Out There

Refugee

2011-12-24T13:40:00.000-05:00

What is it to be a refugee? Of course, in the technical sense of the word it means something about beingforced to leave where you live and travel to a place that isn’t your home. And I guess the reasons for leaving where yougrew up can really vary. I mean here inSudan it often has to do with the fact that there’s no more food, or thatsomeone is attacking your home. Thoseare the truest technical definitions of what it means to be a refugee, right? But people here leave their home because itdoesn’t make sense to stay there for other reasons too. If you want to have a high school educationyou need to go somewhere where there is a high school. If you need to make some money to take careof sick parents or poor friends you go where there are jobs to be had. If there is exciting work to be done in a far offplace you go far off. If you want tomarry the perfect one but there isn’t space for her where you live you movesomewhere else. Obviously we’re not justtalking about Sudanese villagers. Butthere’s something of the reluctant refugee in all of us, isn’t there?

Tetherball with a stick, a piece of rope and a sock filled with dirt.

When I came back to Sudan in November I spent just a coupledays with Dorette in Juba before I went a few hundred miles north to a refugeecamp near the area where the contested border between the North and the Southwill eventually be drawn. I say“eventually” because nobody really knows for sure where either country will endand the other begin. I was told theplace is a refugee camp so I naturally started picturing the images you see onTV about drought stricken Ethiopia and Somali refugees packed into a Kenyanwasteland. I imagined flies and emaciatedchildren under a blazing sun and people lined up sweating at a waterfaucet. But that’s not what I found whenI got to Yida. I found kids playing witha homemade tetherball. And I heardpeople singing around a fire late into the night. I saw lots of trees and people making hutsout of grass. There was water enoughthat people could get what they need. Isaw old people sitting under trees talking to one another and kids wandering fromhouse to house in their new “village” to play with their friends. I saw people who had been forced to leavetheir home but who had brought most of their home with them. Of course they didn’t want to be there, butthey had made it home.

A tea & hookah shop in the market.

Daily chores in the camp.

Listen, I don’t pretend to know what it is about their livesto these people that makes living in a refugee camp bearable, even in a sort ofnice but still unfamiliar place like Yida. But there is something there that helps things to somehow seem normaldespite the fact that things are definitely not normal. Maybe it’s the fact that the most valuablethings they own can be put in a bag and carried with them. Maybe it’s because the people who mean themost to them are coming along. I don’tknow, maybe it’s the fact that regardless of where they are waking up and going tosleep, they know who they are. Maybeideas like that are why it’s appealing for someone like myself to leave homewith just what I can carry and stay for a while in a strange place with someone I love.

Maybe more of us are refugees that we realize. I certainly left where I grew up to travel toa far away place. Some of us leave ourhometown for a place that isn’t so hostile to our ambitious goals. Some of us leave because the way of life webelieve in is being somehow oppressed and we feel like we simply have to go.

It isn’t easy to leave home, especially when youdon’t feel like it’s your choice. Butlife can be bearable, and even amazing, despite being in someone else’s landand not knowing if you’ll ever go home again. We bring home with us when we don’t forget the importantrelationships. And we find home in theplace where we sit around the fire with people we love. Living like this isn’t easy. And the Sudanese in Yida have seriouschallenges ahead. It’s not a perfectplace. But we could probably learn somethingfrom them. Something like how home iswhat makes you feel whole and the people that satisfy you. Something like that.

Back to South Africa

2009-08-17T09:08:00.020-04:00

For my last R&R Dorette and I decided to go to South Africa to see her family and see other parts of the country I haven't seen yet. She arrived the night before I did so she picked me up at the airport in Johannesburg. We went from there to Pretoria where her parents and one sister live. We had some good quality time with Dorette's folks and an AMAZING braai (barbeque) with boerewors (farmer's sausage), skilpadjies (cow liver wrapped in intestine fat) which I was surprised to find is incredibly good, espetada (beef on a skewer with Portuguese spices and garlic) and of course, big fat steaks. See, South Africans don't braai ground beef patties or hot dogs. I've never heard of a meat loving culture such as theirs. And let's not forget biltong, their version of beef jerky. But honestly, biltong kicks beef jerky right in the stomach. So much better. Seriously, if beef jerky were a grocery store donut, biltong would be a hot fresh Krispy Kreme. If beef jerky were a plastic hazmat suit, biltong would be a double breasted Armani.

So after a few days in Pretoria seeing some of Dorette's family and good friends we took a short flight down to the Eastern Cape Province town of Sedgefield where her younger sister, Magda, lives. Sedgefield is one of the many places in SA where the beauty can take your breath away. This is the breathtaking view from the deck of a house that Magda was housesitting in Sedgefield.

Here Dorette and I enjoy a soak in the hot tub on the deck of that house.

We saw some wales playing out in the ocean from the deck that afternoon too (South Africa is known for whale watching opportunities).

When the sun set over the mountains the light mixed with the mist coming off the ocean over the neighborhood and created an unbelievably beautiful scene. Magda is a fantastic cook. Among the many incredible meals she made was this plate of finger food.

The next day Magda took us to the Knysna Forest, a national treasure where wild elephants live and a society of impoverished Dutch woodcutters lived in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. We actually had to step over elephant dung on the hiking trail we walked! The water in the Knysna's creeks is a crystal clear brown color from the silt of decayed leaves at the bottom.

My baby and I in the Knysna Forest. Before we left Pretoria for Sedgefield we had dinner with one of Dorette's great friends, Fannie. During dinner Fannie invited us to Mfubu, the game lodge that his family owns in the Krueger National Park. It was his early wedding gift to us. We hadn't planned on spending a weekend that way but one can't turn down an opportunity to see the Krueger or, as I would find out, Mfubu. The lodge is built on stilts and is situated on a river inside the park.
There are no fences and often elephants and other animals just wander through the camp to check out the action. A couple of times I saw Water Buck grazing right under the walkway. One night we heard a leopard's unique growl and the next morning a lion roaring very nearby. It was an absolutely amazing weekend! Thanks Fannie!

The Krueger has all of the "Big Five" animals. It has lots of elephants and antelope of all types, from Impala to Water Buck to Sable Antelope to Kudu.

And of course, we had a braai each night. One night it was beef and mutton, mmm m-u-t-t-o-n, and one night it was giant king prawns and snoek. Let me tell you something. If you should ever find yourself on death row faced with the choice of a last meal, you MUST ask for giant king prawn braai! If you don't, well, you never really lived. The only problem we had to deal with at Mfubu were the monkeys. They get into the tents and destroy everything, poop all over the lodge and steal food. One morning this guy ran off with a half kilo of mozzarella right behind Fannie's back. Luckily the monkeys attract hungry leopards. So if all is right in the universe Karma should come around and get this little bugger. :)

We had an awesome time in SA in July! Please, if you get the chance, visit. YOU WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED!

Presidential Visit to Kurmuk

2009-08-14T01:35:00.017-04:00

So yesterday Salva Kiir made his first visit to Kurmuk and to the Blue Nile State. We were supposed to have a visit from him at the hospital we manage after he made his public address at the soccer field, the town meeting place. However, the weather deteriorated and his entourage felt that if they waited too long they'd be unable to fly out in the afternoon. So after the rally at the soccer field he headed to the airstrip and was whisked away to Damazine, the next stop on his Blue Nile itinerary. Anyway, here are some images of the festivities.

Salva, the President of the autonomously governed South Sudan (also the First Vice President of Sudan proper in the Coalition Government ) makes a loop around the field in his trademark black cowboy hat, waving to his supporters. Kurmuk's Governor Malek stands next to the Pres in a lighter brown suit.
Security was tight, with SPLA soldiers surrounding Kiir at all times.
These two fellas perform a traditional dance emulating battle, in honor of Salva Kiir and the SPLA's accomplishments in Sudan.
All of the different cultural groups in the Kurmuk area turned out to witness the President's first visit to town. This gentleman is from the Falatah tribe, a nomadic pastoral group.
An interesting character from the Dinka tribe, the majority tribe in South Sudan. Salva Kiir is also Dinka.
Here's an albino member of the Myack tribe. They're not all albino but it seems there are more albinos in Kurmuk than I ever saw in Yei.
Some wee little men made their way up a tree to catch a good view of the proceedings.
Some even more wee little men socialize from moms' backs.
And here's me, with my thick cotton Sudanese suit in the high 90's F heat. Goodness gracious it was hot yesterday!
But we feel privileged to witness President Salva Kiir's first visit to Kurmuk. It was a nice thing to see and it was well received by the community.

Vacation: South Africa

2009-03-28T05:55:00.014-04:00

For my most recent R&R I decided to go to South Africa, mostly Cape Town, thanks to good reviews from some guys who have been. What a perfect decision, I must say. And thanks to some special local insight it was the best R&R I've had yet!

Chris met me there from Baltimore so I wasn't lone ranger-ing it the whole time. I didn't glean much deep insight about life or learn anything especially significant about myself, it was just pure Rest and Relaxation. We spent most of the first week driving around the Western Province (go WP Sharks) seeing all the cool stuff that it has to offer. We even went a couple hundred kilometers up the west coast. After Chris went home I spent a day driving around wine country and then just lay around Ashanti Lodge hostel for a couple days soaking up the sun and enjoying the neighborhood.

This is part of the coastline near Cape Point and the Cape of Good Hope, which is claimed to be the "Southwestern" most point of Africa. It's funny, they say there's been a legal battle between the managements of the parks at the Cape of Good Hope and at Cape Agulas, which is actually the Southern most point of Africa where the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean meet. They're arguing over the right of Good Hope to make its claim of southwestern most point. We never made it to Agulas because we heard it wasn't as pretty as Cape Point.

This is the coast in Paternoster (Our Father), about 200km north of Cape Town, around sunset. My South African connection in Sudan recommended this visit. Thanks for the suggestion!

Found this on the beach in Paternoster.

Yes, those are ostrich on the beach! Cape of Good Hope.

That's looking down from the very edge of the top of table mountain in Cape Town.
Clouds covered it when we visited but it was still really cool up there.

The new World Cup stadium they're building in Cape Town. This view is looking down from the top of Signal Hill.

This is on the side of R27 on the way up the western coast to Paternoster. There was a huge fire on the other side of that hill. I think it gives an interesting effect to the picture.
The Frenschhoek valley in wine country.

That's Cape Town and Table Mountain in the background. I'm standing on Robben Island, the prison where political dissenters like Nelson Mandela were taken during apartheid times.

So how did I like the trip? As if you couldn't tell, I was blown away. I am trying to figure out how to get back there as soon as possible!
Devil's Peak, Cape Town, South Africa

A thought I had...

2009-02-28T02:57:00.004-05:00

What if, somehow, we were forced to abandon
all except for only one word
for every letter of the alphabet?
Meaning that we'd lose all ability to communicate
through language, save for twenty-six words.
We'd step back two hundred thousand years
in terms of the sophistication and eloquence of our speech,
our most highly evolved means of communication.

Without question, the first word
that should be saved from annihilation should be "Love."

It's fear that nudges you to make that decision.
Imagine a world where love has been neglected
for some Lounge or Liberation,
and you'll feel the emptiness of a bad dream
press down on your chest.

Love must always be communicated without confusion
or chance of mistake. It's the one thing
that can overrule any Laborious Lot
or acrid station in Life.

I wouldn't fear the Limiting of our Language
nearly as much as the Loss of Love.

Lingual Hoops

2009-02-07T00:44:00.002-05:00

I have the pleasant fortune to be surrounded by myriad languages, African and otherwise. Sometimes we have to go through a number of degrees of translation to get a point across to a particular parson. It's kinda fun.

This is a picture I took of the National Staff's morning devotions. The guy standing up on the left, Edward, it teaching in English. the guy standing up on the right, John, is translating from English to Juba Arabic. Then between them sitting down are two guys engaged in another translation. The guy in the yellow shirt, Jimmy, is translating from Juba Arabic into Swahili for the guy in the black shirt, Yaya, leaning his head toward Jimmy. These guys know so many languages, it's amazing! Edward speaks English, a tribal Ugandan language I can't remember the name of and Juba Arabic. John speaks English, Juba Arabic and Cockwa (a tribal Sudanese language). Jimmy speaks English, Juba Arabic and Swahili, and Yaya speaks Swahili and French only. I'm sure these guys probably know other languages that I'm not even aware of.

Who says Africa is a land without educated, intelligent people!?

Cold Toilet Seats

2009-01-26T07:45:00.014-05:00

What do I remember most about Christmas in Switzerland? Not snowboarding in the shadow of "The North Face", not the Christmas Markets and gluwein, not meeting an international cast of characters you wouldn't believe, and especially not waking up with pneumonia on Christmas morning. What I can't get out of my head is the freezing, frigid, forbidding, frosty feeling toilet seats. I'm not kidding. Those things were like giant frozen doughnuts. There's no relaxing with a magazine when you're covered in goose bumps. But I guess that's just the price of admission, so to speak. Switzerland was amazing!

I went to visit my friend Jen from high school. She lives in a town called Basel, in northern Switzerland on the border with Germany and France. Actually, on my first day there we went shopping for groceries in Germany where it's cheaper, then went to France to have lunch at an Italian joint. That day was a whirlwind tour with stops in Kenya, Holland, Switzerland, Germany and France. You know me...bound to ramble.

The day after I arrived we took off with our snow gear and started a trip to Bern for sightseeing and then to the Interlaken area for snowboarding. Jen's friends Dina, Richard and Marcelo came along. We took a train to Bern, the capital, to see the city and a Christmas Market. I found out about gluwein at the Bern Christmas Market. I'm not sure what I did all my life without that stuff! It's a hot spiced wine with cloves and orange juice. Wow! Mom, Dad, you never told me about this stuff when I was a kid and we used to go to Christmas Markets in Germany.

A really cool hostel put us up that night, complete with internet for the bargain basement price of 15 min. for 2 Franc. The city was really nice, especially in contrast to almost every African city. It reminded me a lot of Germany from when I was a kid. There are cobblestone streets, and Christmas decorations, and there's even a bear pit. Yes, you read that correctly, there are bears right in the middle of the city. But they were sleeping when we were there so no pics. Imagine that, bears sleeping in the winter time. Bern was just like every other square inch of Switzerland in that it was immaculately clean. They tolerate graffiti a bit but don't look for a discarded ticket stub to wrap your gum up in. And don't even think about spitting it on the ground.

I saw an amazing thing in Bern. Someone had actually taken a genuine, authentic picture of Santa Clause. And he looked exactly how I always thought he would. Apparently he's a man after my own heart. A connoisseur of sorts. ;)
Anyway, after a nice rest we proceeded by train to Lauterbrunen where we checked in to the Valley Hostel. A fantastic cozy little place. Our home for the next two nights.
Lauterbrunen is a beautiful little town tucked into a valley in the Bernese Alps. There's a really tall and thin waterfall on one side of the valley and spectacular Alpine vistas all around. That's something there was definitely no shortage of up in the mountains. I've never seen a place so hopelessly beautiful.

The first day in Lauterbrunen Jen, Richard, Dina and I went hiking way up on one of the ridges lining the valley to a high town called Mürren.
Along the way we stopped at an unexpectedly cool little mountain tavern-type place for a beer. We were always stopping for a beer...on a hike, at 6 pubs along a city walk, in the middle of a ski run. Seriously. Oh the joys of a European Christmas. But at this place on the top of a mountain there was a trampoline. And wouldn't you know it, Jen and Dina had to jump on it. Kids.

The next morning it was off to Kleine Scheidig for a day of snowboarding. I really doubt if you could find a place to put a ski lodge with more stunning scenery. It was enough to take my breath away as I snowboarded down trails that took 25 minutes to finish. The scenery and the cold both worked to leave me breathless several times. And, of course, we stopped at all kinds of taverns along the way down to grab a beer, which I hear is the best remedy to bring back one's lost breath.

An example of the awe inspiring snowscape I found up there was the view of the world famous Eiger Mountain. The Eiger's north wall is the inspiration for the name of the outdoor equipment & clothing company, The North Face. That's it right behind me. I snowboarded in its shadow for two days. Just incredible.

So we made it through two days of winter wonderland fun with only Jen suffering a semi-serious injury. Silly Jen. Then the sun set on our ski weekend and we took the train back to Basel, satisfied.
On Christmas Eve Jen cooked a phenomenal seafood alfredo dinner and hosted a party with a bunch of her friends. I felt like I was in a United Nations conference discussing what the world needs to do to about something. There were 2 Americans, 2 Australians, a Swiss guy, an Uzbek, a Tartar Russian, a Moldovian and a Chinese chic. It was incredible, like everything else about my Christmas this year.
I think the one thing that everyone needs to remember, besides the fact that your cheeks will freeze in Switzerland, both sets, is this...be sure about it before you invite me to come visit. Because I'll do it.

Sunrise Sudani

2008-11-19T08:31:00.003-05:00

I just wanted to put up this photo since I've been instructed to put up more by some of you. Enjoy. More will follow from Switzerland in about a month.

This is sunrise on a crisp morning in the Nuba Mountains, South Sudan. It was an amazing morning...the kind of morning that radiates warmth, and hope for this beautiful broken country.

Nacho's First Bath

2008-11-03T07:01:00.007-05:00

Today Nacho got his first bath. He loved it! Well, I can't know that. Actually, if I had to guess by his body language I would say he hated it. But that doesn't make any sense does it? So he loved it. I loved it! It was freak-hing hilarious.

A well deserved hunk of goat for a real tough guy.

I wish I had a picture of our Sudanese cook laughing at me washing Nacho. He said it was the first time he'd ever seen someone wash a dog. :o)

What can I say?

2008-09-24T00:12:00.003-04:00

What can I say? There's a resemblance.

Back For More Lazy Days in Zanzibar

2008-09-17T05:02:00.012-04:00

So I've been asked to put more pictures of me on my blog. I've been reluctant to do so for a while now and I couldn't figure it out. But it finally hit me. It's because I'm embarrassed. I'm embarrassed of how many pictures catch me asleep. I mean it. I bet half of the pictures from my latest R&R find me asleep. Jeremy came with me to Zanzibar this time so he kept catching me unconscious. But you know what I've realized? Whatever. That's who I am, it's what I do.

This first one mercifully gets me awake and actually moving. This is in Stonetown, the major city of the island. In the background is Mercury's Restaurant, named after Zanzibar's most famous native, Freddy Mercury of the band Queen. Strangely, I've probably been in that restaurant 10 times and I've never once heard Queen on the sound system. They play everything else from Enya to electronic dance music. Anyway, in the extreme background is the harbor and the fish market.

I love my new knit hat. I picked it up in Stonetown from this Rasta guy named Zacharia who was carving figures from ebony and rosewood. Freaking sweet guy! But now when I ignore the solicitations of the street vendors who push their products harder than my mom did on a certain October day in 1980 I get, "what kind of a Rasta are you, you don't look out for your Rasta brothers?!" Whatever. I like my hat anyway. It keeps my hair off my neck so I stay cooler. I know what you're thinking...how could I get any cooler? I know, I know.

Well, there I am, at rest in what is apparently my natural state. I'm asleep in the lobby of our Stonetown hotel waiting for the taxi to take us up north to the Promised Land, Nungwi. It's a land flowing with milk and honey, beer and seafood, beaches and girls. See, understand why I was asleep? I had to save my strength.

The other person asleep is Nancy, a lady from Colorado we met who is backpacking around Africa for a few months. She tagged along with us for a few days then went her own way.

Breakfast in Nungwi

I have to admit this one might as well be a sleep shot. I fell asleep on the bow of this wooden boat on the way back from a snorkeling trip. The sail kept hitting me in the face, otherwise this would be just another picture of me dozing through my vacation. If you look closely you can almost see the angst in my countenance over being rustled from my slumber. On the snorkeling trip we met Lital from Israel. She works as an event planner there and was just on vacation like us. We hung out for a few days in Nungwi and hated to say goodbye when we left. She definitely measured up to the reputation of Israeli women for having fiery personalities. Super cool and fun to be around!

In this one I'm over a quarter of a mile out on the water. A storm came through the night before and low tide was REALLY LOW afterward. There were all kinds of starfish and little fish trapped in puddles. Fun stuff.

This is the morning I got sick. I caught some type of flu-like mess and was down for the next three days. I think I do look kinda green. So I slept all day for several days. I know, completely out of character right?

Ahhhh, vacation. Gimme a break. I was probably still sick in this one. Sick people should rest you know.

It was nice to have my little buddy keeping me company under the chair.

OK, there's no excuse for me.

Sweet Corn!

2008-09-15T10:33:00.003-04:00

We had sweet corn for lunch today! After 14 months of roasted dry deer corn, today we had corn that tasted like it came out of a North Carolina field. I didn't even realize I was missing sweet corn. It was amazing!

Kinda makes me wonder what else I don’t realize I miss about home. I think I prevent myself from craving lots of things by avoiding them mentally. I probably did it actively when I first got here and now do it subconsciously through repetition. Maybe it’s a coping mechanism or something. I guess I just know that I don’t live in America anymore and I can’t afford to think about the things that I could really miss.

You know, it’s weird. I don’t have access to any of the comforts of the Western world and the food here leaves something to be significantly desired, but for the first time in my life I am satisfied. Really. That’s not to say I don’t desire things for my life, things like a family and…well, I think a family is all I really want. But I mean I don’t constantly ponder what I don’t have and what I think I need. Maybe it’s robust American advertising that creates in us the false insecurity that insists it can be sated by consumption. Maybe contentment with little is a natural characteristic of our psyche and being in a place where “little” is all that’s available has brought me back to that natural state. Maybe it’s the fact that I live in a place where you can see first hand that we as Americans really are more wealthy than 99% of the world’s population. Maybe it’s easy to appreciate the advantages that I’ve had when so many people around me don’t have, will never have, anything similar. Or maybe I’m just growing up (but I doubt it ☺). Whatever the reason, it’s a fantastic feeling to be SATISFIED.

At the risk of triggering a deluge of cravings, I wonder what else I am missing about home and don’t realize. I guess I miss driving on asphalt and covering 45 miles in like 30 minutes. Then again, I bet if I was back in the US I’d miss driving a four wheeler to the Eritrean restaurant in town for njera and tibs or spaghetti. Grass is greener kind of thing I guess. And really, what’s the reason to get so far so fast? What’s 45 miles away from me that I need so badly to get to? If NC had dirt roads with pot holes (I wish…more like mud pits) instead of pavement maybe we would live closer to each other, in tighter community where we don’t only see our favorite people for a couple hours in the evening after work. I guess my mind has wandered into the front yard of the popular discussion that sounds something like, “Are we really better off being ‘better off’?” That’s not really where I want to go. Though I have thoughts on the subject that I would NEVER have entertained a year and a half ago, that’s not my point. Honestly, I don’t know what my point is. I’m only sort of meandering through the saplings of a newly planted forest of consciousness. It’s just that I’m curious to figure out what else I’ve sealed off from the forefront of my mind like schizophrenia.

Yesterday I thought I noticed the faint scent of decaying leaves and I realized how much I miss wandering through NC mountain trails. I guess I miss a lot of things about my home but I’m content not to dwell on them right now. Can you believe that? I almost can’t. But I’m confident I’ll appreciate those things all the more when next they’re reality and not merely reminiscence. Until then I’ll be satisfied with stripping sweet corn cobs. Oh this incredible sweet corn!

Grab a Stool at the Zanzibar

2008-06-11T09:18:00.019-04:00

Well, I've been back from my latest R&R for about a week now...trying to get used to the hectic pace of my normal life again. It's funny about our pace of life and work how you can take Americans out of America but you can't take America out of Americans. Life here is slower, but we push ourselves pretty hard so it can still be hectic. Anyway, for this R&R I went to a tropical island off the coast of Tanzania called Zanzibar. The island was formerly one of the largest ports in Africa for the slave trade to the Middle East. So there's a lot of history there.

As well as being a popular tourist destination for Europeans and Middle Easterners, Zanzibar is now well known as a "spice island", exporting a good number of different spices. Stuff like cloves, cinnamon, cardamom and ginger gets shipped off to the rest of us. I took a tour of a spice farm one day for the experience, I guess. It was mostly walking through the woods with a guide who would cut this leaf off and crush it in his hands, or scrape that bark onto his knife, or squeeze another flower between his fingers for us to smell or taste. It was funny that as we walked through this forest it seemed like any other forest in Africa or back home that I've ever been in. But almost everything we passed was edible and useful for producing spices. I don't have any pictures of the spice tour because the light was't good that day for good pictures, and because I've become a bit of a picture snob. I should have taken some shots just for the heck it, to have something to post. I did that a couple times on this trip so you'll just have to use your imagination for some of the stuff I talk about on this one.

The people who live on the island are mostly Muslim. They live very peaceably with the portion of the population that is not Muslim, with mutual tolerance for each other's beliefs. So it's a really relaxing, calm place to be with relatively low levels of crime. The main city on the island is called Stone Town, I think because of the way they built stone fortresses and other buildings with the natural stone there in the past. Nowadays the history of some of the old architecture is interesting to some degree but Stone Town's still a typical relatively-prosperous African town. There are very nice areas and very rundown areas. You can stay in really clean and upscale hotels or you can stay in cheaper, more basic accommodation. There are safe areas and, at night, there are places that aren't so safe.

So I spent most of my time in Zanzibar on the northern portion of the island in an area called Nungwi. Nungwi is much less developed than Stone Town and has a much more relaxed feel. There are several bungalow-type places to stay and, on the recommendation of a friend, I chose one called Jambo Brothers (or Union Beach, depending on who you ask). From my front door you can throw a rock into the surf. There was a restaurant at Jambo Brothers where I ate several times and the food was outstanding every time. I ate seafood for almost every meal in Zanzi and it was never out of the ocean for more than 24 hours before it landed on my plate. I've never had seafood that fresh.

It was just under two weeks of ultimate relaxation and rest. I went alone and hoped to meet up with a couple of my friends who happened to be going too. However, I spent most of my time there on my own, reading "Catch 22" (an old classic that I HIGHLY recommend) and hanging out with various people I met along the way. The one day I did spend with the people I already knew from Sudan was only by coincidence. I had heard about this fantastic snorkeling reef near an island off the northwest coast of Zanzibar called Mnemba Atol. Almost every day you could go snorkeling there for about $20, which included lunch of fruit, bread and seafood. I went to Mnemba once and decided to go back the next day because it was so cool. So when I climbed out of the water onto the boat that second day, all my friends were already on it! They'd been picked up at another bungalow-type resort just south of Nungwi because they'd heard about Mnemba too. We all went snorkeling that day and had a great time. I ate the freshest seafood I've ever had on one of those snorkeling trips. One of the small crew of this rickety little wooden boat trailed a fishing line behind us the whole way back from the island and happened to catch a Snapper. So he quickly lit the rickety charcoal grill they had stuffed under one of the rickety bench seats, cleaned the fish over the rickety side of the boat, wrapped in tin foil with some spices and we were eating Snapper 30 minutes after this guy pulled it from the water. Is that as fresh as it gets? Yeah, I guess so.

After returning from Nungwi to Stone Town the day before my flight to Nairobi, I took a trip to the most well-known slave cave. After slavery was officially abolished somehow by the British in the late 1800's, it continued underground, literally and figuratively. The slave smugglers would gather slaves in remote caves and hidden places, to be picked up by ships in secrecy bound for the Middle East. So to descend into this abandoned cave was to be surrounded by the most tangible kind of reminder of the wrongs that have taken place throughout history. It's unfortunate that equally appalling things still happen all over the world. Check out www.justiceandjubilee.org to learn about some stuff a few friends of mine back home are involved in to battle modern day slavery. So to be in a slave cave was...well...it was what it was. Definitely a "must" on a trip to Zanzibar.
The only real problem I ran in to while on my trip to Zanzibar is that there was no electricity whatsoever. Accommodation was cheap, food was cheap, travel was cheap and easy, but there was no electricity. There normally is. But for some reason, it was all down and if you had lights or a fan at night it was because the place you stayed had a generator. In Nungwi I got my room for real cheap so, predictably, they didn't run a generator. But coming out of Sudan, Zanzibar really wasn't too bad without the live wires. I'll go back again some time in the not-too-distant future but I'll make sure they have hot outlets before I do. You can get SCUBA certified there in four days for about 350 bucks so I'll probably do that next time I make it out that way.

OK, I love you guys and I miss all of you from home that happen to see this (I miss all the others too, but you especially). Here's a pic of me after getting back to Yei, since I failed to get any on the island.

Cuisine or Entomology?

2008-05-06T08:34:00.010-04:00

Termite season has finally arrived in South Sudan again. Excitement! I'm tring to convince myself. Termite...White Ant...Insectus: Isoptera, whichever you like. And let me tell you, around here they like. Although they can be a terrible pest when trying to clean up in the open-top showers here, they are a local delicacy. And I, being a kawaja (whitey, basically), can't pass up the opportunity to pick up some street cred. So I eat.

So, as alluded to in the last post, and without further ado, I bring you the seasonal one-course African meal of Termite.
First, you have to remove the four wings from the bug before you eat it. If you didn't, well, that would just be gross. They're easily separated from one another. And I doubt it hurts them. Well, at least not as much as the next step in the process must.
After the separation of the inedible from the edible (I know, who thought there were both on an insect) you start digestion. A quick pinch between the front teeth will kill the prey, leaving the rest of the process quite humane, comparatively speaking.
A brief chew keeps the meal moving.
And finally, the swallow. All Gone!
At this point the meal is finished and the involuntary portion of the digestive process takes over.

However, on that note, if a more inactive approach with more involuntary aspects is desired, a person can certainly be accommodated. Some of the guys here who grew up in Africa are fond of simply pulling off the wings, placing it on the tongue and letting the termite walk itself down the throat. In this case the critter is a little more involved in determining its own destiny, inevitable as it may be.

Street cred or not, you'll not find that I've taken this approach, no matter what.

Sights of Sudan

2008-04-25T02:53:00.016-04:00

Well, as it turns out, weekly posts are impossible for me. I just don't think enough exciting happens to me. And I certainly don't have enough to say to keep a weekly blog interesting. So WYSIWYG I guess...it looks like posts will be just one notch above "rarely".
This time I thought I'd put up some pictures I've taken that I think are interesting.

This one is a neat flower I found deep in the bush coming back from one of our build sites. I have no idea what it is. The next two are the seed pod of the same plant and a budding leaf on the stem. Kinda random images but I like 'em.
This handsome gentleman is Levi, our Chief Chef. He's from the South, specifically an area called Yambio which is a couple hundred miles to our west, but he has spent a lot of time in the north of Sudan, in Khartoum. He speaks Classical Arabic and only writes in Arabic script. It's really enchanting to see a page full of that elegant script written in someone's hand. Levi LOVES his title. When he was given his most recent employment contract to sign he was ecstatic! Not because of the raise he was given over his previous contract, he made clear. But because he had been bestowed with the title of "Chief Chef". Formalities, titles and the like, are very important to the Sudanese. I'm not quite sure why that is. Maybe it's because, for the most part, they don't have anything else to be proud of. Their country is in shambles and possessions usually consist of only the essentials to sustain life. Only a small percentage of the population in the relative "upper class" can afford such luxuries as the occasional soda or more than one outfit and one spare in their wardrobe. Facts of life in a developing nation I guess. But, nevertheless, worthy of our empathy and inspiring for our work. Anyway, Levi is a FANTASTIC guy with a jovial personality. And he really cares about us.

This little guy lives on the leaves of our pineapple bushes. There are a bunch of 'em around because we have a bunch of pineapple plants. But you can only find them at night. Don't know where they go during the day but wherever it is, I can't blame them. I wouldn't be laying around on pineapple leaves in the heat of the sun here either.

Introducing...Richard-Richard. He's a dik dik. Get it? Someone brought him to the compound a few months back and Heather, our nurse, bottle fed him milk for a while. Now he's big enough to eat grass, shrubs and fruit. He loves apples. Such a cute little guy.

How 'bout a termite mound that has completely engulfed the lower third of this tree. In the Zandi language, this is called a kpoyo tree. The termites in this type of mound are eaten by folks during a certain time of year when they proliferate. I'll have an exciting post to put up when that season arrives. ;o) OK, let me end this post with a disgusting little creature. This one is called the Goliath beetle. Maybe you've heard of it. It really is enormous. The picture doesn't have anything for scale so I'll just tell you it's about the size of a roll of nickels. We have all kinds of creepy things like this around. I guess no more than in The States but they're new to us whities.
I hope you've enjoyed this long overdue post. Hopefully I'll get the next one up pretty soon. Love you guys.

Kinko's...Sudan Style

2008-01-23T08:51:00.001-05:00

You may have noticed that I've been a little (okay, a lot) lax in updating my blog of late. So with this post I begin what I hope will be weekly blogs. Each week I'll tell about an experience or highlight some element of life in Sudan.

This week I thought I'd show you the local printing/copying, etc. store. It's funny to me the things that parallel things back home. If this isn't funny, or at least amusing to you, wait till next week I guess.

As you can see by the sign, the store is called Legacy Secretariat Bureau. I doubt the owner really wanted to name his store after a race horse. Probably was looking for "Secretarial", huh?

As we go through the gate to the Legacy Secretariat (snicker snicker) Bureau it looks more like the offices of an Arizona ostrich farm than a professional document solutions outlet. Nevertheless that is, in fact, what it is...or what it is reputed to be. I have never actually used the doubtless first-rate services of our local Secretariat (snicker snicker, it doesn't get old for me) Bureau.

Take a look at the storefront. You can see that professional printing and binding services are in high demand in what may be the most third-world of Third World Nations. The four employees sit on the porch and enjoy the shade. I stood and talked to them for several minutes and nobody come up. As a matter of fact, I don't now that I've ever seen anyone in there...ever. That's funny to me.

And finally, lets go back to the sign in front of the Legacy Secretariat Bureau compound. It's clearly a high-end financial district where the owner chose to locate his business. Yes, those are goats meandering through the overgrown grass near the sign. Funny stuff.
Okay, well that's all for this post. Tune in next week when I'll show you...well, who knows? But it will be something. See ya then.

Oh, I almost forgot. Here's a picture of me. I thought some of you might appreciate it. That's something I'll try to do every week too.
The guy with me is Aloro James. His picture is on another post too, I think. He's one of my best Sudanese friends. A hilarious guy!

Something Pretty Cool

2007-11-01T12:46:00.003-04:00

Well, I've got this pet chameleon. His name is Amon. He's a little green about life, but we're changing that. ;) The program manager here in Yei found him on the side of the road on the way back from the air strip one day. He used to live in a big basin with a bowl of water until I read online that chameleons are arboreal, living completely in trees. And I learned that they don't like to drink standing water, preferring rather to drink sprinkled or sprayed water from the foliage they live in. So I transplanted a little leafless shrub found all over the place to a bucket and put it inside my room. I stuck a big banana leave in the dirt to give him some privacy and I sprinkle the whole thing with water a couple times a day. Little Amon seems to like it. A couple times he has wandered away from the tree and we've found him in some precarious positions. Once he was rescued from the volleyball court in the middle of a game. Not quite sure how the little guy wasn't trampled. Another time he was almost run over on the road next to our compound. Some of the ladies who work for us came to get me and told me to get rid of "that monster!" So I picked him up and brought him back home to his tree. You should have heard the screams when I did that. Most all of the locals are afraid of pretty much any animal except goats. Most of the American's do fine with all those animals, but can't stand goats. As Joe, the finance guy, puts it, "I hate goats!"

So anyway, here's Amon. He's so handsome.
Please don't make fun of his lazy eye...s. He's sensitive about that.

Here's his good side. The guy's got flexibility going for him, at least.
So most days I take Amon's tree out on to the porch for a little while and he eats flies that land on it. It's a good time for all. Today I actually managed to photograph him in action. This first picture is with his tongue rolled up in the front edge of his mouth, ready to strike, with the fly on the branch in front of him. And by some wild chance I happened to snap the shutter just as he was recoiling his tongue after snagging lunch! I couldn't believe it! It's crazy because I read online that chameleons strike their tongue and bring it back in about one thirtieth of a second. Talk about random good fortune catching my little guy in the act. Sorry about the blurry recoil in that picture, but my camera is just not capable of capturing something so fast clearly. Click on the pictures to blow 'em up if you can't see what I'm talking about.

This is me and Paul, a newer one that is a bit larger. He belongs to a guy in another sub-base here. He used to live with me too but I only really have room for one. They are highly territorial and would fight if kept together.

Anyway, I haven't posted in a while and I thought you guys would get a kick out of little Amon. I'm actually in the process of building a little, well...a big, enclosure for him. It's gonna be about 1m by 1m by 1.5m tall, screened in with plants and rocks and dripping water and the whole 9. He can't wait. He'll then spend his days and nights on the porch, enjoying the sunlight when he wants and sleeping in cool crevices under rocks when he wants. I'll catch flies in our office compound and set them loose in his enclosure so he gets a little sport and feels like he's taking care of himself. You know, chameleons have a very fragile sense of their self worth. I'll edit this post with a picture when I get the Chameleodge finished.

Kenyan Adventure

2007-09-16T13:11:00.002-04:00

About a week ago I went on safari in the Masai Mara National Reserve in southern Kenya. The Masai Mara borders Tanzania's Serengeti National Park to the south. A friend of mine, who also works in Sudan, went with me. We chose to go with a safari outfit that drove us down the A104 Highway, famous for its views over the rift valley escarpment. The alternative option is to fly down from Nairobi, saving some six hours in travel time, but taking a nice chunk out of your pocket. So for the views and the thrift, we drove the escarpment. As it turns out, this view of the escarpment from A104 is somewhat famous. It's the panorama after which a scene in the Lion King film is reportedly modeled. If you can remember, when Mufasa takes Simba to a peak and they look out on a beautiful landscape, he tells Simba that all this land is under their family's rule and that it will all be his one day. Well, the makers of the movie supposedly took the basic look of that scene from this view over the escarpment. I thought that was pretty cool. As a matter of fact, the national language of Kenya, and other East African countries, is Swahili. Their language also made it in to the movie. Of course, hakuna matata means "no worries", but several of the names of the characters, i'm told, are common Swahili words. True stuff, check it out.

The time of the year we went, early September, happens to be near the end of what is known in East Africa as the Great Migration. The term refers to massive herds of wildebeest, beyond a million strong, crossing the border between the Serengeti and the Mara. This is the single largest herd of animals in the entire world. I mean, these things blacken a landscape with their sheer magnitude. It's a funny looking animal, and zebras mingle among the herd's ranks, lending an element of oddity to the spectacle of so many animals in one place. They move from the Serengeti to the Mara for the food source, the grasses watered by seasonal rains. And in doing so, present themselves as a food source for the predators who live there. Our only experience with "big cats" was with lions, but man were they memorable experiences. These next few photos are of a bachelor pride of three males around 3 yrs. old who had just taken down a wildebeest and were nearing the end of their meal when we arrived. You'll notice they don't have the characteristic manes of adult male lions.
That comes some time after their fourth year. Our guide told us they're most likely brothers. (WARNING: The following description is not intended for the squeamish...but hey, circle of life and all, you know)
You can see the wildebeest's head, with its still-in-tact horns near the lion on the left. The stomach and liver lay disemboweled on the ground in front of the big guy. Such a good sport. :) They never did eat those. Guess that's more the vultures' speed.
We watched as this brother walked away from the table. It's about time, I'd say. Look at that belly! But wow he's gorgeous!

Apparently manners have not made their way to Kenya quite yet. This guy's got his food all over his face. You'd think these fellas were raised in the wild!

So on the same morning we saw the three brothers polish off the migratory guest above, we saw these jokers with their ma. I hear it's extremely rare to see male lions eating like we did, or to see a mother nursing her cubs. So right there it's official, "This Trip is A Success!" A couple more:

Does she look nervous? That look makes me nervous.

Look at that punum.

Look at that punum.

We were fortunate enough to ride up on this lioness scoping out a herd of wildebeest herself. It would have been cool to see her take one down but our guide told us with the grass so low, and her by herself, the chances of her catching one were low.
So we moved on. We saw the standard spectacles...
Elephants

Giraffes

Hippos

Zebras

Yeah, I'd say a couple things caught my attention. :)

While we were in the park we met some Masai warriors who danced for us. Part of the dance is to jump as high as possible. The one to do so the highest gets the most wives...or something like that. :) We learned that they wear red all the time because of the wild animals they live in close proximity to. While out grazing their cattle, sheep or goats the Masai want any predators who might think about an attack to be warded off by associating their red clothes with danger. I guess through centuries of fearless, warrior protection over their herds these guys and their reds have developed quite a reputation with the local wildlife.

Well, the trip was nice and restfull,

but eventually the sun set on this adventure like all the rest.
I had a good time but I was ready to get back home to south Sudan by the time it was over.

That Was A Good Day

2007-08-22T11:59:00.000-04:00

Today was a really great day! Actually, every day here is a really great day. I mean I'm in the middle of Africa with a bunch of guys my age, building stuff. It feels like we're a bunch of kids and there are no adults around, like we can do whatever we want. I'm making some of the coolest relationships I'll ever have, with some of the most outstanding people you could hope to meet. These are my best Sudanese friends, Aloro, Moses and Simon (left to right). AWESOME guys!But today was especially nice. The weather was clear with the temp. in the mid 80s. The sky was beautiful, the deepest, cleanest blue with the same clouds from the opening theme-song scene on The Simpsons. I drove about 25 miles from our base to take building materials to one of our sites, then pick up two of our carpenters who had been taking care of the final touches to another church building. The police left me alone, I made it back to our compound in time for dinner, and the cherry on top of this day is that we're having fried chicken tonight! Yeah!
Most of the time I love it so much where I am that I'm pretty sure I'll be in Sudan for more than just a year. But days like today make me feel like I could stay forever. Today gave me a feeling of well-being that made me actually feel physically stronger, taller, more handsome, just, well, right. Incredible! It's a powerful thing when you have such a sense that you are where you belong that it makes you feel this way.

Well my first round of R&R (rest and relaxation) begins next Thursday. I can't believe I've already been here 10 weeks! While I'll miss the guys out here, I'm looking forward to spending some time in the big city of Nairobi, eating at restaurants, going to bookstores, that kind of stuff. I'm also going on safari for a few days in the Masai Mara Wildlife Preserve with a girl who works in Juba, about 100 miles north of our base in Yei. She'll be going out on R&R at the same time. It should be fun. Stay tuned for pictures from that adventure.

"On this rock I will build my church..."

2007-08-02T11:03:00.000-04:00

I came to South Sudan to help Samaritan's Purse in its project to rebuild churches that the Fundamentalist Islamic government of Sudan, based in the north of the country, had destroyed in the past 40 years, or so, of civil war against the Christians and people of traditional/tribal religions who make up most of the population of the south. We just completed a church in the town of Yei, where our base is located. So I was able to go by the construction site and take a picture every day, showing the progress of building over the 16 or so days it takes for the average church. So here are some pictures and some brief explanations about what you're looking at. I'm not an engineer (we're blessed with several highly capable engineers from the US and Kenya) but I'll tell you what I can about the photos, and you'll get to see a church rise up from the ashes...or from the dirt, as it were. This first photo was taken about half way through the first day of construction. The crew, comprised totally of Ugandans and Sudanese, has set out the bounadries of the building with stakes and building line. They then dig the foundation by hand and make sure everything is level, with a method I'm not completely sure about, but which uses a thin transparent hose pipe, water and the principle that if you fill the pipe and hold the two ends up, the water will settle to the same height in the two ends of the pipe. Like I said, I'm no engineer. But apparently it works, so that's what is important! In the next photo the crew has begun to place the foundation blocks in the place where they've excavated and has begun to erect the trusses. The blocks being used for the foundation were built by hand and a simple block press by two skilled block makers and help from 8 or 10 guys from the local church community. The blocks are made of "river sand" which the community gathered by hand with shovels and hoes, and cement which we provide. The trusses were fabricated in our workshop by Ugandan and Sudanese welders. So on day two the trusses are all put up with concrete footers poured around their bases. The crew then builds up the foundation of the building with their concrete blocks. On day three the forms for the "beam" are built. The "beam" is poured in the forms between the trusses using rebar and cement. I'm told this is so a "beam" connecting the tops of the vertical section of the trusses is not necessary. At least that's what I gathered from the mumbo jumbo that I heard when one of our engineers tried to explain it to me. :o) The next day, after the concrete has had 24 hours to set, the forms are removed and another later of blocks is placed on top of the "beam". Then the crew begins to back fill the foundation with a compactable clay-like soil called mirrum. It's basically the red dirt you see whenever you see a picture of Africa. On the fifth day the back filling continues while the foundation for the veranda is added to the front of the church and purlins are welded across the tops of the trusses for stability. Day six involves more back filling of the foundation and installing the veranda trusses. On the seventh day they rest. Just kidding. :o) On the seventh day they back fill some more, this time in the veranda foundation. Also, the masons start to bring up the walls with blocks. Day eight means installation of the zinc roof. A specialized roofing carpenter is brought to the site and bolts the roof on the trusses. Fiberglass sheets are used in four locations instead of zinc, so that light can enter during the day. The building will not have plumbing or electricity. This is part of the reason it can be built so quickly. Also on day eight the steps up to the veranda are constructed. The next day the walls begin to climb in the front and rear of the church, and fascia board is installed along the front of the veranda. The roofing carpenter had to be moved to another site before he could finish the roof of the veranda, so he'll return in a few days to wrap up the job. On the tenth day the walls all around the building climb higher still.

Day eleven shows that the walls are all constructed up to the top of the window openings on the sides.

The windows and doors arrive to the site on day twelve from the carpentry shop on our compound where Ugandan and Sudanese carpenters build them. They use the most beautiful mahogany for everything here. It's as abundant as pine in the states. We even burn the mahogany scraps in fires for the shower water and for cooking sometimes. Anyway, we end up with these windows and doors that are the most beautifully-stained works of art hanging in each building. The crew continues the walls after installing the windows. On the thirteenth day a mason hangs from the veranda truss and perplexed children stand on a dirt mound staring at the white guy with the camera pointed at their new church. :o) Hahaha! Actually, on the thirteenth day the walls are finished up to the roof and plastering begins inside. Also the crew begins to plaster the base of the outside of the building...skirting, I'm told it's called. The plastering inside and out takes a few more days. And on one of those days the roofing carpenter returns to finish the veranda. Somewhere around sixteen days after construction began, the church is finished.

The community of Yei now has a permanent structure to replace the stick and mud-wall, grass thatch-roof building they built after their church was destroyed in the war. Despite all the work that goes in to making these beautiful buildings, our hope is that the ultimate result of our work here is that more and more people are presented with the Gospel than ever before, that people hear how Jesus loves them and how he died for them.
The next step in the work of Samaritan's Purse in Sudan, after these churches are rebuilt, is to begin to train their existing pastors and enrich the lives of the Sudanese with community development programs such as HIV/AIDS education, water purification and filtration systems and World Medical Mission, among others. Take a gander at the Purse's website, www.samaritanspurse.org to see what else is going on in Africa and around the world. I feel an intense sense of honor and excitement to be part of this organization and I know I'll never be the same because of it!

What is it they say about children?

2007-07-13T05:37:00.000-04:00

If children are the future of our world, I'd like you to meet some of the rising stars of New Sudan.
Everywhere I go the children clamor to greet me, to shake my hand, to say, "How are you?" That's the phrase that EVERYONE here knows. They may not know what you are saying when you answer that question and they may not know how to respond if you ask them, but people have heard westerners greet them with this phrase for so long it's simply what you say when you see a "khwaja" (white person) on the street.

Anyway, please keep my friends from Sudan in your prayers. The political situation is calm now but there is possibly another civil war on the way. The Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) between the government of Sudan, in the north, and the governing force of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM), in the south, is set to expire in 2010.

Also, please remember the women of the country who raise these gems. They themselves are shaping the future of their nation.

From Sudan With Love

2007-06-30T14:18:00.000-04:00

So i've made it one week in Sudan. Having been to Africa before, I knew somewhat what to expect. And that helped me adjust quicker I think. People are substancially poorer here than in Uganda, if anyone who's visited Africa before can believe that.

The drive to our base in Yei from Juba, in South Sudan, where I flew in to from Nairobi, was only 100 kilometers. However, since there are only about 15 kilometers of paved roads in all of South Sudan, the entire trip was on a dirt road. The road was full of pot holes, rainwater runoff trenches and INCREDIBLY dilapidated bridges. So that 100 km drive took every second of 4 and a half hours. That was a sign of things to come for sure. There is not one single stretch of paved road anywhere in the area I travel on a regular basis, between all the churches we are constructing. And some of the roads still have yet to be cleared of all the land mines left over from the civil war against northern Sudan.
This is a photo of a "Mine Wolf" vehicle we passed on the trip from the airport. It's one of the pieces of equipment the mine-removing crews use. Hopefully the fact that we passed it going the opposite direction doesn't mean we had just driven through a mined area. :) Just kidding. I was assured he was just on the way to another mined road which was not cleared and opened yet.

So, in an intentional transition to a related subject...this is the truck i drive. :o) We use Toyota LandCruisers, both hard-top (SUV) and pickup truck styles. They're extraordinarily tough!! And it's so much fun driving on dirt roads in the countryside, across rivers and through mud bogs, hopping pot holes and puddles!

So when we got back to the compound where the staff lives I was pleasantly surprised. They've taken great care to make sure we are comfortable here. I was fully expecting to live in tent camps and to have no reliable electricity and that type of thing. But fortunatley I was sent to what is held as the most comfortable Samaritan's Purse base in South Sudan. This is what the area of the compound where our living quarters are located looks like. Yeah I think I can handle it here. :)

We have electricity but only that which we generate from our diesel generator. The generator runs during the day and charges batteries which we use for power at night. We actually have hot water in our homemade shower. The photo on the left shows the business end of the shower. The one on the right shows the fireplace where a fire is kept going to heat the water overhead. Pretty groovy setup, huh?

This is of one of our banana trees and some of our pineapple plants. If you click on the picture to enlarge it you'll see both are bearing fruit right now.

They have these huge tectonic semi-mountains here that bulge out of a mostly flat landscape. It's an amazingly beautiful country. The problem is that the government will not allow people to climb up these massive hills. I've heard that the government thinks there are valuable natural resources such as mercury in them and they think people who climb them are trying to steal those resources. But there really hasn't been a suitable explanation given as to why nobody's allowed to climb. It's a pitty because they really look like a lot of fun. In fact, they're so enticing that a couple months ago some of our staff tried to climb one and were arrested and had to stay in a local jail overnite. Maybe one day when the government mellows out and the economy/infrastructure develops, tourists will be able to come and climb.

As evidenced by some of these photos, the weather is pretty violent right now, during their rainy season. Yes, that is an overturned, fully loaded gasoline truck we had to pass one day during a storm. It probably rains five days a week on average during this season, but the climate now is very nice. It's usually no hotter than 85 and always very low humidity, execpt when it's raining, of course. However, I hear the dry season is scorching. We'll see. :o)

Well that's all for this post. I'll have another going up soon with pictures of our local construction workers and of churches under construction, as well as some general photos of the people of Sudan.

Unbelievable Fortune

2007-05-18T16:26:00.000-04:00

I simply cannot believe how good God is.

Everyone has an idea of what their dream job would be. I know I do. The ideal situation for me would be a job where I live in an adventurous place, a wild, rare, exciting place. I would travel around an amazing landscape in an off-road vehicle, camp out, hike, backpack, learn a new language and live with people of another culture. I would live without the constant pressure to make money and seek efficiency at all costs. I would be able to develop relationships with astounding people, learn their lives, teach them skills, share ideas, invest in people who can, in turn, invest in other people in the same way. I would need to be able to make only enough money to sustain myself and, one day, a family. It would be nice to make enough to venture out and see even more of the world from time to time.

I'll admit, some of those ideas are a little specific to be coming up with in a general sense. But that's because I have actually found the job that would suit me perfectly! The crazy part is that I applied and actually got it!

I am moving to Africa, to help a faith-based humanitarian organization make a difference in people's lives in a real way. Samaritan's Purse is an international relief organization run by the evangelist Billy Graham's son, Franklin Graham, also a well-known evangelist. The project I am joining is their church reconstruction project in southern Sudan, a very poor country in east central Africa. Decades of civil unrest in the largest and poorest country in Africa have destroyed hundreds of Christian churches in the mostly-Christian southern part of Sudan. The northern part of the country is run by a somewhat hostile Islamic government. And now, as the conflicts have fizzled out, Samaritan's Purse has entered the country to help rebuild those beacon's of light in the otherwise dismal lives of the native people.

My job will be traveling around to the various construction sites to encourage and motivate the local church body to take ownership in the rebuilding of their church. I will have some responsibility to ensure that materials, tools and equipment are in place when needed at the various stages of construction, a kind of logistical function. I will be expected to invest in the lives of brothers and sisters in Christ by teaching them new skills and developing relationships that will certainly be eternal. I will live in a remote location under harsh conditions (90+ degrees in the rainy season, 120+ degrees in the dry season) which will require camping at church sites and eating local food. I will maintain open communication between Samaritan's Purse and the various construction projects. I fancy my position as a "greaser", making things go smoothly so that the most effective use is made of funds entrusted to the organization by its donors for the purpose of advancing God's kingdom here on earth. I'll need to learn the official language of the country, and the most widely spoken, Arabic. How awesome is that!

For a while I have been thinking about devoting my life to doing something more constructive, something mission-based, just something real. I decided that if God is leading me in this direction, and He certainly has been, I will surrender my physical needs to him. It is a scary thing but I decided that whatever it takes to follow His calling for my life I am willing to do. I resolved that if it would be required of me, I would simply let go and trust Him for my financial security, the very thing that culture tells us is of paramount importance over all else in our lives. And I meant it completely. The incredible thing is that my God knew I was willing to take that leap, and he rewarded me. My new job in the mission field actually pays. And it pays good! I trusted Him and he came through!

It's one thing to see the beauty that God made for us in the world. It's one thing to hear people talk about how good God has been to them. It's one thing to hear and know the story of how His son came and sacrificed his life for me. But it's another thing completely to see Him take over the reigns and actually provide in a real, physical way. For Him to answer actual specific requests I'm made of Him in prayer.

I found the job with Samaritan's Purse, applied and began praying that I would somehow get it. I didn't really expect to get the job. I mean, what experience do I have in construction. What qualifies me to be a missionary. Why would Samaritan's Purse find it worthwhile to pay me money to live in Africa. But despite my faithless doubt in what God is capable of, I leave for the field on June 18.

Stay tuned for updates from Yei, in southern Sudan!

Deutschland uber ales!

2007-04-05T09:04:00.000-04:00

So here is how the first night of my vacation to Germany looked. Yes, that is the airport in Charlotte, NC. Severe weather up the eastern seaboard caused extensive flight delays leaving hundreds of people stranded. I was one of those hundreds...number 216 I think. The Red Cross came and gave out cots for people to sleep on as there were no vacancies in local hotels. I wasn't going to get a hotel anyway, so it was nice to sleep on a cot instead of curled up on the floor or slumped over the armrests of a row of airport seats like an earthworm. It was the biggest slumber party I've ever been to, and the loudest chorus of squeaking cots you can imagine. So the next morning was nice. I was still in the US but it was a beautiful day outside so I propped my feet up and enjoyed the view of the Charlotte skyline. I happened to purchase a book the day before in the Raleigh airport thinking I might get a little of it read on the trip between activities. It's a spirit- lifting story of a Himalayan-mountain climber turned humanitarian who built schools for impoverished villages in the most remote regions of Pakistan and Afganistan near the world's largest mountain range. Anyway, when I got to Charlotte and learned that the delay in my first flight caused me to miss my connector to Frankfurt, I started reading. 28 hours later I boarded the next flight with any vacancies to Germany and had read 2/3 of the book. I finished it on Monday at my brother's house in Baumholder, before I had been in-country for 28 hours yet. What I was greeted by in Germany was snow; constant, relentless suffocating snow every day I was there except the day I left. Nice. Nevertheless, the wintry weather did provide some scenic photograph opportunities. We spent most of the time I was there hitting historical and scenic points throughout the country. It was good to be back to the place where I'd spent well over half of my childhood before we left the second time when I was 11. And it was certainly good to spend time again with the guy who I'd spent my whole childhood with, and with my new sister. It was just as I remembered...except I did not remember how hilarious the sign for "exit" off a highway or out of a parking deck was. The picture tells that story. This little linguistic oddity proved fodder for comedic interludes throughout the trip. Anyone who knows me does not find that hard to believe at all. :0)

Ok, following will be a bunch of pictures from the trip. I don't really see the need to bore everyone with lengthy discourse about what the photos meant or what was going on when I took them. (That's code talk for "man, I really don't want to write that much about every one of these things!")

The best thing about Germany!

A Roman gate still standing in the southern city of Trier.

Above and below ground ruins of a Roman baths in Trier.

This gal was playing Mozart on those glasses!

Wolfe the one-man-band.

Acordian Sal.

Not Tom Ford. :)

Looks like Germany to me.

Pretty place, huh?

What to eat?

2007-02-15T15:15:00.000-05:00

Sometimes when I look into the fridge and can't decide what to eat I get overwhelmed. It doesn't have anything to do with what I'll actually eat. What overwhelms me is the fact that if I can't even decide what to snack on, how am I ever going to be able to make sense of these conflicts bouncing around in my head right now. As a lot of people know, I have been actively seeking a volunteer assignment with the Peace Corps for about the past year. I'm about three months and 10 cholesterol points from reaching that goal right now.

But I've recently been ambushed by some incredibly strong desires that have set up camp in direct conflict with plans I've made for myself...I mean really ambushed. I've always been aware of that tiny hole tucked away somewhere in my life that's meant be filled with the companion God has planned for me. I just never put that much thought into it. Well, apparently it's put some thought into me lately, and that tiny hole feels like a gaping chasm right now. I've started to ache for that woman in my life, that complementary piece, the soulmate that my mother has prayed God would send me every night since the day I was born. And I wonder if i can stand this constant nagging of loneliness for the next 2 years. I have this intense desire to venture into the world outside our American bubble and share some of the incredible bounty my god has blessed me with. I mean, I'm a twentysomething, white, college educated, American male with advantages that 99% of the world's population can only dream of. I want an experience of reckless enthusiasm, to be filled with righteous confidence in my mission. I want a story that I can look back on some day and wonder, "was I ever that bold", and at the same time ask, "how did I ever consider not doing that?" I want to shatter the diecast product my life has become. I want to go somewhere where people can't believe what just moved in next door. Simply put, I want, no I need an adventure. But I have this tragic loneliness, this unsolicited yearning for my wife. I don't want to sleep alone anymore, as a friend put it. I know these feelings can only be from the one in control of it all because I didn't ask for them, not right now. And I have faith that He will take me where He wants me. I just wish I had the ticket in my hand with a departure date and time, destination and number of companions with names printed on it.

Here are a few of the questions I've been wrestling with lately. I guess they represent the options I feel like I have. They're probably not mutually exclusive or collectively exhaustive but this is what I'm thinking about right now.

Should I go to Morocco for 27 months?
Should I go to Dubai with my buddy and live there for a year, just to get away for a while?
Should I cash out my 401K, take the tax penalty, pay off my student loan and jump into a life of full time service to God with no debts but no certainty about my financial future?

I just wish all I had to figure out was what to pull out of the refrigerator. I'm not even hungry anymore.