I LOVE South Africa and I wanted to share about my life here through pictures! Life is so great here- I don’t think I ever want to leave. God is so good and I feel so blessed. Thanks for reading! 🙂
This is a panorama of the high school campus that I live on! While taking this picture I was standing on the rugby field- this field is the best thing ever. We use it for team time, deep talks, tea time, watching the sunset, and having dance parties. The school is on the left. It’s called Global Leadership Academy. And if you zoom in you can see my house! It’s the log cabin on the far left.
This is my house! I live here with 25 other girls from my squad. We have two teams in Johannesburg and one team at a different ministry in Jeffrey’s Bay. I live here with the remaining three teams and I love it! Living in a house with 25 instead of 50 has been the best. Our house has a really amazing story. You should read about it in my friend Paige’s blog here.
Manual labor! aka lots of painting around the school, building log cabins, varnishing wood, moving wood, washing windows… the list goes on. December is summer break here (weird right?) which means there was no one at the school. So our first month in South Africa we spent helping out around the school’s campus wherever we were needed. I really enjoyed this month!
Last week I started a new ministry at a preschool in the squatter communities called Ithemba. Some of the girls from my squad are helping in classrooms at GLA (the school we live at), some are doing ministry at a coffee shop, and some are serving as camp counselors. But, I do ministry at Ithemba with 5 other girls from my squad! In the mornings I help with a class of twenty 4 year olds. They’re pretty cute- not gonna lie. In the afternoon I help with an after school program. There, I am helping about 15 first graders with their homework- which is a little difficult because their homework is in Afrikaans haha! Most of the kids there speak Xhosa or Afrikaans, but since English is so popular here a lot of the kids can understand me. It’s crazy how many languages they know! I’m really excited for the next four weeks I get to spend here.
We live 3 miles from the beach! This has been a dream. Jeffrey’s Bay (where I live) is a small town in the Eastern Cape of South Africa. It’s known for surfing (not that I’ve actually gone surfing haha but its a really big thing here)! It’s so fun to go downtown because there so many fun things to do and I usually run into someone I know. Jeffrey’s Bay is the best little town and has such an awesome community.
AFRICAN SUNSETS. Nothing can describe them. It is RARE that there is not a pretty sunset. Usually we will go out on the rugby field, drink tea and dance while we watch the sunset. Very sweet memories.
Lice, Lice Baby! I’ve gotten lice I think four times now. We just can’t seem to get rid of it haha. We’ve decided that God made lice to bring community closer together. I wouldn’t trade the hours of picking through my friends hair for anything!… well that’s half true #makelicecasualagain
Christmas!!!! I had an amazing Christmas. We all pulled out our sleeping pads and had a big sleepover in the living room on Christmas Eve. In the morning, we went to our favorite church in JBay (it’s called Victory Church) for a Christmas service. The rest of the day we ate delicious food, opened lots of presents, took naps, and I got to call home and talk to my family! Definitely one of my favorite Christmas’s.
Debrief! The first week in January we got to reunite with our whole squad for our mid-point debrief. Which means…I am halfway through the race which is absolutely CRAZY. Time is flying. It was a week full of good sessions, worship, and time to relax. Debrief is a great time to process and recharge to be ready to go back out and serve!
I also want to share a little bit about what I’m learning right now… which is God’s grace. I’m learning that grace is always more than and it meets people where there at. It gives a fourth, fifth, six chance. It always tries to understand. It’s undeserved, unmerited, unearned. It’s the exercise of love, kindness, and mercy. I’m learning that grace has nothing to do with us, but everything to do with God. God’s grace is the only reason I can open my eyes in the morning, or even breathe! I’m learning how to give others grace, and also how to give myself grace. God’s grace is so simple yet so unexplainable. I’m saved by Grace!!!
So there’s a little look into my life in South Africa! If you would like to pray for me, my prayer requests are that I would continue to grow in grace and my eyes would be open to everything God has for me on the rest of my race. I really appreciate all of your love and support!
