December 2008 / January 2009
Dear Friends
I’ve been doing my ‘secret garden’ thing, only in this case it’s not a matter of looking for a few bulbs poking up through the ground but of trying to locate groundnut plants, currently swathed in 3 feet of grass. Fortunately, although they look fragile plants with small orange-yellow flowers and delicate stems, they’re actually quite sturdy and hang in while I wrench out great clumps of grass and weeds. Anni has nobly volunteered to do 2 hours’ weeding in the mornings to try and speed things up.
Next it was time to go ‘round and round’ the mulberry bushes.
Whatever the supposed origin of the children’s song’, I’m sure there has to be some connection with the number of times you go round each bush picking fruit. The leaves are huge, the ripe fruit, either black or deep purple, hide in the shadows, under the low branches trailing the ground or high up almost out of reach. Each time you go round the bush you spot a few more. With all the stretching and stooping, I call it my aerobic exercise for the day. One consolation, I don’t have to do pick mulberries on cold and frosty mornings! We have quite a glut this year, some new trees fruiting for the first time, some older ones having given up and keeled over in the recent storms, aided and abetted by termites.
I’m seriously ‘off’ termites at the moment. I went to the cupboard to get a shirt and discovered that the termites had been there before me and had eaten their way from one sleeve, across the back to the other sleeve. I was even more gutted when I discovered they’d done the same to a new blouse I’d only worn a few times. We have to constantly check behind cupboards, inside cupboards, around the window frames, behind the cooker to limit their damage.
One day we hope to be able to develop more of the land at the Living Waters Centre but in the meantime it’s good to see so much of it under cultivation. College and centre staff members who live here, Bible college students and around 80 others all have small plots or bigger ones, planted with maize, beans, groundnuts and sweet potatoes. A good harvest would be a great boost as many people are struggling in the current climate of high inflation and rising unemployment (estimates suggest some 300 000 people would have lost jobs in the mining sector by the end of 2008 as many mining companies have pulled out of the province). There are no safety nets in place here in the form of benefits of any kind so those out of work become an additional responsibility for their already overstretched families.
Christmas Day was different this year. I spent almost half of it tucked up in bed, snoring. No, I wasn’t ill. Just recovering from the all-night service at church! By about 10pm on Christmas Eve, church was full of children, choirs, adults all looking forward to a night of worship, singing, preaching, praying and drama! The pastor drew the short straw as he preached last, at around 5am, by which time all the little people around me were fast asleep. The church has lots of choirs and each was allowed 2 songs. While the drama was being performed by the youth group, ladies came round with big mugs of sweet, milky tea and a large bread roll for everyone then came round a second time with additional doughnuts for the children.
And then it was the start of Term 2! A new student has joined the first year class bringing the total to 7 (better but short of the 20 we would have liked). Generally they seem keen and there is a good atmosphere around the college, with something going on in all the rooms most of the time. As of this week, the computer lab has 7 computers up and running so I now have 2 computer classes, one on Tuesday for first year students and another on Wednesday for the second years. That’s in addition to my English classes.
Towards the end of November I attended a Scripture Union Writers’ workshop organised by my friend Judith for around 15 new writers she hoped to have sign up to write Bible Reading notes for young people. We were able to use facilities at a Roman Catholic retreat centre and arranged for two ladies to prepare meals so that we could all keep up with the busy schedule. By the end of the weekend we had each been given a series of Bible readings around which to write the notes. A week on Thursday we will be meeting to update each other on how we’ve done so far and hopefully most will have completed their share, so that Judith (who now has her office in my house), can crack on with the collating, checking and typing.
The last 2 weeks I have been to a ladies’ group at a new church plant in Kawama, not too far from here. I was asked to be the speaker at their first 4 meetings, i.e. for the whole of January. This is definitely a new departure for me. I’ve hardly ever been to a ladies’ meeting and certainly never spoken at many that I can remember. So far it hasn’t gone too badly. The meetings are from 2.30 to around 4.30 pm. One of our colleagues, Kasongo Simon, an elder at the parent church here at Eau Vive, currently has the oversight of the new church. It‘s a big responsibility given all his other commitments but one to which he is giving his all.
Unbelievably, it’s now Sunday 18 January! After the first service this morning, I listened to – and was encouraged / challenged by - Lisa’s message of Jan 3rd, so I’m not too far behind the rest of you! I meant to say thank you too for all the cards, notes and email cards around Christmas and New Year. We had some before Christmas and some after New Year but it’s always great to hear from folk.
With love
Bridget