it took a while to get us all here, but we made it and we are still going strong!

Africa, gets me every time. It remains complete with the beauty and richness that we all would imagine it has but it is also just as frightening and poor as we all have been warned.
When we first arrived we got busy and to the point. We meet with the church board and started planning out English lessons.(every time I write ‘we’ I want you to assume that we were all present but I actually wasn’t, so let’s just continue to make assumptions and believe them for the flow of things, lol)
I arrived on a Tuesday afternoon and walked right into English lessons and worship services. Alexander provided us with the word that day, it was quite memorable. Felicien and his wife Dina were more than welcoming, actually most everyone was quite welcoming. Just in case you need help envisioning the type of person that he is, imagine the typical Pentecostal preacher whose voice box is only set on one ‘almost too loud to be an inside voice’ volume, always full of energy (praise God) but almost too much for most human beings who get a feeling commonly known as tired. Felicien has so much love in his heart that I am not sure he can control it, and he may not be completely sure with that to do with the bit that he can control. I wish we all had this much love fighting to get out.In case you didn’t know Felicien is the leader of the church and leader of the people that we communicate with here. He spends his spare time praying that each single member in our group marry one of his church members. But he assumes well (one of the assumptions made to continue the flow of things)
We visited the pygmies. I think it was a Friday. Can someone say SENSORY OVERLOAD? . . ok wait, that cant be the correct term. But it was overwhelming, and I would like to believe that that word is not powerful enough for the emotion that was felt that day. There were many people, there was a lot of fighting, there was sadness and anger, there were smiles but no laughs. I suppose it was the best and the worst experience one could have while in Africa. We cant explain it to you, you just have to be there. We were shown the monster that was created long ago, and what it has grown into today. Im not sure I ever want to experience that again. I suppose we will have to, if that is where God wants us to be at one point again (whether as a group or individually). If I was the ‘emotional type’ I would have cried out of sadness and anger, but since I am ‘not’ I can only say that I fought with sadness and anger for the rest of the trip. And I am going to say nothing more about the pygmies. Oh, other than the fact that we fed them and had a quick sermon while we were there. Im thankful for all of the many things we have been able to provide for everyone while we have been here, that has been the least we could do.
After the pygmies, we went down to Nyanza lake. Nyanza was genuinely one of the best church experiences that I have had in my life today. When people have as much love for Christ as they seem to have I begin to think that there is no way that we are worshipping the same God, and I want nothing more than to worship the one that they are worshipping. We were welcomed with praise, and then together we praised. It was one of those situations where you experience would have been heightened if you spoke the language (just for the sake of communicating and understanding what the songs mean) but it was enough just knowing what they could have been saying and the passion behind it. We provided them with an offering of clothes and money, and although I personally didn’t know about it beforehand and wasn’t able to make a donation it felt good to have something to give them. I wish we could have given them more, because of everywhere we have been they have had the least and I believe deserve the most. . . if anyone were to deserve anything at all.
Immediately after leaving a church with nothing and everything(meaning there were about fifty+ people having church in a room about the size of a small living room without the furniture), we were taken to have dinner at a house nearly the opposite. The house wasn’t repulsively big, but it was big enough that the church could fit in a corner of the front yard, and big enough that they should be encouraged to give an extensive amount to the people around me or move somewhere where the gap between poor and rich is not that big. I know, I know I have high idealistic and impossible hopes for the rich, and actually who would it really benefit for them to give much often and/or move away??
Thus far everyone has preached their sermons, thre is a possibility that Liz will be preaching a second time. We will fill you in again at the very end of the trip. e
Praise God for this trip. The learning, the discomfort, the laughs, the near tears, and the relationship. Praise God that it’s over yet.not