A "Good" Day

This past week has been a good week, but for very different reasons than I am used to! Alyssa and I were talking tonight while we were eating dinner that we have plenty of good days here but it is getting harder and harder for us to explain the things that make a day "good."

Here are some good things that have happened this week:

-We have met with our new language helper for two days straight and have learned some useful things! I know this is small in comparison with others who are in language school for hours every week but this is a big deal for us! We are focusing on the biblical story of Cain and Abel and the story of Noah in our story groups this week so John has taught us some sentences and vocabulary from these stories so that we can follow along as it's being translated in the group.

-There have been no more snakes in my tukel. Need I say more?

-We made lentils, sauteed vegetables and rice for dinner tonight and everything was delicious. You know how sometimes things are cooked juuuust right? That was our rice tonight. Perfect.

-Almost 30 women from nearby villages came to our compound this afternoon for our ladies-only story group. Alyssa told the story of Cain and Abel, then had them help her re-tell the story. They were really listening because one lady even remembered the part where God tells Cain that sin is crouching at his door. I told the story of Noah and then the ladies took turns filling in the blanks when I told the story the second time. They all clapped for themselves when they remembered all the different things that went into the ark!

It is SO encouraging to see how interested these ladies have been in the stories recently. We can tell by their facial expressions during the story (looks of horror when bad things happen), the number of ladies who join in the re-telling of the story and their ability to remember details as they re-tell it that they are really listening. Tomorrow some of these ladies are going with us to Lomayen to help us tell the women in those villages about Cain, Abel and Noah.

As you are praying for the Toposa, remember these ladies and ask God to help them understand the stories they are hearing. Pray that they will tell their friends these stories from God's Word. Also, join us in thanking God for bringing us another language helper. We don't know how long this one will be with us, but temporary help is better than none!

I believe I've mentioned before that the Toposa like to jump (karot). You're not "in" until you jump with them. I dare you to jump in a circle around someone else for 60 seconds and tell me you're not tired.

Here we go...again

Since our language helper has disappeared, Alyssa and I are back to square one.

Again.

In the mornings we are teaching school to the boys so the afternoons are the time we have set aside for language/culture acquisition and ministry. Without a language helper it is hard for any of that to happen so after lunch we headed out to try to get some usefulness from our afternoon.

First we went to the county commissioner's office, which is in a large village about 20 minutes away by car. Because Shannon and Carrie had to gain the local leadership's permission for me to come live here, I wanted to greet the commissioner and ask him about his job and learn a little bit about how the government works out here. We drove up and didn't see much activity in the compound. Turns out all the government officials in the area had gone to Torit and no one knew when they'd be back. Great. On to the next plan.

We went to the clinic in this village because most of the clinic workers know English. Since almost no Toposa speak English we figured the clinic workers would know of any others who did. English-speaking Toposa are in high demand to work for the NGOs as translators so it's almost impossible to find anyone who speaks English AND is unemployed. They directed us to a village about 10 minutes further to find a man who had done some translating many years ago.

Alyssa and I sat in this old man's village for 45 minutes or so, just talking to him about his life and telling him about ours. He also didn't know of anyone who could help us.

We drove back through the larger village on our way back to Paringa and stopped to ask about a lady who was friends with one of the clinic workers. We'd heard she spoke English and had completed secondary school, which is way more education than most Toposa get. The man at her house said she was currently unemployed but had gone to Juba to look for work. Darn. We need her HERE!

All of this had taken several hours so in order to salvage the rest of the afternoon and not feel completely defeated, we went to Kapoeta to fill the truck with gas. Sounds simple but actually takes about an hour and a half to get there and back.

Results: no commissioner, no language helper, BUT we have a full tank of gas so I'm going to desperately call the afternoon a success.

SNAKE.

Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. -Genesis 3:1

This morning I went into my tukel to get something and heard a scurrying noise that was coming from the top of the wall. I saw a lizard wiggle over to the window and then saw IT dangling from one of the beams in the ceiling.

I feel very strongly that killing IT needed to be a boy's job so I yelled for Davis and the commotion brought pretty much everyone else within shouting distance.

Edwin got an arrow and chased IT back out of whatever hole in the ceiling that IT had come in from so then they were able to get a shot at IT with a big stick and knock IT off the outside wall and onto the ground where the dogs could get to IT.

After the dogs and sticks got ahold of IT this is what was left. And yes, I am now freaked out about every little noise in my tukel and wondering if another one will drop on my head.

Like I said, killing IT is a job for boys. I just take pictures.

Seriously?

The second half of our stay in Kenya was for doctor appointments and re-stocking. I'm now on the right meds so my strep-throat madness is over. I can swallow again! One of the "fun" things we get to do every time is pack up everything we buy in Nairobi and get it ready for customs at the border. Yikes.

Note the lovely plastic drawers. Those would be for my clothes because the termites have attacked the wooden dresser I've been using. This has enabled lizards to get into my clothes. Nothing like finding termites and lizard poop on your tshirts!

We got home to Paringa on Saturday night with relatively few problems so thanks to those who prayed for our trip!

Today was the day we went to Kapoeta to find our language helper from the last two weeks in December. He had agreed to help us when we got back and lo and behold...he's left the country. In Kenya for school. So now we are back to square one with no language helper...again. Seriously? I could write a novel about how frustrating this whole situation has been but I will skip that (you're welcome) and just ask you all to pray even more earnestly and diligently for us as we try to learn the Toposa language to be more effective in communicating the good news of Jesus.

I leave you with this: one of the monitor lizards that the dogs caught the other day. Betcha don't have one of these in your backyard!

HAPPY New Year

So many things have happened in the past 2 and a half weeks that there's no way a blog post can handle all the details. Here are the highlights:

-The day before we left for Nairobi, Alyssa and I had the best story group ever in one of the nearby villages. We listened to the story of the calling of Peter, James and John to be followers of Jesus and fishers of men (Luke 5:1-11) on the Proclaimer, then discussed the story substituting more Toposa-friendly things like gardens for boats and sorghum for fish. Some key spiritual leaders were listening to the story and had some really good questions afterwards. "We've heard we can only sin 70 times and then we die, is this true? What exactly is a sin? If someone comes and steals my cattle and I kill him in order to get my cattle back, is that a sin? Why did Jesus mix good and bad people together? How could Jesus never sin if his mother Mary had sinned? Why did God make man separate from Him?" Whew! We have lots of work to do when we get back on Saturday.

-We are currently in Nairobi because last week we had a company meeting for all the career missionaries who have been in Africa 3 years or less. Alyssa and I, along with three other Journeygirls and a team of volunteers from the US, helped with childcare for those who were attending the meeting. Shout out to Edwards Road Baptist Church for raising money to bring each of us care packages from the US. They blessed me so much!

-The day the meeting ended we went to visit Benton at his boarding school. Rift Valley Academy has some of the best views in all of Africa and I don't feel too sorry for Benton having to look at that scenery every day.

-Later that night we got to go to the airport to pick up our newest addition to the Toposa team, Jonathan and Holly! WOOHOO!!!! They will live about an hour and a half from us but it is awesome to have them so close. Currently we are all boosting the Kenyan economy by stocking up on food, toilet paper, and other necessities that we can't get in South Sudan.

-We got haircuts for the first time since September! You know the epic hair wash/massage you get when you get a haircut at a salon? Yeah, that was wonderful. And we had our curly hair straightened for the first time in months!

Thank you to those who have been praying for the Toposa people. Some specific things to pray for this week are:

-Safe and smooth travel back to South Sudan for all of us. We are bringing back a LOT of stuff since we won't be out again until after Easter, and Jonathan and Holly are setting up their house. The customs process is never consistent but always ridiculous so please pray that we can get everyone and everything to where it needs to go!

-School starts next week. Davis is in 4th grade and Walker is in pre-k. Pray that Alyssa and I will be able to teach the boys in a fun and creative way that helps them learn.

-There are lots of opportunities for sharing about the gospel of Jesus with the Toposa. Please pray that God would lead us to specific people in specific villages who are open to hearing the Truth.