Meet my latest former roommate, Benny the bat. At first he seemed innocent enough, quietly sleeping all afternoon. I thought he would be a great addition because he too would eat my insects, however the confinements of a roof were never meant for a bat. At about 2:30am I was awakened by something nudging against my feet. Since I’m here alone, needless to say, I was quite startled, but I’d seen him earlier in the day so I had a pretty good idea that it was him. I quickly flipped on the light and after he circled the small room quite a few times at great speed, he finally landed on the floor. I threw my blanket over him and “escorted” him out. I think I’ll stick with my gecko, Linus, for a roommate. He’s much less intrusive and doesn’t try to snuggle at night.
Three's a crowd
Photo of the Day
“The Lord is my shepherd; I have everything I need. He lets me rest in green meadows; he leads me beside peaceful streams. He renews my strength. He guides me along right paths, bringing honor to his name.”Photo of the Day
“Look at the lilies and how they grow. They don’t work or make their clothing, yet Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautifully as they are. And if God cares so wonderfully for flowers that are here today and gone tomorrow, won’t he more surely care for you?”One down, eleven to go
Today I have officially been here for an entire month. This is the longest I’ve been in Namibia and it’s starting to wear on me a little bit. The past couple days I’ve been thinking a lot about people back home and what I might be doing if I were there. I think it’s partly because I’ve been so idle lately and I hear about all the cool things people are doing back home. But hopefully this next week things will kick into gear.
On Monday I’m going to meet this guy named Buddy. Apparently he’s the guy to talk to about youth ministry in Okahandja. He’s an American who’s been here for 3-4 years and it pretty heavily involved. He said he runs a Bible study at the high school on Mondays and Wednesdays and has a coffeehouse on Fridays. I look forward to meeting him to see how I might get involved. Please pray that we get along because it sounds like I might be working with him a lot. :)
I caught the sunset on Monkey Mountain tonight, joined by about 20-30 baboons. Today’s photo of the day is for all those people who’ve been there and still haven’t seen why it’s called Monkey Mountain.
First blog post of 2008
After two weeks in Arandis for the holidays, it’s nice to be back in Okahandja (minus the humidity) where they got some good rains while I was away so everything’s nice and green. I made a mistake on the bus time today so I showed up an hour late, but it was not a problem as I’m getting quite used to this hitchhiking thing, plus it ended up being N$30 cheaper.
But I must say, my time in Arandis was well spent. I got to spend a lot of time with Toivo, getting to know him and his situation better. I spent many walks around town asking him questions about biology and business and WWII to help him get ready for mock exams when he goes back to school. I got to hang out with Tresford a bit, teaching him some new praise songs and listening to his ideas for the ministry. He invited me to come back in February to help teach some workshops at a little worship leaders conference he wants to put on. That’ll be good because my friend, Boniface, was away with his family for the holidays, so I’d get to see him then in February. To the ‘07ers who went to the high school, I did run into Jesme. She sends her greetings and asked when you’re all coming back. :) And it was great to chat a bit with Brenda. She was a great resource for helping me understand different cultural dynamics of doing ministry here and catching up on what’s going on with Hope’s Promise. (Sorry, Molly. Revival was in Windhoek the whole time so I didn’t get to see her.)
So now that I’m back in Okahandja and people are starting to come back from vacation I’ll be able to make contact with some of the youth ministry people around here. Schools start up in the next week or two. So hopefully I’ll be starting to get a better idea of what everyday ministry will look like around here. But for now I’m gonna sign off so I can go catch this stellar sunset. peace
