I intended to do after graduation in a couple of months. (We had never talked about future plans.) “I’m considering joining the Peace Corp,” I responded. Then he surprised me by saying, “Well, I thought we would get married!” Another round of boisterous laughter rose from the table. This time Desmond gave Paul a hard time for not being romantic either. Now people were looking in our direction. The banter continued a little longer and Leah and I decided that neither was very romantic!

They are such lovely, warm people. Paul continues to call them his mother and Dad every time he sees them and they refer to him as their son with much laughter. How blessed we are to have this opportunity to be around them. We will likely have other opportunities to eat with them, talk, share life experiences, sign books, and pictures together. We went on the Morocco City Orientation Tour. Desmond and Leah were in a separate bus. We stopped and went into shops to look at their store. Leah apparently was tired and sat down on a small chair to rest. Paul saw them and went up to her and pretended that he was going to sit on her lap and she naturally got startled until she realized it was Paul trying to be funny. He started talking to both Desmond and her and I was able to take a picture of them together for fond memories.