Baby elephant

This morning at 8.42 hours I was watching live on the website the birth of a baby elephant in our zoo here in Antwerp. It was so wonderful, I couldn't stop watching afterwards. It's sister and aunt were there when the baby was born, it was planned that way. After 20 minutes the little one (? +/- 100 kilo's!) could stand on its feet. And then the word came out: it's a girl! All of the citizens of Antwerp will receive a birth announcement and there will be a baby drink in June.

The baby is an Asian elephant and Tuesday its Asian name will be announced.

Of course the coming hours will be still critical, but a good sign is that it already drank with its mum. It's sister is jalous about all the attention the little one gets, but mum and aunty are very cautious. I am so happy I could watch this miracle. It's the first elephant being born in Antwerp, even in Belgium. I will visit it this or next week, when the first crowds have been there to watch it, I have a subscription for the zoo, so I can go as often as I want.

On the other hand, we had bad news from the oncologist last Friday, hubby's tumour is growing again, surgery and radiation therapy haven't worked. Next week we will sit down with the oncologist and the surgeon to see what can be done. I really hope there will be something that can be done. Maybe they will try chemotherapy again. At the moment we are in shock, it's so hard, his organs are clean, only the place where the tumour is growing is so hard to reach.

We are not religious, so no prayer can comfort us, even now I feel no need to search for a God. This does not mean we are unhappy, we cherish the moments without pain, sit quietly together, a cuddle, a kiss... We don't need many words, we understand each others feelings without talking. I still have good hopes (I am pathologicly optimistic) that something comes up. On the 25th we will know. Meanwhile stitching is a good therapy.