(written Sept 18th)
Today was a fairly typical rainy season day, at least in terms of weather! Around 7.15am the rain started – I was in our room with no noise, and heard it approaching, a low rustle gradually growing louder as it raced across the field, leapt over our wall and began to rap on our roof. We ate breakfast in a sort of half-light. I hate rainy Sunday mornings, as we never quite know when church will start. There have been times when we've turned up on time to find no one … and then the last time when we waited for the rain to stop and went late … only to find ourselves walking into a packed church! I sit at the front (the only place where I can put my folding chair – better for my back than a backless bench) so it is pretty obvious if I get there late. Since it had stopped by our usual time to go, we went then and found the church as full as it usually is when we arrive … phew!
The service was led by someone who had never led the service before, and he did very well. Discussing the sermon afterwards, however, Marc and I realised we'd had the same problem – we seemed to understand the individual words said, but found it hard to put that together into something that made sense! It didn't help that we'd found the Bible passage hard to understand, and weren't sure the sermon was exactly based on it! But during a time of prayer I was encouraged to hear one of the church elders saying how important it is to pray for our Bible translation, particularly that we won't be slowed down by illness or anything else. Very relevant since the pastor wasn't able to come to work (as a translator) for four days last week because of bronchitis.
We came home after church and were soon joined by three boys who'd come to play with our boys and/or their toys. We sent them home at lunchtime, and others arrived in the afternoon! Sometimes I feel like we're running a day-care centre.
Marc is the one who usually goes to Bible study in the afternoons, but I have been saying I should make the effort to go, and so off I went this afternoon, unsure if it would actually be happening since the pastor had been ill last week. When I saw about fifteen men sitting under the tree outside the church I knew that meant it wasn't on, but since I knew them all I went and greeted and checked that yes indeed it wasn't happening. So I went and took a photo of the corn growing inside the new (unfinished!) church building and then went to my favourite place for sitting with women, under a mango tree near the pump.
The friend I know best wasn't there, but the women who were there greeted me, and I explained why I was there and said I was “wandering about”. That made them laugh in a nice way, because I'd said something the way they would, which they didn't expect me to (if you see what I mean!). They invited me to sit down with them and I ended up staying for a couple of hours. It was a pleasant temperature (30°C-ish in the shade, with a slight breeze some of the time) with sunshine, blue skies and just a few white clouds to make the sky more interesting.
I realised that I have come on from when I first used to go down to the village, where I understood about 10% of what was said, and felt very removed from everything. Now I am far from understanding everything, but when the women talk amongst themselves I can tell more or less what they're talking about (and get some of the details), and if they talk to me I can get by (as long as I'm honest when I don't understand, so that they will repeat it!). We had some good chats about liking okra (or not), what is a good number of children to have, an old injury of one of the women which still hurts, whether my boys understand Monkolé and so on.
I think I do still prefer harmattan (beginning of dry season, before the heat really kicks in) to rainy season, but I do like days like today. Actually, rainy season isn't so bad now that I am better at remembering to put on insect repellent, and now that we don't have nappies to wash – and dry!
The blue blue sky as I walked into the village:
The corn in the new church building – one way to bring in more funds for the church!
Today was a fairly typical rainy season day, at least in terms of weather! Around 7.15am the rain started – I was in our room with no noise, and heard it approaching, a low rustle gradually growing louder as it raced across the field, leapt over our wall and began to rap on our roof. We ate breakfast in a sort of half-light. I hate rainy Sunday mornings, as we never quite know when church will start. There have been times when we've turned up on time to find no one … and then the last time when we waited for the rain to stop and went late … only to find ourselves walking into a packed church! I sit at the front (the only place where I can put my folding chair – better for my back than a backless bench) so it is pretty obvious if I get there late. Since it had stopped by our usual time to go, we went then and found the church as full as it usually is when we arrive … phew!
The service was led by someone who had never led the service before, and he did very well. Discussing the sermon afterwards, however, Marc and I realised we'd had the same problem – we seemed to understand the individual words said, but found it hard to put that together into something that made sense! It didn't help that we'd found the Bible passage hard to understand, and weren't sure the sermon was exactly based on it! But during a time of prayer I was encouraged to hear one of the church elders saying how important it is to pray for our Bible translation, particularly that we won't be slowed down by illness or anything else. Very relevant since the pastor wasn't able to come to work (as a translator) for four days last week because of bronchitis.
We came home after church and were soon joined by three boys who'd come to play with our boys and/or their toys. We sent them home at lunchtime, and others arrived in the afternoon! Sometimes I feel like we're running a day-care centre.
Marc is the one who usually goes to Bible study in the afternoons, but I have been saying I should make the effort to go, and so off I went this afternoon, unsure if it would actually be happening since the pastor had been ill last week. When I saw about fifteen men sitting under the tree outside the church I knew that meant it wasn't on, but since I knew them all I went and greeted and checked that yes indeed it wasn't happening. So I went and took a photo of the corn growing inside the new (unfinished!) church building and then went to my favourite place for sitting with women, under a mango tree near the pump.
The friend I know best wasn't there, but the women who were there greeted me, and I explained why I was there and said I was “wandering about”. That made them laugh in a nice way, because I'd said something the way they would, which they didn't expect me to (if you see what I mean!). They invited me to sit down with them and I ended up staying for a couple of hours. It was a pleasant temperature (30°C-ish in the shade, with a slight breeze some of the time) with sunshine, blue skies and just a few white clouds to make the sky more interesting.
I realised that I have come on from when I first used to go down to the village, where I understood about 10% of what was said, and felt very removed from everything. Now I am far from understanding everything, but when the women talk amongst themselves I can tell more or less what they're talking about (and get some of the details), and if they talk to me I can get by (as long as I'm honest when I don't understand, so that they will repeat it!). We had some good chats about liking okra (or not), what is a good number of children to have, an old injury of one of the women which still hurts, whether my boys understand Monkolé and so on.
I think I do still prefer harmattan (beginning of dry season, before the heat really kicks in) to rainy season, but I do like days like today. Actually, rainy season isn't so bad now that I am better at remembering to put on insect repellent, and now that we don't have nappies to wash – and dry!
The blue blue sky as I walked into the village:
The corn in the new church building – one way to bring in more funds for the church!
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