Bonjour/Bonswa
Good morning/Good afternoon
Je me appellee Kelsey/Como tu tappelle
My name is Kelsey/What is your name
Como çe va/Ça va bien
How are you/I am good
Pardon/Au Revoir
Sorry/Goodbye
We have been pioneering this month, which means no world racers have ever been to Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast). All of our squad was in Abidjan, which is rare for everyone to be so close, but we were separated by where we lived and our ministry we were working with. There were five teams at a compound doing different ministries, a team off by themselves doing ministry, and two teams in a villa doing ministry – I was with one of the teams at the villa.
When we were dropped off at our villa on Wednesday, we settled down after 59 hours of travel – all we wanted to do was go to bed, no one was coming for us early so we could sleep in. We finally settled down at about 11:30pm and I didn’t wake up until 1:15pm the following day. It was wonderful and restful, just what we needed after what felt like non-stop travel. We were all very hungry and didn’t have any food, so we went out exploring for food, we went up to the main gates of our neighborhood and found a security guard to walk us to the super marche (super market / grocery store). Our two teams divided and conquered in the store, so our team go food and the other got supplies like toilet paper and dish soap. We had someone come and get us from the store with taxis to take us home. We then stayed at home for the next couple of days until we were picked up for church on Saturday night.
We worked with a church called La Masion de La Destine – The House of Destiny. The youth (which was really young adults, as in people ranging from 18-35) were assigned to work with us. We also attended an English speaking church within La Masion de la Destine, Pastor Kwame was in charge and he was wonderful, he sat us down and asked us what our passions were so that he could help us do what we wanted to this month. And then he told us “Our God is the God of the world, and He has been waiting here for you,” I cried. This was something all of us needed to hear. We were all so excited to do ministry, this is what we have been looking forward to, this is what God has called us to do, and we were itching to start.
We went to church the next morning and sat in on the French speaking service for about an hour, and we were introduced to the congregation, which was massive, it had to have been at least 500 people. We then went into the English church and heard the sermon and finished with “How Great thou Art.” We circled up with the other Americans there and we got to meet them and talk to them about what they were doing here, and they were all teachers or worked at the international school, serving as teachers but also missionaries. We expressed that we really liked working with kids and some of us really like to pray and evangelize. It was good starting relationships with these people who have lived here for longer.
Monday happened to be a national holiday, so we went to church and it was lead by the youth and we sung African songs and we danced in a circled and celebrated. We got to talk to the youth and we met wonderful people – Paula, Odrik, Lulu, Manuela, and Sovereign.
That same night one of the families from the English church asked if we wanted to nanny for them for the rest of the week. They said that they had been praying for someone to be able to watch their kids while they did teacher in-service. When we said yes, she cried because her prayers had been answered, God provided. Wednesday was my day to nanny with Erica. Two boys, Caleb and Enoch is who were watching and it was so much fun! Erica and I lucked out because we each had an interest that the boys did, I love Star Wars and Erica likes Mindcraft, so we were able to talk to them about both of those topics, which they were excited about. We built with Legos, jumped on the trampoline and hit each other with light sabers (pool noodles – you could hit each other as hard as you wanted and it never hurt), we played candyland, did a puzzle, and watched Veggie Tales. When their parents got home (Janette and Barklie) we all sat down and had dinner together. And then we went to the Bible study they held at their home.
The rest of the month we did a lot of evangelizing in markets, we went to a sister church and got to celebrate Jesus, we also tried serving each other as much as we could in the villa by helping clean up and doing dishes, serving meals and just being patient with each other.
We got very close to Paula, we loved her, and she was bilingual so she was always there to translate for us. We hung out with her on our off days too.
On one of our off days we celebrated Erica’s birthday by going to Sofitel Hotel Ivoire, which was the nicest hotel in Abidjan and we swam and had lunch there. It was a lot of fun, we then went to dinner afterwards at our favorite local spot. We had chicken and onions, plantains and French fries. It was a lot of fun to eat with each other. Mosquitos attacked me, over 60 bites on my legs; I didn’t think that we would be out past dark. But you live and you learn.
Being in Abidjan was fun. I was able to get a cab and know how much it should cost, I could convert the money into what it would be in American Dollars, I could speak very few phrases in French, but just enough to be polite, and I got closer to my team, my family.
There were many challenges such as patients for Africa time, figuring out what we really wanted to do and what God wanted us to do, learning how to live with a language barrier, learning to live in community and figuring out myself and what I need to work on.
This month was beyond fun, but it wasn’t always easy. All I know is that God is here, God has called me by name to come here and build his Kingdom.
Please consider helping me by supporting me financially! I am still in need of $5,300! Prayerfully consider! Many Blessings from Côte d’Ivoire!
Off to month 2! Accra, Ghana I come!
