So I realize that it has been a really long time since my
last blog post and I apologize for that.
I have just been really busy doing all sorts of different things and it
gets difficult to make time to sit down and write a post.
Well I guess I can catch you all up to speed on what has
happened over these past couple weeks that I have been here. We started our classes, which includes being
at class at 6:30. We began going to
chapel once the college students got here. We have been to Victoria Falls in
Livingstone. We have started a rotation for working at the clinic. We have been working with the kids at the
Haven. We have attended a traditional Zambian
wedding in a village, which included a lot of dancing. We have attended a couple different village
churches. We have visited with the
patients in the local hospital. We have
watched the Namwianga secondary school football (soccer) team play in the
championship match of a local tournament. We have attended a traditional
wedding. We are currently participating
in a measles vaccination outreach this week, in which I personally gave about
70 shots to children. We totaled giving
over 450 shots just yesterday alone.
Unfortunately not everything we have experienced so far has
been positive in our eyes. There have been many close calls with death with
some of the children from the Haven. I
am sorry to say that we have had to live through the untimely death of one of
the children from the Haven that many of us had gotten attached to in the first
few weeks we have been here. This has
been quite a blow to everyone in our group, but it has been especially hard for
all of the aunties who work with the children because they have literally
watched him grow up over his few short years.
I know that God has some sort of plan in this, but it is definitely hard
to see what He has in mind in situations like this.
I have been able to befriend a few Zambians while here,
including Justin (one of our night guards and coach of the secondary school
football team), Prince (choral teacher at Namwianga and has been helping us
with our Tonga songs), Fine (a guy who lives in a village next to the clinic
and goes to secondary school in town), and am starting to play sports with some
of the other college students and even watched a Zambian national football game
with a about 50 of them all squished into a classroom that had a TV in it. Within the next couple days we hope to be
paired with our Tonga tutors for the semester.
Tonga tutors are college students who have volunteered to help us
understand Tonga and their culture better and so that we can help them
understand English and our culture better.
I cannot wait to develop this relationship with one of the college
students.
I could go into so much more detail on all the things that
have happened, but this will have to suffice for now. I will try to start posting more often so I will
be able to put in more details about the things we are doing, experiencing, and
learning.
Much Love and God Bless,
Paka (my Zambian name because they have a really hard time
saying there R’s)
