An update

Tomorrow morning at 5AM we bid farewell to Mozambique and its beautiful people. We'll be traveling into Kruger National Park tomorrow and most of Friday before we head back to Joburg and the airport. Connectivity and all that will be sparse at best in the Park, so our last update may just be our goodbyes at O.R Tambo Airport in Joburg. We'll keep you posted...these guys have been incredible! Everywhere we've gone people have commented on their commitment to love people and to working hard when asked to do so...
Later

Masana

The boys from Masana

August 1, was a great day, today we went to Masana, which is a home for street boys who have run away from home and live on the streets. It’s an awesome program, the people who work there work with the kids and families to find out why they ran away hoping that they can get back home and live with their families. So yesterday we had a little preview of the kids that we were going to see today. We went there to go and have a cultural experience by killing some chickens we would have for lunch with them today. It was a very different experience since it was pretty crazy to watch your eventual lunch die right in front of you, and I helped plucked one of the chickens, which was really weird, but oddly fun for me.

            

 Today was one of the best days I’ve ever experienced with the Masana Olympics we did today. So pretty much what we did was show up this morning as school started for them and we got all of our stuff and waited for school to end. Then once school ended we walked about a block up the street to a field that was all dirt. I was a little skeptical at first, especially since when we got there we saw three policeman walking off the field with AK47’s, but then I thought, when am I ever going to get to play soccer in a third world country with a bunch of street kids. So we played a couple of games, one of which was a game that was the Mozambiqueans vs. The Americans. This was a game in which every member of the team made the equivalent of a human knot and everyone had to pull the kids apart. When I sat down to get pulled apart I was thinking, this is going to be the dirtiest I’m ever going to be, and I’m wearing a white shirt. It turned out being a great time, and getting dirty and being able to roughhouse with some kids was a great change of pace today. Then after that we played soccer on this complete dirt field with rocks and glass, and half of the kids were shoeless with was crazy since I couldn’t imagine doing that. Playing on that dirt field was probably the most difficult thing I’ve ever one, but easily the most fun thing I’ve done, and I’d love to do that again. So around noon we went back to the home and we hung out for about an hour and played lots of different games, learned Portuguese, and roughhoused until lunch was served. When lunch was served we had chicken, rice, salad, and beets. The chicken which we had watch been killed yesterday, was so fresh and delicious, and the rice was so amazing, I’m not sure why but it wasn’t just the usual boring bland rice we usually think of.

            So after lunch we hung out for about an hour or so, then we had to leave and the goodbye was really difficult for me because even though I could only understand about two of the kids, it was one of the most fun filled days I’d ever had, and I want to go back there sometime. After that we went to a market that looked very similar to other markets we’d gone to, and at the end of that we parted with our good friend, Rafael. This was a really difficult goodbye since he had been so good to us, with translation, learning Portuguese, showing us around, and just having fun with us. He was a great friend who I’m going to miss and hope that he and his new fiancé do great things for themselves and everyone else they meet because I’m sure they will. After that we got a tour of downtown Maputo and went to an Old Portuguese fort, learned some of the history of Mozambique, and went to the Indian Ocean. It was a great day and will be one that I’m never going to forget.

-Pearce

Project Purpose

July 30^th, and 31^st

At Project Purpose

At Project Purpose

At Project Purpose

At Project Purpose

At Project Purpose

At Project Purpose

On Monday we had our first day at Project Purpose. It is a center for women working the streets and their children. Right now there are no women living in the center, only kids. So today was our VBS day for the kids. We spend a little bit of time in the morning playing with the kids and getting to know them. We read the Bible story and did crafts with them. The kids had a great time. I was surprised at how receptive the kids were. I can tell they really love God. On Tuesday we went back to Project Purpose and did some work for them. We started off by packing boxes of bras into the storage crate. Then the group split and a few of us went to go and paint a mural on one of the walls. They painted a beautiful water fountain. The other group built a sand box and a jungle gym of tires in the yard for the kids to play on. I didn’t work on the mural so I don’t know what they went through, but I did work in the yard and I know it was very hard. It was hot, and there was a lot of digging in hard ground. We worked as a team and pushed through to make an awesome play area for the kids. As we were working it was hard to get past the fact that we were tired and sick of working, but when we were working on the tires and turned around to the finished sand box, all the kids had jumped in and were having a great time. It really made all of our work worth it seeing the smiles and joy on their faces. The sense of accomplishment was enormous after both groups finished working. Before we left the kids decided that they wanted to pray for us, so two little boys said prayers over our group. We couldn’t understand much because they were speaking Portuguese, but one thing we could pick out a lot was thank you. It was a magical moment having little kids praying over us when we are normally praying for them. After we left, the group had a choice of two activities to do. One was shopping for fabric, and the other was killing chickens for the next days feast at Masana. I went with the boys to go kill chickens and everyone else went shopping. I didn’t kill a chicken, but I did pluck the feathers off and it was one of the oddest experiences of my life. Overall our two days at Project Purpose were amazing and I will never forget them.

            -Mandi

Mozambique...

Leah, Max, Kim and our new friend James

            The past three days have been a blur of new people, places, and experiences that are unlike anything any of the team encountered while in South Africa. The beginning of our adventure to Mozambique began with nine already exhausted teenagers being stuffed into a van with eleven humongous suitcases full of donations to the family we were staying with while we were in Mozambique, on top of our entire personal luggage. So just take a moment to image all nine of us in a van, fitting eight people in the back with luggage to the ceiling on a six and a half hour car trip to Mozambique. As you can image all of us were ready to jump out of the windows by the time we made it to the Terpstra’s house in the heart of Maputo. By bedtime all of us were exhausted and excited to finally have time to rest since the next day we were told we would have a “cultural experience” that none of us would forget.

James, Hannah, Mandi and Eric

Titos, Pearce, Ashley, Katie and Francesco

Trying to learn some new dance moves

            On Sunday the team was woken up so that we could go to church like any of us typically would on any normal week in the U.S. except for the fact that this service was spoken completely in Portuguese, the primary language in Mozambique. The language barrier at this church was so prominent to us since in South Africa all of us could communicate perfectly to the people there. From that moment on the team realized that talking with people here might be a little harder than expected due to the fact that no one in our group knows Portuguese. After church we headed back to the Terpstra’s to find ourselves being greeted by three of their close friends that are native to Mozambique. We then found out that this was going to be our cultural experience that was talked about yesterday by our host family. Our mission for this “cultural experience” was for all of the teens to be broken up into three teams and given one of their friends as our guides for the day. Our guides were to take us through the area in which they lived, and let us walk a typical day in their lives here in Mozambique.  The area in which our guides lived was considered a working class barrio, but by the our standards in the United States it looked way worse than the poorest parts of Denver. The barrio was a lot like my trip to the barrio of La Chureca in Nicaragua last year because this barrio was also located within a trash dump. As my group walked next to the massive trash dump, little children looked through the trash so that they could find plastic or tin to sell later, it broke my heart to see such small children sifting through trash so they could make maybe a couple cents per can. As we went on in our trip in this barrio my guide James took our group to his house.  James’s house was a small concrete building that fit his mother, father, grandma, brothers, and his sister; he also stated that if you wanted a room of your own in his family you could build a new concrete room on your own.  By the standards of America, James had next to nothing compared to all of the things we own, however his family actually had all of the necessities that one needs in life. They had food to feed their bellies every night, a room to sleep in, and they even had a small TV in the corner of their house; they were the perfect example that in the United States we have so much excess that we don’t need but they survive on just the necessities of life.  After walking through James’s barrio for another hour or so we weren’t quite done with our cultural experience yet! We had to ride a shappa back home, which is the equivalent of a taxi in the U.S. except for the fact about 15 people were shoved into an right person van, so personal space was not an option. At a shappa station change Mandi and I got to see first hand just how crazy Mozambique could actually be due to the fact that a drunken man followed us through the entire market on our way to the shappa. I was so glad to have the protection of James in this moment for his knowledge of Mozambique and his ability to remain calm despite the panic of my group. This moment made me realize just how different I really was in this country, and how most people in Mozambique aren’t used to seeing white people walking through their markets or using their tradition way of transportation. Seeing the way Mozambicans truly lived opened my eyes to just how neat and tidy the U.S. is, not just in the way of hygiene, but in the way Americans don’t typically live outside of their bubble and put themselves in sometimes trivial situations.

            The day ended with an amazing dinner made by our host family surrounded by all of our guides (aka our new best friends) and amazing stories of the other group’s “cultural experience”. While doing the dishes, our guides attempted to teach us how to dance in their own personal Mozambican way. As laughter of our failed dance attempts with our new friends erupted we continued the dance party for an entire hour. I don’t think I have ever met a group of people such as our guides who have so much love of life and laughter even though their life situation may not be ideal. Despite the fact they may lack the material objects people have in America, their lives are so much richer than ours in pure happiness for the little things that we American’s may not appreciate. The Mozambican way is truly different than our own and it took a true “cultural experience” for all of us to see just how different we really are. Our guides are amazing friends we will never forget and the day they let us experience was a perfect introduction to Mozambique.

Hannah

Leah - July 27

“Motho ke motho ka batho- A person is a person through other people” –African proverb

A sign at the entrance to The Apartheid Museum

July 27 was a Friday packed full with history, love, and ,of course, Jesus. We started off the day with an amazing breakfast and a perspective of a white women living through Apartheid, both provided by Glenda, the owner of the Castle.  She described the confusion and frustration of living with parents who supported the movement, but believed the truth that a person is a human, no matter the color of their skin. The passion and emotion behind her words brought true light to the foreign tragedy. Her story, however, was just warm up for us. Then we went to the Apartheid museum. This museum was packed full of information and representations of the whole history of Apartheid and included an exhibit about the life of Nelson Mandela. We were at the museum for a solid two hours, and I personally spent 90 minutes just reading about Nelson Mandela. The whole museum was silent not only because we were constantly reading, but also because of the material made everyone speechless.

The team with Ma Ethel and all her children

            After our little history lesson at the museum, we met up with Sihle Mooi, a pastor for a church located in Soweto. We went to lunch at a local buffet that had interesting food. Of course I tried it all because, well, we are in Africa. What I didn’t realize was that my first big bite was of cow intestine and stomach. I am just going to say that it wasn’t for me. Everything else, however, was delicious. My favorite part of the meal was when Eric went up and played the xylophone with the natives.

Sihle then took us to Ma Ethel’s, who is an exceptional women! She is 78 years old and for over 30 years has opened up her home to abandoned children. At this time, she is housing 35 children in her 3 bedroom home. She says that Jesus has blessed her with all these children and when she loves on them, she loves on Him; so, she is able to love Him all day everyday. After a tour of her home, we were lucky enough to get a concert from not only all the children, but also Ma Ethal. You could just see the light in their souls while worshiping Him. The beauty in that house was so pronounced that you couldn’t help but have a smile on your face. However, we still had to experience the difficulty of saying goodbye.

Children from the neighborhood in Soweto

Connecting with some children from Ma Ethel's Home

The last stop of the day was to Porsche and Wendy’s home. This mother and daughter team live in a township in Soweto. their home is half the size of my bedroom, but they are proud to live there. Wendy, the daughter, is the representation for physical science for her school at a competition on Saturday. She also runs a bible study in her township which partners with Sihle’s church. Wendy is only 16 years old, but has spiritual maturity of a women three times her age. While we were at Wendy’s home, we also had the privilege of playing with the children of the township. I met two girls, Angel and Taylor. Angel is ten, her favorite color is pink, and has the prettiest smile I have ever seen. However, Taylor was a mystery, we had no way of verbally communicating with each other. Nevertheless, just embracing her and loving on her made a connection between us the will never be forgotten. Both Taylor and Angel exerted raw love and I have no doubt that God was present in that time we spent together. When we left the township to head home, Sihle told us that the children we just spent time with rarely got that much affection, and we made a difference in their lives.

The beautiful Ma Ethel sharing her powerful story

            In the past two weeks, we have experience so many different places and set the foundation for so many relationships that is as been bittersweet. The bitter part is mainly that we only get to love on these people for a few hours max. however, it is so sweet that we get to share our love with so many different kinds of people. I cant lie, it has been wearing; Nevertheless, it is totally worth it. 

 

-Leah :-]

We're back online... (for now)

We know that there have been a lot of questions and wonderings about the team and how we are doing. Well, we have been without internet for the last few days since being in Mozambique. The central server for most of the country was done, so virtually everyone in the country was without internet. But it's back on now and we will do our best to post all of the days that you've missed out on. As for us...we are all doing well, we are experiencing amazing people and incredible things, we are so thankful to be here and to be a part of such powerful kingdom things.
Gershwin

now, a little fun.

Wednesday, July 25.

I'm just gonna throw this out there.... cape town, south africa is my new favorite place on earth. seriously this place is. unexplainable. the energy here is so clean and renewing and THE FOOD IS AMAZING TOO... my mom would be so proud. i even eat everyone's leftovers off their plates [that's a big accomplishment for a skinny boy].

today, i awoke to the ringing of my alarm clock and sprung into the shower. after some maple granola [bear naked, i brought it from the states, my favorite granola] and a south african soap opera, the rest of the team walked through the door after being picked up by our driver, mr. ford, from their host families. we all shared a few words and broke back into the van and began another journey. today was a lot of things... sunny, our last day in cape town, and our fun day!

St. James beach

we started off at st. james beach. it's a beautiful, and small, beach with bright and bubbly changing shacks lining the water and a large, concrete-walled pool that's protected from the ocean. when each wave hits the wall, water splashes up and ripples across the pool. i just couldn't resist the opportunity [since i am a mermaid] to change into my trunks and enjoy the sea! leah snapped a few pics of me ariel-style and then we headed to get lunch. everyone had to fulfill their craving of fish and chips, so that was the dish of choice. we scrambled to the nearest seafood eatery and were quickly back on the road with fresh seafood.

What else needs to be said?

photo by leah.

next stop, the market.

yes, a real [touristy] market. one where you bargain and everything. well, they don't sell animals, but it's still a pretty cool african experience. and with help of our loyal driver, we set off to buy some souvenirs. the purchases range from tapestries to flip flops to bottle openers [for the adults back home of course]. i would go to one stand and tell them i'm from the states, to get a response like, "oohhhhh, i give you goooood price, yes" or, "oh, feel free to touch, yes it is all yours". many polite "no thank you"s were given. some stands i would say i'm from cape town, and they would say, "ohhhh, really?! i give you local price!" or "my prices for locals are much lower than those tourist prices, tsk." hmmm... i think i'll go as a local!

African masks sold in the local markets

then at about four o' clock, we arrived at the hout bay harbor for a little devotional/recharge time with kay. she is such a great leader for us teenagers and is a really fun person too. we soon got a call from gershwin for us to meet him on the other side of the harbor for a boat ride.

Seal Island

when you think of boat ride, i'm sure 99% of you think of a relaxing evening boat ride, maybe some hors d'oeuvres... well our boat was one of those crazy tourist thrill high-speed roller coaster boats, complete with jockey seats and surprisingly no barf bags. yes, we were part of that 1%. so we whooshed out of the harbor and into the deep sea waves. in the midst of the airtime and splashing, we approached an island completely covered in seals! from afar it looked like brown rock, but it was just a plethora of seals making awkward noises and being cute. they would even repeat our noises that we made at them like parrots! amazing.

we all were exhausted and ready for our last night in with our host families. we were all dropped off by mr. ford and savored the last night in cape town.

The view from the front of the boat

this place has a place in my heart and i never want to leave. nonetheless i cannot wait for what we encounter in Johannesburg, Soweto, and Maputo. hopefully I'll fall in love with another place yet again. god has shown himself in every single thing here so far and this is a place where you truly see the beauty of his creation. now, off to Joberg!

Eric

photos by eric.