Monday, April 18, 2011

So I am back!

I know it is a little late, but I made it safely back to the States. It is nice to be back and see my wife (and her growing belly! :D), family, and friends. I do miss the village and especially all those children. It was hard leaving, but life must go on and I very sure that Sarah and I are going to see them in the future! I would like to thank all those at the COZV church and village for their help and support. Continue to pray for Travis and Lorna and all of those staff and volunteers. Also keep praying for the flood! It had been rising ever so slowly even when I left, so we hope it goes down as soon as possible.

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Final Update

So this is the last update for me being here in Namibia. It has been a wonderful couple of weeks. I wish I could have stayed longer because I was just getting to know all of the kids.
 
April 9th
 
A very long day of walking and driving to soccer. The girls game was scheduled at 11, but didn't start til 2. The guys played after them and I got to play with them also. The girls won their game 3-0. The boys didn't fair so well... we lost 0-4. :( I got to meet Disco (one of the older boys that is now at another school) and we actually played against his school and him. Everyone didn't get back to the village til after 8pm.
 
April 10th
 
We went to pick up a team from Campus Crusade for Christ and they led a sermon and gave a message for the kids. Got to hang out with the kids some more that day.
 
April 11th
 
Quite a long day. Started with devotions in the morning and then went to Mafuta to drop off food. Then we had to go to town to do all of the food shopping for the village among other errands. I got some shitanges for Sarah and the baby at the open market. We had so much food and supplies to bring back we had to take 2 trips on the boat to get it back. The boat was very low in the water on the trips. It was kinda scary lol
 
April 12th
 
Started with staff devotions, then went to help organize the shelves in the workshop. One of the dogs had ran off a couple days ago and then came back today. He looked very sick and wouldn't eat anything all day. Was trying to figure out what was wrong, but he just kept moping around all day. I cooked dinner for Travis, Lorna, Johannes, and Lena. Made them some fried chicken and mashed potatoes. Since it was my last night here I hung out with the kids some more. Got quite a few letters for Sarah from the kids. :) Had some goodbyes, but I told them I would see them in the morning before I left.
 
I definitely am going to miss the children and everyone here. It has been a wonderful time and everyone has treated me so well. Am most definitely going to try and come back in the future. This is my last update here and I will post when I get back to the states. Continue to pray for the flood to go down as it continues to slowly rise. Also pray for the kids as they will go on break from school next week.

Friday, April 8, 2011

Woah so I got kinda behind! Sorry!
 
April 5th
 
Did some laundry today! I was down to my lasts of everything haha. Also did some painting on the outside cooking area. It started raining when we were painting and of course didn't stop till after we were done, but we got the first coat on! I practiced with the boys in the soccer practice. I was tired half-way through their warm-ups... It was good though and a lot of fun.
 
April 6th
 
Really didn't do much today, but rest. Practiced some more soccer with the boys and then had their bible study later that evening.
 
April 7th
 
Johannes and I had to paint the outside cooking area and laundry bench again with a different coating of paint. Read 1-3 John and some of Revelations today. Revelations is so confusing lol. Got to practice some more with the boys, but I wasn't running a lot because I was tired haha. Also had the final session of the bible study with the boys that night.
 
April 8th
 
Got to go to town again and did some shopping. So the water has been flooding onto the dirt road so we have to go by boat now to get the cars. The river isn't rising, but the water is breaking through the small dams that were keeping the road dry. It was also very windy today, which means according to the elders that the flooding should be done and winter should be coming now. Some of kids want me to teach them Kung-Fu because I am "Ching-Chong". So I taught them some stuff, but the most important lesson is to never start fights! Got to go to a bible study for the older kids and they were in the book of James and learning about that. Got to hang out with the kids some more and learned how to dance!

Monday, April 4, 2011

April 3rd
 
We had a short church service today, but a very good sermon from Travis. It was a very long day with the girls playing a friendly soccer match against another school. We had to drive all the way to the Namibia-Botswana border, which is where the school was located. Our girls won! The score was 2-1 and they did a very good job playing against girls that were older and bigger than them. It was also very hot that day.. I got a little more sun burnt hehe.
 
April 4th
 
Had staff devotions in the morning and then packed up and went over to the Mafuta village to drop off some food. We then went to town to get food for COZV. We had to go to 2 shopping stores and then 2 catering services to fill up the Backy (err on the spelling, it is the 4x4 truck they use). The truck was so full. Lorna had 2 crates full of loaves of bread on her lap in the front seat. Johannes and I had very little room in the bed of the truck. I had to sit on a box in the corner of it and he was sitting on a corner also. The dirt road to the village has also flooded more (even though the river hasn't risen), but we barely made it through the water. Praise God that nothing or no one fell out!
 
Travis, Johannes, Melinga, and I headed out one last time on the truck through the water to get firewood for Mafuta. We had to drive deep into the bush to look for wood. Since the road was getting too deep, we had to switch over to using the boat on the river and will probably be using that for a while. Once we got back to the village we had the bible study for the older boys.

Saturday, April 2, 2011

March 31st
 
After staff devotions, Johannes and I thought we could help out some, so Tombe asked us to fix the crane for the large pots for the outside cooking pit. All we had to do was drill a large hole and place a large bolt in it to help support the heavy weight of the pots. Something that should've taken a hour ended up taking us over 3 lol. So lesson learned: always measure before you start drilling.
 
I gave Niko his basketball and the other kids some soccer balls. I got to play soccer with the girls and boys also. So I ended up playing basketball and soccer for about 3.5 hours. I was tired after that.
 
April 1st
 
I got to sleep in a little bit. After I got up I started cutting some of the tall grass near the children's home. I had to use a old push mower that kept getting stuck because the grass was so tall. I got to help serve lunch for the kids and Albert helped me out too. Uncle Travis and I had to show Niko and Mateo how to play basketball. :) Later that day I got to ride in to town with Travis to see the bus stop. Later that night Johannes led a bible study for some of the older children.
 
April 2nd
 
So a group of men from the Seventh Day Adventist church came today and led a service for everyone. It was an awesome service and they can really sing well. After that for lunch we had a authentic meal of grilled chicken, pap, and potatoes. We had to eat it with our hands, which was fun. The kids were showing me how to eat it. They also found out that I am half chinese so now I have to teach them some things. I feel kinda bad because I forgot a lot of my chinese, but hopefully it will come back to me. Got to play more basketball with more of the kids and ended up with very large blisters on my feet haha. I also got a little sunburnt. (but don't worry baby, I'm fine) Saturday is also movie night so we watched Cool Runnings.