Back To School

Well as Sio would say, today was a WOW day! Part of our team finished
the garden with the help of a couple of youg men and women from the
community, which looked great.

The rest of our team went out into the comunity with pastor Rainy.
We stopped at a school that had 82 kids of all ages. The school was
in an old abandoned church, with broken windows, dirt floors and
only 2 tables and maybe 20 chairs. It was so sad. We decided very
quickly that this is the place for the school supplies we brought.

We handed out a t-shirt to each child. They were donated by Heart
For Africa, Michael Crews and Kroc kids , yes they were wearing
Michael Crews shorts in Swaziland. They were so appreciative
and polite, 80% of these kids were double orphans. We left there
in the back of the pickup and went to vist a family where both of
the parents have Aids. Sio, Ian, Cisco and Annie went to speak
with them, but they weren't home.

Driving Brothers Home

We loaded up the truck to visit with a widow with 4 children,
they lived way up a mountain. I was shocked at how they lived,

I mean it was sadder than anything I had ever seen. They had

a thatched hut that a had absolutey nothing but a dug hole that

was dug in the middle to light a fire, like a fire pit. They had

nothing to sleep on but the ground. We brought them some

clothes and asked if we could share our lunch with them. We

sat on rock hard dirt which felt harder than the truck bed.

Ian said a beautiful prayer with the widow and read a Bible

verse. She was a non believer, she listened quietly. As we were

saying goodbye, I asked my Mom if I could give the widow my pink

Bible, before giving it to her, I asked to read my favorite bible verse

from Jeremiah. The pastor then asked me to sign my bible for her, it
was a very used Bible with plenty of pen and highlighter marks, but

I didn't think she'd care. She seemed to appreciate it, I could tell by

her eyes it made her heart smile, which I don't think happens often.

We said goodbye and left some clothes for her children that the

Taiwaneese people donated.

We loaded up the truck with the preacher lady and moved on up the

long, bumpy dirt road. We drove by the school that we visited on Monday

with (271) kids. When they saw us they started screaming and clapping

and they were singing the somg "litsemba" that we had taught them.

Litsemba means hope. Rainy (the preacher lady) said we could get out

and visit. They ran to the gate and we greeted them. Sio then gave a

quick bible story of Zacheus. I taught them the song "Pharoah Pharoah",

we had a blast! I love those kids, all 271 of them, I must say that there

were a few that were special in my heart. Preacher Rainy said it was

time to go, and so we loaded in the truck bed and went off down the

bumpy dirt road again.

Our day was done,

or so we thought.

Sio's Zacheus Out Of the Blue Story

We went to meet the rest of our team to head back to the hotel (2 1/2 hours).

Along the way we met a gogo who had come to help plant the seedlings.

She was old and spoke no english. A gogo is a grandmother. One of our

team, Tom told us that she had made them sweet potatoes to share for

lunch. Those potatoes were probably all she had and she shared her

meal with them. When we were leaving she was sitting infront of her

hut, it was getting cold and looked like rain. My Mom took off her purple

fleece jacket and gave it to her. She was so happy, she rubbed her face

in the fabric and wept. It wasn't fancy and, probably a litlle dirty from

riding down the dirt road, but to her it was a treasure.




.....like Sio said....A WOW day




McKenna

GoGo With New Fleece