Ashamed to Require

It was an interesting weekend to say the least. The police called the pastor to tell him that a strict Hindu group was planning to cause problems for churches during their services. The police wanted to send a plain clothed police officer to the church to make sure our services were uninterrupted. Just the week before, the same Hindu group pressured the police into arresting dozens of Christians for “forcing” people to convert. They were later released, and that apparently infuriated the Hindu group. They want the country to be a Hindu country again, making it illegal for the people to become Christians.

The Many Jobs of a Missionary ~ Exterminator, Flying Creatures

These flying creatures I don't mind. Gold finches build hanging nests in the tree right outside of our study, and we feast our eyes on them every spring.

Now that you are fully creeped out by my former descriptions of Africa as THE home of all things crawly and fascinating, I thought I'd wrap it up with those nightmarish descriptions of things that can take wing and follow you or actually get-in-your-face:

Mosquitoes

Annoying, loud or silent, deadly at times, and incessant. Not so bad here in our home, but terrible--causing sleepless nights--if you cross the border to Zimbabwe or Mozambique. We can get malaria here, but it's uncommon. Just a little farther to the north, it is both common and deadly. I wrote a bit about my fears concerning malaria here. We've become experts at homemade window screens and all forms of insect repellant--electrical plug-ins, sprays, creams, roll-ons, burning smoke coils.

Wasps

We catch insects and draw them for our nature journal.

Interestingly, it took a nature reader from a Christian publishing company to figure out what kinds of wasps continually built under the eaves of our house. They are the paper wasp.

You know, I've noticed--get ready for something really profound here--that critter issues are worse the farther from city life you go. I know, that's a shocker. But on my one trip to very rural Mozambique, I noticed the bugs everywhere! You couldn't even enjoy a quiet time with the Lord without feeling like you'd sat in an ants' nest or should just start waving away mosquitoes full-time.

On one trip to Mozambique, our teammate left his truck's windows down overnight. The next morning, to all the guys' dismay (especially to another teammate, who is allergic), the truck was full of bees. The guy with an allergy got far away; and the other wrapped a tarp around himself showing only his eyes, eased himself into his truck, and drove full speed down the road with windows and doors open until the bees went somewhere else to make their nest.

He didn't get stung once!

Bats

Don't you just hate these guys? They fly in such an erratic pattern, looking like they'll zoom into your face on accident. Two bat memories--when my parents came to visit, we went to a game park to see the wild animals, and while making our dinner at an outdoor kitchen, the bats began to fly around for their nightly meal. It was a fright to my mom who grew up with bats in her attic and a brother who loved to take a bat upstairs and play a game of hit-as-many-as-I-can-while-they-fly-around-my-head. :)

When we built our house in the village, we had no ceiling for the first nine months. I remember when a bat got in and couldn't get back out. It was during our first two weeks living there in the house. It would fly around at night, and Seth would jump from roof truss to roof truss trying to scare it out of the cracks it had entered by. It was not easy to sleep wondering if a bat was over your head!

Others

These aren't the kind that eat flowers, but they're close.

We have pretty black and yellow beetles that fly into our yard whenever the flowers bloom. I hate them because they sound like bumblebees, and they gorge themselves eating all of our flowers. :(

When it rains hard, flying termites escape their flooded holes in the ground and flutter all over. At first I called them "throbby bottoms" because that's exactly what they looked like. I literally thought I would go mad during my first few encounters of them getting into our house. They crowd around the lighted windows seeking a way out of the rain. They have four cellophane wings which barely hold them up and which they easily lose. They don't fly very well, so they actually do fly right into your head. It is sooo unnerving. The Africans simply pluck of their wings and eat them (usually fried first!)

Look at that walkingstick!

We have some big, colorful grasshoppers and walking sticks, and mango flies, which I haven't seen but have heard of. They can lay eggs in your laundry drying on the line. Then they hatch inside your skin, and if you don't pinch them out while they're small, it gets very painful. I hope I never experience that! There are ticks that can cause nasty flu-like symptoms and need strong antibiotics to get rid of. I'll never forget when I got tick bite fever while pregnant! And fruit flies and normal flies are here as well of course.

I think that's it. See, that's all! haha. When are you coming for a visit??

A Thief in the Night

Two weeks ago Sunday evening, exhausted from a busy weekend and a late night, Seth and I dropped into bed and slept heavily until morning. When Seth arose, he noticed the front door ajar, with the key on the outside. We always kept it on the inside and locked the door at night.

Footsteps led straight from the front door to our study. Frightened, Seth followed them and noticed his iPhone missing from the desk, as well as my cheap cell phone. He ran in to ask if I had certain other valuables. I noticed that the laptop was also gone.

We kept finding more clues of what had happened--an open window that hadn't been opened before; footprints; the outdoor light had been dismantled. How could we have slept through a break-in?

It's a lot scarier than the cute cartoons show.

And our next immediate thought--how glad we were that the children did sleep through it!

We tried to think who it could have been. Residents of Joburg or South African cities know how common and frightening the more sophisticated hold-ups there can be, but we have never been burglarized while home here in the village. Every time we've been away on furlough, there have been attempted or successful break-ins, as well as on occasion while we were at church, but never while we were in the home.

Our first suspect was our neighbor, the culprit of several past break-ins. He was nine years old his first time to steal from us when we moved to the village in 2006. Now he's older and bolder, stronger and more sophisticated. He did it this time as well, as we discovered. (I'll call him T to aid the story.)

Seth went next door, but T was gone. His blind sister allowed Seth to search T's room. Seth found several other items of ours from past break-ins that we hadn't missed yet; or if we had, had no concept that it could have been stolen--things like a heart pen and rose-printed valance aren't usually on a teen boy's next-time-I-get-a-chance list.

We heard that sometimes stolen items got stashed by T "in the bush." Seth then searched much of the overgrown areas around our house and found other evidences of past break-ins, but not our special items from this specific break-in.

Then we involved the police. We filled out forms. They said an investigator would arrive to dust for fingerprints. He arrived hours later at dinnertime (right when we were hosting a team dinner). It was a trick to keep our kids away from the middle of our house all day!

By then, Seth had located T (about mid-afternoon) and delivered him to the police himself. "Here's the suspect," Seth emphasized. On the way to the station, Seth had tried to talk tough and scare him, but he denied stealing from us.

The police said to the boy, "Why are you stealing from the white man?" He denied it. "Aw, be quiet," they responded, "we know you did it. It'll go easier for you if you talk." They put him in a cell.

Meanwhile we also got quotations for welding "burglar bars" on our windows. We had the back half of the house done several years ago, but the front of our house was usually too high or visible for thieves to break into; so now our entire house is "burglar-proof." Those were installed Wednesday and Thursday. It seemed that our whole week was taken up with the burglary.

Makes you feel like you're living in a prison.

 

T confessed on Tuesday and named two other helpers for his crime. One, a son of a tribal authority member, stood in court with his parents and was let free with no penalties because of his age.

After prayer group Wednesday night, Seth visited them. The tribal council member was ashamed of his son's actions. Although not strictly apologetic, he and his son went that night to track down the third boy, the one who had been small enough to get through the window and let T in. #3 supposedly had our things but got away.

"I don't understand why he does this!" Mr. Tribal Authority mentioned regarding his son. "He has everything he needs!" Seth noticed that the big-screen TV in the living room was chained down to the furniture... "I lost two days of work for this!" While we are glad to see someone who cares about work, Seth wasn't very sympathetic. "I lost three days of work and R10,000 of valuables because of this," Seth rejoined. "Oh, yeah," he mumbled, chagrined, "Eish."

So anyway, what happened to "T"? He got out after a few days in prison. He is of age now to be "punished," but after confessing in court and bail being posted (of a minimal amount), he was let free because...aw, he's a poor person! Poor person! (Say that with a kind of sympathetic, aw-what-a-cute-baby voice.) He can't pay that amount! Okay, you can go.

So that's what happened. We didn't get our stuff back. He didn't get his back-end stuffed. :)

Seth took some of his clothes and told him if he wants it back, he can work until the amount that he stole is paid back; then he can have his stuff. I'm afraid he's not used to working... I'm also afraid that will give him another reason to break in.

But anyway to cut out more details, we've kind of imposed our own ineffective form of community service on him. He worked patching dirt roads around here one day of his week off of school last week. Well, "one day" is overspeak. Make that three hours. It was a hot day.

Today was the story. Next week are some thoughts that have been marinating about this situation over the last few weeks. Thank you to our friends for prayers and well wishes.

If you're a missionary, share your break-in stories here! I know we're not the only ones!

A Story of Shipments

It was funny—while we were in the States on furlough this last summer, there were two occasions in which we happened to be with two other missionary families. It wasn’t planned, just happened. And on both occasions while I was passing the other two ladies in conversation, I heard them discussing shipments!

“Are you using a container?”

“How are you shipping your things?”

Apparently this is one of the first things on missionary women’s minds.

This is what you would find me doing for a few weeks in America!

We have made four shipments now. Seth shipped his things as a single man, and then we shipped my things when we got married. We made another shipment after our first furlough with a toddler, and now again after our second furlough. Each time, there have been different needs—Seth’s, mine, babies' items and things I didn’t know to bring when married since I’d never been here for a visit, and this final shipment was a lot of clothing and materials for homeschooling. So each shipment would look different for us.

If we had come over with our family right from the beginning, we might have shipped a “container.” But every time we have shipped, we have done it in a smaller way, using a crate. I recently heard of a possible way to take it all on the plane with you; but up until now, because of airline restrictions, we have shipped a crate.

The first time Seth shipped (#1), there was confusion, adventure, and eventually clarification. He didn’t know that you need a company not just to ship your items, but also to receive them and get them through customs. The next time we shipped after we got married (#2), the shipment was several weeks late, and some of our things were damaged or stolen. They blamed it on Hurricane Katrina. It was nerve-wracking. The last time (#3), I can’t remember any big problems. And this final time (#4), we were so relieved to get our shipment only a couple of weeks late, with everything in tact.

Storage tubs in my parents' garage waiting to be shipped.

The summer before our furlough, I discovered homeschooling forums on the web, and all of their accompanying “for sale” sites. The “used” prices allowed me to buy so many more great books and curriculum for my kids than if I had purchased new or off of Amazon. My parents were kind enough to receive boxes after packages after envelopes of homeschool curriculum and books for the kids. They stored them in their home for almost a year until we shipped them over here! I also frequented thrift stores and garage sales in almost any town where we stayed for more than a day all over America, and I had the chance to go to two big library sales while on furlough. It was so fun to take advantage of America's sales! People were so kind to take me shopping, and some even donated books to our stash.

We don’t have a TV, and we really want our children to love reading and learning. Probably most missionaries wouldn’t ship as many books as we did this past shipment, but that was an area that we had decided was important to us.

Seth and I also love books! So probably more than half of our shipment was books. The rest of the shipment was clothing and shoes for the kids, church materials, some kitchen equipment (I got a Kitchen Aid! :)), and home décor.

It was a very weighty shipment! Thankfully, when you ship a crate, it is the size that matters for the bill, not the weight. So we sent most of the weighty books in the crate, and clothing on the plane. But that also presented a problem for Seth when he needed to pick up the shipment and bring it back here. Shipment #2, they drove a truck right to our door. Shipment #3, Seth went to Johannesburg to pick up the things, but they fit in our truck. This shipment exceeded our truck. Seth borrowed a trailer from a friend, but we were concerned about our old truck having trouble pulling the load.

Some of the bins were taken off before I thought to take a picture.

Another small drama came up when the shipment arrived in port in Durban. The receiving company told us to put our signature on a couple of forms to get it through customs. But one of the forms required our signatured promise that we had not shipped any “vegetable matter” or stuff from bees. Unfortunately, we had! We shipped a huge tub of coconut oil, and two boxes of beeswax. Our hope was to use it as a church to make homemade lip balm to sell to make money for our church building.

When Seth contacted the clearing agent to discuss the form, the agent advised him to lie. “Just don’t read the forms, sign the papers, and send it back.” If we admitted that we had those items in our shipment, it might hold up our getting the items for weeks as the customs officials would probably search our entire shipment (a scary thought as far as keeping the items in tact! :(), and they might confiscate the oil and beeswax, as well as anything else they might want! Can you tell I struggle with trusting government officials over here? There is so much corruption.

Now those three items sitting in obvious view on the top of our pallet of materials were compromising our shipment! And we had bought and added them to our shipment on the very last day we actually shipped it. It was a last minute decision, and I felt terrible about it on this end. “We shouldn’t have done it!” I worried. I had had no idea that those wouldn’t be accepted in the country.

No matter your philosophy on lying and whether it is acceptable in war or to save life or whatever, I don’t think this situation fits. We couldn’t justify lying in this situation. I am so thankful that Seth didn’t lie, tempting as it was. He checked the two boxes, signed his name, and sent the form back. Later that day, the agent informed us that our shipment had been cleared, with no further problems! Oh we were so thankful that we had done the right thing! God blessed Seth for his truthfulness. And even if we had experienced problems, it still would have been right to tell the truth. God hates lying—much more than we would have hated losing our things!

Seth took a day and a half to visit church members in Johannesburg and returned with our things Thursday evening. (He also managed to make a plan to repair our piano!) He took a young man from our church with him to help keep him awake and to visit the other church members. They had so many valuable discussions together! Maybe I’ll share some of those lessons later…

The young man who went on the trip with Seth!

Everything worked out beautifully:

• The truck had no breakdowns.
• The shipment wasn’t too heavy for the trailer.
• Seth didn’t fall asleep while driving. (This was a definite concern!)
• Visits with church members went wonderfully.
• Our things got through customs and arrived to us in good condition.
• And we even got the piano down there to be repaired!

We took time, like Noah, to thank God afterwards for bringing us safely over the sea. It is so good to have so many comforts with us here.

More Blessings in Disguise

After last week’s blessing in disguise story, several ladies shared a story with me.  I would like to share a couple of those with you today.

Tom and Connie Robertson have been missionaries in Chile, South America, for almost thirty-two years.  Once Connie had to return to the States by herself.  She was driving through Florida toward Miami to return to the field.  She pulled into a gas station.  As she got out of the car, without thinking she locked the door. Her keys and her purse were still inside the vehicle. The gas station attendant called someone to come and help her. While the locksmith attempted to unlock the car, Connie was sharing her testimony with him.  The man was stumped as to why he could not get the vehicle unlocked. After he had tried for quite a while, Connie looked and saw that he just needed to press down on a button with his tool. Within seconds, he had the door open.  He did not charge her anything, and she went on down the road.  Not more than ten minutes down the road, she came upon an accident.  A semi had come across the median and was sideways across the two lanes on her side of the road.  The cars had to go off the side of the road to get around him.  Although it was frustrating to lock her keys in the car, it was definitely a blessing in disguise!

Our next story is from Althea Nordquist in Brazil.  Recently they were taking some of their church people to a meeting.  Her husband Jeff took the van with a load of people, and Althea took their car to pick up a family who lived about twenty minutes away from them.  Althea’s son was with her. About halfway to the house, the car started having a burning smell.  Within seconds, the whole thing just shut off.  She had nothing – no lights, no hazards, and a locked steering wheel.  She was on a curve and could not even pull to the side. The car rolled onto the side a little bit.  She tried several cell phone numbers of the people in the van, but no one had taken their phone.  She finally got a hold of their deacon.  He had the cell phone number to the mechanic, and they sent a tow truck.  There were people walking around the car; Althea was getting a bit frantic thinking that they were going to be robbed.  Finally, four teen boys came.  After they listened to Althea speak Portuguese with an accent, they asked her where she was from.  By the time she got done explaining who she was, the four boys decided they needed to stay and protect her.  She got to witness to them, and they asked her to always honk when she drives past their house.  A broken down car in an unfamiliar neighborhood – a blessing in disguise!

If you have a story that you would like to share with us, please e-mail it to me at lo@consfords.com. Please include the name of each family member, your field of service, and a picture of your family if possible.

Until next week, keep your sunny side up!

A Blessing in Disguise

Since arriving in Ghana, we have not done much traveling in Ghana other than an occasional trip to Accra, the capital city.  We live in Takoradi, which is about four hours away from Accra.  We have some friends who are missionaries in Kumasi, which is about five hours away from Takoradi.  They have come to visit us several times, but we had never been to visit them.  So, we decided to go to Kumasi for a vacation. 

About ten minutes after we set out, the questions began.  “Are we almost there?”  “Is it snack time?” “When can we stop to go potty?”  “Where are we now?”  And the list goes on and on.  My husband had traveled to Kumasi before, and it only took him about four and a half hours to make the trip.  Of course, he did not stop at all.  With the wife and three children along, that easily adds at least an hour to the trip! 

We enjoyed looking at the new surroundings as we traveled.  Takoradi is right next to the ocean.  I did not realize that there were mountains in Ghana until we went through them.  I did not notice how high up we were until we started going downhill.  My ears popped.  I was getting over a cold; so, I asked my husband if we were high enough to make our ears pop or if it was just part of the cold.  He said that we were high enough.  We saw several donkey carts and even some brick houses; we have not seen those things down in the area where we live.

When we were about an hour outside of Kumasi, Bonnie suddenly threw up.  She had gotten car sick, but she did not give any warning.  So, I did not have time to give her a bag or anything.  We pulled over to the shoulder and got her and the car cleaned up the best we could.  Then, we were back on our way. 

A few minutes later, we came upon a wreck that had just taken place.  Two public transport vans, which are called tro-tros here, had collided head on and had both fallen off the edge of the road.  People were being pulled out of the wreckage.  Wounded people were being taken across the road to taxis to be taken to a hospital.  If Bonnie had not thrown up, we very possibly could have been right in the middle of that wreck. 

Later that day, we were told by several people that they were praying for us at the exact time that all of that took place.  It never ceases to amaze me how the Lord protects us and takes care of us.  Even a puking episode can be a blessing in disguise!

If you have a story that you would like to share with us, please e-mail it to me at lo@consfords.com. Please include the name of each family member, your field of service, and a picture of your family if possible.

Until next week, keep your sunny side up!