The Season to be Thankful

Our house has been very full lately.  After Emily left, we had about a week with just us and Aimie (our friend from France).  Then, we got a group and a new roommate all in one day.  The group has since left, but Kirsten will probably be staying until April.  However, she is young and it is her first time away from home.  As a result, she is considering leaving earlier.  Please keep Kirsten and her family in your prayers.

We have had quite a few children leave the orphanage.  There have been three adoptions and three children going home to extended families.  Dieudonne’s adoption was a historic one for the orphanage.  He was the first child to be adopted from this orphanage by a resident of Burkina Faso.  He will be living in the capital with his new family.  The other two adoptions were actually a set of sisters.  A German couple spent about half a week here before they took Rita and Christianne yesterday.  It was an amazing thing to see.  We got to experience their first sight of the girls this week and see the way that they have bonded as a family through their time.  Rita, who is older, was even learning some simple German before they left.  The parents were so happy that when they left the orphanage yesterday, that they both were crying. 

We have three new babies and a child at the orphanage as well.  Orikea is about 2 years old.  Her mother and father recently died and she went to live with aunt.  This aunt had two infants of her own and was unable to take care of a third.  Her aunt brought her to the orphanage in tears hoping that we would be able to take this little girl.  Omarou is about 3 weeks old.  He is the result of a mentally unwell woman being taken advantage of by a man.  She is unable to take care of the Omarou so he will be staying at the orphanage.  Omalie is only a few days old.  Her mother gave birth to her in a bus and left her there without telling anyone.   Social Action was informed and brought her to us.  She had multiple bruises on her body so she went to the pediatric hospital yesterday for a complete checkup.  God’s grace was shining on her, because everything seems to be fine.  Finally, Wenddinda was found by Social Action to be abused by her family. She was forced to drink poison, which fused her tongue to the roof of her mouth. Before coming to the orphanage, she needed to have a surgery in the capital to fix her mouth.

With these newborns come new responsibilities.  Because they are too young to be safe with the older children, we have taken over much of their care.  We take care of them during the nights (we call this practice for the future) and during the days when we are available. 

Lauren is pleased to report that she had been given the teaching of the 10^th graders.  While the pastor still translates for her, she has taken over the lesson planning, the teaching, and even the testing.  She is currently teaching on the life of David and will continue with that until Christmas break.  One of Lauren’s overabundant projects was to take pictures of all the kids that live at the orphanage.  She wanted to get two of each child.  She is in the process of sending them to her mother so that she (Deb) can get them printed and send them when Doug and Matthew (Lauren’s dad and brother) come in January.  An offshoot of that resulted in a PowerPoint which Lauren made and sent to our church  with pictures of all the kids so that they can be prayed for by our church family back home.

Bekah continues teaching the preschool children.  She continues in the struggle to teach them their colors and numbers.  They have the hardest time with memorization, but they can remember every story that they have been told.  Once a week, the lesson is on a bible story.  They can now tell the stories of David and Goliath, Isaac and Rebekah (that was an awkward lesson), Noah, and Jonah.  Because the stories are repeated a few weeks in a row, they begin to memorize the facts.  It is so cool to hear them ask about Goliath when they pick up a stone on their weekly walks.  Bekah also continues to work with Haruna.  He is a 2-year-old who is deaf and blind.  She feeds him every day and works to give him some stimulation in his life.  He really enjoys listening to music on Bekah’s speakers.  He likes Lady Gaga, the Black Eyed Peas, and Beethoven.  He also likes Christmas music. 

For Thanksgiving, Lauren had to work so Bekah mad e the some of the dinner and ate with every other American in the town (and our French friend, Aimie, and our German friend, Annalie).  We were able to have a good time of fellowship and fun together.  After dinner, we played Apples to Apples and kicked off the Christmas season by watching a Christmas movie together.

Our menu consisted of:

·         Two Turkeys

·         Mashed Potatoes

·         Gravy

·         Green Beans

·         Spinach and Artichoke Dip

·         Pumpkin Bread

·         Bread Stuffing

·         Rice Stuffing

·         Dinner Rolls

·         Cranberry Sauce

·         Apple Pie

·         Pumpkin Pie

·         Chocolate Chip Cookies

·         Cinnamon ICE CREAM!!!

We did not feel like standing in line for Black Friday Shopping, so Lauren and Bekah sent the two newest members of the household to do their shopping.  They came back with five baguettes.  They said they got a great deal.

The Princes and the Paupers

The past few weeks have been filled with our usual daily activities, as well as some new adventures. Lauren continues to go to the secondary school, and has had more opportunities to teach as of late. She is teaching a series on Jonah with the tenth graders, and so far it has been going well. Bekah is still helping with the preschool, and is finally learning some of children’s songs (in Morre and in French). She also learned a new game, Renard passé-passe, which is similar to Duck Duck Goose. She continues in the ever present struggle to teach the toddlers their colors.

Two weeks ago, we had the opportunity to visit the home of one of the boys that lives in the orphanage, Barto. We helped his family begin their harvest of millet, which is a grain. We met his father, sister, and nephew, and enjoyed seeing where he lives, when not at the orphanage. Barto lives at the orphanage because there is no secondary school where he lives, and he wanted to continue his education in order to go to medical school.

Last week, there was a celebration for the new directors of the orphanage. Mike and Amy Riddering have been learning from Ruth Cox for about a year how to run the orphanage, and have now officially taken over. Ruth is moving to the south of the country to begin a new orphanage. Even though we couldn’t understand what was happening at the actual ceremony, the party atmosphere before and the party afterwards were really fun. Everyone looked very nice and was in good spirits. We had chicken and salad (and sodas!), with a very good local dressing. While we dined, we were at the same table with two kings. Then the kids and Bekah watched a movie, The Amazing Spiderman, outside on the projector.

We had to say goodbye to one of our roommates, Emily, on Tuesday. We went to Ouaga on Monday      with Mike and Amy to drop off their friend, Pat, who returned to Florida on Monday night. At that time, we left Emily in Ouaga with her missions organization, so that she can touch base with them before she left for Colorado on Friday. While in Ouaga, we also got hamburgers, French fries, and ICE CREAM J   

One Month In

Today is a month since we got here, and it has been a pretty good month. Even though most of our time is spent with preschool/school and the babies, we have also been connecting with some of the older kids recently. School is officially back in session, so our time is more structured. 

With one month down, we are now mostly accustomed to life here in Burkina. We feel pretty comfortable shopping in the market, although sometimes it’s confusing with the different money (and that slight language barrier). We are getting used to our schedules, and are enjoying our time here. We especially like how relaxed the culture is, and usually get a nap during sieste(from 1-3) every day. 

Yesterday (Tuesday) we experienced our first Muslim holiday. Lauren was a little disappointed since she was supposed to teach for the first time, but school was cancelled. African organizations are not that organized. She found out a couple of hours before school started (through our tailor). Everyone was dressed up for the holiday, and the kids looked especially adorable. It was cool to see everyone very excited and pretty, and the music went well into the night (past Lauren and Bekah’s bedtime- who go to sleep around 9 and midnight respectively). 

Lauren also found out today that she will be teaching on Daniel 3 tomorrow in class. If anyone has any suggestions n this, please feel free to email her at lp1218@messiah.edu. She has never studied Daniel in depth before, so any help would be greatly appreciated!

Some prayer requests we have are: 

The husband of one of the tauntes (who take care of the babies) in our orphanage passed away this past week. Please pray for her and her children as they mourn and adjust. 

One of the Air Force men is returning home this upcoming Sunday, and he and his family will be starting the adoption process soon thereafter. Please pray for Joe and Christy as they begin this exciting process!

For us as we continue to adjust to life here without our families. 

A praise that we have is that all of the babies that are adoptable right now have families! We were hoping for a family for one boy in particular, Haruna. He is blind and deaf, and has had very little stimulation in his life, but we are hoping with more stimulation and attention, he will flourish. Just on Sunday, a family from the States accepted him, and we are very excited that he will have a family within the next couple of years!

Topics for Teaching

               The past three weeks have flown by so fast! We are now basically completely adjusted to life here in Burkina Faso. Right now, we have a lot more people living with us than when we first arrived. Last Friday (October 4), a girl from France, Aimie, arrived. She will be staying at Sheltering Wings with us until December- she is doing an internship at a nearby school. Also, yesterday (October 7), Ruth and Linda arrived. Ruth is the lady who began the orphanage here. She is only visiting for a couple of days, and will be going to south-west Burkina Faso to start another orphanage. Linda is one of Ruth’s friends and will be going with her.

                This past Saturday, Bekah and Lauren had the opportunity to help at another TOMS distribution. This time, we handed out shoes to 1,144 kids- how amazing is that? Bekah was sizing feet this time, and Lauren was fitting the shoes on the kids. The kids at this village were so excited to get their shoes, and it is amazing to see how a simple pair of shoes can make a child’s day.

                Lauren started going to school last Thursday (October 3). She is an assistant to Pastor Valentin, who teaches Bible at the secondary school. Pastor Valentin teaches 7^th through 10^th grade, and he teaches through 4 different parts of the Bible:
 

7^th grade- Creation
8^th grade- The fall of man
9^th grade- Jesus’ life/death/resurrection
10^th grade- The second coming of Christ

Lauren makes lesson plans for two of the four classes that the Pastor teaches (7^th and 8^th grade). Just this morning (Tuesday), Lauren had the opportunity to teach part of the lesson. After class today, the Pastor asked Lauren to teach the following week on the third and fourth days of creation. Lauren is very excited for this opportunity, and hopes that more opportunities to teach will also be available.

Bekah has been continuing her work with the preschool at the orphanage.  At the beginning of every week, the head teacher tells Bekah what topics she wants to teach on and Bekah figures out the exact method and materials needed to convey those topics.  The basic outline of the day starts with some singing and music.  The children are each given an instrument and they sing some basic Bible songs.  Then there are two different topics each day.  Normally, the first topic is a story of some sort (at least once a week, this is a Bible lesson).  The second topic is more general.  It can be something like learning a specific letter, numbers, colors, or even playing soccer… football. 

Classes are Tuesday-Saturday, from 8:30-10, so you can see that Bekah has plenty of time to do other things.  She can be found playing with the children, but most of the time she is doing some sort of work for the orphanage.  Last week that consisted of a lot of painting.  Yesterday, she (and the other girls living in the house) sorted through the preschool supply closet and cleaned all of the toys in the baby and toddler area. 

In the late afternoon, Lauren and Bekah tend to spend their time with the older children.  Many times, they are playing Uno or watching a football game.  Sometimes this means following them around while they ask the girls to take pictures of them.  Then they go eat dinner.  Lauren really can cook J

Ca va?

We were happy to discover that we would be having a roommate from California/Colorado (she moved to Colorado 5 days before coming to Africa) named Emily until November.  After arriving, we got a tour of the compound from Amy.  She informed us of the fact that the vast majority of the children are in their home villages right now visiting with relatives for the summer.  They will be returning at the end of this week as school starts in October.  Amy said that she wanted to be sure to save the babies[1] for the end of our tour, because we would not want to leave their cage.  

During the past week, we have spent most of our time working with (actually playing with) the babies.  This gives us time to get acclimated to their time, their culture, and their lifestyle before starting the work that we have been assigned.  

We were able to work on our first TOMS shoes distributionon Saturday, which was Bekah’s birthday.  Some people from the US embassy came down from the capital and assisted us.  It was really nice to be able to talk with them and actually understand what they were saying.  For the distribution, we went to a nearby village and distributed about 460 shoes to children that needed them.  We were shoe fitters this time, which means that by the end our thumbs and pointer fingers were sore.  It was really cool to see this side of the TOMS program, as we have both previously purchased their shoes in the states.  Lauren also said that she now wants to be able to buy more when she gets home.  

Here are some highlights of the baby cage: 

They really enjoy playing phone and photo.  This means that we have conversations on our pretend cellphones and take pretend pictures with our hand cameras.  They get great pleasure in telling us if the pictures are ‘jolie o no’.  

One of the older boys, Galilou, has stated a new game of put the younger child in the traditional Burkinabe baby wrap and walk around the baby cage.  One of the younger children will walk around behind the older child with a blanket wrapped around them.  We will try to get a picture of this to try to upload to the blog. 

The kids also enjoy practicing their greetings. They will walk around the cage, hold out their hands (we have to remind them sometimes to use their right hand), and say “Ca va?” They will not leave until we respond with our “Ca va” (meaning ‘how are you’ and ‘I’m fine’). 

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[1]Any child under the age of six.

Turkish Delight and Flat Tires

Overall, we had a pretty smooth trip getting here. After saying goodbye to our families, we went through security, and we didn’t have any problems. We made it to our gate with plenty of time to spare, so we were able to sit and talk for a little. 

The real fun started once we got on the plane. The takeoff went fine, and after we were in the sky, the flight attendants came by with some presents for everyone. First, we got Turkish Delight, and Bekah commented on how she now understood why Edmond liked it so much (Chronicles of Narnia reference). Then we received hot washcloths- we had no idea what to do with these. We tried to look around to see what others were doing with them, but everyone else looked just as confused. We decided to follow everyone’s example, so first, we put them on our necks, next we washed our face, and finally we washed our hands. 

Soon after, we got our food. When we had ordered our plane tickets, we were asked what type of meal we wanted. There was no option for the normal meal. We did not want to miss out on a meal though, so Lauren had ordered the vegetarian meal, and Bekah ordered the fruit platter. As the flight attendants brought everyone their food, we realized that we could have just left that option blank, so we had quite a laugh about our unique meals. 

After that, we were able to watch some movies and get some rest on the 9 ½ hour flight. Thank you for all of the prayers for Lauren’s head, as it only hurt as we descended on that flight. When we landed, we only had about 50 minutes until the boarding time for our next flight, so we were a little worried about that. Fortunately, we were able to get to that gate quickly- only needing to ask for directions twice. Once to our gate, Lauren was able to buy very expensive ‘exotic’ orange juice to take some more Sudafed. 

On our next flight from Turkey to Ouaga, we were able to watch some more movies (and Lauren slept some more). This flight was fairly uneventful. We got more of our special meals, some more Turkish Delight, and some exotic Turkish Hazelnuts. We were, however, hopeful that no one would have the seat between us, because we were using that seat for our very large backpacks that didn’t fit in the overhead compartments. We had a scare at one point, when a man seemed to be looking at that seat, but he eventually just moved farther back in the plane without a word. We were grateful for that. 

Once we landed, we went through customs, and got fingerprinted, without any problems. We got our luggage with the help of a porter, and then went out and found Mike and Amy Riddering, who are in charge of Sheltering Wings. Unfortunately, Bekah’s suitcase got a little destroyed on the plane ride, which will make it fun on the way home for her. Mike and Amy then took us to a Missionary Guest House, which was about ten minutes from the airport. Lauren and Bekah were able to get online as well as call home to talk to their families. We slept well that night, and due to Lauren’s alarm not going off, woke up late the next morning.

That day, we went to a couple of different places in Ouaga (the capital of Burkina Faso). We first stopped at a bakery called ‘Cappuccino’ and got pastries for breakfast, as well as mango juice- Yum! We stopped at a couple of places for Mike, as well as the grocery store and the bank. At the grocery store, Bekah got some hair products, and Lauren got cookies and cashews. At the bank, we had some small problems withdrawing money, but that has since then been taken care of. 

Then… the trip to Yako was very interesting. The first hour and a half went smoothly- Bekah talked to Mike and Amy as Lauren tried (and failed) to keep her eyes open. Then, with about a half hour left in the trip, the back right tire went flat. Luckily, we had Mike to put the spare on. Amy, Bekah and Lauren stood and watched/guarded as Mike did the dirty work. We were once again underway, when, low and behold, the spare went flat. Awesome. This time, we had to wait for someone to come from Yako, so Amy, Bekah and Lauren stood in the shade while Mike guarded the car. 

It took about 20 minutes for Immanuel to arrive with the truck to pick up the tires so that they could get repaired. The ladies would be going back with Immanuel to Yako, while Mike, once again, guarded the van. Bekah and Lauren got in the bed of the truck, excited to ride ‘African style’ back to Yako, but then the truck would not start. We had to get out, push the truck back away from the van, and then push it forward so that Immanuel could get it started. After the truck started, we once again got back in the bed of the truck. 

The ride to Yako was bumpy and windy and blurry for Bekah (she had to take her glasses off so that they wouldn’t fly away or get dirty). Once we arrived, we heard our very first ‘Nazara bonbon’, which all of the kids shout when they see white people. The story behind this, is that when missionaries first came, they gave candies (bonbons) to the children, teaching about Jesus of Nazareth. Therefore, white people must always carry around pockets full of candy all the time. We have grown to love this saying over the past week.