First Africa Posting

First Posting From Africa
September 22, 2009
Harare, Zimbabwe

Well we have been in Africa for 2 full days, after traveling for a little over 30 hours, including a 15 hour non stop flight from Atlanta to Johannesburg, South Africa. Hopefully we have gotten the most painful part of the trip past us. We were greeted by Washington Mhlanga when we landed in Harare about 10:30 pm local time on Saturday the 19th. After a short ride to Washington's house we all were shown our rooms and headed for bed. There are about 23 people on this mission. The people on the mission include people from Kansas, Oklahoma, Missouri, North Carolina. And of course our team of 3 from Seattle.
The next day was Sunday and after a breakfast prepared by Alice Mhlanga, Washingtons's wife we headed off for church at the Avondale Church of Christ. The members of the church were very gracious and friendly and we felt immediately at home. One of the most striking features of the service was the singing of some hymns in Shona. The language is a very musical language when just spoken, but the effect of hearing a group singing Shona hymns was very striking. I look forward to listening to more of this as our mission progresses. I will try to record some of it when possible.
We returned to Washington's house for a potluck lunch before heading off for our trip to Nhowe Mission, about 3 hours from Harare. The road reminded me of roads I have traveled in Mexico and Honduras, only not so windy and fairly flat. We are at approximately 4000 feet elevation. If you want to see about where we are go to Google Earth to about 18 degrees south and 32 degrees west. One of the mission people is a mechanical engineer and he had a GPS and fixed our position. You've got to love geeks. After dinner we all went off to our acommodations at the Brian Lemons Memorial Hospital at the Nhowe Mission. We are staying with one of the doctors at the hospital, Gordon Majonga and his wife Linda and two small children Anesu (boy 2)and Siphetokuhle (girl 6).
The next morning we awoke to see a red sun in the sky and a few cows grazing not too far from our house. We set off for the Hospital (about a 5 minute walk) and after a devotional with the staff of the Hospital we all introduced ourselves and got to know some of the hospital staff. After breakfast we got a tour of the hospital from the director, Dr Ndege. Some of us then went to the Nhowe School and got to see some of the classrooms. This is a large school, (actually 2 schools, a primary and high school) They have over 600 students. The school is much larger than anything we saw in Honduras but the classrooms and the kids looked very similar. After lunch we headed off for some of the Orphan Ministry locations. This was an opportunity to see the people and the countryside of rural Zimbabwe. The people we saw were definitely poor and very happy to see us. One of the things I was struck by is how polite and gracious these people are. It was very fortunate for us to be on this mission, since the Eastpoint church from Wichita has done so much work for these people. It was a gathering of old friends which we had the privilege of attending. Travel was similar to Honduras with a lot of riding in the back of pickup trucks, etc and the roads are every bit as bad as the dirt roads in Honduras. After a day of traveling and touring we finished the day at one of the families which ministers to orphans. We had a singing session in a round building with no roof and once again we heard Shona Hymns. It was fantastic. The final cap to the day came as the family we were visiting gave us a goat to take back as a gift to the Nhowe Hospital.
Just as we thought we were getting back to the Hospital for dinner and a night's rest, Washington came by and brought us the forms for the visas to Mozambique. After doing a little work on the forms we noted that we did not have our 2 photos for the visas. So we traveled to Harare with Washington and spent the night. The next day we got up and got our photos and applied for the visas at the embassy of Mozambique in Harare. Washington will pick them up tomorrow. So far our access to the internet has not materialized. We are now in the office of Alice Mhlanga which has internet access so will try to make this first posting. So it looks like we will only have a few opportunities to post to the blog. So far we have a lot of pictures but I have not had the chance to download them. Hopefully we will be able to do this on the next posting.