So far our time out in the Nsoko area is continuing to go wonderfully. Morgan, Heather, Christy and I have come into the city to prepare for two teacher training days we are hosting next week. During these days we will gather helpers of our care points and other surrounding care points who are interested in teaching and give them basic instruction on teaching. We will work on things like scheduling days, working with what you have, subejcts to teach and how to teach them, and many other things that go on in the classroom as well as providing our new teachers with materials to use and training to use them. There is alot of work to do and so much to teach, but we are very excited. Since Heather and I are teachers, we will be doing alot of the training along with a local Swazi lady.
Our contacts met up with Gary and were pleased with our progress. They are ready to start digging deep now. Part of this means a new building.
We will be moving the location of one of our sites to a nearby plot of land that one of our contacts has graciously donated. Building a new building on the current location would not work because it is privately owned and could be taken at any time. We are very excited about the new building for several reasons. Currently the care points do not house the children. They give them a place to go during the day. Some of these kids go home to parents, some go home to a 14 year old brother who is taking care of them or a similar situation. The new building would eventually expand into more buildings called mercy homes. Mercy homes are different from orphanages in that they usually house only 8 or 9 children and are run by a Go go (grandmother). This gives more individual attention to each child. Continued expansion after this is hopeful, with children learning how to make and sell crafts to provide a living in the future.
Much of this is far away, but it is very exciting to see the beginning stages of it first hand. Please pray for us as we continue our work.
