Namibian Notes

Mission Log Aug 24th 2004

Trust me, if you have not visited South Africa you haven't been anywhere!

We had a few days between teaching schedules, so Kaye and I decided to take the opportunity to visit Cape Town, South Africa (where we had some contacts we needed to make). This was a big adventure for me to fly there, rent a car and set out to places unknown. (Kaye is much more adventurous that way.) Even though the weather forecast was "freezing cold and rain", we went.

God blessed our trip completely. We saw thousands and thousands of beautifully cultivated acres of land with yellow flowers, flocks of sheep, herds of cattle, orchards and wine lands against a backdrop of high mountain ranges while driving through the Garden Route.

Some people said that it might be boring returning via the same route, but God’s creation is never boring. He makes all things beautiful and gives us opportunities to see His handiwork in different ways. So wouldn't you know, on the return trip, we drove through a snow-storm while crossing through one of the mountain passes, and saw those same mountains again, now white-capped with snow!

The Garden Route is the most beautiful place on earth. It runs along the southern coast of South Africa, so as we were driving, we had the mountains on one side, and the seacoast on the other. Every place we looked reminded us of another country. In some places, we were reminded of Jamaica, in others, Austria, Italy, Greece, Ireland, Lebanon, so many other places. That is why it is said that "South Africa is the world in one country". Photos cannot capture the beauty and grandeur of what we saw. It is breathtaking.

Start saving up everyone...we are all going back there together!

At many of the lookouts, and at the National Parks, there are plaques (posted for all to read) with a verse of Scripture declaring the glory of God. One that we saw was in Storms River Mouth, where the raging sea crashes against the rocks on the shoreline making a constant thundering water-works display day and night. Its power is both magnificent and awesome all at the same time. The verse was from Psalm 93:4 "The Lord on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, yeah, than the mighty waves of the sea". That verse took on real meaning as we stood there and experienced the mighty thunder of the crashing waves.

On returning to Cape Town, we met with a gentleman there, whose organization provides a Micro-MBA course for people stuck in poverty to help them work their way out of the life they are in.

Jobs are hard to come by and really not even available for these people, though they have aspirations and dreams and are talented in various ways. Because they have no business skills to develop entrepreneurial projects on their own, they are hampered and often taken advantage of. This program equips them with the basic skills of preparing a business plan and managing their cash flow. They have prepared at least 123,000 people with this training and have an 83% success rate. It is very impressive and, we feel, a major key to helping many of the people we have been in contact with here in Namibia. More on this later for sure! It is a new and fresh approach to development by giving all the tools for a hand up rather than hand out. The proof of the success of it speaks for itself.

I would love to take the course for trainers. It would be wonderful to equip and empower people who want the help, in this way. The poverty and lack of resources of all kinds that we have seen, has been devastating emotionally, especially as it is often found in the midst of great wealth and beauty. On the one hand you see the beauty and the modern buildings and facilities, and in contrast, the shantytowns sit there in the middle of it all.

I know we can't help everyone, but with the right tools and the right mindset, many can be empowered to help themselves and then in turn help others to have a better life. Just simply throwing money at the perceived problem is no way to do this kind of work.

Kaye and I feel that the Lord is about to change the direction of life for us. And although we don't know exactly what that means, we nevertheless covet your prayers for us as we move forward together. It continues to be an exciting journey.

~ posted by mexikids at 1:04 PM

Mission Log Aug 13, 2003

It has been a while since our last log. Email is expensive and difficult to manage. Keeping this diary is tedious to read, but the best way I can keep you all up to date. We will try to post some photos now that the digital camera is here.

On Sunday, August 2nd, we attended a service to hear Pastor Phineas Dube speak. He is a former teacher of the Haggai Institute, and is currently working with Scripture Union in Zimbabwe (where he is from).

We all had lunch after service, at Pastor Wallace's home in Windhoek, and had a great discussion about not only "knowing the words to speak" in Africa, but also "knowing the right tune" to put them to so that the words will be best received. If your words are not music to the ear and the understanding they will fall on deaf ears and dull minds.

To this end, we made a 3-day trip to Zimbabwe to continue to "learn the tune" of Africa. We had the most incredible experiences.

We stood in the shadow of Livingstone's statue while viewing the spectacular Victoria Falls. We stayed in a Jungle Lodge and had monkeys come on the porch in the morning. We can now officially say that "we rode an elephant through the wild". We saw hippos, elephants and crocodiles while traveling on the Zambezi River.

The African name of the Victoria Falls, is Mosi Oa Tunya which means The Smoke That Thunders. I hope we can post a photo of the 7th Wonder of the World for you to see.

One of the highlights for us, was a visit to a typical African Village. Unfortunately, we had a time constraint, as we had to catch our plane back to Namibia.

You can be born in any state in the North American continent and be an American. However, if you are born in Namibia or Zambia or Morocco or any other country on the African continent, you are a citizen of only that country. So the big question is, Who Is An African? This is part of the tune I am trying to learn. It is even more complicated as it is not only which country, but which tribe, which language and which color one is.

There is a great effort being made to find unity and to be able to blend the Federal System of Government with that of feudal Tribal Africa and it’s ancestral traditions.
Some countries are doing better at this than others.

I heard a quote in Phineas' sermon that has struck home for me:

"If you only do economic development with people who do not know they are children of God, they will eat up the world and each other."

When Adam and Eve left the Garden (of Eden), they entered the Jungle. As a result, Man now lives precariously in the Jungle like the animals.

To me, helpful answers seem impossible. I was speaking with a young pastor who is attending Bible School here. He has been in exile from Burundi for 29 years of his life, and yet still has hope to be able to one day return home and make a difference. He shared a wonderful insight with us. He observed that we would usually look for Jesus to come through a doorway to enter into our problems and answer our needs, but in his experience, He supernaturally and unexpectedly comes through the wall. Please pray for Pascal. He is a musician and is hoping to make a difference through his music as well. He has already cut a master CD and we heard some of it. It sounded really good.

I feel very humbled at the many problems that people need help with. And a little goes a long way. Please pray for us to be wise in knowing who to help and how to extend our hands and resources.

This is Kaye. I am really adapting well to all of this. This has been a rich experience so far. I know that it makes us think about life differently. I know my way around Windhoek quite well, now, and the little German that I picked up years ago, has come in handy. Like, "Guten Morgen" and all the expressions that I have driven my family crazy with at times. :-)

I still can't believe that I rode an elephant in the wild terrain. It was an unbelievable experience. Made you consider what it might be like to be that big, walking through the land down to the waterhole and being aware of other animals as you see their tracks and droppings... "that is giraffe... that is zebra."

Nature. Expanse. Caring. Fear. God's creation. Seeing the wild animals as you drive on the dirt roads and some on the main road is surreal. I haven’t seen a zebra yet, but I have, so far seen giraffes on the side of the main road at dusk, kudu, varieties of antelope, baboons and monkeys, warthogs, ostridge and other animals. The funniest thing was seeing a family of baboons with babies on their backs and under their bellies, running through the main street in the town of Victoria Falls.

Contrasts... of the modern and the tribal... of the new and the ancient... of the city and of the wild... and on and on it goes.

I've been with Val, to help with her craft classes. Both at Five Rand Squatter's camp to teach paper mache, and then this last Monday at Rehoboth to teach more advanced crafts. Val is making the most beautiful things out of paper mache and other materials. I see her love for the people and her desire to better their way of life and to encourage them by equipping them in this way. I truly admire her heart and her talent. It has been a real privilege to work alongside her in this way.

~ posted by mexikids at 1:45 PM

We are back from Swakopmund after a five day stay. The weather was exceptional, no East wind bringing the hot wind and the blowing sand off the desert. I wish I could post the photographs of the drive over. I took photos showing how the vegetation dwindles away over the 200 mile or so drive through the desert. It ends in the highest sand dunes in the world and the other side of them is the sea.

Sunday we went to services at the Swakop River Community Church where Lon gave the sermon. The church is located on the edge of town and you can see the dunes outside the window. There is a green line in the sand at the base of the dunes which is where the Swakop River runs. It is not visible but runs beneath the sand. The shrubs grow in the sand so you can tell where the river runs. The slogan of the Church is "where the river runs there is life." Amazing how God brings life even when you cannot see Him.

In the afternoon we had tea with some of the members and it is time for a good joke. Our new friend Jimmy a good Scottish gentleman who works at one of the mines told us this story:

There was an old man who was sitting on a park bench crying his eyes out. A policeman asked him why he was so upset. The old man told him that he had married a very young and beautiful girl. She would take care of his home, wash and iron his clothes, cook dinner for him every night and tuck him into bed. She would come every morning and make wonderful love to him. The policeman asked him why he was crying. He said that he had gone out for a walk and couldn't find his way home.

Monday night Lon led a meeting of the leadership of the church to help them formulate their plans for their next steps to becoming a bit more organized than they presently were. They have about 45 people now worshiping on Sunday mornings on a regular basis so it was time to have a bit more organization to their structure. The balance between Pastor, Authority, Influence and Control would be vital. They seemed to understand this and were very grateful for Lon's input. As they work this out in practice I am sure they will have questions that Lon can help them with in the future. It is a great privilege to be part of something like this.

I took their Tuesday night meeting and shared with the same group some concepts of small group development. We started out by asking them what they thought a small group was and it gave me a good platform to share a much wider concept with them. I would love to be in on the ground floor as a coach since they are only 45 strong at the moment. As I will be here for several weeks more we will see what comes out of this. They were really excited by some of the concepts they heard. If they decide to be church of small groups at this time in their growth they could grow the church through people being joined not only to do tasks but to be consciously doing life together. Small Group is the nearest thing to my heart so I am hoping for some more time with them on this subject.

We managed to do visiting around this delightful small beach town. There was a pretty well stocked wood carvers market with some nice things. Kaye was identified as not being an American and as soon as they found out she was originally from Jamaica she became known as the "Leggae" lady. Somehow they don't pronounce R's very well. A good Lebanese Leggae Lady gets good prices, so we had some fun with that.

We visited a local weaving shop which is unique to Swakopmund. The wool of the karacula sheep is used to provide the wool to make these rugs. It is quite amazing to see this process way out in the desert. The factory is run by an English lady who has been developing this craft here for 25 years. We went to try to buy dyed wool for Val. But when the manager saw what Val was doing with it, she showed us the place including a class room for teaching young people in the community. She introduced us to the manager who then was so excited about what we were doing that she arranged a meeting with the managing director of the mine that funds the foundation that runs the place.

We had dinner with the managing director, his wife and the lady who runs the weaving shop. Anyway, this is one more piece of connection to an ever increasing web of influence and networking in Namibia. Everything is here but it is not always easy to find out where it all is.

The lesson I learned from the Karakula weavers was this. The weaver sits behind the loom and is surrounded by spools of spun, dyed yarns. He has an outline of the pattern he will weave into the rug hung behind the loom. He chooses color and texture etc of the yarn he will use and makes his knots and runs of yarn into the threads before him. Just like life I thought. We are free to make whatever decision we like about how we do life but if we have a pattern of the Master Designer in front of our eyes to follow our choice of color and texture may not be perfect but the tapestry will reflect a picture of our life that is good. When we chose to design life without the outline of the Master Designer the tapestry will surely tell a sad story.

On our return journey we had a very special surprise. I have driven this route so many times before and never had this special bonus. We passed by the animal preserve between Okahandja and Windhoek at about sunset and lo and behold we saw Kudu, Springbock and two Giraffe right on the fence line. This is really unusual and it was a big surprise for us all in the car.

We are back in town and spent the day in Okahandja getting the ladies in the settlement camp organized to make the cutest preschool furniture out of paper mache. They can sell the furniture to preschools all over Namibia if they so chose. Most all of the materials are free: cardboard boxes, old news papers and fabric tubes. They are very sturdy little chairs and tables attractively painted and could provide a very nice income for some of the ladies. Val is also showing them how to make bowls out of paper mache and they are all excited about that. It just amazes me how such a little can go so far here. It is a lot of work as many of folks are completely without skills and hope, but once they catch on that this is really something they can do, they get very motivated to try. This makes working here sometimes in the dust and heat very fulfilling.

~ posted by mexikids at 11:48 AM