Monthly Archives: June 2009

At lunch today, Josh saw me looking over the bay, which is beautiful. He said “you’re gonna miss it.” You’re right Josh. When the weather is nice, it really is beautiful (and having space and wireless is good too). But its hard down here, like the whole communication thing. I realized that today when I got tired of not being able to hear Sweet Anna on our daily phone call and went to my room, fired up the netbook and Skypedout her at work. FINALLY, I can hear and talk with Sweet Anna! Man, my whole mood just changed radically. I felt so great after talking to her! I walked to the beach and took some pix. The sun sets here at like 530 this time of year (it comes up about 730. I will get a rude awakening Saturday when i’m back in the Heartland where the sun comes up at 4 and stays up till 8 or something (Hungary is a bit further north than S. Africa is south) So ANYWHO, the sun was setting, so I took off to see the waning light on the bay (see pic below).

It was all the better because of the warmer than I’ve ever felt down here and my general mood. Connection with our most important people (or person) is soooo important because we are beings who are made for community. I was thinking about this and how it is like when I fail to connect intentionally with God, my spiritual self suffers, have you experienced that too?

But there can hurt in community too. Today we invested the morning at a camp being run to serve girls who have been abused. The percentages of girls subject t such abuse (stated in an earlier post) are just staggering.  Abby was an awesome leader on an intentional walk we took. Early on the little journey, she had us get a rock and carry it. We would stop and read a Scripture and someone would comment on it, then we went to this pond where Abby taught us that there are things we need to throw away from our lives, and she prayed as the kids held  the rocks and then they threw their rocks into the pond. This symbolized that when we give our junk to God and really give it to him, we are free from it! On the way back they took a couple of turns in a little pick-up to get everyone back, but I needed to walk to get some exercise, I took the shot of the road to remember this little leg on my journey. There are people with awesome visions to deal with some of this hard stuff, they just need some help getting it done. I’m praying about how we might help them help these kids. But I have a few more things to see… hard things. But Josh has been telling me the saying down here: ‘Africa’s not for sissys’

On Friday I got to see a weekly ministry to kids in action. A South African couple has a burden to see children have a relationship with Jesus. So, for the last four months they have been coming around each Friday after school to have fun and teach these kids about a relationship with Jesus. The activities start out with sports and games and then singing. Then the wife  shares about Jesus and having a relationship with Him. The husband told me that there are plenty of people telling Bible stories but that what they really need is teaching about know Jesus, not just knowing about him… here are some pix from the day… Josh was a star with the kids, singing, teaching American football and hangin’ out…

A couple of powerful storms have come through here Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday causing some pretty awesome waves. While setting up to take some pix of waves, a vintage steam engine came through, that was cool.

As I promised yesterday, I will give you a hint on the situation in preschools. We visited a preschool in a township about twenty minutes from here. We were taken there by Yolandi, who we heard about yesterday.
This preschool once had 65 children, which blows my mind to think about given the size of the place. In fact that is why they only have forty enrolled now, since the health department told them to cut enrollment. It is a shame though because those absent kids are not being well served.
When we visited, there were only a dozen or so kids due to the weather. It was cold and raining and the conditions in the townships are notorius in the winter time (why do I go everywhere in the winter?). One cannot watch the news here without seeing the plight of people displaced from their homes by water. So, the director of the preschool told us that when the weather is bad, the mothers do not go to work and keep their little ones home. A woman will do domestic work in the homes of the more affluent for about $11.50 a day.
These mothers pay 55 Rand (about $7) a month for this day care/preschool. If a woman qualifies, she can receive about $28 per month per child from the local government. The local community provides about a dollar a day per child to offset the cost of this day care/education/nurturing place. I throw these numbers at you to get you contemplating the relative low cost of things in these preschools.
Last December, I was at a conference in DC that focused on the need for Early Childhood Development (ECD) in the developing world (which this certainly is). At this conference, I learned that studies show that if we can educate children well in the preschool years, a dollar invested in them is worth five invested in an elementary (primary) school aged child and worth ten invested in a high school aged child. Today, I began to see – – – and undertstand.

I have not crunched the numbers yet and have no ideas or proposals yet, I am still gathering information. But when I looked at those little faces and compared them to the faces of the drunk teen age boys I saw earlier or the faces of the girls giving themselves away after they have been raped, I am beginning to see where some wise investment here can be a Kingdom priority. We will visit more pre-schools next week.

Next: the church Josh and Abby help plant and serve in celebrates its first anniversary.

Next Week: a camp to bring Peace from Grace to young girls hearts who have been crushed by sexual abuse.