Prayer Email #4
Sent 2/7/2004

     Hello my faithful prayer partners! I hope that this e-mail finds you all well. I feel like its been quite a while since I last updated you on what has been going on here, so I am excited to get a chance to let you know some praises and prayer requests!

     God has really been at work here as Megan and I begin our ministry in Grahamstown and the surrounding area. We have contacted three schools and have worked out times when we can come teach. This is truly a praise and a work of God, because the school system is kinda crazy here. Let me try to explain it.

     Each school works on a cycle. This means that if a school has an eight day cycle, it will begin with Day 1 and continue on until it gets to Day 8 and then start over again. This means we cannot just schedule to come every Thursday, because each Thursday will look different, depending on which day it is. Complicating matters further, each school has a different number of days in its cycle, so some of our schools are on an eight day cycle and some are on a nine day cycle. The final blow comes with the two schools in the townships, because they are not very organized, and do not always adhere to their schedule, which at any given moment can throw out all of what I just explained to you. So it is a feat to try to coordinate all these times, but Praises to God, we have gotten the month of February pretty much planned out.

     We are also going to be taking a course at Rhodes University (in G-town) in Xhosa three mornings a week, so this should help in the language learning. We have also started leading a Bible study for the youth at the Baptist church in town, and the first meeting for that was this past Wednesday and it went very well.

     We are continuing to show videos on HIV/AIDS in the church in Port Alfred, and they are responding in such a positive way! Every time, we have discussions on how they can get involved in their community. These discussions are always brought up by them, and they are really taking an initiative in starting up an AIDS ministry. God is moving. It is exciting!

     On a more personal note, I think I have dived head first into the first stage of culture shock. This stage is called the "honeymoon" stage and it is characterized by thinking that everything about the culture and people are wonderful. (I don't remember what the second stage is, but I intend to prolong this one as long as possible!) I really have settled in well here, and am enjoying living in G-town and getting to know the culture so much.

     I had a chance last weekend to go to a township in Kenton on Sea and stay with a family. To explain a bit about the townships, they are the communities where the majority of the black people live. They were forced there during the years of apartheid and since then, most have stayed either for economic reasons, or because of the community they are a part of there. The living conditions vary a lot, but it is more reflective of what most of you are probably imagining when you think of Africa. The towns here are really like America or Britain. You go to the townships to see "Africa".

     The family I stayed with were wonderful, they were from the church in Kenton. Mamma Hoyi lives with her daughter, Xobsi (go ahead guys, pronounce the "x" like you are clicking to a horse!) and her son Malabongwe. Her husband passed away just about a year ago. They were so encouraging and challenging for me as believers. They had such passion for the Lord, it was really amazing. It seemed like the things of God just poured out of their mouths, their hearts, their lives. They truly live and breathe what they believe. It was really just so encouraging! (although I often thought--what am I doing here, these people don't need me, if anything I need to be more like them!)

     Some fun cultural aspects of my time there include:

• The food was AMAZING. I'm talking rice, beans, dumplings, stews, so many yummy things that I'm quite sure I would be fat if I lived with them all the time!
   
• They didn't have indoor plumbing, so I got to bathe in a plastic tub and use an outhouse (there are fun stories accompanying the outhouse experience, but probably not appropriate for a mass e-mail. If you want details, I'll share on a more person-to-person level!)
   
• Because of a slight miscommunication (probably due to the fact that we don't speak the same first language) I ended up getting to address the entire high school in Kenton, when I had only intended on meeting with the principal...leaving me questioning, WHY did I not take a public speaking class at Carson-Newman?!