Hello everyone!
It has been a longggggggg long long time sense I’ve blogged, and because of that, I have a lot to share! After Cambodia, my squad and I arrived in South Africa, where we stayed for 1 month. My team was grouped with two other team in Steenburg, Cape Town…which meant 18 of us living in one house! This month, to my surprise, was very “homey” and “comfortable”. The house we lived in had two living rooms, two kitchens, three bathrooms(each with hot water, a shower, and a bath tub), and three decently sized bedrooms. Our hosts where a husband and wife named Mama Boli(Mama) and Pastor Richard. Mama and Pastor Richard and two of the nicest people I’ve every met! Constantly taking care of us and making sure we are comfortable, I could definitely tell that they had the Holy Spirit inside of them. Needless to say, we had it pretty nice in Cape Town.
The first week was rather slow, our ministry contact hadn’t arrived and the family was still moving in. We helped as much as we could and spent our days exploring the City and hanging out with each other. We also made a few friends amongst the younger guys at the house. Tevin and Dustin are two of the guys, around our age, that liked to hang out with us frequently. They showed us around the neighborhood and introduced us to the Gatsby(a gigantic sandwich made up of meat, tasty sauces, melted cheese, and french fries). Personally, I really enjoyed the Gatsby, but I cant speak for my squad mates haha. The Great Gatsby Crisis of 2015 had caused a lot of hatred and spite towards the poor Gatsby. If you’d like to know more on that subject, please feel free to visit the blogs of some of my squad mates who stayed with me in Cape Town, as I’m sure they elaborated on those events (;
The second week is when we started to branch out and speak to people. Unlike the other two countries we had lived in, people here primarily spoke english! This was huge for me because it made it much easier to evangelize and make new friends; however, it was also very difficult as well. Back in Thailand and Cambodia, I’d constantly be telling myself that ministry would be so much easier if everyone spoke english, but now I feel like it almost made it harder. On our first day, pastor Richard took us to some grocery stores so we could pray for random people and make new friends…I got super nervous. I’d find myself forgetting everything I was going to say the minute I walked up to someone. I was scared, afraid of what people might say back to me. It took a whole day and a lot of encouragement from my teammates, but I did end up getting over that fear. God sent some pretty interesting people my way as well. One lady had a daughter who was struggling with a relationship and another woman had a friend who was going through surgery. I also got the chance to talk to a man who had already been born again. He shared a little of his story and I returned the favor. It was awesome to be able to pray for these people(:
Cape Town was pretty awesome, I got to learn how to surf in Muizenburg, see Star Wars VII at a Cape Town mall, lead worship on a train, preach in a parking lot market, attend the Hillsong Christmas Spectacular, and hike Table Mountain(which was amazing!).Need I remind you that this was only one month!? I had a lot of fun, but it was also a bit of a struggle as well. Not having wifi made me miss home a lot. I felt weird being with so many people and didn’t get to see my team as much as I wanted. These things sprinkled themselves into my days and nights. When I was at my lowest, I would climb up onto the roof and spend time with the Lord, just praying and listening. These moments were amazing, just being in God’s presence when you aren’t feeling good makes a world of difference! He is there! He’s listening! I firmly believe that he was sitting right next to me on that roof…yeah, that was my month in Cape Town.
Now, me and the other 11 guys from our squad are living in Mokhotlong(spelling? yeah? no?), Lesotho! It took us 30 hours in a small van to get here and we’ve been here for 2 weeks already. We do construction down at the soon-to-be orphanage, visit the local clinic and preach/serve food, and give services at the local prison! Our small village is on the side of a mountain and the people here are super friendly. People here ride horses everywhere and use donkeys to carry things, which is pretty awesome. On the way here, it wasn’t uncommon to see wild horses, sheep, or ostriches roaming around. Our home is pretty cool too! There are three cabin like rooms, each with 2 bunk beds for us to live in across from the kitchen building. Our time here has been awesome, and I am looking forward to giving more in detail about it when I’m home again, but I think thats about all I have. At the end of this month, I will be returning to Cape Town for one more month. After that, I head to Nicaragua, where I will get to see my beautiful Mother for the first time in 6 months!(: Thank you for reading this and I apologize once more for how long its been since I’ve posted. God bless!!! (:
