Lizard Feet???

After a wonderful week and a half in Zimbabwe we are now back in Lusaka, Zambia. Our last few days in the village were filled with the men working on the rainwater harvester and Lauren and I taught a workshop as well as led a Bible study. Thursday was our big long day. 

We had planned on getting an early start in the morning, but it took longer to get some stuff than we had planned. Daniel and Drew decided to spend the night in the village so that they could get as much done on the harvester as early as possible. We got on the road around 10:30, but the car was so weighted down that Amber decided to catch a Combi (the public transportation van’s I wrote about earlier) out to the village to help make the car lighter. So we were finally on our way. Kudashi was asleep in my arms and Mufaro was asleep on Lauren’s lap. We were bouncing down the road when all of the sudden I felt something land on my hand. I quickly flung it off and saw that it was a lizard. I was in a bit of a shock so Lauren and I just looked at each other without saying anything, even when it started to crawl to the front. It got quite the reaction from the guys. I think we almost heard Drew scream when he saw it! J When we got to the Lufiyele’s land the guy they had hired to drive the cement out had gotten stuck in their driveway. It hasn’t gotten packed down yet so it is very loose sand. Daniel used his jeep to get it out which was quite the sight to see. Since the girls were sleeping, Lauren and I just stayed inside the car, along for the ride. Once Amber arrived we ate and then went to the ladies Bible study. Lauren and I started with a workshop that we had planned about safe water storage. It went pretty well. Amai Christ In Us translated for us, which was interesting an interesting experience. She does a very good job, but we still had to make sure we were clear in what we were trying to say. We left the guys to keep working and got home to find that the power was out. 

On Friday Amber took Lauren and myself to the gorge where the Zambezi River runs through. It is only about 2 miles from their land in the village. It was nice to just sit there, enjoying the view and talking about future possibilities. On Saturday we left. It was a long day of crossing the border and riding in the bus for 7 hours from Livingstone to Lusaka. It was harder than I thought it would be coming back to the bigger city of Lusaka after spending time in the countryside, right next to the bush. 

On Sunday we went to a different church, but still a part of the Presbyterian church that Lloyd is a part of. The service ended up being about 4 hours long. Most of it was in Nyange and very little English was spoken, so it was a tiring experience trying to follow along. There was quite a bit of liturgy involved, and they dedicated some new music equipment, as well as inducted some new deacons and deaconesses. A large part of the service though, was when they had the different choirs come up and sing. The men’s choir, women’s choir, youth choir and children’s choir each came to the front and sang a few songs. That was a lot of fun to see and hear. After the service was over we went to go visit the Moyo family whose nine month old granddaughter passed away. She had only been sick for a day when she died. All of the close female relatives were with the mother when we came. They had stayed up the last two nights since the baby had died, singing and reading the Bible. We sat with them in the room and Lloyd said a prayer for them, then the ladies told us what had happened. 

Monday night Lauren heard the Boy’s Brigade band playing next door. Lauren plays in a band back home and she was very interested to see them, so we had Tamara escort us over there to take a look. They were most willing to show off their skills. It was a brass band and Lauren plays some trumpet, so they had her play along with them. It was a lot of fun to listen to them and to see how much fun they have with their music. Teenage boys are teenage boys wherever you go J That night the U.S. played in the World Cup at midnight. I slept for about an hour and a half before the game and then was awake long enough to see the U.S. score their first goal. I was tired enough and not interested enough to fall asleep for most of the rest of the game. I woke up just in time to see Ghana score and the U.S. score again. So I saw all of the important parts, right? It was great to be able to go to sleep for real that night J Since the U.S. won we got stuff to make cheeseburgers for supper last night. Even though some of the things we used were a bit different, it was still really good to have something that tasted of home. 

Today (Wednesday) Maureen took Lauren and myself to the tailor. She saw the difficulties we have been having trying to wear our chitenge’s and so she had the tailor put ties on them so that we can tie them around our waist like an apron. We went to one tailor, but when he saw us white girls, he wanted to charge an extra 5 Kwacha. Maureen wouldn’t let him do that, so we found another shop where there were two ladies working. They were willing to do the work for the expected 10 Kwacha and even went beyond our expectations by hemming the raw edges. It was interesting for me to see the sewing machines they were using. They had two machines that originally been manpowered and had been adapted to use electricity. While we were there a couple of gentlemen came by and wanted to take us girls out for drinks. Apparently they were in love J Both of the tailor ladies and Maureen were quick to tell them off, but we had many laughs over the encounter. Maureen said that every Zambian woman must have at least one chitenge, so we like having ours to look traditional and respectful.(Maureen is a director of YouthHope here in Zambia and she will be joining us for the rest of our trip. She has been a great help to me and Lauren as we try to understand the language and culture here). 

We will be leaving for Chipata on Thursday and will be in the eastern areas of Zambia until around July 15^th. We will be doing some different leadership conferences and then going to the youth training camp where it will be more of the farming techniques. 

Please pray for: 

- safe travels

- We will be doing a lot of teaching at several different conferences, so pray that we will be prepared for that and for confidence for myself since this is not really in my comfort zone. 

- Unity for our team, that we would continue to feel free to share openly with each other.