African Hospitality

Shot day number two is over. Whew. I've been around my share of hospitals and clinics but these immunization days are no joke. 3.5 hours, 195 people, and 566 vaccinations later...we are all one step closer to being invincible against yellow fever, typhoid, TB, and rabies!

Last night the Journeymen in our Sub-Saharan Africa affinity group went to our leaders' house for some authentic African bonding time. Shoes left at the door, wrap skirts and head wraps for the girls, and eating on the floor with no silverware make for a fun evening. It seems like every time I would tip my head back to eat the rice off my fingers my head wrap would fall off! I've been to West Africa five times so I was fairly familiar with the differences between American and African mealtimes, but I still had a new experience with the no silverware. The food was a very odd and very delicious mix of rice, beef, tomato sauce, mangoes, pineapple, bananas and peanuts. Never had beef with banana before, but it was good!

The whole head wrap, sitting on the floor thing was pretty entertaining. I feel like I have a lot to learn in the way of fabric tying so things stay where they're supposed to but give me time and I bet I'll get it totally right!

Coffee and dessert? Yes. Always.

Shot Day

Everyone at training (close to 200 of us) goes through three rounds of vaccinations before moving overseas. Today was the first of those three days and it was actually more enjoyable than I was thinking it would be. Misery really does love company...and fun Snoopy bandaids. Some only had to get one shot and one poor girl had to get six! I was right in the middle and am now well on my way to being invincible against rabies, polio and hepatitis A.

One of the things that our Sub-Saharan Africa group has to do while we are here is cook a meal from scratch. We made a feast last night! There are 32 adults in our group, plus 18 children...which equals a LOT of food. It's amazing what a potlock will bring out in a bunch of Baptist people. I love the family feel that our affinity has. As much as I hope to communicate with friends from home I know that there are some things that will happen on the field that only my affinity family will understand. I'm thankful for the wide variety of ages, experiences and personalities that make up our group and I am double thankful when there is a buffet of homemade food involved!

Is this real life?

Hopefully all of you got the "David goes to the dentist" reference from the title of the post. If not, YouTube it.

I'm currently in a "how to homeschool on the mission field" workshop. This is the LAST place I ever thought I'd be. Therefore, I'm trying to negate the fact that I'm here by blogging :)

This whole training thing was supposed to help me feel more prepared and if it's possible, I feel like I'm less prepared than when I got here! I should rephrase that. I'm just more aware of how much I don't know and how much I have left to learn. We've been going over doctrine, prayer, legal issues, anthropology, and currently...homeschooling. Some sessions are interesting, some are not, but it's encouraging to see how information is starting to come together and I'm catching a glimpse of the "big picture."

So I am horrible at crafts. I hate crafts. One time I tried to make an origami frog and ended up with a wad of green paper that went into the trash can. BUT I have taken up sewing! There are some very patient women who volunteer their time to teach us how to sew and quilt so I'm trying to broaden my creative horizons by doing something with my hands. Not only am I a missionary, but now I'm homeschooling and sewing? Uh oh..

Mindy and Lindy go to DC! (With Melanie and Dorothy)

So, it's fun sharing most of my name with Lindy. We are both going to Sub-Saharan Africa so it's extra fun when we can introduce ourselves together. Mindy and Lindy. Done.

My friend Kate lives in Washington, D.C. so I drove up there with Lindy, Melanie and Dorothy on our free day yesterday. Our schedule is packed from 8-5 during the week but we have weekends free for the most part. D.C. is only 2 hours away so we plan on enjoying it as many Saturdays as we can. Apparently most student groups also plan on enjoying D.C. in the summer because everything was packed. Or maybe it's always like that. Either way, there were a lot of groups of kids and a lot of adults with visors and fanny packs.

After Kate moved to D.C. we unintentionally started a tradition of visiting each other in the summers and in January so this trip worked out just great. Good pizza, laughing about random memories from college (and after) and making jokes about what my life will be like in South Sudan compared to how it was in Lubbock. I really value my friendship with her. We're serious when we need to be, and I always have a good time.

After lunch I met back up with the other three girls and we went to the Holocaust Museum and walked to the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial. Two miles seems so short on a GPS...and so much longer when it's 100 degrees outside.

Thank you to those who have been praying for me. I have only been at training for a week but I have already become much more aware of how powerful prayer can be and what a difference it makes in my attitude and my level of encouragement throughout the day when people at home are praying. If you would like to be on my "official" prayer update list then shoot me an email/text/FB message!

Pray For Mindy!

I wanted to share a sketch of my overall job assignment and a little bit about the Toposa people. If God brings me to mind in the next few days/months/years then you can use this (and later updates) as a way to be praying more specifically.

My two-year term will be focused on the Toposa people. The Toposa team currently consists of one career couple and their three children, plus another girl who is a few months into her two-year term. My main job duties will be split between homeschooling the boys and implementing a new HIV/AIDS curriculum in the cattle camps in my area that is specifically targeted at the Toposa culture. South Sudan is not only the newest country in the world, but also one of the most underdeveloped countries in the world. HIV/AIDS is a growing problem. There are approximately 800,000 Toposa in South Sudan. Of these, less than 2% have responded to the gospel of Jesus Christ. The Toposa are a pastoralist people group, and feared by their neighbors because of their tradition of cattle raiding and war. They believe in a supreme god, but worship and offer sacrifices to the spirits of their dead ancestors.

Some of the ways you can specifically pray for me are:

• Discernment on what to focus on during my two months in Richmond at orientation
• Encouragement as I am encountering entirely new situations
• Confidence in language study once I am in South Sudan
• Boldness in sharing God's word
• Personal growth in my relationship with Jesus

Some of the ways you can specifically pray for the Toposa team are:

• Peace during this time of new independence from Sudan
• Health of the team
• Discipleship of new Toposa believers

Mac Davis Was Wrong

I'm sitting upstairs at my parents' house in Dallas in the middle of a bunch of suitcases. Yesterday I packed up my car (after giving away or throwing away a TON of stuff) and drove a very full Mazda 3 to Dallas to drop off a few things before going to Richmond. Part of me is glad to finally be going to FPO and the other part of me is really sad to be leaving Lubbock. Plenty of people don't like Lubbock, either because they haven't been there but think there's nothing there but flatness, brown grass and wind..or because they've been there and know that there really is nothing there but flatness, brown grass and wind. Even though Lubbock isn't that pretty, I think it's the people there that make it great. I've lived there for six years and have some great memories and some wonderful relationships that helped shape who I am today. Most of my best friends are people I met while going to Texas Tech and even though the last couple of weeks have been full of hard goodbyes, I'm glad that I have meaningful relationships and people in my life to encourage and support me.

Thank goodness I can go back one more time before I leave for South Sudan in October! Lubbock will be in my rearview mirror for good then, but Mac Davis was wrong! It will be a sad day because I will leave a lot of great memories behind. But then again, I'm gaining a lot more than I'm losing and I am thankful that God is the same in South Sudan as He is in Lubbock.

Packing

I'm leaving for Richmond next week so I'm currently packing up my Texas life for the next couple of years. It's harder than I thought! I'm a minimalist so my first instinct is to just throw everything away or give it to someone else, but what if I should keep something for two years from now? I was going to put my furniture in a storage unit but now I'm reconsidering and thinking I'm just going to get rid of everything and re-buy what I need when I get back. I could just keep a few boxes of winter clothes and some of my books and pictures.

Too bad Goodwill isn't across the street! It's a good thing Lubbock is a college town and there are plenty of university students that need furniture! I kind of feel bad that I have this much stuff to get rid of, but I'm thankful that God has blessed me with more than I've needed.

Checklist for this afternoon:
-take books to donate to library
-take bags of clothes to Goodwill collection spot
-box up books to keep

Sigh. 100+ degree weather is so de-motivating!