Oh My Goodness I love Africa so much! So very thankful for the opportunity to live there for 3 months and experience so many amazing things! These are just a few of the lessons that I learned during my time in Africa. Enjoy 🙂
While in South Africa I learned that…
1. The Holy Spirit is alive and working in the lives of all people.
2. When you eat cold sandwiches for lunch every day for a month, you kind of start to get tired of it.
3. South Africans are very hospitable.
4. When you are invited to a brie (South African barbecue), expect there to be meat. LOTS AND LOTS OF MEAT.
5. Monkeys think they have the right to come inside, steal your food, chase you, or run all over the roof of your dorm at 3:00am
6. The power often goes out unexpectedly, so sometimes you have to cook in the dark…or have awesome candlelit worship sessions!
7. You can drive double the speed limit and still not get caught (that was a crazy ride! :/)
8. Africans don’t limit the Lord to time. They worship however and for however long the Holy Spirit leads.
9. African church is AWESOME! Expect to sing, shout, dance, and praise the Lord!
10. “Buy-a-donkey” in Afrikaans means “thank you”
11.There are thousands of different African dialects.
12. There is power in the name of Jesus to heal.
13. A traditional meal is “pap” (boiled water&maize meal) and stew.
14. The weather can be blazing hot one minute and cold and rainy the next.
The cold weather caught us off-guard.
15. The African sun is scorching. You will get a horrible sunburn and a farmers tan and a headband line on your forehead if you don’t wear sunscreen…let’s be honest though, you’ll probably get it even if you do.
16. African taxis sit 16 people…or 25 if you really want to.
17. A majority of South Africa’s forests are manmade.
18. You can get a really bad (and uneven) sunburn just from leaning your arm out of the window of a car for several hours.
19. There is so much more of the Father that I have yet to tap into.
20. South Africa has very limited and slow wifi…which is an excuse for my lack of blogs.
21. Don’t drink the tap water because it comes directly from the dam- which means its sometimes brown and will most likely give you parasites.
22. South Africa has been in a drought for many years, so water is a precious commodity and needs to be conserved.
23. The Lord doesn’t call the equipped; He equips the called.
24. If you do any sort of children’s ministry during the day, you will most likely come home with your hair braided into all sorts of interesting styles.
25. Jesus is Lord of all
Things I learned in Lesotho…
26. Maize meal can be used to make porridge, pap, and other staple foods.
27. Basothos (Lesotho natives) wear blankets instead of coats/jackets.
28. 9/10 men you see will be wearing some type of hat.
29. 25 cows in the standard you pay for a wife (if you are a rich man). Chickens, on the other hand, aren’t worth anything.
30. Donkeys are a main form of transportation
31. God is Creator, and all of creation is singing praises to Him.
32. Most men are shepherds.
33. If you’re racing a donkey and don’t clench your legs hard enough, you will most likely fall off.
34. Village communities are like families. They know, look after, and help everyone.
The community of women I was blessed to live with.
35. Most women have very short hair, then braid fake hair into theirs every few weeks. This is called a weave.
36. Having a day of Sabbath to rest is so important and necessary for me to have a healthy physical, mental, and spiritual life.
37. You can shave a pig’s fur with butter knives, aluminium can lids, and shovels.
The aftermath of said pig shaving.
38. South African Rand can be used in SA, Lesotho, and Swaziland, but Lesotho also uses Loti and Swaziland also uses Lilangeni.
39. Stars are so beautiful and I could lay and watch them for hours! Also, if you stare at the same clump of stars for 15 minutes, you will see a shooting star.
40. Even if we didn’t worship the Father, His creation will. We get the privilege of joining in with creation as we sing praises to the Lord.
41. How to slaughter a chicken.
42. The joy of the Lord is my strength.
43. Wifi can be purchased in vouchers of either limited time (30 minutes- 1 hour) or a certain number of megabytes…but then you never know when your wifi will run out so I learned to prioritize updating family and friends and be content without wifi for weeks.
44. A popular food/snack is a “makoenya”, which is a ball of fried dough. It’s English name is “fat cake”, so that’s good 🙂
45. You can be in a 4 hour long African church service and be singing for 2 hours already when the worship leader says, “Now, let’s begin worship”.
46. You can tell a few children your name and soon all of the children in the village will be calling you by name when you walk down the street.
47. Africans are very relational. After a quick conversation they will be calling you their best friend.
48. The majority of toilets are long drops.
49. ALWAYS put motions to songs, the people love it and will remember them much better. The banana song, Joy to the world, anything 🙂
50. God is always faithful and He is always good.
Here’s to a new country, Cambodia, and all of the new lessons and adventures that I get to experience on this journey with my Father!
