Third posting

This is the third posting, coming from Elephant Hills Resort at Victoria Falls. An extremely slow internet means I will probably only post text. Hopefully I can post some pictures and video latter but I wouldn't count on it. So here is our story so far in summary form. Some has already been posted but most is new. Thanks to Betty Grace for the e-mail in Zimbabwe.

Fellowship Africa Mission Journal

1.)Nhowe Mission Hospital, Zimbabwe. 9/24/2009

This is the first journal posting for the Fellowship Africa Mission to Zimbabwe and Mozambique. I will summarize the events of the first 4 days in Zimbabwe.
We arrived in Harare on the 19th of September and were met by Washington Mhlanga who then transported us to his house. We are a group of about 22. Washington has a very large house with accommodation for several people. There were several couples on the trip and more singles. The couples each had their own rooms and the singles either paired up in individual rooms or slept on couches in an area behind the main living room.

A brief mention of the trip. It was an uneventful but long trip especially the 15 hour non stop flight from Atlanta to Johannesburg, South Africa. The layovers were not too bad. We ended up spending more time in Atlanta but that just meant we spent less time in Johannesburg. There were more services available in Atlanta, so that worked out fine. We met some of the people that we would be traveling with in Atlanta but did not make all of the introductions until we were at Washington's house in Harare. We carried most of our essential items in 2 carry on items each which although a pain for lugging around served us well since all the checked baggage was delayed until the next day.

(Sunday, Sept 20) After a night of fairly good rest since we were so tired we got up, had breakfast and went to church service at the Avondale Church of Christ. The church is small but very nice. The members of the congregation were very gracious and the singing of Shona Hymns was heavenly. (more about this later)

The group that we are traveling with include several members of the Eastpoint church of Wichita, Kansas. These include:
Steve Lemon - an MD who has been associated with Nhowe Mission for about 20 years. The Nhowe Hospital is named after his son Brian who was killed in an automobile accident about 15 years ago while attending college.
Chris Lemon - the son of Steve and brother of Brian. He is an avid soccer player and has been coaching and playing soccer with some of the young men here at Nhowe.
Corry and Trish Mauck - a couple who have been to Africa and in particular Zimbabwe many times. Corry appears to be in charge of the Orphans Program and seems to be eveywhere and know everyone.
Emerson and Joyce Stuart - a retired couple who have been to Zimbabwe before.
Beverly - who is a photojounalist for this trip.
Dean Foster - originally from Oklahoma and a big OU fan. He has sponsored some of the orphans who are in the Orphans Program run by Nhowe.
Megan - a young girl who is associated with the Eastpoint congregation but who has been on an extended mission to Zambia to work in an orphanage which cares for children from birth to age 3
Nathan Batten - a young man who is a mechanical engineeer and works at Cessna.
Abbie Castelli - a nursing aid who is in Zimbabwe for the first time.
John Langley - one of the ministers of the Eastpoint church who has been to Zimbabwe multiple times
Geoff and Kerrie Van Sandt - a couple from Springfield, Missouri. Geoff's father is Roy Van Sandt, who is one of the elders of the Eastpoint church. Roy and his wife had planned to come on this trip but were unable to due to a family emergency.
Tracy - from Oklahoma - a fried of Beverly and a teacher, interested teaching some of the children in Zimbabwe and in the Orphans Program. This is her first trip to Zimbabwe
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From North Carolina there are:
Judy and Jim Liby - a couple who have not done missionary work before and are interested in the Orphan Program
Jessica - a young woman who is interested in the Orphan Program and is on her first Zimbabwe trip. She is also interested in teaching.
Tiffany - another young woman from North Carolina whose name I can't remember. She is also doing extensive photo jounalism and is interested in the Orphan Program
From Seattle there are:
John and Sue Calhoun - that's us. Sue is the chairman of the Missions Committee at Fellowship Church. John is retired.
Jesse McFarland - a registered nurse who is serving on a medical mission at the Nhowe Mission Hospital

After church we came back to Washington's house for a potluck lunch after which we packed up and hopped on the bus to Nhowe Mission. This is about 2 to 3 hours south and east from Harare on the Mutare road.

We arrived at dark and had a candlelight dinner since the power was off. In a little while the generator came on and we had power as we moved to our accommodations. We are staying with Dr. Gordon Majonga and his wife Linda and their two children Anesu (boy about 3) and Siphetokuhle (girl about 6).

(Monday, Sept 21) After getting a fairly good sleep - not too hard since we were still recovering from our 30 + hour traveling expedition - we got up and had a devotional with the hospital staff where we all introduced ourselves. This was followed by breakfast, a tour of the hospital and a tour of the Nhowe School.

After we had lunch we hopped in the trucks and headed out to several of the Orphan Program locations to visit some of the people who minister to the orphans as well as see some of the orphans. There are certainly a lot of very needy orphans in these locations. We first visited a man, Mr Makunde who used to be the headmaster of the Nhowe School. He has recently retired and is currently an Orphan Program minister who monitors the progress of the people supporting the orphans as well as the needs and progress of the orphans. We went to three locations where there were orphans. The last place we were at we were given a gift of a goat for the hospital. We took it in the back of the pickup we were in. They were certainly among the most impoverished people I have ever seen.
The one memory I will carry with me from Zimbabwe is the graciousness and politeness of the Zimbabwean people.

We got back to the hospital after dark and had dinner after which we went back to our room. In a little while Washington Mhlanga appeared with the forms for our visas to Mozambique. We filled in the forms and then noted that we had no passport photos. This meant we would have to accompany Washington back to Harare. We arrived about 11 pm and went to bed immediately.

(Tuesday, Sept 22) The next morning I got up and composed a posting for my blog. We had breakfast with Washington and Alice and went to get our photos and to the embassy of Mozambique for our visas. The application process went smoothly and we all went back to Alice's office where I thought she had internet connectivity. It turns out that she has e-mail only so Washington took Sue and I to the internet cafe. For $1 you got 40 minutes of internet. We waited about 15 minutes and I was able to upload the blog posting in about 10 minutes. We then took off for Marondera where Washington got his car certified for travel into Mozambique. This took about an hour. We called the Hospital and found out that Dr. Ndehge and Dr Lemon were on the way to Marondera. We met them and traveled back to Nhowe hospital with them.

After dinner we retired to our house and had a long conversation with Dr. Majonga about economics and life in general in both the US as well as Zimbabwe. It was very informative. We also got a good bit of information from Dr Ndehge on the drive back from Marondera I think I have a much better appreciation for the political scene and the history of Rhodesia/Zimbabwe.

(Wednesday, Sept 23) The next day we went to the school to attend the start of the day services for the students at Nhowe School. The building holds about 2500 people. The students file in and begin singing the Zimbabwe national anthem in Shona. This is an experience which must not be missed. After we got back to the hospital we had breakfast and headed out to visit one orphan who was sponsored by one of the members of our mission group. We found her and were able to determine a few issues which could be resolved to get her back in school. It was a very good experience and we left with a large bag full of lemons directly from their lemon tree. We returned for lunch and then I helped paint some primer on some of the fascia trim on one of the buildings. At about 4:30 we went to the Nhowe school for a service which included the washing of feet of the elders of thje Nhowe School congregation by the elders of the Eastpoint church. We then returned for dinner and headed back to our house.

2.) Nhowe Mission Hospital September 25, 2009.

(Thursday, Sept 24) Today we did our usual devotional at the Nhowe School and returned for breakfast. After breakfast we hopped in the truck to go and take pictures of some of the orphans at one of the orphan stations near the house of Mr Makunde. He lives on part of an old "White Farm" where the owners have been driven off. There are some old barns for drying tobacco on the farm and we met in a roofed (but partially open on the sides) structure which I believe serves as a meeting place for the local community. Along the way we met up with Washington Mhlanga who had our visas for Mozambique and our passports. We were very pleased. Most of the time was spent having all the orphan kids on the list come and have their picture taken to document their progress in the program. We had done this the day before at Nhowe School and while we were in Harare on Tuesday they had done this at another school. This allows the program to determine if the children are still in the program and are progressing with their school work. For this group the day to day monitoring is performed by Mr Makunde.

We returned in the truck but as we just started someone noticed that a stick bug had attached himself to my pants and was walking along them. He eventually climbed off of me and on to Joyce. People started taking pictures and eventually Trish tried to get the bug off of Joyce whereupon the bug fell right on the front of Joyce and she let out a whoop and eventually got the bug off. A good time was had by all. We returned to the Hospital over the usual bumpy roads and had lunch.

The highlight of the afternoon was a singing presentation by the students of the Nhowe School. Several groups of 4 or more did songs in both English and Shona. All of the groups were very good but one group of about 5 young men from the High School stood out as being exceptional. In particular one of the young men, a bass had one of the most amazing voices I have ever heard. He was fairly small but the power of his voice stood out from all the other singers and this was all accomplished with seemingly little effort. After the singing presentation, the assembled school choir gathered to do a practice session for the singing of the national anthem of Zimbabwe. We were treated to an extraordinary performance. The choir performs in competitions at a national level and are highly ranked. Once again the voice of the young male bass singer also stood out from the rest of the choir due to the power and clarity of his voice. After the singing we went to the house of Nhomo Maranga, a graduate of the Mutare School of Preaching, the only Bible College in the country. We support some of the special projects of this school. He wanted to thank us for past support and inquire as to any future support. He works at the Nhowe School doing preaching and counseling but would like to have his own congregation.

We returned to the school and while we were waiting for a class on witchcraft to begin, Sue began to take pictures. She was immediately mobbed. I tried to take pictures of the mob but soon found myself caught up in a different mob. We retreated to the class in a short while.
After the class we returned to the hospital for dinner and then returned to our house. I did some downloading of pictures and sound recordings and cleaned off the memory cards in the cameras. The little netbook that I brought has proven to be very useful. Unfortunately I have found little time to be able to use it. Hopefully I can remedy this. It appears that I tend to wake up early and I am able to do some journaling in the hours of 4:00 am to 6:00 am. So far I have used this time for journaling because I have allowed myself to get behind. I am mostly caught up so I hope to get some blog material together for posting in the next few days and then hope we can get to the internet cafe to post to the blog. I also hope to prepare some photo sets and videos.

(Friday, Sept 25) We got up and went to the usual devotional at the Nhowe School and returned for breakfast. No trips were planned so we all stayed around the hospital and either observed or pitched in to help do tasks. Dean and I got two of the doors that had been brought down and fit them to a doorway that leads into the operating theater. The old doors on the outside have gotten badly weathered and had begun to deteriorate. We got as far as sizing the doors and cutting and planning them so they fit the opening. Unfortunately there were no hinges so we could not hang them.

I spent the afternoon trying to catchup with my journaling. There was a class at 4:30 at the school and I attended while Sue stayed behind and helped with some sowing. I walked back with Jim Liby and John Langley and we had to delay since a couple of the boys wanted to talk and have some pictures taken. John asked how to say short and round so that we could apply a nickname to Corry. We were told Mupfuti Mapudha or something like that.
We returned and had dinner and headed off to our house and went to bed. I am feeling a little sniffly and wanted to get some rest.

(Saturday, Sept 26) Finally caught up with my journaling. It is about 6:00 am and we are preparing for the day. There will be a dedication of a nursing school at the hospital today at around 10:00 am.
The dedication was quite an event. There were several dignitaries including a senator, the governor, the local chief, the minister of health as well as several of the board of governors and directors of the Nhowe Mission Hospital. The nursing school will be located a short distance from the set of Hospital buildings between the hospital and the location of the houses for the staff of the hospital. We heard the singing of the students from the school and lots of speeches followed by a tour of the hospital. This was followed by a lunch and then endless meetings for the board of governors and the political officials. The rest of the afternoon was quiet and little was done for the rest of the day.
(Sunday, Sept 27) This was a day that started out well with a service at the school that lasted for about 3 hours. I was able to get a series of videos of the children coming into the church building. This was followed by lunch and we had little on our agenda for the afternoon. We took off with a couple of the cooks from the hospital to visit the hospital garden and to visit their homes. One of the cooks was named Lisbon and I did not catch the name of the other cook. Lisbon has a son named Anesu. The other cook had a chicken coop in the front of his house. He buys chicks for $1 and sells them for $7. He had a battery operated TV and radio running off of a car battery which was charged by solar panels. On the way down to their houses we saw a fire burning on a ridge in the not too far distance. It was more advanced as we came back. We took some pictures and were not too concerned until we saw some fire in the vicinity of the hospital. By the time we got to the first set of dwellings for the staff we could hear the fire crackling about 200 yards from the houses. The mission visitors who were living in the houses were being evacuated. We hurried back to our structure and packed our stuff. By that time the fire had moved up the hill and was within about 50 yards of our house by the time we came out after we had packed. The fire was primarily contained by consummation of the fuel which consisted of the high grass which is all over the area.


This does not diminish a heroic effort by the mission group, the hospital staff and students from the high school. Key participants were Jesse McFarland, Chris Lemmons, Geoff Van Sandt, Dean Foster, Emerson Stuart , Nathan Batten as well as several of the wives and Jim Liby. Jim suffered a heart episode (he has heart problems) and was admitted and released from the hospital. The next day he appeared to be OK and was in good spirits. The fire continued on for quite a while past dark and and I was able to get several short video sequences which I can edit together later. So a quiet afternoon proved to be anything but quiet.

(Monday, Sept 28 ) Today we are headed to the school at Igava which is not too far from Marondera, the town where we got the car permit to drive to Mozambique. The school is quite a bit smaller than Nhowe and has been in existence from about 1990. I would say the number of students are half or one third of the student population of Nhowe. There was to be a ceremony at the school where new uniforms were to be given out and the borehole which was supported by the Eastpoint church was inspected and water was seen coming from the pump. Our (Sue and I) orphan whom we support for her school fees was there and we were able to meet her and have pictures taken with her. A long bumpy ride back to Harare followed where we arrived at the home of Washington Mhlanga. We leave for Victoria Falls tomorrow. We had a great dinner and got packed for the trip. We shared a few stories and got to know our fellow travelers. It seemed that we did not get enough down time while we were at Nhowe but I guess that just happens when you try to pack a lot in to a short time.

(Tuesday, Sept 29) So begins our great adventure. Today we packed our things and loaded them into a truck and got a ride in a neighbor's van. On the way to the airport we passed a small game preserve and saw kudus (a kind of large antelope) as well as zebras. Shades of things to come. We were on our way to the airport to fly to Victoria Falls and then to the Chobe Game Preserve in Botswana. A flight of about 1 hour brought us to Bulawayo where we discharged some passengers and got a few more. Then another 1 hour flight and we were at Victoria Falls, on the extreme west side of Zimbabwe. We got a van ride to the hotel we are staying at on the outskirts of the town of Victoria Falls. It is called the Elephant Hills Resort. It is definitely 4 or 5 stars and has beautiful grounds as well as a nice golf course and views of the Zambesi river. You can look out across the river and see Zambia. After getting settled into the hotel we set off on a tour of the falls. This is probably the driest period of the year so the falls were down quite a bit from their usual volume. In some ways this worked to our advantage since the mist from the falls is at a reasonable level so that you can see the falls and also not get drenched. The falls are definitely spectacular and we spent about 2 hours walking along the trail and taking pictures. At the end of the trail you have a view of the bridge that crosses into Zambia. This bridge is used for bungee jumping for the adventurous tourists. We declined. On the way back to the entrance we encountered some wart hogs which are quite abundant in this area. They were rooting in the ground for something. (More about wart hogs later). We concluded our tour and made plans for dinner at Boma Restaurant, not far from our hotel.

The experience at Boma Restaurant was incredible. The food is the traditional food of Africa. This included a variety of fruits and vegetables most Americans are familiar with as well as a variety of meats that most Americans may have heard of but never seen, let alone tasted. In addition to beef, chicken and lamb there was pork sausage and boerwar (another kind of sausage) as well as ostrich, wart hog and crocodile tail. The consensus was that the wart hog won the battle hands down. The ostrich was tasty but tough. This is an all you can eat restaurant and then some as a few of our group can confirm. One of the young men on the trip, Nathan seemed to be the victor when it came to over stuffing oneself. A variety of deserts complemented the meal and then it was time for the entertainment. A group of African dancers began the show and then audience participation began with everyone given a drum and drumming lessons followed by group dancing. All in all a very full night in more ways than one. A quick trip back to the hotel and a nights rest would prepare us for the Botswana portion of our journey.

(Wednesday, Sept 30) The morning came too soon since we were aiming on reaching the border (about 50 km away) by 7:00 am. The hotel had packed breakfast for us, so we each took our little boxes of food and headed for the vans that would take us to the border. Along the way we saw a few animals in the bush along side the road, or crossing the road. This included a giraffe, a sable (a kind of antelope- we saw a black male cross the road) as well as a small group (5 or 6 ) of elephants along the side of and crossing the road.
Shortly after this encounter we reached the border for all the paper work shuffle and cleansing of our foot ware (to prevent the spread of hoof and mouth disease) and then climbed into our open air safari vehicles for the short ride to the Chobe National Park. Our trip began on land as we jerked along the bumpy roads in search of wild beasts. The prize of course, would be a sighting of a lion or leopard. Unfortunately neither of these appeared, although lions had been spotted a few days before. The area of the National Park that we visited was along the banks of the Chobe river which separates Botswana from Namibia. Part of the park includes Seduku Island which is in the middle of the channel of the river. A border dispute settlement in the Hague gave the island to Botswana and abundant wildlife use this island, including Cape buffalo, elephants and hippos. Our land trip included views of lots of varieties of birds, including storks, cranes, bee-eaters, fishers, eagles and vultures. We saw lots of impalas, a few wart hogs, cape buffalo, kudus, a monitor lizard, elephants, water bucks, some giraffes and as we were making our way back to the starting point, a few zebras. We also saw truck loads of the most dangerous animal - tourists.

After concluding our land trip we headed to a lodge for lunch. It was the Mowanda Lodge, which is located on the bank of the Chobe river. Once again a fabulous meal which this time included Impala steak, which was quite good. A short walk to the dock and we all piled into the boat for our water trip. After a short trip by water to the registration hut where our captain (Sinka) registered for our group to enter the park waterways we set off to see the wildlife. This was by far the best part of the trip. We added a few new animals - crocodile and hippo - although we had seen both before but not so close. Also several more monitor lizards, some quite large. The highlight of the trip was getting close to Seduku Island where we got very close views of elephants, Cape Buffalo and hippos in fairly large groups. We got to see them as they entered and in some cases emerged from the river to and from the island. Lots of photos and videos were recorded of course.

It was with a great sense of satisfaction at seeing nature so well preserved as well as a sense of regret in having to leave that we headed back to the dock and boarded the vehicles back to the border and then back to the hotel. Along the way in Zimbabwe we once again saw several small herds of elephants in the bush along the roadside.

Dinner was at a pizza place in a local shopping mall in Vic Falls, followed by a little mall shopping and then a quick hop back to the hotel. Some of the group may head for a local lion preserve where young lions are being studied ( up to 18 months). I have decided to stay behind and catch up on the blog. The afternoon is set aside for shopping and packing for the trip back to Harare tomorrow.