Sunday School

Last week was our first week doing Sunday School during the service for the small kids in church, 5-7 years old. We are alternating weeks, Linda and I, to teach during the service. My week was today and I told the story of David and Goliath. There were fifteen little kids and it was so much fun. One of the youth girls asked to be able to help out and she did a great job. The kids were so well behaved and it was great. I taught them a new song and we colored a picture about David being a shepherd. It was really encouraging to see the kids enjoying the service at a level that they could understand. I am also really excited that some of the youth are interested in helping out. I hope that we can encourage more people to help out.

Girls just wanna have fun...

While the girls from Rundu (the town North of me) were visiting for the birthday weekend, we had ourselves a little dance lesson. Anna, in the front, is a dancer and kindly showed us some elegant moves. I definately think I made the best choice in not pursuing a dance career...

Girls Night!

Some of the missionary women from the town North of us came down to celebrate a couple of birthdays. We had a great couple of girls nights. We spent quite a bit of time cooking and managed to get massages in between. We made mexican food and pizza - all by hand. That means the pizza dough, the tortillas all the veggies cut, the guacamole and everything else. It was baie lekker (very good). It was a lot of fun to have some girls around my age and some not. Just to be able to enjoy the company was great.

(first picture) - Lauren and Janeen cooking.

(second picture) - Anna also cooking.

(third picture) - Lauren, Anna and myself seriously enjoying some good grub!

(fourth picture) - Lauren and Janeen acting out the log scene from "Dirty Dancing."

My Boys!

My grade 7 boys are a source of great joy and of equal frusteration! They are a lot of fun and hilarious but in class they talk! And they tease the girls! And they make comments the whole time! And they constantly ask for sweets! But at the same time they are always there to help me carry stuff! They are really helpful most of the time! They even got together a few of them and made me a Valentines card. They are pretty fun! It is crazy because when we hang out and they are in class they are just a bunch of kids, a bunch of teen age boys. But I know the reality of life here is that they are not just kids in a lot of ways. They are not innocent, a lot of them drink and hang out at bars, they fight and they live hard lives. They are not young, they are 15 - 19 years old. I pray for them so often and pray that my time with them will have some influence on their lives.

(first picture) - Carlos and Kambulu are two of the more outgoing boys in my class. They love to dance and they love to make people laugh and they combined both for a hilarious act at our Valentines Day party.

(second picture) - These are my "big" boys. From left to right we have Johannes, Edu-Kali, Timo, Frans (in the back), Carlos and Kambulu. There are still a couple boys not in the picture.

Can you get any cuter?

There are many pictures of my little neighbor Lettie. She is in orange. Recently another girl moved in to be the house help and brought her small daughter Tangi. Tangi means Thank you in Oshivambo. They are also frequent visitors to my house. They walked down the street to play at the house and I had to capture the moment. They are so precious. Lettie has started a new game with me. Usually when I would see her I pick her up and say "Where's my kiss?" and she lays a smack right on my lips. Lately though, I will say "Don't kiss me" and she attacks me and climbs all over me trying to kiss me. She is so cute and giggling the whole time. I love these two!

Uh Oh!

The other night I was closing up the house and I look down in the corner and a snake is taking its sweet time leaving my house! I grabbed the camera first and took a few shots and then encouraged it to leave a bit quicker. It may be a baby mamba, one of the most dangerous snakes in the world. Hopefully we won't see any more of these!

Valentines Party! - Grade 7

This is my favorite class. These are my grade 7 kids and they range in age from 13 to 19 years old. This party was a bit different from the grade 4. There were sweets and treats and DANCING! These kids love to dance and to put on a show. They ended up having a dance contest. If they danced then they got a "stukie" which is a sucker. This is a favorite sweet and there was a lot of dancing and a lot of fun competition. There is no shyness here and both the boys and the girls. These kids can seriously move. I will try to load a short video on my blog of some of the dancing action. The last picture is of the whole grade 7 class!

Valentines Party! - Grade 4

My Grade 4 English class also had a Valentines Day party. For our party we had sweets and cookies that I made and I gave each of the kids a pen. since we were still in english class I decided to ave the kids make Valentines cards. First they told me things they might want to put into their cards. Then they got to work. I turned onto some Namibian music so there was some dancing in between making thier cards. It was a lot of fun and a great way to combine fun and english at the same time. It is great to watch them relax and enjoy things also.

Valentines Day - Teachers Party

What does Valentines Party with the teachers look like in Namibia. Here are some great shots of the party we had for the staff. The thing is this is in the middle of one of the class periods! So all the kids are sitting in their classess waiting for a teacher to come! Unfortunately this is normal but I am lucky that I didn't have a class at this time. We joked around and voted on Mr. and Mrs. Valentine for both the kids and then the teacher. This was the person who was the most dressed up for Valentines day. The kids were excited to be able to wear something other than their uniforms! We also ate brotchens with meat and generally joked around.

(first picture) - Decorations for the holiday which happen to still be up a week later!

(second picture) - Ms. Kharese, Mrs. Hanavi and Mrs. Selma getting the food ready to eat.

(third picture) - Me enjoying the party!

(fourth picture) - Ben and Milka. These are my two favorite teachers. Ben is new this year but is a really nice guy and fun to hang out with. He is the nicest male teacher and the only one who doesn't spend half the time hitting on me! Milka is probably my closest friend here in Namibia. She is so funny and we laugh a lot together. She is a really nice and we hang out when we both get a chance. We have had some great mini road trips to the town that is next to ours, about an hour away. And she lets me drive her car!

(fifth picture) - Enjoying lunch!

A cool little thing...

Today is Saturday and usually Linda and I don't let any kids or youth over to the house until about one or two. This lets me sleep in because I generally don't get enough sleep during the week. It gives us the morning to relax a bit, sometimes do some cleaning, wash clothes and just generally have one morning that we are not rushing to get ready. We both really enjoy the quietness and the small bit of peace. Now this doesn't mean that we don't get visitors. Even this morning, after a year of this rule, there was a youth girl looking for earrings to borrow at seven this morning and a couple of youth girls came around noon to pick up the four loads of laundry we let her do in our washing machine. The big surprise was that at ten this morning, four girls from my school showed up. They have been asking to come over so I told them on Friday that they could come over on Saturday at two. When I saw them I went out and told them sorry but that they would have to go home and come back at two. I felt really bad because they live in "the location" by my school which is about an hour walk from our house. I told them if they wanted they could hang out at the grass in town which is a shaded area in town that a lot of people go and hang out at. They decided to go to town but then came back. I gave them some oranges and water while they waited. I know it sounds a bit harsh but one of the things that the kids and youth around here struggle with is listening and following directions and instructions. I don't mean they are normal kids who have some trouble listening but today was a perfect example of this when the kids showing up four hours before I told them to. Often kids will come literally ten times in a day to ask if they can play when we have told them what time to come over. The same at school about doing certain work or do something at the school. Anyway, they waited four hours to be able to come in and hang out at my house. We watched a movie, ate popcorn and drank juice and played some games while listening to music. It was fun and I was excited to see that they were able to relax a bit and hang out with me. I love the kids from my school who are in my grade 7 class. These girls are a lot of fun in class and I am super stoked that I can continue to see them outside of class. I want them to know that I love and care about them and I think opening my house to them is one way to show that.

Lekkers Assebelief!

Anoshka and No-No (that is really her name!) are my daily visitors. We go through the same little conversation every time they come to visit.

Me: "Ooh gaan dit?" (How are you?)

Anoshka: "Gut Auntie Jessica" (Good Auntie Jessica)

Me: "Waat jy val?" (What do you want)

Anoshka: "Ek val lekkers." (I want sweets/candy)

Me: "Waat jy sy?" (What do you say?)

Anoshka: "Assebelief Auntie Jessica." (Please Auntie Jessica)

I give them some sweets

Me: "Waat jy sy?" (What do you say?)

Anoshka: "Baie Danke Auntie Jessica." (Thank you very much Auntie Jessica)

We go through this every day. I don't always give them sweets but they always ask. Usually they give me a big hug and often I take them into the back to swing for a bit. They like to watch cartoons sometimes if the tv is free. These two are best friends and are only three and four years old. They live seven houses down at the end of our street. They come running to our house all the time without any supervision. They go around our street all the time alone. It was odd for us at first but now it is normal. It is amazing because it is just a given that the whole neighborhood watches them. Any person on the street, even the young kids as well as Linda and me, will take care of them and watch out for them. Gives true meaning to it takes a village to raise a child. I love this aspect of community.

Team Building!

A couple weeks ago, the head kids from our school came for a training day at our house. One of the things that we wanted to do with the kids was some team building activities. We played one game that as a team they had to eat a whole plate of food but some of it was quite gross. I thought they would go through it carefully and picking out what they wanted but they gulfed it down like nobody's business. One boy, in the first picture, helped his team by cleaning his plate but he couldn't swallow fast enough. They also played a game where they had to work as a team to remember fifteen items on a tray. The last game was to go through an obstacle course but one team member was "blind" and one team member had no arms to use and one person could not walk. They did an amazing job with all three games and I was encouraged to see them enjoying themselves and working together. The whole day went so well and was a lot of fun. The last picture is of our whole group. They are such good kids!

Training Time

There is a group of students at school called prefects, they are like the head kids that help out the teachers and stuff. We held a training at my house for the 14 students. They did a whole training on their personalities and how to work with people and what their responsibilities. I don't know how much they will take away with them but it was great for them to learn, to have teachers take time to teach them and feed them, for them to have good positive attention. They will remember that for a long time. I was able to give them a bible study lesson on Shadrach, Meshach and Abindigo. I used the lesson to teach about faith and trust in Christ and also that as leaders at school that they should set an example and not follow the crowd. It was a wonderful day and I am so glad we were able to do that with the kids.

A little bit of fun...

After a hard day of training... not that hard but a busy one, we managed to have some fun at the same time. Listening to some good Namibian music and dancing seems to be the leisure activity of choice. One of the teachers, Ms. Dauses as well as myself got in on the action. Although most of the boys preferred to be outside playing. It was great to see a teacher hanging out with the kids as well as having the kids be able to relax and enjoy themselves with no worries.

Valentines Day in Namibia

Some of you might be wondering what I am doing the night before Valentines Day. I am doing what any normal person would do. I baked 14 dozen pink sugar cookies to take to school, made mini valentines for the 15 teachers and made regular Valentines to take to the high school to be handed out to youth kids! It is a lot of fun because they get so excited. The teachers at the school are ust as easily excitable as the kid!

Great Day!

I will post some pictures soon but I just wanted to share about the great day that I had today. Our school has a group of 14 students who are called 'prefects.' These students are sort of like the student leadership at the church. Today was the training day for this group and we had it at my house. It was just one of those great days. The kids behaved really well and were really involved in the activities. I did a bible study on the story of Shadrach, Meshack and Abindigo. The point was that these men did what was right, not what everyone else is doing. I encouraged the kids to make the right choices at school as leaders instead of beating the other kids, leaving the classes and abusing their privelges. They listened well and I was super stoked about that. They did a lesson that taught them about their personalities and their strenghts and weaknessess. The kids really enjoyed that as well. I had to sit though and explain the meaning of the 56 personality traits. That was exhausting! The kids did some games that were for team building and they did a great job with that. They were stoked because they got a ton of food to eat and of course getting a chance to watch tv. They were also really excited to be coming to my house. It was just great to see them happy and relaxed. One of the new teachers at the school really seems to enjoy the kids and she was here with me. We hung out with the kids and even danced with the girls. I was so happy to see another teacher treating the kids nicely. After they all left some of the youth girls came over and we had pancakes for dinner and watched the old version of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory." There was nothing super wonderful about the day but it was really good and reminded me that a lot of what we do as christians is love on people, build relationships with them and show them who Christ is. It doesn't always require words.

Good Friend

Shari (the guy in the picture below) is a good friend of mine that I met while I was in Kenya last year. He is a great guy and was a real help to both Linda and I while we were in Nairobi and Mombassa. He made sure we had people to stay with and helped us get around and took us out to some nice places in the city. Even though he left me hanging a few times... :-)

The Split...

After Mombassa, Linda and I split up for most of the rest of the trip. She headed on Safari and to Nairobi while I headed to the village and the town of Migori with my friend Max. Here are some of the pictures from Linda's safari.

(first picture) - Masaii Mara; Lions feasting on a wildabeest.

(second picture) - Masaii Mara; Seeking shade for nap.

(third picture) - Masaii Mara; On the prowl.

(fourth picture) - Masaii Mara; All alone

Linda's Safari Trip

(picture one) - Masaii Mara Game Reserve; Siana Springs; My Tent

(second picture) - Masaii Mara; Female Cheetah

(third picture) - Masaii Mara; Lions in the wild

(fourth picture) - Masaii Mara; Mama and Baby