Bible School class

For the mid-terms of my Children and Youth Ministry class, I got each of my students to give a 5 minutes presentation of a bible story as if the class was a children's sunday school class. Children's ministry is often the least thought about and planned part of a church here. Even when new church buildings are put up, rarely are classrooms put in for the kids, and they end up out back sitting in the sun or in some small room. They are given a tiny budget and usually don't have enough benches to sit all the kids (which is usually a lot as familes are generally big here). I have really being stressing the importance of children in the Kingdom and also the importance of being well prepared when teaching them. One of my focuses this term has been on getting creative when teaching children. It is very rare for Children's churches to have even a picture of a story that is being taught let alone some sort of object lesson. Of course it is hard to get Bible curriculum and pictures that are so easy accessible to us in the West. So I was trying to show them to use things around them. A few weeks back I presented the lesson of Jesus feeding the five thousand, and I brought a basket with some bread and fried fish (something everyone has in their house). I also taught The Good Samaritan and brought some bandages, plasters (band-aids) and an empty wine bottle. I was showing them that with a little planning and thought, despite the fact that we have limited resources in Cameroon, one can make Bible stories come alive to children.  I also encouraged them to not always just narrate the story but tell it from a different perspectives of one of the characters in the story. And of course, to teach a lesson, not just a story. They all did amazing well and each one came up with a unique way of presenting the story, I was very happy. We also had a lot of laughs!

Cynthia teaching the story of Abraham and Isaac

Justine teaching on the Good Shepherd. She also brought in a keyboard and we all sang a song of rejoicing at the end. 

Matthias got our attention by doing a puzzle at the start

Emmerencia got her class mates to help her act out Jesus healing the blind man

Sister Agnes taught on Jesus changing the water into wine and brought along yummy juice for all to taste

Mable brought a Picture bible with a drawing of Zacchaeus in it. 

Goodness assuming the role of David

George brought in some of his own helpers!

Goodness was really nervous but did an AMAZING job

And Jacob was very creative as he made a tomb and when he pulled a string,  up popped Lazarus!

Currently there are two children's workers in the class. I am really hope this will encourage many of the students to get involved in their churches, neighborhoods, and schools, to start reaching out to the youth of this nation. 

Dance night

If you told me when I came to Cameroon that I would one day learn to line dance here, I would have thought you daft, but that's exactly what I did last week. There is a missionary girl who is in town for a couple of months that is really into dance. She decided to put on a Family Dance Evening with the help of some friends. Missionaries from all over came plus lots of Cameroonians. We started with swing, later on we lined danced, next a Scottish lass taught us some Ceilidh dances (my favourite), and then we even did some waltzing. The boys really enjoyed themselves too and were all hot and sweaty by the end of the night. One of my favourite things of the night was to watch a Cameroonian married couple do the Scottish dancing. PDA is not a norm here between couples, in fact I can say I have never seen a couple even holding hands in public. But it was so sweet to see them twirling around together, laughing, and having a good time. 

Breanna and I doing the Swing (couldn't get Jake to do this one)

Some Scottish dancing

Dosey Doeing with Josh

Driving Licence

Since being in Cameroon I have always driven on my American licence. It has never been a problem but I have always intended to go get my Cameroonian one at some point. When Jake got his a few years back, he just went into the office, showed his US one, paid the fee, and had his license in a week or two (same with every other missionary I know). Well, Norbert who works at the children's home needed to get his too, so we went in together. I think that was my mistake as Norbert has never had a license before and would need to take the test. So they said I had to take a test too. I explained I've been driving for like 15 years, but no they insisted I had to take a theory test. They only do a test once a month (for the whole city of Bamenda's 350,000 residents). So we paid our fee and put our names down for the test. We were told to show up prompt at 7:30 in the morning on the particular day. So a few weeks back that day came and Norbert and I headed up. As normal nothing was set up and we waited and waited with the throng of people. Finally at about 10 the people showed up and started taking down our names. It wasn't until 11 that we finally sat down to take the test. We had two hours to complete a 30 question, multi answer test. I hadn't study at all as I didn't have a book and I figured I knew everything already. But some of the questions were really bizarre such as, "What is a sign on internal bleeding?" and, "What should you do to someone who is breathing but unconscious?" I didn't think I was taking a medical exam. Anyway for the most part it was very simple and I was done in 10 minutes. They they said we had to come back on Monday for the practical test. So we went back that afternoon, and once again I thought, how hard can it be? There was literally hundreds of people there, waiting to take the test. We had to wait and watch while every person parallel parked. Seriously I think the last time I parallel parked was when I took my test in the states in '97, maybe once in Chicago.... and it was a bit nerve racking with all the people watching you but thankfully I had no problems. Norbert did pretty good too even though he was really nervous and had only practiced it once before. A few people did knock the poles over and everyone cheered, pretty funny. Then after everyone had finished (hours!) we went out in groups in a car with an instructor (I had two nuns in my car). The lady that started could hardly get the car to move forward and then almost killed us as she popped the clutch and went whizzing into the road then stalled it. The instructor told her to get out. I went next and had no issues except he told me to slow down :D. Then we went back to the office to find out how we did. There they said our results would be announced in the next month, ahhh! Why does everthing have to be sooo complicated? Anyway, I am sure that I passed, Norbert wasn't so sure.  I guess we'll find out in a week or two.

Team

Last week we were very blessed to have a team from California visit Helping Hands Children's Home. They came from a church of one of our good missionary friends that live in Yaounde (the Young family). They were in Cameroon for just a week but managed to get a lot done. They were all I.T. guys who work at Microsoft, Facebook, Ebay, Yahoo, Cisco etc.,  so they were very techie to say the least. They came to help set up different security and internet systems for different missionary groups. They came to Bamenda just for one day but it was great to get to know them. They blessed the orphanage with two laptops! It is so wonderful, we have always wanted to be doing some sort of computer training with the kids (especially the older ones) as it is so important in this day and age, but never really had the opportunity. We were also blessed with a desktop recently too so we now have 3 computers. This month we will be switching one of storage rooms into a "Learning Center." We're still working on a system that is fair allowing all the kids to have a chance. It will also be a good incentive to get chores and homework done! Thanks so much to this generous team!!

One Year Anniversary

Our church just celebrated it's one year anniversay, it hardly seems possible. We have so enjoyed helping out with this new church plant and just continue to see it growing from strengh to strengh. When we first moved to our new location a few months ago, the church seemed to slow down a bit. We weren't having many visitors or seeing people getting saved. The last month or two though it has really been picking up and we are seeing lots of new faces. We had a three day Celebration outreach for the anniversary, we saw over 200 people the last day. We praise the Lord for all the souls that were saved and lives that were touched. It has been so awesome to see this church grow from the very start, we know everyone in the church and feel like such a family. The leadership all went out to eat at a "buffet" after church on Sunday, it was such a nice time of fellowship. Of course the church has already had it shares of difficulties and challenges but we do serve a faithful God. I have a great team (seven to be exact) of children's workers who are doing a fantastic job. If I do say so myself, we have an excellent children's Sunday School. I'm glad that the church has really caught the vision of how important children's ministry is as it is often overlooked in many churches.

Jake is traveling for 3 days and took the laptop with him so I am on Seth's notebook at the moment. I don't have any photos on this computer but I will try to remember to post some once Jake gets back.

On another note, Jake and I will be celebrating our 12th anniversary this Sunday. We have too much going on to do anything that day but we are hoping to take a day in the week where we can pawn off the kids to someone, go up in the hills horse riding, packing a picnic. I'm really looking forward to it. And I know this sounds terrible but it will be the first time Jake and I have had a date alone since Jordan was born. Way over due!

Running in Cameroon

For the most part I go running three times a week. My distances vary from 3 to 10 miles depending on weather, time, and my energy level. I leave the house at 5:30 as that's when there are a lot of other people out running. It's still dark, the sun comes up about 6am. Many people take sport very seriously and there is literally hundreds of people out jogging at that time and doing exercises. I'm actually a late bird, most people are out by 5am. All of us runners clap as we pass each other. Also if you're having a hard time, someone will always give you an encouraing word to keep on going. Generally running is a great, relaxing time. But running in Africa certainly is an experience. There are no side walks, huge pot holes, often no street lights, serious mud in the rainy season, suffocating dust in the dry season, lots of stray dogs, terrible drainage when it rains, motorbikes that don't seem to see you, cars that give you no space.  Just the fact alone of being a "white girl" you attract attention weather your running or not. People calling out, guys cat call and sometime try to run along side you. Usually a curt, "Leave me alone, I'm running" get's rid of these distractions. When Jenna was here she ran with me a lot. She is young and blond which is even more of an attention grabber; there was often boys trying to run with us. One boy would not give up, so finally after sticking my finger in his face and telling him to stop following us, he quit. We kept running and then about a mile down the road we saw a taxi pull up in front of us and then the same guy got out! As we passed him he said he wanted to talk to us but we told him we weren't interested. Thankfully he finally gave up.  Just the other day I was running Upstation, a mile and half huge hill that comes into Bamenda. It is super steep and is an awesome workout! Anyway I was on my way up, listening to my music, and I heard a guy shouting at me, I kept going but could still hear him. I turned around and saw it was a "mad" man following me. There are lots of these people in Cameroon, I'm guessing in the West they would be put in a hospital of some kind, but here they just sort of roam the streets (often naked!). Thankfully this man was dressed but I did speed up to a guy running in front of me and kept a steady pace with him. I forgot about the man in a few minutes and made it to the top in record time! On the way back down I noticed the mad man again... he had come all the way up the hill after me! When he saw me he started waving his hands and blocking my way. I shouted at him to move but that didn't help. I decieded to go around him in the ditch. As I came out I missed the curb and twisted my ankle, so now I couldn't run... thankfully he stayed where he was and just kept shouting. There was a lady in front of me running and she told me to jog down with her. I didn't feel unsafe at anytime as there is so many people out but is was frustrating. I have been thinking though, that when we are back in the States next year, running is going to seem so boring! 

Getting back into a groove

It feels good to be back into a routine after our full summer, it is only now that I feel like I am getting back into my school "rhythm."  We aren't behind, the boys are learning lots, and we're still having fun. We are really focusing on spelling this year as I feel that is where the boys are a little weak (you know why if you read my blog). So poor kids, I have really been drilling them, but they are doing great. Jude is still enjoying school and when asked if he had a good day at school last week he enthusiastically replied, "Yeah, no one hit me!" Ah, so glad he's having a good time! No seriously, he really is.  He has become a little chatter box these last few weeks. 

On another note, some friends that come to Cameroon every summer to do missions lent us their motorbike for a year. It had some work that needed to be done on it but it is finally all fixed up. As you can imagine, Jake is very happy to be out and about  on two wheels again (ok, me too!). Jake often runs Jude up to school in the morning. 

This week in pictures

Our good missionary friends, the Conrods, came to stay with us a few days this week. It was a lot fun to hang out with them (stayed up way too late most nights!). They have three kids very close to Josh and Seth in age so the boys had a blast. We went out to Prespot (a pottery place), attempted to have a picnic, and also went horse riding (thanks Laurel for taking all the great photos).

Seth hanging around at Prespot

Taking the tour, seeing how they prepare the clay

Seth trying his hands at the potter's wheel

Josh's turned out awesome

Jude helping me with my bowl

Not bad for my first time (especially since this is a manual wheel, you have to keep spinning it with you foot)

Jake's started out great but slowly turned into the shape of a bedpan :D

Of course Stider had to come along

Stopped for a lovely picnic next to a gorgeous waterfall....

... but we didn't even get to eat before the rains drove us back to the car

The boy's racing up the road on Prince and Macchiato

Nathan and Jake having a race

Me instructing Asher how to ride and pretending I know what I'm doing (with a beautiful shot of the Bamenda valley behind)

I love Jake's face in this one!

The boys swimming in a little stream

My little doll!

Bibles School

Faith Bible College kicked off it's second year this week. We have three new students signed up, but we would like to see at least triple that. Registration lasts for another week so we hoping to see more coming in. I am teaching on Thursday nights an elective class; Children's Ministry. I have the second time slot but this first week the other teacher wasn't able to make it so I had the whole three hours. It was a bit daunting just because I didn't know how much material to have ready for that long. Thankfully I did last the 3 hours and had a great time (I think everyone else did too). The students had some interesting questions that showed they were really paying attention. So I get next week off and then have a normal hour and half class after that. 


Another quick testimony. I was chatting with our pastor's wife, Marthe, who was telling me about her brother who has been coming to church the last few weeks. He is a musician that lives in Nigeria and she hadn't seen him since she was a teenager until he recently showed up. Two weeks ago Jake preached and gave an appeal. A few people raised their hands and Marthe's brother was one of them. Marthe was telling me that he has really taken it seriously and she can see a change in him. He even fasted for three days last week. He just headed back to Nigeria where he is living with his girlfriend. He is going to be sharing with her about his new faith and is praying that she will become a believer too. Please keep Domonique in your prayers that he will stand strong as he heads back home and that his girlfriend will become and Christian and that they can get married. 


Ok, now to watch the US open!

Little Girl Update..

We had Tom and Linda Maher stay with us this weekend. Lots of you know them, they are the TMI co-ordinators here. They led the TMI team that we visited out in the East this summer. So of course I asked them how the little girl was doing that had the badly infected foot. They said they went to the village and continued to soak her foot everyday and finished giving her the antibiotics and by the time they left, three weeks later, she was walking around and going off into the forest! My heart rejoices, poor thing she was in such a lot of pain. I can't wait to see her next time we go out (I have no idea when that will be!). Anyway, just wanted to share my praise with you all.