Africa Trip
Posted: Tue Nov 30, 2004 5:27 am
:o Well, I arrived home after my trip to Africa yesterday. Brought my brand new (showed up minutes before i left) Centofante 3, and it was invaluable. But it was an amazing trip.
On my first "mission" trip, I spent some time in Poland, and it was the ideal culture for me. Mozambique was far from it. I fit in in Poland, and except for teh language, the guys we were with thought i was Polish. But being in a country where everything, my clothes, money, language, health, skin color, religion, everythign was so different was hard. But the fact that most of the work we did was either with South Afrcan Missionsaries or little kids helped. THe missionaries spoke English...and while my American i slightly different i could understand them ofr the most part. But with little kids even if you can't talk, leading by love and example (as Jesus did) works just fine. One of the first things that i noticed when we touched down in Maputo (the capital) was the poverty. THe second was that EVERY little kid was dying. We spent most of our time outside of the city of XAI XAI, (pronounced shy shy) We went to a school that was seventy five percent orphans...and when i was sitting in a circle of kids who were giving me "high fives" and i looked around and realized that every kid was either starving to death or had a disease such as Malaria, Cholera, HIV, or in at least one case full blown AIDs. All of the kids were under cared for...most were abused. Whil we were playing duck duck goose, a comotion broke out in a hut. A man tried to kill his wife with a spear after beating her to a pulp. He was run out of the village. A four year old boy ran out of the hut terrified and we had to pry him off one of our girl's necks three hours later so that she could get some rest. We gave shoes and school supppplies that the second graders at my school collected...and the little kids were so happy. but it was so hard knowing that the little girl whose shoes you were putting on would probably not live long enough to outgrow them. It puts things in a whole new perspective. Please keep the whole continent of Africa, specifically Mozambique in your prayers. Pray for Mark and Leslie Harper, and their two sons (the missionaries we worked with) they need 400000 dollars (american) in the next four years to keep the land that the government gave them to open a training center for pastors. It is a beautiful piece of property and GOd is already working through it to reach the country.
Please keep me and the rest of the mission team in your prayers as coming home will create some very interesting emotions. and please pray for my upcoming trip to India.
THanks all,
Jason
On my first "mission" trip, I spent some time in Poland, and it was the ideal culture for me. Mozambique was far from it. I fit in in Poland, and except for teh language, the guys we were with thought i was Polish. But being in a country where everything, my clothes, money, language, health, skin color, religion, everythign was so different was hard. But the fact that most of the work we did was either with South Afrcan Missionsaries or little kids helped. THe missionaries spoke English...and while my American i slightly different i could understand them ofr the most part. But with little kids even if you can't talk, leading by love and example (as Jesus did) works just fine. One of the first things that i noticed when we touched down in Maputo (the capital) was the poverty. THe second was that EVERY little kid was dying. We spent most of our time outside of the city of XAI XAI, (pronounced shy shy) We went to a school that was seventy five percent orphans...and when i was sitting in a circle of kids who were giving me "high fives" and i looked around and realized that every kid was either starving to death or had a disease such as Malaria, Cholera, HIV, or in at least one case full blown AIDs. All of the kids were under cared for...most were abused. Whil we were playing duck duck goose, a comotion broke out in a hut. A man tried to kill his wife with a spear after beating her to a pulp. He was run out of the village. A four year old boy ran out of the hut terrified and we had to pry him off one of our girl's necks three hours later so that she could get some rest. We gave shoes and school supppplies that the second graders at my school collected...and the little kids were so happy. but it was so hard knowing that the little girl whose shoes you were putting on would probably not live long enough to outgrow them. It puts things in a whole new perspective. Please keep the whole continent of Africa, specifically Mozambique in your prayers. Pray for Mark and Leslie Harper, and their two sons (the missionaries we worked with) they need 400000 dollars (american) in the next four years to keep the land that the government gave them to open a training center for pastors. It is a beautiful piece of property and GOd is already working through it to reach the country.
Please keep me and the rest of the mission team in your prayers as coming home will create some very interesting emotions. and please pray for my upcoming trip to India.
THanks all,
Jason
but I realize that it's not even close to some African places. May God take care of all those people out there, because I really feel that God is their only chance