Pictures

One of the girls who was on the survey trip with me posted pictures and stories on her blog. I highly recommend it. 

http://teaguemeyer.blogspot.com

"The Open Road"

I had an enjoyable time on the roads of Angola. These, like everything else, were destroyed during the war and are just now being repaired in some places. Most roads are dirt potholes one after the other. The ride is less than cushy to say the least. Not to mention the mode of transportation is different. The taxi that we hired to drive us the first week and a half was a blue and white van (the standard taxi and form of transportation for everyone). Imagine bumping down these washboard roads – they are everything you imagine and more – catching a foot or so of air pretty often, and then landing back down on “seats” which are metal bars covered with vinyl whose stuffing probably fell out years ago. The drive took you back in time as well because every-so-often there are police checkpoints where you are pulled over and your paperwork is checked. Mostly they are just hoping for a bribe. Fortunately, our drivers were usually able to talk their way out of it – as we were not going to pay one. We had this driver take us in his cab from Luanda the capital city to Bengala, about a “6 hour drive” down the coast. Here is how our “6-hour journey turned into a really long one.
So, we arranged with our driver to leave the capital city at around 10am after he had made a few needed maintenance adjustments. So he arrived promptly at 1.15pm and we packed in our bags to set off, so we thought. But we made a stop and took on a spare tire, a 10 gallon container of water, a large bag full of spare parts, and an extra passanger. I felt the anticipation building and prepared to enjoy my African journey. We pulled into the unsurpassed traffic of Luanda, took a few potholes in stride, and heard a rattling sound from the back of the taxi. I turn to see the back of the taxi fly open, and the luggage of the whole team spill into the busy streets and go gracefully bouncing down the road. Robert no-less gracefully hurled himself over the back seat and into the busy street to rescue our possessions while we all yelled for the driver to stop. (Whoa translates into any language). The other guys piled into the streets and helped pull our luggage to safety. We then re-load our now battle-scarred luggage and rope the back door shut. And we are off. A little ways down the road we stop to take a picture of some amazing coastal views of the slavery museum and note our random passenger filling the radiator from the water supply under the seat. Mystery solved, our new passenger is a mechanic who has come along as the maintenance was not all done prior to leaving. From this point on, our poor little van needed water added to the radiator about every 30-45 minutes. Fortunately this only involved everyone piling out of the car so the front beanch-seat could be lifted up as the engine and all other important mechanical parts were located underneath. Let me tell you we got it down. ☺ At one stop we had to let the van cool a while so we took a stroll down to a nearby beach and got to see a beautiful sunset. We drove as the stars came out and it was a breath-taking sight. The Southern Cross was so bright, and the stars were so numerous and just went on and on forever. We hit a town and we started smoking from our left front tire area. The mechanic said our wheel bearing had gone out. No problem though because we happen to have a spare in the bag of parts in the back. So we took turns holding flashlights while this was repaired. On the road again. Around midnight we are approaching a town and we start smoking from the right front wheel area. So we decided to call it a night, find a hotel, and head on again in the morning. We were about 2 hours from our destination. We made it in the morning and had a wonderful day.
(I will probably have more on the road trips later)

I fought Malaria and the malaria won!

I wrote an e-mail about my experience with malaria once we got back to Luanda in hopes of sending an e-mail – a hope which never materialized.

“I fought malaria and (let me assure you) the malaria won. And the malaria may still be winning. If it is indeed truly malaria. That is a constant question here. Malaria looks like 50 different things in 50 different people. By the time I had a test (which was negative) I had already been on a treatment regimen for three days. So, besides the fact that the test only tests for one type of parasite, it probably wouldn’t even have shown positive because of the medication. I think I am on the road to wellness now. For several days I tossed Jonah at least once an hour, usually more frequently. Since yesterday afternoon however, I have only thrown up after actually eating something. This is a vast improvement for which I am very thankful. I can now obtain a little sleep/rest. I am now simply longing for the day when I can eat again. And on to the silver lining: while malaria is not very pleasant (to say the least), it is much more effective than the diet I was going to go on when I got home. I should be fitting into all those clothes I was hoping to wear again.
And another blessing was that the day I came down with the worst of the side effects we were in a town with no guest houses, so we had to stay in a very nice hotel where I had my own room. We were there for three days, so for three days I had a very comfortable bed, air conditioning, a room to myself, and a clean bathroom with running water (both hot and cold). All of these things are quite rare, and in combination I have not yet had them during our travels in Angola. So to have them when I needed them most was a huge blessing. Needless to say I saw nothing of the town called Malange, except what was seen going to and from the airport. I did watch lots of Portuguese television in a half-alert state. I am waiting to see if all those studies about learning a language in your sleep prove to be effective in my case.”

When I wrote this we had returned to Luanda and I was still in a semi-exhausted state which caused me to take a nap about every other hour. But the next day I bounced up and began eating everything on site and in sight. I was blessed with rejuvenation of both body and spirit. I was able to finish the rest of our trip with a renewed interest and with renewed energy, which is normally so low at the end of such a long period of travel.

Angola Summary of Sorts

Hello to all,
I have safely returned to the States after all my time of travel. It was an exhausting journey, but a very wonderful one. I have learned so much about myself; the others on my team; and of course about the country, people, and culture of Angola. I felt God enlarging my heart and making room for Angola in it. ☺
The 28th of May I flew off into the wild blue yonder with an eventual destination of Angola, Africa. It is located on Africa’s West coast right above Namibia. I have been praying seriously about joining a mission team bound for this country for the last year and a half; and so I joined them for a month-long survey trip. The team consists of three couples and one other single, as well as a two-year-old (who came with his parents). I am hoping that this time in Angola, as well as with the team members, will help me to determine if this is where God would have me for a while. While I am still seriously praying about the final decision, I feel certain that I was led to be on the survey trip. God made that quite clear to me both before I left and through the experiences that I had while in this country.
The country of Angola is one in desperate need of aid. About 6 years ago this country emerged from approximately 47 years of war. The first 20-some were to gain their independence from Portugal, and the latter half was fought between the differing political factions for control of the newly independent country. Needless to say, the people and the landscape are severely scarred by what they endured for so long. Because of this recent history the country has become a largely urban one - everyone moved into the cities for protection and to escape the minefields that are still shockingly extensive. I was privileged to be able to visit a minefield in Luena (the province most severely affected my numerous minefields) in the process of being de-mined by MAG. It is a painstakingly difficult and long process, but I am so thankful for the NGOs that are in here doing this great work. It was an eye-opening and surreal experience to walk down the narrow pathways marked as safe between huge expanses of mine-infested fields. It also brings home the reality when you see people begging on the streets who have lost limbs to these awful tools of war.
The object of our trip was to collect data and make contacts that will aid us in deciding on where we would be able to best minister to people and how much it will cost us to do this. We acquired lots of information about cost of living, housing, goods availability and cost, schooling options, and transportation. We also met countless wonderful people that God placed in our paths to encourage and aid us, both at the time and, I believe, in the future. Many of them were seemingly by chance – but I know God had the appointments all set up, we just didn’t know about them beforehand. ☺ An example: One evening we had become stranded pretty far off the beaten path and a car drove by and kindly agreed to take us back to our temporary residence and even enlisted his brother to drive a second car so we would not have to cram in. He turned out to be a very well-connected man whose family had been Portuguese plantation owners before the war. It was very interesting to hear his perspective of the country and he was very informative.
The trip: we started in the capital city of Luanda (loo-WAN-da) for several days, then drive to the sister port cities of Lobito (low-BE-too) and Bengela (ben-GAY-la). Here we met with Reverend Chipenda and his wife Eva, church leaders in Angola who had much advise to share with us. They were quite hospitable, and shared with us many opportunities for outreach. We then traveled by bus to Lubango (loo-BON-goo) – this is quite a tale, I will elaborate later - where we met with some missionaries, and toured a mission hospital and SOS orphanage. We got around this city on moto-taxis (motorcycles that you hop on the back of and tell them where you want to go) and it was so fun. At this juncture we traveled the rest of the way by plane as the roads are terrible or practically non-existent. We flew to Huambo (WAMM-boo) which is a city that was greatly affected by the war and met with a former BBC journalist who lived in Angola to cover the end of the war and was back to do some research for his thesis. He knew so much about this county. We then went on to Luena where we toured a missionary–run clinic and met with a refugee church. On our last day in Luena I started getting sick with malaria. We went on to Malange (ma-LAWNGE) but I don’t remember much about it, and then we went back to Luanda to do some more research and meet with some already existing churches. I wrote an about my experience with malaria once we got back to Luanda in hopes of sending an e-mail – a hope which never materialized. I will post it in a later entry.
When we returned to Luanda and I was still in a semi-exhausted state which caused me to take a nap about every other hour. But the very next day I bounced up and began eating everything on site and in sight. I was blessed with rejuvenation of both body and spirit. I was able to finish the rest of our trip with a renewed interest and with renewed energy, which is normally so low at the end of such a long period of travel.
The last week of our trip was spent back in the capital city of Luanda bettering our relationship with and our knowledge of ICA - the church group in Angola who sponsored our invitations and who were are thinking of working with here.
Thanks to all of you for putting up with this really long update. I don’t have any pictures to send at this time as my camera was taken in Angola. However, I will be getting them soon from the others on our trip and will send you an address where you can view them.