Brokenness

It’s true I am content.  SO glad to finally be here and to be ‘in the midst of God’s will for me.’  Glad to have time to put my thoughts on paper, time to watch the amazing birds play in the trees and eat the fruit in my yard and listen to them sing. Glad to begin to know the community here.

Pied Crows in a tree at sunset

A hymn sing goodbye for our
Swiss friend (left)

The easiest people to know first is of course the ones who look and sound like me: other missionaries, here to serve, called to serve in this place now.  There is depth here.  Wisdom. Age. Youth.  Naivety. Hope. Despair.  These Saints are not Super Christians. They are broken, hurting, loving, kind saints making their way like you and me. There was last week a woman who has served here for over 40 years and was leaving to return to her ‘homeland’ Switzerland.  She is leaving her work, her friends, her heart here in Cameroon.  Yesterday another missionary woman lost her young cousin back in the states to cancer, just after they took her 2 ½ lb. preemie by emergency C-section, their 4^th child, but my friend can not go home to help or comfort her family. My neighbor’s oldest child has mild autism.  This teenaged girl and her family deal with all the stresses of high school without the autism support found in the states. A husband leaves for two-week trips often, leaving his wife at home with several children, while they do the next step on the project.  

MKs watching a movie with my kids-
giving a mom a break
while her husband was out of town.

A wife makes a ‘quick’ trip home to the states with some of the kids because of a death in the family, while the husband holds down the fort.  There are displaced people who were supposed to serve in now war-torn countries.  A man who wants desperately to do his job well but is working through red tape and change of job description.  A pilot waits for the governmental okay for the developing aviation program.  A former MK with 2 small children has a stress fracture in her foot and no way to get a boot. 

But this community has something truly special.  People pray.  People practice hospitality.  People share what they have- food, rides, water, information. People love well.  It is not easy.  But it is good to see God’s glory and faithfulness in the brokenness of his saints.

Silas shows the kids and a parent
the summer sausage he is making on
their walk home from school

The second set of folks we’ve gotten to know are the Cameroonians who work nearby.  There are many who work at the SIL offices (Wycliffe’s sister organization that we report to here), and at CABTAL (Cameroonian Association for Bible Translation and Literacy) next door, but also the guards, vegetable salesmen, small boutique workers, gardeners, house help, and babysitters. It is hard to explain the language and cultural barriers, but they are real.  Again there is so much brokenness.  Everyone is struggling to make ends meet and to care for their children. Everyone has brokenness that needs a BIG God to fill and heal.  This time of year the stories are everywhere of the children who are not in school because of the school fees, or that they can go, but there is not enough money for books.  The guard whose wife lost a baby at birth but the insurance found a loophole and didn’t pay so the family has crippling hospital bills to pay as well as the grief of losing a child.  There are so many stories.  And I believe them.  But these Saints are persevering, praying, believing.  And God continues to provide help where there should be not help.  There is love and compassion and prayers for people and problems that we have never met.  What a blessing to serve alongside these Saints!

I just finished reading the book ‘Kisses for Katie’ about a young missionary woman serving in Uganda.  She has way less than I do in many physical ways.  She serves radically and while I do not feel called to serve the same way she does, I do feel called to love well right where I am, wherever I am.  I believe that is the will of God for all of us.

Please pray for the people of Cameroon, for our work here, and for the ability to love well.   The expat church does not have a regular pastor.  It has elders and people who take turns doing the jobs.  Missionaries need shepherding too!  Pray for you missionaries, for your pastors, for those in leadership.  They need it!  We all need it.  We are all dealing with brokenness and the need for a savior to make us whole.

A woman walking down our street
holding a baby the tradtional way.

This worm (10 inches) crawled up our shower drain!

Tonight's sunset from my porch

Please continue to pray for our house in Lynchburg to rent, and for us to find a good, used, four-wheel drive vehicle that we can afford.  Pray for a solution to Chris’s malfunctioning iPhone- it works except you can’t hear him talk.

Content in Cameroon

7 weeks.  Right now I can honestly say that I am happier here than I was in language school in France.  That’s not to say I really like Cameroon better than France; I haven’t been here long enough to know that. But what I can say is I feel freer here than I have in a long time. 

Kristin and Chris at RFIS
Barn dance night

RFIS entrance 

I have the freedom to do what I like to do, want to do, what I’m good at. I am not sitting in class all day feeling unsuccessful.  I am using my French everyday instead.   I can walk my kids to class and volunteer at their school.  I can go to a prayer group and pray for my kids.  I can go to after school activities.  RFIS boys’ soccer team played the Cameroonian women’s national team Monday.  How cool is that?  And I could go! 

Final score 7 - 3
Not bad!

And while I was there, I got to give one of the teachers a backrub – she said it was the first time to have one that really was deep enough since leaving home.  I have time to cook, go grocery shopping, and spend time with friends.  I can tuck my kids in at night and stay with them a while and pay attention to them and not be thinking of my homework or what I should be doing that’s not with or for them. I get to be mom here, not student, not being with my mom and dad while dad died and just helping mom afterwards, not packing, not sharing our calling to friends and potential partners.  This is the biggest adjustment.  I have time to take care of all of those things and have time left over-

Meat counter at the big grocery store

even in a place where it takes a long time to do much of it. I don’t have a system yet.  I have to re-learn to take time for myself, more time to pray and spend with God, to be a good wife.  I have time to be good to my friends and to those I feel called to minister to.  

Heidi and me

I am jealous of my time.  I have said no to many volunteer opportunities- or at least, no, not yet.  I am waiting to know how God wants me to serve here and not to just be busy.  I am loving the time of rest.  I woke yesterday morning with a sty on my eye and feeling like I’m catching a cold. And I could roll over and go back to sleep. Oh it has been so long since I’ve had the freedom to do that!

The water has been out since last night, but today, for the first time, instead of feeling just overwhelmed and helpless, I washed my dishes anyway.  I killed the collecting ants.

Ants- most of them were gone before
I could take a picture.

I used the ‘grey water’ and flushed the potties.  I made ant bait.  I made popcorn for the kid’s snack. I cooked dinner. It was good!  And it was good to get over the helpless feeling.  No one freaked out tonight when the power went out during the thunderstorm.  We all knew where the flashlights were.  The computers and phones were charged.  SO, no water, no electricity, no internet, but we still had gas and 4 of 5 of us had bucket showers (I took a shower at my friend’s house around noon J ).  It was okay.  We are okay.  And tonight to the glow of my computer, Kristin read her book, then we prayed for the folks on our list, we read a chapter in Acts and talked about why Paul and Barnabas split up, but reconciled later.  We talked about how we need to pray for one another and give each other grace.  Undeserved favor. Oh how much it is needed- along with forgiveness and love.  I feel it here.

God is good and we are content with Cameroon.  Thank you for praying, for supporting, for reading, for having grace.

Kristin's first ever taxi ride

Fish dinner Cameroonian style
No silverware!

p.s. Our house Still hasn’t rented in Lynchburg.  Keep praying!

p.p.s. My tooth I had ‘fixed’ just before we left France is bothering me again. L And I am catching a cold.

One month in….

We have been in Cameroon a whole month now.  Wow! What does this look like?

 

Walking home from the elementary school

Well, yesterday we had the pleasure of celebrating our daughter’s 11^th birthday with 3 of her friends for pizza and cake and a movie. What a blessing she is! 

So how is this possible? 

There is a Cameroonian man who lives just down the road and has one of the little shack ‘boutiques’.  He is a Christian man who, with his wife and kids, does neighborhood kid’s club/evangelism, and disciples young men.  He caters to the nearby missionary (mostly) American community by making pizza.  I had thought about making it myself, but this seemed like a great opportunity to support local business, try the pizza, and have less stress today.  Silas’ sons brought the pizza by last night at 6, half-baked, and I put them in our fridge until noon today.  He only makes pizzas Friday and Saturday nights so we kept his pans and will return them on Monday. 

I made a cake on Friday, put it in the fridge (no ants in the fridge) and iced it this morning.  Thankfully, I brought my Wiltons kit along to France and here so I could do it well and SO thankful for my mom who taught me how.  My first electronic purchase was a hand mixer (okay I did buy a fan first, but only because the store was out of hand mixers!)  Unfortunately, I didn’t buy 2 cans of powdered sugar so we ran a bid short on icing.  But I have discovered that although there is no buttermilk in France or Cameroon, milk with a bit of plain yogurt works well in my chocolate cake.  

The movie came via our personnel director who has been collecting movies for decades from other missionaries and has a lending library! Another friend has a projector (good since we don’t own a TV here) and I borrowed some small usb powered speakers.  My computer played the DVD and voila, The Incredibles!  Monday I get to return everything.  J

 

Kristin with 3 friends for her party

We have had training on life here.  We learned about what to do in in emergencies, basic health concerns of the tropics, who to call when you need something, and how to cook some traditional food.  

Getting Rabies vaccinations

Rebecca and her helper in the Kitchen.

We’ve met with the director of personnel, and discussed what our future here might look like (many more meetings to come on that one!)  We have learned how to get money, and paid to get drivers licenses.  We’ve volunteered at the kids’ schools.  We’ve gone to parent meetings and game night. We  went to the closing ceremony at Ben and Kristin’s school for the ‘joint learning session’ – a three week session for MKs who live in villages and those who will go to school at the Greenhouse school all year.  

Kristin and Ben's classes together for an art class

Learning about explorers 

Our filter

Our reserve

We have been with out tap water for 9 days since we have been here.  Our house doesn’t have a giant reserve tank, but the neighborhood across the street, Newland, where many missionaries live, does, so we always had access to water, just not in the tap.  We also have a big blue barrel in the kitchen as a reserve.   I don’t like the water issues, but I’m dealing with them better!  

We changed out our propane tank and got one filled for a reserve.  We played volleyball after work.  We’ve been to a birthday party for a good friend’s child.  

Hannah's 8th birthday

Our first restaurant experience in Cameroon!

And today, we were blessed to go eat hamburgers and shakes and fries after church- first time in over a year.  Who knew we’d find that in Cameroon!

We’ve spent hours here in town between our house and a grocery store with meat.  We’ve learned to buy for at least 2 weeks so you don’t have to go again so soon.  Meat is expensive, but we still eat it.  I know we could go to beans and survive, but I’m not there yet.  I love good food!  We found chocolate that is okay and not bad and expensive, so we have our daily square after dinner every other day here. We found school supplies- and we miss things like scotch tape, duct tape (thank you Govers), Elmer’s glue, nice markers and colored pencils, colored paper, nice binders that don’t cost a fortune (but you need 4 hole ones like in Europe NOT 3 hole ones like in the US), and lunch boxes (I’m looking for insulated lunch bags or boxes!  Not to be found here.)  

Street market as seen from the car

Outdoor furniture market we drive by

Buying pillow while in the car

We’ve had friends over for dinner and lunch.  We went to a yard sale at Newland.  Thank goodness it was just before Kristin’s birthday.  It is hard to find little things for gifts here.  We received our first order form for Scholastic Book Clubs, International schools (Prices are high, but include shipping!).  Seen cool sunsets, birds and lizards.  

Local colorful lizard

Small lizard 

Friday's sunset at RFIS- Rainforest International School

In the month we’ve been here there were 2 days I cried and felt I couldn’t pray. But that means there were 30 days that I smiled and prayed and gave thanks for my/our many blessings!  Our kids all have friends.  Friends that I like- we have prayed for this for so long.  And talking to the parents here, they have prayed for friends as well.  Double blessing and answer to prayers on both sides.

Noah and Gabe at game night

Dinner with friends- lots of veggies and guacamole made with avocados from our yard

I got house help- she calls herself a domestique.  She comes 3 mornings, and sweeps and mops and washes windows, takes out the trash and compost, cleans the bathrooms, does dishes, and on her Wednesdays she goes to the market for produce for me, and bakes a sweet bread or banana bread for me.  She is Francophone and helps me with my French.  Her name is Hortance.  Someday I will take her picture.  She is a nice lady with 4 kids.  I am so thankful for her help!  We are thankful for all the people who answer our questions, help us with groceries and driving (we are hoping to buy a car soon.  They are expensive here.), show us how to find things.  There is a library here, not 4 libraries: one at Greenhouse, one at RFIS, a scholarly library at SIL, and a reading room.  I can read.  I can take time to rest and sit still and just be. I have time for quiet times with God and no pressure to get going quickly.  It has been a long time.

 

Greenhouse (elementary) library

RFIS library

Please continue to pray for our adjustment, our work as we figure it out, our testimony, our love/Christ’s love to shine in us, our kids and school, to find a good vehicle at a good price, and to figure out how our budget really works – not just how it was suggested 2 years ago on paper.  Pray that our house in Virginia rents quickly to good renters who stay a long time.  Thank you!  Thank you for reading.  This was long!

Laundry

For the second day another line on the porch

The prayer chapel at RFIS

Inside the prayer chapel at RFIS

P.S. We switched internet providers and have the first month of 'unlimited' use- so lots of pictures this time!  Praying it works well for a long time because sometimes the outages are just random.