Sunday, November 27, 2005

Thanksgiving in Mali


<Hilary at the upperfalls. So picturesque!

Thanksgiving in Mali is not quite the same as it is in America.
The trip to the grocery store to prepare for your thanksgiving meal is not the same.
We were able to get a turkey. It cost $20 and weighed about 6 pounds. It had enough meat to go around for all of us.
Of course family is no where near by, So we invited Tom & Laura Requadt, and Lee & Susan Hochstetler, with their kids, Laura, David, and Sarah, to share thanksgiving with us.

Everyone brought something they baked, and some american treasures. There was Turkey & Stuffing, cranberry sauce, and apple pie, and pumkin pie, salad, watermelon. (Watermelon is always part of a thanksgiving meal, right?) Lisa made some ice cream to go with pie...
We really enjoyed our meal together.

We talked afterwards about how it would be nice to fall asleep in front of a football game of some sort.
And wondering if the Santa Claus parade was on.
Requadts went back hom Thanksgiving afternoon, and we spent 2 more days with the Hochstetler family. They are in a remote village, and enjoyed being able to share with another family in english.
Their kids are our kids ages. Laura is 14, our Hilary 13, David is 12, our Ben is 10, Sarah is 7, and Caleb is 5. So they played fairly well together.
We enjoyed card games, and watched some intellectual movies like Mr. Bean.
Remember Wizard, anyone?

Yesterday we accompanied them on their way home to their village, and stopped for the second time at the Waruni waterfalls. This was Joannie's first time there, she was amazed to find such a lush oasis of cool & color after walking through dry fields to get there. It is astonishing, even when you know what is coming at the end of the long hike. We stayed several hours this time, enough for Lisa & the kids to go to the upper falls, where the water is much deeper to swim.
The kids did see a small crocodile up there, only about a 3 footer. Interesting to swim with, though...

Joannie, Caleb and I had enough walking so we stayed in the cool lower falls. When we saw them up the cliff we played a little ball up and down the cliff, but that didn't last long. It was a long throw to get the ball up to the top...

After the waterfall/picnic, we said our goodbyes, and headed for home.
So that is how we celebrated thanksgiving weekend this year.
God Bless,
Tom & Lisa

A few pics. These pics didn't come out as nice as I would have liked. Sorry.
A really nice Baobob tree we saw on the way home from the falls


Ben & David making a mud hole at the falls.

Monday, November 21, 2005

Lemons again



Church

I (Tom) preached Sunday in french. It went well. Freddie translated into Bambara for me, and he understood me well. It was slightly more difficult because I was dealing with an eye infection and wasn't able to see clearly more than 15 feet. I could read my OVERSIZED outline, though. 18 Points really helped.
Joannie gave me a passing grade on my french for the morning! Translation was required for our family, but also several of the students from Senoufo Cote D'Ivoire who are not strong in Bambara.
This is a pic of Caleb at church at the end of the service...




Here is the pic of Hilary with lots of lemons!
We ended up with 100 lbs of them.



The Study room is finally going to be open for business today. I'll add a pic of it later...

Tom

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

Ministry Update & Lemons

Church
Church Sunday was a special event. The AGEMPEM (an acrostic for the multi-denominational organisation of evengelical churches of Mali) was asking all the churches in the big cities of Mali to meet together for fellowship and corporate worship. In Bamako, a stadium was rented; and we in Kadiolo didn't want to be left out. Our "Pain de la Vie" church invited the local C&MA church over for the service. (They are quite a bit smaller than us, but our groups get together often.) So the church was extra full, and the radio station, Radio Yeelen (Radio Sunshine) broadcast the service, which went from 9am to 1:15pm.It was a special event, very encouraging to all the believers here in Kadiolo. Here is a pic from last Sunday...

Study room
We're beginning to get a lot of requests from people who want to learn English.Nearly a dozen people in the last 2 weeks have approached me and asked when we are going to start English classes. Honestly, we weren't planning on doing classes. We were hoping to be open to make contacts with students by offering them help with homework, and a place to study. We didn't expect this much interest in English classes. So we're having to rethink our strategy, and make a few changes to meet these demands. It would have been handy to have had a TESOL course when we were in the States. But this strategy for reaching Kadiolo youth came to us after we arrived and surveyed the town and the possibilities. We didn't imagine the demand would be as strong as it is. Pray that the interest is maintained and that we can develop close relationships with the students. Because the room islocated at the bus station, it has easy access and is "neutral ground" for folks. Also, Kadiolo is in a buildingphase where there is new infrastructure being developed, and new banks and businesses are starting to open slowly. This means that the socio-economic status is rising slightly, and there are more educatedpeople coming to town. It is some of these who are interested in furthering their English abilities.Pray that we can use the open doors God gives us in ministry.
Pray for Joannie as she is going to have her hands full. We're opening the room this week on Wednesday, and hope to have a weekly schedule in place soon after. We've had to wait while our tables are being made,but they're supposed to be done tomorrow. Here is a pic of Joannie and Hilary walking through the high grass at the Pain de Vie camp outside of town...


LemonsIt's lemon season here, and the camp has an orchard to help support the older couple who live there to guard the property. We've been buying lemons while they're available and making little baggies of lemon juice concentrate for lemonade later in the year. One day last week, we all went out to camp to help gather a big 50 Kilo (100 pound) bag of them (and to see if there were any snakes or bats to hunt). It was a fun family outing. Here are Lisa and Hilary gathering lemons...

I wanted to put in 3 other photos with this blog, but it is now Wednesday, I started this post on Sunday Night. My Photos are sooo slow that I was doing them here at the cybercafe, and not at home. Still slow. Sorry. So this week we only have one new photo. Hopefully next week. Thanks for stopping by...

Tom

Saturday, November 05, 2005

Maribu Visit

This is an interesting story.
Yesterday, Lisa prayed for opportunities to share the gospel with someone.
Aminata, our lady who works in the house, was sick. We decided she needed to be seen by a doctor.
So at the clinic, Lisa meets this Maribu guy. (a maribu is a teacher of the Koran, some of them practice magic on the side...)
This guy asked her to help with his medicine, but was also very open to talking. Lisa was able to share with him, and give him 1000 francs. (About $2.)
He was very impressed. He said that moslems would not have given any money to help him, and here she was, a believer in Christ giving him help. She invited him to come to our place to meet me, and to talk some more.

So later on that day, here he comes. We sat out on the porch, and shared for quite awhile. He was very impressed with someone who would give something because of God. I told him that we do not give to earn points with God, because God loves us 100% already. But that love enables us to love others, in fact Jesus (the prophet Issa) commands us to love one another.
In the process of the conversation, he said that his need was to go back home to Mopti. (very far away) to rejoin his wife and kids. We just met SIL missionaries from Mopti last week when we were in Bamako. I was able to give him a small sum towards his bus ticket, Lisa gave him some filtered water and bananas. (He was being treated for ulcers...)
Then I walked with him to our study room at the bus station, and gave him an Arabic new testament, and some Arabic tracts. He was very thankful. Who knows where this conversation, and small gift will produce fruit?

Here is a picture of us talking, Lisa took it at a distance through the screen door, so not to be obtrusive.



Continue to pray for us as these kind of contacts are many, and that we would be wise with the gifts we give, and that the gospel falls on open hearts and minds.

Tom

Tuesday, November 01, 2005

Caleb & Lydia



Speaking of friends in Bamako, I couldn't resist this pic.
Lydia Caswell & Caleb at the restaurant in Bamako. Her parents are AG missionaries, and we got to know them quite well in Cote D'Ivoire. These two were born at the same hospital in Cote D'Ivoire, with the same doctor, about a year apart. They are two peas in a pod right now at this age.

Joannie est Arrivee!!

Have you ever had a dream for ministry or a desire to help serve that you couldn't make happen on your own strength? We had a dream to have a tutor come out to help tutor our kids, especially to help Hilary as village life is difficult for girls. The tutor would need to have a desire to work with our church ministries, and have a good base of french to be effective. So when we went to Quebec spring 2005 for a short trip, we shared in the church our dream/need. Joannie Gagnon, a young girl partway through community college to do teacher training, came forward. She is a French speaker first, and speaks English well also. She is strong in Math, which we are lacking in.. So we were excited about the possibility, but neither she nor we were sure how the financial needs for her coming would work out. God moved in a miraculous way, and her needs were all taken care of- even when the air ticket was double what we thought it would be. So late Sunday night, when Joannie's feet touched Mali soil as she got out of the airplane, we saw a tangible proof of God moving in a myriad of ways to accomplish His promises. In this case, it was not necessarily a biblical promise from Him to us, but it was a fulfilment of a dream we had to help facilitate ministry in Kadiolo! God is so good. Rejoice with us as we acknowledge His hand in bringing Joannie out to join us. We could not have done it on our own! Joannie will be here until Oct 2006. We are so pleased to add her as a full member to our team in Kadiolo!!

Here is a pic of Joannie and the kids in the car the day after she arrived. (2:30 am arrival after a long layover in Paris and a short hop from Casablanca.)
Note: This picture could include any of you who are reading this blog, and have a desire to taste & see of what God is doing in Mali.



We're in Bamako, because that is where Joannie flew into. We also had a day retreat with our WorldVenture colleagues. We called it a Pray & Play because that is what we did. Lots of pool time, a good meal at a hotel, and time to share and pray. It did us good inside and out. (For most of us, Hilary got quite sunburnt!)

Bamako is an interesting place. It is a big city, so has lots of hotels, resteraunts, and ammenities that come with a big city. It is also in West Africa, and as you imagine, life goes along here in an African way. So often you see a contrast or combination of Modern vs Tradition.
Here is a pic of very nice furniture for sale under some mango trees at the side of the road. Buy now for it rains tomorrow!


Another thing about Bamako that the kids like is the other missionary families. There seems to be no shortage of other kids to play with. Ben and Caleb are constantly asking to go play with someone. And everywhere we go it seems there are lots of new friends to be made. That makes Bamako a special vacation for them, because Kadiolo has no other Mks nearby to play with on a daily basis...
The kids were able to get in two days of classes at Bamako Christian Academy, and enjoy real kids, real teachers in a classroom setting as well.
Here is a pic of Ben & friend Keenans' winning watermelon carving at the fall festival held at BCA. Can you guess who it is?


Once again, thanks for praying for us, and dropping by to read the latest in our adventures. We hope you enjoy the pics and stories, and that they encourage you in your walk in the Lord.

Tom & Lisa Seward