amanda's journey: August 2008

So, last week we got our final calendar for the year. The final calendar!!! I couldn’t believe it! For about 15 minutes we talked about “the rest of the year”. It was kinda hard to take all that in and think about the days when this would all be over. I can’t believe that time is coming up! We now have 11 full weeks left…that’s all! Time is really starting to wind down. However, we still have a very full schedule. Yet to come is a girls’ trip to the Drakensberg mountains (where the apprentices went in the beginning of the year…should be great!), hopefully a visit to my World Vision sponsor child…still working out the details to that, ministry as usual (time with the girls and time with Sister Melanie), an environmental weekend here at Pangani, Life Compass (where we look at where we have been and try to see where we might be going), and our final celebrations. It should be a great, full time…although I know it will be tough! I am really excited to get home and see my family and friends, but it’s going to be so hard to leave this place and these people! I am sure that will leave me with some crazy emotions in the coming weeks. But, God is good and I know He will be directing and guiding me through it all.

We are in the Imagining posture right now (and will go into the Entrusting posture to end the year). I am looking forward to revisiting all that I have done here and beginning to imagine what God could have in store for me down the road (this is where the Life Compass comes in). I am praying that I have an open mind, heart, and ears to all that God could be speaking to me during this time. I don’t want to be closed off to His ideas out of fear or by my own ideas getting in the way. It’s always an adventure with God…I want to be ready and willing!

Recent adventures:

Feast of the Clowns…a week long conference/celebration/festival that focuses on diversity in the city and taking back the city for the children. TLF (Tshwane Leadership Foundation…who runs Lerato House) puts this on annually and I believe this is the 8^th year. Throughout the week there are seminars, productions, classes, and a march to conclude the week. It’s a great time! Some of us went to see the Soweto Gospel Choir during the week and they were awesome!!! It was an amazing opportunity! We actually only got to see half of them so I am interested to see the whole group! The march at the end of the week was great as well! It was full of youth from all over the city singing and dancing through the street. I took some fun pictures of my girls from the Lerato House as well as all the other youth marching through the streets. See my pictures online here.

We also had our second (and last) week off during the week of August 17^th- 24^th. It was a great time to relax and enjoy this wonderful country by heading to Cape Town. This is an amazing city! The views are quite picturesque with the mountains and beaches in one place. We had perfect weather, which is rare for August. So, it was an extra amazing time. Click here for pictures from Cape Town. We got to see a number of great things while visiting…Table Mountain, the beautiful beaches (though not so much beach season yet), Hermanus (small coastal town with whale watching), Cape Point/Cape of Good Hope, South African Penguins, an Ostrich Farm, Wine Country (on our rainy last day), and a GREAT local market. I loved all of it!

The Road Trip of eight also finished up their time in the last month. They were here for a total of 2 weeks. It was cool to have visitors here who were checking out what we do and thinking about doing this same thing next year. I loved being able to share all that God has been doing in my life throughout this year and being able to encourage others. It was also fun to feel like a local in South Africa and even get to take others to Pilanesberg for a game drive. We saw tons of animals and even came very close to being stampeded by a huge elephant! That was both super scary and super cool all at the same time. Sadly, the time with the Road Trip ended on the same day that Passion took place. So, I ended up having to make a choice and I opted out of going to Passion. I would have really liked to have seen Passion international, but I was really exhausted from the Road Trip and wanted to see them off and hear their closing sentiments from the past 2 weeks. Next time.

Ministry with the girls continues to go well. Some of the girls are becoming more and more comfortable with us and I enjoy them all more and more. However, I have to say that it is difficult only seeing them twice a week. Sometimes it feels a bit disjointed and I often feel like I should be doing more. It makes me wonder how things could be if this were my full time job. It makes me wonder about the future and if this kind of thing will be apart of my life when I return to Atlanta. We’ll see! I am also enjoying meeting up with Sister Melanie once a week on Tuesdays. It has been inspiring to me to see her dedication and passion in fighting Human Trafficking. She is a great woman and I feel blessed to know her! I feel she will be someone I will be in contact with for a long time. I have mainly been doing office work with her still, which is fine by me. It has been good to help her out in this way and do some things for her that would normally take her much longer to do. I guess living in the bush for 23 years doesn’t help your computer skills much.

Oh yeah…speaking of Sister Melanie…the march for human trafficking! So, Mariah and I tried to be apart of the March at the beginning of the month. We got a flyer that said the event (speakers back at City Hall also) was going to be from 10-1. Well, we got there at about 9:45 and went on a wild goose chase trying to find the march. Apparently there were a few things going on for Women’s Day so people were a bit confused when we asked them about the march. We finally just went back to City Hall to find that the program was almost over. We had completely missed the march…which ended up starting at about 9! Typical Africa for you! But, Mariah and I had a great time! We had our own signs and marched through the streets on our own. We met some fun people along the way and enjoyed every second of it. So, my first march ever…a semi-success!

I guess that’s about all I have been up to recently. As busy as it’s been I have managed to have some great times with God and am still trying to read through the Old Testament. I am currently on Esther and hope to be through Job by the middle of next week. My friend who I am reading with is on Isaiah so I am going to just skip Psalms and Proverbs to try and catch up with him. It has really been a highlight for me. I love reading through big chunks of the Bible at a time and highly recommend it. It brings a whole new light to it.

Prayer Request: Please pray for my health. I got sick the first couple days of Cape Town and was in bed all day one day (actually many of our community members caught the flu that week). But, I have not been able to get fully better since then. I have had a nagging cough and now I am starting to go downhill again with a sore throat, congestion, and headache. It’s kind of a bummer. So, please pray that I would recover from this illness. Actually, while you are at it, pray for Jody as well. He has been sick longer than I have and can’t seem to shake it either. Thanks so much!!!!