Hello followers!! It’s that time again….
Things her e are going great. Even though we seem to have a lot of down time right now, we still have had some awesome experiences. Particularly our time with the locals. They are extremely generous, inviting us into their homes and stuffing us with food, coffee, and juice every chance they get. They will pull out chairs from their houses for us where we will sit around talking for hours on end. They love showing us pictures of their families, and although they have no electricity and few personal possessions, they can’t stop talking about how much God has blessed them. They are truly an inspiring people. And hard working……extremely hard working. Living up in the mountains they pretty much have to be. As a matter of fact, we came upon a house on Sunday where an 11yr old girl had just killed a chicken and was in the process of pulling out its feathers when we arrived.
They have church services here every day of the week except Wednesday. I have a theory on that which I will explain a little later. But anyway, their services are a little different than what I am use to. It’s mostly singing (with a lot of hand gestures) with the actual sermon being rather short. Once a month the entire church makes a trek through the mountains to visit a lady and her husband who live all by themselves on a tiny cliff. I found out firsthand how difficult this trek was on Monday. Our translator Ronny told us we were going on a “short hike” to a ladies house. He pointed down into the mountains to a barely visible white speck. “That is where she lives” he told us. I thought he was joking. I found out later he was not. It reminded me of hiking along the Napali Coast in Kaui. Except this was only about 3 hours round trip instead of 8. But to be honest, after he told us that the lady who lives there makes the same trek to come here every week for church, I knew I had to go. If some random, old lady could do it every week, I could do it once. I should also mention that none of us had brought our flashlights. I began to worry while we were there because the sun was setting and I really didn’t feel like getting stuck in the middle of the mountains over night. But God is good and we made it back literally as the sun set.
Although life here is for the most part pretty simple, it’s funny to see everyone walking around with cell phones. It’s not uncommon to see someone riding a donkey through the mountain while talking or texting on their phones. Some of the younger people have even asked us if we have Facebook. The people here may not have much, but they almost all have cell phones. Which brings me to my theory on why they have church so often. It’s quite funny actually. The church building is the only building in town with electricity. They have a generator which is turned on only for services. People will arrive early just to wait until they open the doors. After the doors open there’s a mad dash for the outlets. It reminds me a lot of shopping on Black Friday. During church services are basically the only time anyone can charge anything. Luckily for me I have a power strip that I found in Ft. Lauderdale before we left, so I’m set. That’s about all I have time for right now. I’ll post again as soon as I can. PEACE!!!
