Big Steps

I did a couple things today that I recognized as big steps. You may or may not agree.

First, I realized that I know Mbabane well enough to navigate using directions. That may not seem like a big deal where we use directions like "Take 94 West" or "Take the Beltline North", but here directions are "Go past the spar and take the little path, you know where that is? Then go towards the bakery and look for the people frying meat." Or "Take the golf course road, then go up the hill and when you get to the top of the little hill, take the turn up the small hill, then turn down the big hill and go to the first big intersection and then turn and look for the gate behind the other house." So navigating is really something that only works if you already have an idea of where you're supposed to go. And apparently, I've been here long enough to figure it out (to some extent).

My second big step was to accept my student loans for law school. So today I have 2.5 times as much debt as I did yesterday. But come this fall, I'll be able to pay for my education at University of Wisconsin Law School. It's something I'm looking forward to very much, and I think it will be a great next step in my life.

Have a good week,
-Ben

Africa

During one of our many public holidays, I went to a local game park with a couple friends. Here are some pictures of what we saw, but one of the main things I realized was that pictures don't do any sort of justice to these animals. I guess that's why game parks draw so many people, but it was very cool. You can click on the pictures to view them better.

This is just one landscape shot, but the entire park was extremely beautiful. It was also a great day.

Here is me standing quite close to a Nyala. This is in the picnic area, where a number of antelope chill.

A real-life warthog, just hanging out.

This is a male impala.

We saw quite a few zebras. This was a particularly good picture, especially with the landscape in the background.

These are either wildebeest or water buffalo. I'm not really sure.

This was the find of the day, two hippos. We were pretty far away, but close enough to see one stand up,  walk into the water and swim away. 

As we were leaving, we found more zebras.

Catching up

Well, you may have noticed that I've been falling a bit behind in my blogging. There are a number of factors contributing to this. Some days, I've got to get to something (Monday nights are small group, Friday nights I help with the youth group, some nights I hang out with friends or church folks, etc.). Some days, I'm a little worn out and feel like there isn't much new to report, which is a bit silly because as much as I've written, I'm sure I can't really convey the experiences I'm having. Some days I just forget about it altogether. For all these reasons, I need to apologize to those who've been wondering about me and whether I'm ok. I am ok, and I'm happy that I've gotten more involved in the past few months. If it means I have to start blogging in the mornings or something, I should be able to handle that.

One fairly significant thing that's been going on regards a fellow missionary. The director of Children's Cup (his name is Mitch) recently had his appendix taken out in Swaziland. He has spent most of the past 6 weeks in a hospital in South Africa with tubes running through his body. I think it's mostly some nasty infections and he's not in great shape. Yesterday he was put back in the ICU, but the reports are that he's doing better. I know most of you didn't sign up to support an entire missionary community down here, but so far I have been enormously blessed with wonderful circumstances, health, and a great support network. So if you could pray for Mitch and his wife Char, I would be very grateful and consider it a favor to me personally. Pray for physical strength and healing for Mitch, and pray for emotional strength for Char as she cares for and supports her husband. Both of them are wonderful, caring, and giving people who I know I could count on if I needed them.

Thank you,
-Ben

Busy Weekend

This weekend was quite busy. On Friday, I went to church to help out with the youth group. They brought in a Christian band from Manzini, so I ran sound for their concert. They have a different philosophy on the importance of hearing the vocals over the music. So we had to change all the sound settings. It was interesting, but the concert seemed to go well and a lot of the kids who came enjoyed it.

On Saturday, I got up at 5:15 and we left for Johannesburg (hereafter, Joberg). My two small group leaders and two other guys from the group. We drove for about 3 and a half hours, and we stopped at McDonalds. I got real American french fries, and everything tastes the same here as it does in the US (if you think about it, it's a bit troubling, so don't).

After McDonalds, we went to an extreme sports park, full of circus-like things. There was a rock wall, trapeze, giant slip n' slide, tight rope, and one of those spinning rope ladders that require balance the whole way up. We had a great time, mostly laughing at each other as we failed spectacularly and numerous little children succeeded.

After that, we went to a big mall, walked around for a while, and had seafood. It was a good day, with good fellowship and a lot of fun.

Sunday I was up at 6:15 so that we could get to church and fix the sound system. We got it sounding good for worship again, which was rewarding. Then, after the second service (circa 1:30), some friends picked me up and we watched a movie and ate some delicious chicken before I went home and passed out.

Hope you have a good week,
-Ben

You sure?

The other night (Saturday), I was talking to a missionary friend here who had a rough week. We were talking about how rough things happen and it's pretty easy to get discouraged because it seems pretty major, especially when you don't have much of a support network and it feels like you're balancing on a very thin wire. Her trouble was mainly financial and administrative, and I talked about how I think God has been teaching me to rely on him and trust that he'll work things out. It's true, and he's worked many things out.

Anyway, at 2am on Sunday, only a half-dozen hours after we had been talking about this, I woke to hear what sounded like something was boiling over or getting ready to explode or something. So I shook off a bit of stupor and discovered that the rear tire on my motorcycle was rapidly deflating. So tonight I'll be taking the rear wheel off my motorcycle so I can try to get that fixed. Unfortunately, it looks like it's more complicated than taking the wheel off of a car.

Even though I'm not thrilled to have to fix this, and I don't like being without my mode of transportation, I do think that I've learned a lot about trusting. It hasn't always been a fun lesson, but a lot of the time here, I don't always know what's coming next. And I don't have a good plan for the next ten years of my life. But my time in Swaziland has turned out to be great for me, and I think I've learned that although I don't always know where I'm going, or what will happen, God does.

-Ben

Tragic Realizations

I generally think of myself as a good person, at least a decent one. That's probably why the Hunger Games intrigued me so much (just the books, the movie hasn't made it here yet), because I was thinking about what I would do in a situation where I would have to kill to preserve my own life.

As it turns out, you wouldn't have to put my life in danger to get me to act like an animal. On Thursday I went to the government offices to pick up my residence permit. First I had to wait in one line to get a reference number, then bring that to another office where they gave me the paper that is my permit. Then I had to wait in two other lines for two offices that stamp the permit. After an hour waiting in a dark hallway with a half-dozen other people, I was no longer behaving out of an ingrained sense of right and wrong. If someone had convinced me that all I had to do to finish everything was be the last man standing in that hallway, I probably would have pushed everyone to the ground. It was a sad realization.

Anyway, I now have my permit. Yesterday after work I helped out with sound for the youth group meeting. Tonight we have young adults, but I just attend that.

Hope all is well with you,
-Ben

And we're back

I hope everyone had a great Easter Weekend. Celebrating Easter here was a different experience, and I felt like we didn't make a very big deal about it. We did have a worship night on Saturday, and that included communion, which I had been missing very much. Sunday we had our typical two services (one in English, one in SiSwati). I stayed for both because I was on sound, but I spent the second service training an apprentice, so I was sitting second chair to deal with feedback loops and such. For some reason, the stage lights stayed off Saturday night, but worked Sunday morning. No one's really sure why.

So after a 4-day weekend (Monday is off here too), we're all back to work. Below are some pictures from the training last week.

Some farmers loading up on the sandwiches we made. This is tea time, approximately 11am. Lunch is at 1pm.

Pastor Daniel talking to one of the Ministry facilitators while the farmers are queuing for sandwiches.

Another government employee giving a presentation. We had presentations on budgets, vaccinations and feeding, biosecurity, marketing, etc.

Farmers being attentive. The feedback was very positive and I think it was a good thing to do. We'll see how much it helped performance, but I think it at least encouraged the farmers.