Monday, December 24

Irma woke at 8:00 and I woke shortly afterwards. Luke, the girls and I had cornflakes for breakfast. Anib came at 10:00 and we went to buy some beer, and some skin lotions.

Now we are at the beach. We have had a drink at Leo’s and left our clothes there. We are going to the beach to rent boogie boards. In an hour we will all be happy and exhausted.

Back at Leo’s Luke will attempt to deal with his back-up problem – the one which means he will lose one year’s work unless he figures out how to stop Mozi advancing nightly – before eating a delicious meal. We both opt for spicy. Luke will have chicken vindaloo and I will have spiced ginger fish with rice. The girls will all have home-made fish fingers and chips.

At 19:00 Luke will walk back down in the dark to phone Kari and make a final effort to prevent his data from melting away. We will sit on the porch listening to the disco from the gym until the nightly power cut ends it. We will sit through a loud storm, a firework display, and the. Sounds of the local church choir singing hymns and Christmas pop songs.

Luke will return about 22:00.