Settling In

Almost two weeks now here in Petauke, and we're starting to get to know the village quite well.  We have established our service schedule and gotten the necessary items for our home here. We go in the ministry every day except Monday, when we do our cleaning and laundry washing. The service is wonderful, as of right now we have four bible studies each. Its exciting having bible discussions at almost every door we go to.

When we walk down the streets the children will say "Ozoongoo, Ozoongoo" ("White person, White person") but we have been replying with "No my name is Kalila" or " No, my name is Micah".  So the kids now have been coming after us yelling "Kareera! Kareera!" or " Meeka! Meeka!".  Its pretty cute.
Some of the children in the congregation like to come and visit us in the evenings.  The other night they came over and wanted to braid Kalila's hair very badly so they were thrilled when she let her hair down and handed them the brush. Our hair is a very different texture so they find it very amusing to play with it.  In return we had them help us cook some of the local food (Nshema, the staple food here), which turned out quite well.  The girl who helped us is 8.  She did a great job. 

We haven't had electricity the last couple days so we have been consuming our fair share of PB & J sandwiches and fruit under the candle light. 

Unfortunately a few sisters in our congregation have Malaria right now so we've been visiting them regularly during the week. They started getting sick over the weekend but the hospitals did not have any medicine to give them, and told them to come back on Monday.
The electricity is going in and out, so thats all for now.  We'll post pictures on Flickr.

We miss everyone!

Meeting Petauke

Wednesday, July 18^th we were picked up by a brother and brought to Petauke, Zambia.  We drove through the hills and hut filled, baboon infested forest until we finally arrived at our final destination for the next few months.  We were taken to our new home and greeted by many from the congregation.  They had been waiting all day for us to arrive!! They were very excited for us to finally be in their village.  The brothers we originally emailed and have been communicating with since March were thrilled that the hard work they put into trying to get us to their congregation finally materialized. 

The brothers showed us around our new house which was a little more primitive than expected, but of course they have been taking great care of us.  For the first night the brothers put us up in a local home and made sure we were bathed and fed. The house we will be staying in has water and electricity as requested.  I posted a few pictures to give an idea of what it looks like.  We have two papaya trees and two mango trees in our yard! The weather is wonderful, sunny every day without doubt.      ( Our beautiful outhouse >>)

On Friday evening at 5:30pm we enjoyed our first meeting with the local Petauke Central English congregation. The Kingdom hall is a large brick building with wooden swing open windows.  The lighting is fairly poor consisting of just a few light bulbs lining the center ceiling. The sound was in and out with the sound system failing a few times thru out the meeting. But thankfully we had several who were more than willing to lead the songs for us!  There were 100 people in attendance at the meeting that night. 

There are over 73 languages in Zambia, but we have been learning one of the more common local languages- Chichewa.  There are three additional Chichewa congregations meeting at the same Kingdom Hall as us.  The Chichewa congregations have been given specific territories, but the English hall has been given the freedom of the entire city as their territory.  We were excited to hear that for the 4 congregations meeting at that kingdom hall there were 1,200 in attendance at this year’s memorial.
Today, Sunday we attended the meeting and surprisingly there were 222 in attendance.  A record for the congregation!!  We were smashed in there like sardines on the wooden benches but it was the most amazing experience watching so many come from the territory.  Pictures to follow...

Zambian Bliss

July 15th we left by plane from Gabarone, Botswana to Lusaka, Zambia. It was a nice short flight (2 hours).  We were picked up by brothers from the branch at the airport and were taken to the Zambia Branch in Lusaka. 

 Here is the room we get to stay in here at bethel.  Its appropriatley an Africa themed guest room!  Today we enjoyed touring the bethel and seeing the beautiful property here.  

This bethel is mainly a translation branch. There are at least 5 languages being translated here at thebranch by different brothers and sisters into native languages to Zambia. (Cibemba, Chichewa, Chitonga, Luvale, and Silozi)

Interestingly, we learned that the number of branches is actually diminishing. In the yearbook it says we have 98 branches worldwide, but actually we have 91 as of right now because of some branches being disolved and taken over by other branches. They said this is not because of a decrease in work, but other factors. Such as: there is an increase in modern technology that speed up the work. Also, some that are being used for translating are being sent into the areas where the language is actually spoken so that they pick up any changes in the language and can provide the most up to date translation for our literature.


There are native animals on the property, such as Zebra and Impala.  Super cute!

For more pictures check out http://www.flickr.com/photos/terrellmk/

Tomorrow leave for Petauke, Zambia. For the next few months. Finally a place to stay for awhile. In Petauke we will be in the English Congregation. The Native Language is Chichewa.

Ramotswa

We have been staying in Ramotswa, Botswana for the past week with a local family.  This week has been filled with lots of ministry and picking up some of the local customs and language!  The ministry of course is quite different than back home.  When entering the yard of each home we say "Ko-Ko" (kind of like knock knock),  letting the householder know that we are entering their yard.  Ususally there are people in the yard cooking or doing the household washing.  We talk to whoever seems to be listening to us when we start talking.  "Dumela" is the native greeting for "Hello".  When we start speaking in their native language before going into the reason we are calling they are much more receptive.  Commonly the witnesses will talk to the family  for a few minutes in casual conversation until the householder brings chairs and then will bring out the Bible and the reason for the call.  Here, we have been using the "Would you like to know the Truth?" tract at each door and then if they have time we will cover one question with the Bible.  We've found the most common choice is "What happens to us when we die?". 
We all walk in the territory wherever we go, so we're getting plenty of excercise!! :) Below is a little snap of what the village looks like. There are lots of goats, donkeys and chickens roaming freely  around. 

We saw our first glimpse of African Wildlife!! 

Last night an elder and his wife had us over for a meal with some other brothers and sisters. 

and Micah doing the washing... the African way!

For More Pictures Visit http://www.flickr.com/photos/terrellmk/

Visit to South Africa Branch

 We had a great visit at the South Africa branch of Jehovah's Witnesses.  We met lots of couple, one of which was on the exact same flight as us from Portland!  They are visiting a missionary in Swaziland.  We made quite a few friends, some of which were in SASL (South African Sign Language) and were being moved from bethel to Capetown as special pioneers to start a new group there.  They were nervous but excited for the challenge.  We had our tour of the branch on Thursday and enjoyed lunch again with the brothers at bethel and it was Hamburgers!  Quite tasty..its interesting and loving how the brothers cater to all the different cultures there at bethel.  The day before they served indian food. (Below are pictures of the branch and Brian and Rita Godwin)

So..on Friday we said our sad goodbyes to the ones there in South Africa and got on the bus to Gabarone, Botswana.  We were greeted in Gabarone by John and Sonia Campbell the special pioneers serving in the local congregation we are going to be helping in Botswana. They are serving in a village of 30,000 in Ramotswa.
The next day, Saturday we were able to join them for a full day in the ministry.  They start out their day by doing maybe 2 or 3 doors and then spend the rest of the day with their studies. Micah went with John and I joined Sonia. The territory we worked were the government houses where the people who work the border crossing or hospitals live.  Sonia thought it would be a good choice because the majority are educated and speak good English. We were able to speak to someone from each of the 6 doors we did and had some nice conversations.  We used the Truth tract as our offer so that we would ask them which question they had 5 minutes to discuss and then would have a discussion based on their choice.  Two times we discussed the question on What happens when we die?.  And we also got a few to agree to attend the meeting the next day.  Micah joined John on studies the whole day.  We started at 9 am and ended at 4:30 with a 1/2 hour lunch break in between. 

Sunday we enjoyed going to the meeting in Ramotswa where it was conducted in half Tswana (the native language) and half English.  The talk was interpreted from English to Tswana and the Watchtower is conducted trading the paragraphs between Tswana and English.  The power went out in the morning, so we got to sing based on memory and had to pay extra careful attention so we could hear the brother conducting! 

Today is Monday and we are staying with another couple, Farai and Lorraine and little baby Unathi (Cute little picture of her right above).

Arrived in Johannesburg

After a couple delayed flights and crowded planes we have finally arrived in South Africa!  Thankfully, baggage claims and immigration was a breeze.  None of our baggage got lost. 
Brother Nhlanhla Gwala and his wife Thembi picked us up at the airport. We held up Watchtower and Awake! magazines so they'd know who we were.


They drove us to Krugerdrop, South Africa where Bethel is located, about 30 minutes from the airport. We had a wonderful spiritual conversation with them about the territory and the people of South Africa. They dropped us off there at the residents building at South Africa Bethel and we went to the room of Brother Brian and Rita Godwins. They werent there because they were attending they're weekly meeting, but they had an entire meal waiting for us on the table and a beautiful welcome note. They had prepared a delicious beef and veggie soup with bread and warm shower awaiting us! Brian is a native South African of English background. He is in the Service Department at the branch. When they got home we had a wonderful conversation with them also.
Brian later took us to the house of Wessel and Keller VanRiensburg who live 10 minutes from Bethel. They arranged a cozy warm room for us. Wessel is a MTS Grad from South Africa and Keller is from Brazil. They have been married 10 years. They greeted us very warmly and lovingly. Again we had a great spiritual talk. Keller worked for South African Airlines and also American Airlines before moving to South Africa and now works at a travel desk at bethel, so she has been able to tell us all the great places to go here. The VanRienburgs have 4 pet Chamileons in the house. Because of superstition the South Africans stone Chamileons, Keller rescues them.  ( Below is Keller with one of her chamelons Markeli)

Ok well thats all for now, we're off to visit bethel...