To get to older posts...

At the bottom of the page, on the right hand side there is an icon the reads "older posts" click on it to see the blogs previous to the last. Unfortunately, I can't figure out how to make that dark enough to read, so just put your cursor over it and it will show a hand that will connect you!

Enjoy!

Love, hugs and prayers!

xx Carol :)

Highs and Lows of Living at the “Bosch”

Brandy this is inspired by you…

HIGHS ( prayers answered & things I really like a lot!)	LOWS (prayers needed and other than the first and last item I really don’t mind these lifestyle compromises. These are observations more than anything else)
Kids being able to run around and play freely	Lack of communication with the outside world – here and at home
Hearing kids on their way to school outside my room	Curfew at 6
Hearing drums playing in the distance	Safety concerns
Birds singing	Bugs, snakes (5 venomous kinds in this area), insects and bats
Beautiful rolling countryside	Shortage of water on a regular basis
Flowers and trees	Unreliable Internet and email
Thunder & lighting	No rain
Fresh cut grass	The freezing cold weather
Exotic Animals (actually animals of any kind)	Inconsistent (hot water for showers
Fresh hung laundry	Not being able to sleep through the night and waking many times 3-6 - I can go right back to sleep, but still ,it is a broken, unrestful sleep!)
MY OWN ROOM :)	Echoes in the building that make hearing difficult and noisy
Lots of fresh fruit and vegetables	Transportation
No port smells	So far away from everything
Fresh air & light	Rust stains on your laundry from the water
Nature	Bed and pillows being damp when getting into it
No more coughing bouts and not using my inhaler anymore! Thank you sooooo much for your prayers!!!!	Brown drinking water (although it is safe)
Friendly, welcoming people	Cost of things
A church like home	Beef Jerky ( I had heard from numerous people how great it is – I don’t like it, at all! :()
Braii’s (barbecues)	Weight - adding additional strain on my back!
Sightseeing opportunities	The Africa Mercy community being divided

TIDBITS OF INFORMATION

Largest mall in the Southern Hemisphere is in Durban (I’ve only been there once to eat, but many of the crew go regularly – it has 18 cinemas alone. I’ve never seen a mall this large)

I am in a bible study going through the entire bible as an overview with a ordained Pastor – super opportunity to go through the bible this way!

Spring is Sept. – Oct., Summer Nov. – Mar. (we’re here at my favourite time of year!) Yippee! Yippee!

The “Big Five” is sometimes unofficially referred to as the “Big Six” for the Shark, as they are certainly part of life here

There are 3 Capitals in the RSA, Cape Town, the largest and the legislative capital, Pretoria, the administrative capital & Bloemfontein, the judicial capital

There are 11 official languages in the RSA. English (Government language and only the fifth most-spoken language), Afrikaans (orginated mainly by the Dutch), and Zulu are the main languages spoken in this province

A note from President Jacob Zuma:

“Africa is where the world meets. It is a true melting pot, where the colour and energy of a number of different cultures have combined throughout history, each adding something special to the African experience. This is a place where every day is different, and life is never just ordinary. It is a continent that sings in the voices of many different traditions, and dances to the beat of our shared pulse.”

I feel like this experience here in Africa, South and West, is really something I can’t even comprehend to what extent God’s been working something in me...

and I undertake to love you forever too!

Moi (aka Mom, Godmother, Aunt, Aunty, Layla, Ms. Carol and Sis )xox

Sailing Into Durban! (Part 1 of 5)

Greetings from the Republic of South Africa!

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Durban…, South Africa…, Wow!!! Exciting, Surreal… Imagine – It’s for real, I’m in South Africa, can you believe it???         I can hardly believe it myself!…Thank you Koonu Kulu (God) for all the challenges, surprises and adventures I am having because of following your call to be a missionary to those on the continent of Africa! Thank you for bringing me here and for all of those who send me to serve you, Mercy Ships and the peoples of Africa in this capacity!

Okay, it is 17 days since we set sail from Togo to Durban and the date is now 1 Sept., 1st day of Spring in the Republic of South Africa (RSA) and we are docked at the port of Durban aka eThekwini (original Zulu name) in the province of KwaZulu-Natal (KZN). We travelled 3,400 nautical miles (6,290 km) to get here. Our reason for being here is to have major repairs done to our ship, or as a friend of mine said, “our home (the ship) will be going into ‘dry-dock’ as it is taken out of the water for some serious surgery (how the roles have turned!)”

But I jump ahead, more about the shipyard in part 4. :)

As we came into Durban, we first saw the Moses Mabhida Stadium that was used in the 2010 FIFA World Cup! 

The panoramic view of Durban was beautiful and reminded me of home in so many ways (I’m not sure why). 

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Then  a group of Mercy Shippers: the Academy’s very own Director, Brian Blackburn & Academy Principal, Nikki Aldum: the advance team (who prepared the way for us to be here (with God’s infinite help of course)), Brenda and Cathy: the director of the National office,  John Paul: and the project manager and his wife, Ken and Ann, in addition, there was a past South African crew member and a bunch of security and custom officials to welcome us to the port, Durban and South Africa. It was a welcome sight – most of us were ready for land!We were all waving back and forth, like, shall I say it?, a bunch of lunatics! :)

To prepare for this momentous entry into the port of Durban, our Captain  prayed on the overhead for our safe arrival and to be able to clear customs etc. with a minimum of fuss (thank you God for the answer to those prayers), the deck crew also could be seen in a prayer circle praying for our safe arrival, the people of South Africa and our presence here (so far, prayers again were answered).  We also had an evening briefing on that first night of 1 Sept. with the advance team. After the briefing we all broke into groups to pray for every aspect of our being here that we could think of including an unsigned Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the government while the crew is stationed here, and for our next field service in Sierra Leone (one thing about being a missionary is you are always busy and thinking and praying for what God has ahead – what you know and what you don’t!). Thank God again, and for the work of our advance team leader, Brenda, that our MOU is also now signed. In addition, I want to thank all of you for your prayers  for our safety and presence during the sail and into this country. Without them things could have been very different! We know that for sure!!!! That was what we did first to prepare to live in this country for the next 4 to 5 months, and I wanted you to know that!

In addition, our preparation into the RSA included special emergency drills,  painting a big yellow dot on our top deck (deck 8) for the arrival of a helicopter, 

 

and packing up all necessary belongings to move ashore. 

For the first time ever in the history of Mercy Ships, the Harbour Pilot arrived by helicopter.  Security and fire and emergency teams stood by while the crew were prevented from going to close to the aft of the ship where the helicopter would let the Harbour Pilot down. The Harbour Pilot landed safely. (In all countries a “Harbour Pilot” brings the ship into port and docks it).  Once the pilot landed safely we raised the red & white flag on the left which indicates the pilot is on board, the yellow flag in the middle to invite custom officials on board for inspection  and clearance for the ship and crew and lastly, the flag on the far right is the country flag (RSA). We always fly the flag of the nation we are visiting.

I hope you enjoyed part 1 of 5… I will talk to you again soon!

I love you guys! I wish you all a beautiful Autumn/Spring depending on which side of the equator you live on! It’s very weird coming into warm/hot (freezing cold – lol) weather knowing Christmas will be the well into Summer!!! Can you imagine???

Thanks for your interest and support of this blog!

Mag Got saam met jou wees! (Afrikaans for May God be with you!)

Love and hugs,

Carol xox

Preparing to Disembark and Relocate (Part 2 of 5)

Well now that we’re here, we had to get all our business departments - over 200 boxes for the Academy alone (inventoried by yours truly), the galley and personal belongingsto the ships pre-staging area on Deck 5, ready to carry off the ship , down the gangway into 2 moving trucks.

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We filled 2 moving trucks with our belongings, 2 chartered buses and 13 land rovers carrying approx. 90 adults (non-technical) and 45 children (children cannot live in drydock which is one of the reasons we had to move to land) for the 3 hour (normally 2) drive to our new home in the rural area of Appelsbosch. As a convoy we travelled through wind, rain, mist, dropping temperatures and winding roads (surprise I still managed to get some decent shots to share with you :)).

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Past drunken drivers, an accident, tolls, stores and

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various Zulu communities.

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Farmlands galore (mostly sugar cane fields)

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and smiling Zulus waving to us throughout the journey.

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Can you imagine how we looked to them? I was blessed and warmed by their welcoming waves and smiles.

When we arrived to our new home (up the hill and around a corner you can’t see from this turn-off taken from the highway)

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we still had to unload. Imagine! It wasn’t so bad though. We formed two lines from the trucks to the gymnasium (which are the front doors below) and started passing every box, piece of equipment, toys, appliances, fans, lawn chairs etc. etc, down the line (even kids) into the gym with open hearts for what lay ahead of us. From there a couple of anonymous angels carried my marked boxes and luggage to my dorm (there are 4 dorms, mine is building B) and Raul (thank you so much!) carried them to my room on the ground floor of which there are 3 floors. The next day various do-gooders carried our 215 boxes to the new Academy for us to distribute amongst ourselves (believe it or not, I’ve had to return to the ship twice for more things we’ve need in the Academy). We were tired, sore and hungry (I was so hungry, I had a chocolate donut from the Tuck (snack) Shop and almost made the mistake of believing it was better than Tim Hortons!) lol

Now it was time to ignore my very dirty room, stains on my mattress (piece of foam with a sag in the middle) cover and make my bed (with my, thankfully clean sheets) and get into it (without a shower as there was no water or toilets)….Tomorrow would be another busy day!

So, 27 hours after arriving we were settled (sort of) in our new home, cleared by customs and immigration and ready to start the major cleaning, unpacking and organizing that was very, very necessary!

(Here are some pictures of my room once finished)

A close-up of the collages you see around my room

Oh, oh, the 500 South African adapters that were ordered for us were the wrong ones…none of us could use anything electrical! However, I must say, it only took 2 days for the powers that be to get us new adapters (seriously, through with every little set-back, which have been many, those involved on any level have gone over and above to try and fix whatever the problem - asap!). Once purchased we could buy them for $10 USD. The rooms only have 1 electrical socket (spaces for 4 people per room, but only one socket!@#*???), as do the offices (someone suggested since the campus was built in ‘94 no one thought about the need for computers etc), so unless you were a family with more than one room assigned to you; one adapter was sufficient, thankfully! (10 dollars is not cheap, but then again, neither is SA as I’ve been learning.) I luckily brought a couple of extension cords I could plug into each other for my kettle, fan, lamp, chargers,iron etc. :)

God be with you!

Love, hugs and prayers,

Moi xox

Appelsbosch aka The ‘Bosch’ (Part 3 of 5)

Appelsbosch is a remote area of KwaZulu-Natal (funny how easily that flows off my lips in just a month when in the beginning I thought, “how would I ever begin to pronounce the Zulu names”) in one of the Republic of South Africa’s 9 provinces. It is approx. an hour and a half from the 3rd largest city in SA, Durban aka eThekwini which is the Zulu name they are trying to change to. Translated it means “as the place where the earth and the oceans meet.”  The RSA is in the process of changing all the provinces names back to  original Africa names, but as yet everyone still calls it Durban. KwaZulu-Natal is home to the Zulu people

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and lies between the Indian Ocean to the east and the Drakensberg mountain range to the west . There are miles of beaches,

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Big Five Game Reserves  

(the “Big Five,” includes elephants, leopards, lions, water buffalo and rhinos),

 

and beautiful gardens. (KwaZulu-Natal is known as the garden province because it is so green.) Since we got here 5 weeks ago we see everything becoming greener, but necessarily hotter. :) I will blog some photos in November, so you can see some of the changes. A moment for my passion please…they have a purple blossom tree with the name Jacaranda – beautiful, absolutely beautiful,  

 

 

 

 

 

and one called yesterday, today and tomorrow that smells divine       (Mom it smells like lilacs and makes me think of you). Being that Spring is here we get the pleasure of seeing many things come into bloom – I’m in ecstasy! The weather here is known as a “subtropical” climate. What that means to me, is one day, or part of it, it can be a balmy 30 degrees Celsius and the next moment (it seems) I can be wearing the down jacket a friend gave me, with a scarf, hat and layers!@#*??? NO KIDDING! Apparently, This Is Spring, so no more complaining Vancouverites, okay! lol (keep in mind of course, this is coming from the person who wears long johns into Spring at home – ha ha ha!) Having said that, however, they are experiencing a serious drought here. There has been hardly any rain for more than 3 years (I have heard varying comments on the time factor). River beds are dry, vegetation & trees are dying, rolling hills of sugar cane farms are half their normal size producing minimum amounts of sugar and the amazing animals that live in hectares of game reserves aren’t getting the water they need to survive :(. We are all praying for rain – please join with us. Anyway, again I digress (there’s just so much to share with you :));  back to Appelsbosch.

In 1994 (hence the reason for the old fashioned keys :))  Swedish missionaries came to Appelsbosch and together with the Apartheid government  built Appelsbosch College of Education which was used to train teachers.

 

 

 

 

In some of our offices where we have the Academy based, there is one way glass where observations of teachers were done.  It was used for less than 2 years and closed.

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It has a huge gym with equipment; including, a trampoline, javelin poles, nets etc. (our gym teacher is beside himself :)),          dining room,

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large kitchen with stainless steel appliances(our chef is ecstatic);          

 

however, stainless steel seems to be what they used back then as our toilets and sinks are also stainless steel. There are 4 dorms, each with 3 floors,

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a Tuck (snack) shop,  many, many offices of which we’ve been able to block off a whole section for the Academy including a biology and chemistry lab (complete with chemicals and specimens left in formaldehyde) which is a huge plus for us as there is so much our Science teacher can’t do on the ship being that we are not allowed to have fire (Bunsen burners, candles etc,) of any kind on the ship. The kids are having a great time here with all the field trips being planned and taking place, the extra learning curves that have been included in the curriculum and generally just being able to run around without being told their not allowed! We have already  had 2 broken arms (one from falling out of a tree :)), ticks, scrapes and bruises to the extent the nurse has already run out of bandages and even a maggot that had to be squeezed out of one of our student’s legs – Yuck! Our clean-up included getting rid of paper that was still on shelves and in filing cabinets. Basically, when the doors closed back in the 90’ everything was left behind other than the teacher’s personal belongings!

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One thing I might mention is their colour choice for the entire college was gray, not my favourite colour to live in I’ve learnt. Everywhere has a dull, lifeless effect.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In my office A friend of mine made me a whole bunch of sunflowers (on my request) and put some of my favourite quotes (her idea, which coincidentally, I have a file full of quotes :)) in the head of the flower.    It brightens up my office a lot and I think the kids like it when they have to go through to the library (door to the right, behind Danae –grade 4 & 5 teacher). She’s a fun artist and she blessed me so much by doing that. I share my office with a temporary assistant while we are here at the ‘Bosch.’ Within the families there is a primary caregiver and a full-time working parent. The primary caregiver has to have a minor job equalling a certain percentage of time according to how large (maximum 4 children allowed and no single parents) the family is.  Deb normally heads up the Patient Care program for the crew and patients onboard the ship, but being that we do not have a hospital at this time she is helping in the Academy. She works mornings as a teachers assistant to grade ones and in the afternoon with me. We have some good times working together and manage to laugh a fair amount, so all is good.

Unkulunkulu Akubusise!  (Zulu for May God be with you!)

Love,

Carol xox