Advertisement
So... highlights from the last few days.
7-4-2007
"Forgotten 4th"
Embassy row is a lot like fraternity row. We had to go to extend our visas, and I thought about stopping in on the Chinese and British just to say "hello." Anyway, we couldn't figure out why the gate was locked and unmanned. Enter our friendly Malawian worker from a nearby truck:
"Ah, no one is working here today. It is a holiday, but only for the Americans."
oops.
Katie and I get called Africans over here for our tree-climbing ability.
Met the 30 students at My Brother's Keeper music & movement school today. The kids at MBK seem to be a lot more open and self-confident than the kids at Hillside. Today made it clear that our experiences at the two schools will be quite different.
7-5-2007
"Back on the Hill"
2nd trip to Hillside. We spent our 2 hrs. exclusively on the high school side. Met the h.s. faculty to start off. A bit frustrated that principal Watson made such a production out of it.
Stopped in on each of the 4 grades. Best comment put to Mr. Watson during this tour:
"Sir, I'm curious to know how they will actually be assisting us during their time here."
-12th grade male
The challenge here is going to be gaining trust and credibility with the students. Not sure Mr. W understands this fully. We can reallly help with dream-building and self-esteem here, but it isn't going to happen through the "programmes" Mr. W wants us to do with the classes. We're going to have to put ourselves in the students' way and build some relationships before the best work can start.
7-6-2007
"Independence Day, Part 2"
Remember how we forgot the 4th of July? Redemption! The 6th of July is Malawi's Independence Day. The house staff was off for the holiday, so Katie made French toast and I scrambled eggs to give Jerome and Taritta an American breakfast.
Got to meet more friends of theirs tonight. Take-out pizza from a place targeted at internationals and a "good" bootleg copy of Pirates of the Caribbean shown on a laptop. One guy, Robbie, is launching a record label, and another fellow named Erasto is working on the first cd (gospel) that Robbie will produce. Cool guys.
7-7-2007
"Hugh Masekela"
Spent most of the day on the grounds of the Lilongwe Golf Club for Hugh Masekela's jazz concert. Jerome's sister Zora works for Celtel, the event sponsor, and she invited us.
Outdoor stage. Memphis in May, Malawi-style. Please appreciate American customer service, because you definitely can't get it everywhere. Malawians think nothing of trying to work with 5 different customers at once.
Methodically read through Acts yesterday and today. Somehow I missed that one, and I feel like the Pauline epistles are all going to read a lot differently from now on now that I have some background on his life.
7-8-2007
"Robert Blake School"
Traveled with a group of about 12 to Robert Blake Secondary School (all boys). Jerome led the trip. The doors were opened for us to come there because originally Chris Taylor was invited to speak and due to his absence Jerome stepped into the role.
The trip took us well off the beaten path; over the river and through the woods. 1 1/2 hours on the road, but we probably didn't really go more than 40 miles. Ran out of paved road really quickly.
Corinthians, imagine stripping all the gravel off of the roads around the Wetland Protection Area in the Tuscumbia Bottom. Get those roads right down to the dirt, narrow them by about a quarter, throw them on the side of Woodall Mountain, and blow a few potholes in them for fun. Good times!
Car horns are really useful for clearing herds of goats out of the road... reminded me of when the Canadian geese take over the road beside the front lake in Dad's subdivision some winters.
I learned what a banana tree-bush-plant looks like. I'll have some for shade plants one day. Yes, I will take a good book into my banana thicket and enjoy fresh fruit before a long nap. You will all be jealous, but in the end, I'll be nice enough to give you a cutting so that you can grow bananas too.
I think golf courses should just scatter a few banana plants around their property. Finding a fresh banana would definitely take a bit of the frustration out of hitting a ball into the trees.
Anyway, learned a lot about traveling with God's Word on this trip. We ended up in an auditorium with an audience of a couple of hundred teenage guys. Jerome spoke from the heart and made progress with the audience. Alex, an older guy that I get odd vibes from, gave a sermon-ish sort of thing that sounded scripted. At best it fell flat, and at worst it might have caused an adversarial atmosphere in the room, since he spoke about the need for unity among believers and the decline of denominational fragmenting. I believe the topic was more mature than the audience.
Katie summed it up best when she said that it seemed like Jerome was doing exactly what he was supposed to be doing, while what Alex was saying didn't seem inspired at all.
The encouraging thing is that at the very least, people were talking about the Bible there, and even debates are better than lukewarm ambivalence.
Lessons observed:
-Find out as much as possible about your audience.
-If you only have one talk to give about God, make it a grace and salvation message. Make sure the foundation is solid before you try to start building.
-When traveling through rural Malawi, make sure your shocks are in good condition and you have a spare tire, just in case.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.083s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 10; qc: 53; dbt: 0.0515s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Squishy
Luke Darby
It's very runny hearing you say some of the exact things I said (or thought) while in India. If it's of any help, the 'production' the principal did appears to be something not at all out of the ordinary. For the first week, everywhere we went basically degraded down to "Here are some Americans! We're going to sit them in plastic chairs and have awkward conversation and then treat them like church officials." But it's a small thing, in the end. Very envious of the introspection and solid-looking work you've got going. I like reading you journals and imagining the voice of a 1920s newsreel announcer, and if you didn't get my facebook message, Ron Paul was a Lambda Chi. Miss you, Puddin'.