Chickens Don’t Sleep
Written by Brady Denger (the idealist)
Edited by Elizabeth Uhles (the realist)
Sitting on a hay bale, snuggling near the fire, I look up to see the Milky Way strewn across the star spackled sky (
beautiful alliteration). Never before have I seen so many stars. The grass rustles as several cows graze by, mooing in content (
I don’t think that ramming their heads into each other while grunting angrily constitutes “content”). The chickens peck quietly now but as the sun rises they will become my obnoxious alarm clock (
or as soon as my head hits the pillow).
When morning comes, I dress in my tent and emerge into a new day (
do you really change clothes every day?). As the sun is rising over the mountain that creates a natural border between Swaziland and South Africa, we eat breakfast and pray over the day. When Nicholas arrives, we pile into the bed of his pickup truck and head into town (
pile: verb. To cram 12 people into a moving 4×3 open box).
We arrive at one of the care points and unload as we are greeted cheerfully by a crowd of smiling orphans (
except for the two that cry every time they see our freakishly white faces). There are four care points that we are specifically working with. Care points are centers where the local orphans can come to receive a meal each day (
assuming food has been delivered that month). Several of the care points are also able to provide a classroom environment but the level of education received is dependent on the knowledge of the gogo (grandmother) working there.
We are partnering with local businessmen (
a gift from God because they’re using their resources to give life to the Swazi children) and missionaries (Gary Black and Tom Davis) to meet the needs of the orphans in this community. We are currently in the planning phase, trying to assess the physical, educational, and spiritual needs at each location. We are putting together a teacher training day where we can provide the gogos with educational resources to aid in their teaching. We are surveying and will soon be building fences to protect the water tanks from being robbed by local adults (
I hope to dig all the postholes by myself). The ground is hard and dry, a sign of the severity of the drought (
maybe I won’t dig all the postholes). Water is extremely scarce, even for basic needs such as cooking and drinking. We are taking steps toward ensuring that the right amount of food and water is faithfully delivered each month. We are creating a children’s program to do several times a week that includes songs, games and a bible lesson. We are currently still in the planning stage but by next week hope to have many of these projects on their way. Some of the needs are greater than what we’ll be able to accomplish while we’re here, but we hope to lay the groundwork for future teams.
After a long dusty day, we arrive back at camp (
please don’t glamorize the dust, it’s flying dirt). The boys (
rented from team Salt) start a fire and the cooks (
me!) get dinner simmering in the large black kettle (
cauldron). As the sun sets behind the acacia trees, I snuggle into the hay bale by the fire. Another day in Africa has ended (
for us, not the chickens).
Please pray for:
-
Meeting more local contacts we can trust -
Knowing the right projects to be involved in -
For God to bless the businessmen for their generosity -
That God continues to work through the businessmen and missionaries once we’re gone
The End.
PS- Elizabeth wrote a good blog called
Bread of Life that I helped edit. She’s linking her readers to my page to read this blog so you should go read that one. It’s a different aspect of what we’re seeing here in Swazi. Just click on her name at the top of this blog to get to her page. Thanks!
