What have I been up to these last few internet-less weeks?
Well I’m glad you asked. Because this blog will answer just that.
We arrived in Nsoko, Swaziland
late one night, and were dropped off at a safari, called Nisela. We were told
to pitch our tents and take it easy. Pastor Gift would be coming by for us in
two days to get us started into our ministry. So, that’s what we did. Pitched
our tents, slept, and woke up to the roarings of our new pet: Lucky the Lion.
Yes, it’s true. He lived approximately 50 yards from our tents in a nice rusty,
rickety cage.
Over the course of the first day, we learned we had many
pets. Including a very large crocodile named Barry, an ostrich who remains
nameless that likes to eat the garbage about 10 yards from our tents, a flock
of very noisy safari pheasants, and of course, the chickens.
Once becoming acquainted with our many new friends, we
started to become acquainted with the staff of Nisela, which we very quickly
came to love. Though they were not our “assigned” ministry this month, they
turned out to be where a lot of our focus fell.
Our “real” ministry, which we partnered with Pastor Gift and
a girl named Faith on, was to the local Care Points. These Care Points are part
of an organization called G42, and are places around Nsoko where the kids can
go to get two meals a day as well as a little teaching. There are Gogos (grandmothers)
and teachers that volunteer at each of the six Care Points.
During our time in Nsoko we visited each of these Care
Points and worked on a project to get all of the children identified, photographed
and profiled. With this information, we were able to create sponsor cards for
each of the children, in hopes that G42 will be able to post them on the
internet and get them sponsored, much like Compassion International or World
Vision.
We as a team absolutely loved this ministry and this
project. I was able to help take the kids’ photographs and then design their
profile cards, which will hopefully be on the web soon. Our team loved spending
time at the Care Points with the kids, loving them and playing with them.
We grew very close to Faith, the 24 year old girl who went
with us each day and translated for us. She is an incredible woman of the Lord,
who is just a local Swazi with a lot of big passion and vision for her people.
She will be missed. A lot.
We also grew fairly close to a few of the Nisela Safari
employees, the herpetologist (snake man, I learned a new word) on staff, and a
few of the regular campers in the campground with us.
So it has been an exciting month, one spent in a place I
love, doing something that fit our team perfectly. (With many amazing pets).
