Foreigner's potluck

Posted by Ali

This morning we actually had a pretty rousing discussion during worship. Actually, more like Max and Denis, the finance director, who was translating for Max, had a pretty rousing discussion. The rest of us threw in opinions here and there, but they were doing most of the talking. I was surprised the discussion became so boisterous since all the worships that I've been at here so far have mostly consisted of Max asking questions and no one really giving any answers. I tried to a bit, but then I thought I was talking too much, so now I wait until a few other people have giving their opinions (which usually only happens after Max calls on someone). We talked about how some people, or sometimes the church as a whole, sees different sins as more or less bad than other ones. It was interesting to hear the African perspective on that, but I'm not sure I see things the same way and I could tell Max didn't either. Apparently we're going to continue with the discussion tomorrow so we'll see where that goes.

This morning I got the keys for my office from Jacob, the campus manager, and got moved in finally. It hasn't been used since June or July, I believe, so it was pretty dirty, but the cleaning lady came in and scrubbed everything down and I did a bit of reorganizing so now it looks a lot better. There are two desks in here, one for the PR person and the other for the grant writer, so whenever Simon (the real grant writer) gets here, he'll have the other desk. Most of the day I struggled through trying to figure out what to write in the proposal narrative for the ADRA Canada proposal. I'm finding out more and more that I was not designed to do grant writing so I can't wait until the work visas finally get here and Simon is able to come help me out. Hopefully then I can get into the PR and storytelling side of things, which I'm anxious to begin. Staci and Mariah decided to make several visits to my office throughout the day, which was fun. A break is always nice.

At lunch I tried the internet in my room again with no success so I reminded Jacob, for a second time today, that it wasn't working. I don't think he's too sure what to do about it, though, and since I'm the only person in the cottages right now, I don't think anyone's really too worried about getting it working again. Near the end of the day Staci came into my office and started to play with some pins she found in my drawer. After avoiding getting "shots" for a few minutes I managed to get the pins put back away and then she asked me if I was going to come with them for supper and worship at some people's place. I told her I didn't know and then she said she was going to ask her dad if I could. I again felt a little strange about that, just like last night with going out to eat, but she came back with a report that he said it would be OK if I came and, since I'm not going to give up a chance for a new adventure, I agreed. Max, Davona, the girls and I took off toward Arusha and then took a few back roads and suddenly we were at an amazing house. I realized just HOW amazing after I got inside, noticed a back porch and went out there to take a look. The grounds were absolutely stunning with brilliant green grass, rock retaining walls and rock stairways leading down to a fish pond. And, from the porch was an incredible view of both Mt. Meru (which we have a nice view of from the ADRA campus on clear days) and Mt. Kilimanjaro. I was SOOO annoyed at myself for neglecting to bring my camera. Although it was kind of cloudy, Kili's peak was just poking out of the clouds and it was an amazing site.

A few minutes later more people arrived, bearing dishes of food for a potluck and then we prayed and ate. I met a lot of people, mostly Australian, I think, from the sound of their accents, but also three Canadians! One lady was from Kitchener, Ontario, while another couple, who just arrived a month ago to start a tourist business, were from Winnipeg. The lady talked to me a mile a minute after finding out I was from BC and I think I now know her whole life story as well as that of her three children. I managed, somewhere in all the talking, to tell her that my aunt just moved away from Pine Falls and she knew where that was, so I was impressed. After a delicious meal, Max, the girls and I walked down to the fish pond and fed bread to the fish. It was awesome! Although we couldn't see the fish, we watched them snatch the hunks of bread and gurgle them down. Seriously, they made gurgling and slurping sounds, which made me giggle quite a bit. When we returned to the porch we found a chocolate cake being eaten for dessert. Mmmmm, I had almost forgotten how good chocolate cake is! After some more talking we moved inside where the kids (Max's girls as well as three Australian siblings, two girls and a boy) were dancing to a mandolin that the man of the house was playing to entertain them. Then we all sat in a circle and sang some praise songs together before watching a segment of a Max Lucado video they are going through for their weekly worships. After the video, we discussed certain points with the help of a corresponding booklet. There were interesting points brought up about the transfiguration, but we had to leave before the discussion was over since Max and Davona had to go to the airport to pick up the lady who is coming here for three to six months in order to be able to adopt one of the Cradle babies, Emmy. On the drive home to drop me off before heading to the airport, Max and Davona told me that the people at the worship are all Christians who somehow met each other through the years and meet every Thursday night for supper and worship together. It was sure nice to be able to fellowship with them and understand everything that was being said, even if it was in a multitude of accents!

Now I'm in my office using the internet. Ahhh, it's nice to be able to check my e-mail again and post these blogs. I've heard it's a Muslim holiday tomorrow that I guess many people take off like it's a national holiday so I'm not sure if everyone will be here at work tomorrow. Hopefully Jacob will be here though and something can get figured out about the internet in my room so that I can have access to it on the weekend and not have to trek my computer over here every time I want to go online. Oh well, we'll see. I am in Africa, after all...