Well, I may have escaped Malaria, but I have succumbed to a common head cold. Truth be told, I would rather suffer from a wide variety of ailments than a cold. I love to think and my life revolves around it, and when it's painful to do so, I'm just eager to get back to sleep. But I should be getting over it in the next day, so I'm looking forward to that.

Regardless of my ailments, I'm sure a few of you are still curious about my trip to Mozambique. So, as promised, here are pictures of some of the major characters from my trip.

The guy here in the black shirt is Andrew Cunningham. He runs New Horizons Mozambique and is really an impressive guy. He grew up in Zimbabwe, but followed God's call to Mozambique and has built a massive operation there. It's really doing neat things for the country and I think it's on the cutting edge of development there.

Talking with him in the striped shirt is Randy. He's the CFO of CenterFresh Eggs in the United States and came to Mozambique to represent the company as an investor in Mozambique Fresh Eggs. Mozambique Fresh Eggs is a joint venture by CenterFresh, Andrew, and Scott (owner of Eggs for Africa).

 The guy on the left is Kim Dooyema. Many of you know him from Brookfield CRC. He's probably the impetus behind Mozambique Fresh Eggs. He met Andrew a few years ago now and immediately began converting others (me included) to his vision. Eventually, he converted some of his co-owners in CenterFresh and they invested in the project in Mozambique. Members of that group have been visiting Andrew and the operation since, and I don't think anyone has left unconvinced of how neat of an operation this is.

The little boy there is Andrew's son Zacc. He is a joy of a young boy, and is also mentally inhibited. He kept me (and some of the others) jumping on the trampoline, reading stories, or playing catch often. In this picture, he's bringing me a bean bag for bean-bag toss (I nailed it, left-handed).

The guy here is Eric Dooyema. He's Kim's brother, and actually runs some of the CenterFresh operation in the US. In Mozambique, he spent a lot of time working at Mozambique Fresh with the chickens, water systems, and houses.

The lady here is Claire, Andrew's wife. She was exceedingly gracious in feeding us (me in particular, as I stayed with them all week) and taking care of us. I was certainly impressed by the operation and Andrew, but I think she gets most of my respect. In addition to supporting the mission, she takes care of Zacc and teaches part-time at the Rapali International School.

This picture shows Victor in the foreground. His lower half is wet because he just got out of the ocean, but it's the only real picture I have of him. He is the Mozambique Fresh on-site manager. His background is in construction, but he's quickly learning to take care of chickens (and he built some great chicken houses). He's originally from Portugal and married a Brazilian woman in Mozambique. He's a very nice guy and made sure we were well-fed (by that, I mean so stuffed that we had trouble walking).

Standing behind him is Daryl. Daryl is another CenterFresh owner and an investor in Mozambique Fresh. In Iowa, he runs a chicken trucking business, and when all else breaks down, I'm going to go work for him. A real nice guy, he worked with Eric and Victor on site much of the week.

Here is a bigger group picture. On the right are two guys I haven't introduced yet. The far right guy is Scott, a pastor who lives in Zimbabwe who started Eggs for Africa two years ago and has developed it significantly. He's part of Mozambique Fresh because he's doing much the same thing, and also because he has the marketing operation basically set up.

Next to him, in the light shirt, is Peter Cunningham. He's Andrew's brother (or Andrew is his brother). He also lives in Zimbabwe and runs some major agribusiness there. Both he and Andrew are very witty and it's fun listening to them banter until you become the target of the quips.

Not shown: Working for these guys are a fantastic crew of folks. Andrew relies heavily on Wilfred (Dutch) and Alcedir (Brazilian) to keep his operation running smoothly. Scott relies on John Wayne and Doc. I was hugely impressed by these guys and if I were to start up a poultry business in Mozambique, I would pay them whatever I needed to in order to steal them away.

I hope that all makes sense. There are certainly more folks on the ground there, but I think I hit many of the people who are central to the operation we were looking at. Until Wednesday,

-Ben