OUT OF AFRICA

THE HAPPIEST PLACE ON EARTH

2012-01-22T16:27:00.009+02:00

Zimpeto’s nursery is small. It is plain and simple and would be considered sparse if it were not such a tiny space in which seven babies and two tias live. Shaded windows, a ceiling fan clicking rhythmically overhead, cool tiled floors and a colour scheme of muted blues and pinks: such a calming contrast to the burning brightness of the Mozambican sun and the orange earth outside its walls. Beyond the grassed postage stamp-sized front yard, the caneçu fences keep the hustle and bustle of the rest of the Centre and its 250 children away from this sanctuary.

I call the nursery the happiest place on earth. Here, miracles happen every day. Each time I walk in, peace soaks gently into my soul, my heart stops racing and my mind stills. One moment at a time is all we can deal with here. Priorities shift. Time slows. Nothing exists beyond these walls and these moments.

It is not possible to be anything but full of joy in this place. Yes, there are struggles and darker days. We have not won every battle. Most of our babies are loved to life and health; some we have loved into the arms of Jesus. Each day is a new day and each baby a miracle waiting to happen. So we continue to believe that God is enough and that, in our frail humanity, He is all we and these precious babes need.

Last week, God brought us five new bundles of gorgeousness, all within days. Five babies under one, all underweight, all hungry.

Stick-thin and fragile, Faustina (above right) nestles in, too weak to move. At eight months and 3.5kg, she is our most vulnerable right now. I am helpless apart from prayer.

Days pass, one heartbeat at a time. Nappies, bottles, sing-song Shangaana lullabies, sleep. Sighs of relief at the end of each long night when Faustina wakes and begins to bleat weakly for food.

One week goes by...

Today Faustina smiles and giggles. She has gained weight and a little strength (above right). She whines when her bottle empties before she is full. The miracle of life has taken hold and she will come through!

To care for the most desperate of all humanity, babies in need, feels to me in my helplessness like a gift - the purest, simplest service of all – humbling me daily as I confront my own frailties and inabilities. I have nothing to offer but love, and prayer, and trust in the Creator of all life.

My own humanity is shaken to the core as I consider the fate that awaited these babies had they not been brought to Zimpeto. One was found in a pile of rubbish in the city; one was deserted at the Mozambique-South Africa border; one was brought by her desperate mother after the hospital discharged the baby as a hopeless cause; another two came from a childcare centre nearby where the director freely acknowledges the extraordinary “success rate” of Zimpeto’s babies.

The nursery's four oldest, Silvia, Casilda, Jeremias and Gloria, have now “graduated” happily to the Baby House after several months of visits in preparation for this day.

And so may I introduce you to our five newest miracles? Milagrosa’s name means, literally, “Great Miracle” (third from bottom). We also have Rejoice (fourth from bottom) and Inercio (right), Joseldo (below) and, of course, Faustina who is now world-famous thanks to Facebook and the many prayer requests that have gone out to the nations of the world on her behalf.

These five join Xadreque and Shayla who were once as fragile and sick as our newest Zimpeto family members but are now healthy and strong. Day-by-day, heartbeat-by-heartbeat, God heals and restores.

Welcome, precious babes, to the happiest place on earth where miracles happen and dreams really do come true.

FELIZ NATAL! MERRY CHRISTMAS!

2011-12-24T14:09:00.005+02:00

As I sat quietly in the nursery at lunch time yesterday, I marvelled that six babies would all fall asleep at the same time, lying in cribs pushed right up against each other in this small room. There were shuffles and snuffles and the occasional whimper from Xadreque, the youngest and newest nursery resident.

Just two months ago, Xadreque [below] was brought to the Centre desperately malnourished, literally starving to death. At 7 months of age and just under 6kg, he was fighting for his life and now we were fighting with him. Within days and under the ever-watchful eye of our medical team, he began putting on weight and, after a week, he was giggling and happy, his skin beginning to glow again and his hair to grow. He has big black eyes that sparkle all the time and notice everything, especially now he has gained enough strength to sit up and turn his head toward every noise he hears. He misses nothing. Silvia [below], 13 months old and the natural leader of the five toddlers who are now all either walking or crawling, has lately taken to touching Xadreque’s cheek gently and making kissing sounds with her lips. She’s learned this from observing the many times a day Xadreque is kissed and cuddled by the tias, missionaries and visitors who cannot resist him.

To play a part in loving a child back to life is the greatest privilege I can imagine and, as I watched Xadreque sleeping (his name comes from Shadrach in the Bible), I marvelled once more that I am a part of such a miraculous place, where the hopelessness of poverty is defeated by the powerful and practical hope of love. Here, we have the immense honour of loving the dying back to life and watching them grow into the healthy, strong adults they were always destined to be.

I will celebrate Christmas this year with my Zimpeto family: 260 children, 150 workers and 30 missionaries. I will miss another Walker family Christmas and the laughter, the pressies, the giant turkey on the barbeque and the noise of my nieces and nephews swimming in the pool in the late afternoon. I’ll think of them tomorrow and be sad for just a moment or two, wishing I were there. It won’t last long - I will have noise and activity and laughter enough here.

Tomorrow will be all about our Zimpeto kids and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Presents and prayers, singing and dancing in the summer heat and humidity, a church decorated with streamers and balloons and, hopefully, cooled by a breeze flowing through the open eaves, a feast of chicken, chips, rice and fizzy drinks, and the celebration of the birth of the perfect Saviour who makes all of this possible.

The celebrations begin tonight with a Candle Service (yes, candles for all our kids, oh my!) and nativity play, then supper at the home of our Base Directors. In the morning, I will be woken by the noise of excited children before dawn – some things are the same the world over. There will be presentations of gifts in every dorm and, of course, the nursery. Then church, a lunch feast, more presentations and, in the evening, a Christmas dinner with all the missionaries. At some point in the evening’s proceedings there will be a wild, undignified and hilarious Secret Santa game.

Thanks and blessings to all who have prayed for me and for the ministry this year, and to those who have given financially. Thank you for your sensitivity and generosity: I look for what may be credited to your account (Phil. 4:17). Thank you for remembering the poor.

To all my friends and family, I wish you the hope and joy that come from knowing that, because of the birth-day of Jesus, all things are possible. Celebrate the arrival of Jesus two thousand years ago and His presence with us today and enjoy the festivities... I know I will!

Feliz Natal to all!

GOD SETS THE LONELY IN FAMILIES

2011-11-12T20:08:00.008+02:00

Enjoy this slideshow of a year in the life of Zimpeto Children's Centre. Every time I watch it I am reminded of how very rich I am and how good God is. He sets the lonely in families, His heart is towards the orphans and the widows as He calls ours to be also, and, in Him, there is always a way!

ONE LIFE TO LIVE

2011-10-01T15:46:00.000+02:00

Three weeks old. Underweight. Hungry. Wrapped in an old capulana, tied snugly to the front of his vovo (grandma) with great-auntie walking beside them. Somehow they found their way to us at Zimpeto Children’s Centre. They were here for an hour and this one hour I spent on a busy, hot, dusty “ordinary” day, shook me to the core, reminding me once again why I am here, doing what I do.

The baby’s mother left him a few days ago, disappearing into the night, and these two older ladies now have a newborn to feed and no money with which to buy baby formula. The father was not mentioned and the baby has no name. As this tiny, tiny bundle wrapped his minute fingers around mine and gurgled weakly, the significance of this moment captured me and will not let go its grip even a day later.

This one hour and this tiny babe crashed through the ordinariness of a day that has become just one of many routine days for me. I email with potential visitors. I administrate our newly-established sponsorship programme. I pray. I play with children. Then I pray some more, never feeling I can pray as much as the needs here warrant. I try to write about it all but, even in this, I have become complacent. Surely the stories have all been told and there’s nothing more to say about “the poor”.

How can one become complacent about poverty and its consequences? I see first-hand, every day, the devastation that poverty wreaks on its victims yet, still, I have allowed my heart to shut down to the suffering of those around me. My compassion has become stale and inaccessible, even in moments when I hear of the afflictions of Mozambican friends and colleagues.

I have heard in the past few months of the deaths of four people who were close to us here at the Centre. Two of our precious girls; the man who ran the shop at the Centre gate from whom we bought cool drinks for the kids as a treat; a young man who used to live here and left to be with his extended family. This tally does not count the many deaths of people I have not known personally: a mother in childbirth, the brother of a worker... there are more but my complacency has enabled me to forget the details.

When did I become so complacent about poverty? How could I grow to be so unmoved by death? In the world from which I have come, such happenings would make the news every night for a week and cause uproar in the media, and in political and social welfare circles. Here, it is just another day.

Yesterday, a brief meeting with a hungry babe in his grandma’s arms shook the complacency that has gradually established itself in my heart in the 3 ½ years I have been here. For this, I am grateful.

Mozambique is the 5^th poorest nation in the world. Most of the babies we receive into our care are malnourished, many close to the point of starvation when they arrive. I am privileged to spend time each week with our six now-healthy, well-fed, rapidly growing babies in the nursery who are all under one. They came to us sick and struggling and now are round-cheeked , rosy-skinned and delightfully happy. Silvia has rolls of baby fat on her thighs. Sheila is sitting up on her own. Vitoria giggles just at the sight of my wriggling fingers coming close to tickle her chubby tummy. Even in Portuguese, it seems the first “words” from a baby’s mouth are “mum-um-um-um-um...” .

This morning Casilda sat in the sand with a bucket over her head, quite content to listen to the echoing noises from under her colourful hat. Gloria cried when she got sand in her mouth. Silvia practised walking in the sand, enjoying the soft landing each time she fell over. Jeremias chewed on his shoe, Vitoria tried to make a fast getaway on her knees, chuckling as I swung her onto my shoulder and carried her back to the mat. Sheila sat and watched quietly, enjoying her more adventurous friends providing entertainment.

The nursery is well-stocked with baby formula and bottles and clothes for tiny babies such as yesterday’s visitor, ready for any eventuality. We gave the grandma a baby bottle and some formula to last through to next week when we hope they will come back again if they need more help.

We may, though, never see them again and I am okay with that. We prayed for him and his two vovos and, in those moments, I sensed a destiny for this babe that God was sealing. All it took was a can of yellow powder and a plastic bottle to save his life.

I can imagine no more powerful gift to give than life and, for a moment God arrested my attention by allowing me to play just a small part in this interplay that has changed a life – make that two lives – forever.

Photos:

1. Wendy with Vitoria who lives in the nursery, with her two brothers who also live here at the Centre.

2. Sina when she arrived at Zimpeto. She is now five years old, healthy and full of life and spunk!

3. Casilda and her favourite sand toy

4. Tia Madelena feeding Jeremias, Vitoria, Silvia and Sheila in the nursery.

WHAT’S IN A DREAM?

2010-12-18T16:57:00.002+02:00

Facebook status update 9 Nov 2010:

“Traffic jam in Maputo at 6am, emergency toilet stops for passengers with the dreaded lurgy, then remarkably fast border crossing. By sundown, I am settled in Nelspruit SA in a gorgeous flat on a farm surrounded by fertile fields and green rolling hills. Hunkered down on the couch, new novel open, glass of cab sav in hand. Sunset. Silence. Sublime. I may not budge from this spot for 10 days.”

This year I am required by the conditions of my visa to leave Mozambique every three months. Last year it was every 30 days. “Going out” would normally imply going down the road to the store or out for dinner or a movie. At Zimpeto it is missionary lingo for leaving the country.

“When do you have to be out?”

“I’m going out next week.”

“I’m going out next week too. We can go out together...”

The price of overstaying one’s visa is about $100 US a day. One of our missionaries misread her visa and overstayed by a month. Ouch.

Occasionally we will do a border run, a half-day’s trip to the border and back. Every now and then I’ll catch a ride all the way to Nelspruit with a friend then spend a week or so in South Africa, which is where I am at the moment. I haven’t been out for a break for about six months and I forget how very much I need it until I am settled here at Mercy Air in one of the flats offered very cheaply to missionaries in southern Africa who are in need of a rest.

Every time I “go out”, I feel the weight of work and busyness begin to lift as I drive through the Zimpeto gates. At the first toll booth, I breathe more deeply. Through Matola, sigh. Second toll booth, the heaviness is falling away. Cross the border and suddenly the land is green, the air is clear and I can see for miles, physically and metaphysically. The tiredness of months of hard work and spiritual battles slips away and I head into the tranquillity of some down-time.

Today I am sitting at a picnic table under a stand of lush pecan trees. I sip coffee as a mongoose ambles by. The frogs revel noisily in the puddles left by the thunderstorms that rumbled across the African skies for most of last night. Vervet monkeys frolic in the trees about 30 metres away and occasionally a couple of the babies venture close but then are hurried away by panicked parents.

Now this is what I call down-time.

I do so love my life in Mozambique but, even when we live lives that we love and to which we are totally committed, we need to step away occasionally and experience something other than the everyday. Yes, at some point, living in Mozambique stopped being a novelty for me and became my everyday reality and so I need to take time out to rest, to pray and to keep dreaming.

There are missionaries at Zimpeto who have been dreaming of Africa for a lifetime. I am not one of them. I never dreamed of Africa or of Mozambique: I dreamed of being in the centre of God’s perfect will, wherever that may be in the world. Some friends 0f mine moved to Mozambique in 2000 and encouraged me to visit. Finally, after years of pondering, I booked my plane ticket for a three week trip in 2006 and knew that I had just signed off on a collision course with destiny.

For me it is not about Africa or about Mozambique but about obedience to going where I am led, when I am led there. It is about the whatever and the however of following, just one step at a time. People often assume that I am in Mozambique because I love the country but I hardly knew it until I lived here. I had to step off the map of all that was familiar to me and move to a place I did not know to then fall in love. It is like an arranged marriage of God’s perfect design. The dream truly was exceedingly, abundantly more than I could ask or imagine.

Then at some point after colliding with destiny and a year or two of living the dream, it became day-to-day. It lost its shine, its excitement. It began to feel less like an adventure and more like a settled ordinary life. There is nothing wrong with this – it is a sign that the dream has become reality. Glory to God!

When the dream becomes reality and the cycle of life continues day-by-day, we then start to dream again, until the next collision with destiny takes us off the map of the last dream we journeyed. This time, we gaze higher and dream bigger because, last time, God proved Himself so infinitely faithful and able. It may not mean a physical move but a mental one, or spiritual or emotional. Or it may mean moving to the other side of the world. There are a thousand ways to dream and a million different expressions of those dreams.

I will return to Mozambique in a few days with a bag of ripe pecans just off the tree, a rested body, a rejuvenated soul, and my dreams of God’s possibilities refired as I reach to grasp those dreams and draw them to me, one day at a time.

“Now to Him who by the action of His power that is at work within us is able to carry out His purpose and do superabundantly, far over and above all that we dare ask or think - infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, hopes or dreams – to Him be glory...”!

Eph 3: 20,21 [Ampl.]

THE STREETS ARE ON FIRE

2010-09-04T16:22:00.003+02:00

I woke early on Wednesday to the sounds of sirens and chanting crowds. The usual morning noises were absent. There were no children’s voices still thick with sleep playing under my window. There was no scraping of sand being raked into neat rows. No birds twittering as they caught insects for breakfast under the eaves. No trucks in the distance zooming past on the highway north with their heavy loads in tow. The peaceful sounds of a regular Zimpeto morning had been replaced by panicked yelling as loud and repeated “pop pop popping” cut through the air and smoke wafted in the window.

As my mind struggled to make sense of these foreign sounds, I trawled quickly through my memory banks until I retrieved a memory from two and a half years ago... Where have I hear d these sounds before? I can “feel” the memory, I can smell it and taste it... but what is it? There’s a sense of panic attached to it, a bad taste in my mouth... Is that noise possibly gunfire? And then I remembered.

I jumped out of bed, went into the next room and pulled back the curtain. I looked past the school building and soccer field to the highway and it all came flooding back to me. The streets were on fire once more.

The cost of bread has risen 25%. The government has just raised the price of water and electricity. Shapas (public transport somewhere between a mini-bus, a taxi and an accident waiting to happen) cost 30% more than last week, now priced out of reach of many people who cannot get to work or take their produce to market to be sold. Such price rises led to a day of rioting in 2008 and it seemed now that history was repeating itself.

The average monthly income here is $37. Almost 60% of the population is unemployed. More than 70% of Mozambicans live below the poverty line. When I say "below", I mean no electricity or running water, living in a reed hut with holes in the roof, chronic illnesses untreated though manageable, struggling daily with the thought, "Where will our next meal come from?"

A city-wide strike was called to protest against the price rises with text messages the main form of rallying. Many Mozambicans have a cell phone even if they do not have running water – a typical paradox in developing African nations. Mozambique is a country struggling to grow beyond its “developing nation” status and those on the streets are led by a generation who feel they have never had a voice or the power to change their circumstances.

I have never had to go hungry. I have never been forced to live without running water or electricity. The greatest sacrifice I make in a financially tight week is to do without coffee or cheese or meat. I have never missed a meal because of a lack of money. Even here, living on a very limited income by western standards, I am rich compared to my Mozambican brothers and sisters.

Many, many Mozambicans have been hungry for a lifetime with nobody hearing their cries. I cannot condone rioting and violence but I daily come face-to-face with the pain and frustration of a people desperate to be heard. Such frustration will inevitably spill onto the streets during times of pressure if this is the only outlet the people feel they have.

Throughout the day, the rioting continued across Maputo. A militant and determined band surged destructively back and forth along the potholed two-lane highway outside the Centre’s long yellow wall. The crowd worked in rhythmic unison to overturn a bus, setting it on fire and blocking the only road north out of the city. The army advanced, using one of their own vehicles to push it off the road, metal grinding fiercely on metal as the bus easily gave way to the force of the armoured personnel carrier full of soldiers with rifles cocked at their shoulders.

The army moved back, then a car was overturned and destroyed and a pile of tyres set on fire, creating a thick black cloud rising above the chaos. This time it was the police who moved in, firing round after round of teargas and rubber bullets. The crowd again retreated and the vehicle was removed from the road, smouldering through the day outside our gates.

Most of our 300 kids stayed inside, apart from some youth who sat around on the soccer field, keeping enough distance to be safe but close enough to see the action. Occasionally a semi-trailer would roar past at speed and twenty teenage boys would jump up and cheer, high-fiving wildly as the semi ran the gauntlet of the rioters. Even here, even now, boys will be boys.

A group of high school students who ventured outside sat 15 metres in front of me as they watched the action. Suddenly they moved as one, screaming hysterically, and ran back towards the school buildings as they pulled their shirts over their faces. I glanced quickly around to see what had spooked them so abruptly... Suddenly, my eyes began to sting and my throat tightened as an invisible cloud of teargas reached me. Who knew I could move so fast!

I raced into the house, only 50 metres away. As I stumbled through the door, I was unable to open my eyes and felt like I was choking on the acrid, painful gas. My eyes felt like pins were being stuck into them and my throat burned but soothing cool water soon eased the pain. I received just a breathful – our guards at the front gate were in the midst of the worst of all the gas and smoke and I cannot imagine how awful that must have been for them throughout the day.

As the afternoon progressed, the rioting crowds flowed forward like waves surging into shore as they moved towards the police to taunt them by throwing rocks. Then they would stream back from where they came, retreating as the police began to fire from their armoured vehicles. This pattern of attack/withdraw/attack continued throughout the first day.

At the Centre, we went about our days as normally as we could. Most of our workers could not get here although a few managed to make it, walking for hours through the tumultuous streets. Now that’s commitment. School was cancelled for the week. Food was rationed as time went on. Nobody could leave the Centre... nobody wanted to. The younger children remained in their dormitories. The youths grew tired after a few hours of watching the action and withdrew to the playground and dorms. We closed our windows against the teargas as it wafted through the Centre for much of the day.

At one point I felt anger rise within me as some of our youngest kids, seemingly safe in the Baby House, were affected by the gas. Up until this point, I was willing to see both sides: a people who have suffered more than anyone should have to in a lifetime versus a government trying to draw a nation gradually out of poverty and underdevelopment. There are no easy answers and no quick fixes in a country like this. But when the babies are caught in the middle, there is no excuse.

The action moved from outside the Centre on the third day but continued in pockets in the city, and then began in other towns north of Maputo. Looting has continued for a third night in the city but all is quiet here on the northern outskirts today. I hear occasional gunfire and police sirens in the distance this morning but all is calm here.

Ten people have been reported dead and almost 500 injured.

There have been calls for more strike action on Monday.

Here at Zimpeto, there is a definite sense of a clear boundary of safety drawn around our land and a peace that surpasses understanding that envelops us. Psalm 91 (quoted from The Message) has never been more real to me:

“ ‘God you’re my refuge and I’m safe!’ That’s right, He rescues you from hidden traps and shields you from deadly hazards. His huge outstretched arms protect you – under them you’re perfectly safe; His arms fend off all harm...

“You’ll stand untouched, watch it all from a distance... because God’s your refuge, the High God your very own home. Evil can’t get close to you, harm can’t get through the door.”

We could not have been closer to the violence of the past days and yet Zimpeto Children’s Centre and all its residents remain untouched and blissfully restful despite all that is happening on our doorstep. It is in times such as these that the Bible becomes so real to me, speaking directly into my circumstances with promises I need to get me through.

All that the Bible promises to me, I pray also for this city ripped violently apart in past days and for this nation trying to stand under the weight of a tragic past that still holds it down from becoming all it is destined to be.

Please pray with me, friends! Let us believe for better for a people who have never experienced “better” so find it difficult to imagine all God’s possibilities for themselves.

To whom much is given, much is required. We have received so much and now we have an opportunity to give into the future of this nation. You can pray. You can give to support the work here. You can go, either to work or to visit and see for yourselves all that God is doing. You can speak up and be a voice for those who have no voice. Please consider how you can be involved.

If you have always wanted to “make a difference” in the world, now is your chance.

Pray. Give. Go. Speak.

Get involved and see what God can do through you!

WHAT DO I KNOW?

2010-08-13T17:53:00.001+02:00

While I was browsing the web this morning, I read something that resonated deeply within me. David Carson wrote, “When I get serious with God, I retreat into a quiet room with no distractions, an open bible, a new notepad and a comfortable pen. Then I cry out to God for wisdom, for God has called me to be a voice, not an echo...”

I have neither a pristine new pad nor a comfortable pen but I do have my bible, trusty laptop and currently reliable though slow, slow, slow internet access. A “quiet room” is something of an oxymoron here at Zimpeto but I am becoming adept at shutting out the noise of 700 school students having recess 50 feet from my house. Earphones in, ipod on, music up, mentally switch off the noise of the world trying to distract my soul.

With a day off work, I even turn off my phone and feel wonderfully irresponsible... then I change my mind and switch it back on again. The irresponsibility is a little too much for me to rise above.

I get quiet and I listen. And I hear, “What do you know? What do you know... today?”

Today I know that God is good. I know that He is kind. He is faithful. Today I know that, even in the midst of difficult situations and questions that have no easy answers, He is mine and I am His. Today I know that, in an imperfect world filled with imperfect people, I have access to the perfection of the One who created me and knows me to the core of who I am. Today I know that I am frustrated by my own imperfection but He is not.

What a relief it is to be sure, today, that I am fully known – and accepted.

Today I know that life is a gift and so are the people around me... even the grace-growers. Ah yes, especially the grace-growers, the ones who challenge my patience and my self-control again and again, allowing grace to grow in me if I choose my responses well. How would I learn to live patiently without having my “patience button” pressed occasionally to keep it in good working order?

Today I know that, cliché though it is, pain moulds me into something better than I am, if I can receive the pressing lessons it holds. Today I know that faith is being sure of what I do not yet see and, though I cannot yet see the shape into which He is moulding me, the result will be good because He is good. And He turns all things to good for those who believe.

Today I know that I believe.

Today I know that there are babies waiting for some love. I know I will come home covered with sand and dirt and sweat and probably the leakage from a few nappies needing changing. Tomorrow I know I will be doing some laundry.

Today I know the visitors I serve here will have a dozen questions for me as soon as I walk into the visitors’ compound. Some of the answers I give will not be satisfactory and others will bring joyful, gracious thanks bubbling up and overflowing into my day. Today I know that this job is a path of privilege to be walked with care.

Today I know that the weather report has predicted the coldest night of the year and, thanks to my family, I have two new hot water bottles to curl up with. I know it will be a two-bottle night.

Today the wind is wildly whipping up the sand and I know that everything in the house will be covered with a layer of grit within the hour. I also know that tomorrow Maria – God bless Maria! – will be here to help me clean the dirt away while laughing at my jokes even though we speak different languages. Today I know that laughter is a language all of its own.

Today I know that one breath at a time is as fast as I am required to walk through this day and that, if anyone demands that I walk faster, it is ok to say no. In fact, it is necessary.

Today I know that I am where I want to be. I cannot say that any day living here is easy. If it were easy, there would not be the satisfaction of knowing, at the end of each day, that He led and I followed and that His grace was sufficient for the day.

Today I know that, for everything He calls me to, He fills the deficit between what I can do and what He calls me to. He fills the deficit between me and Perfection. I want to live today and every day knowing that Perfection leads me and all I am asked to do is follow, trusting.

Today I know that He is good and that He is making me into His likeness, just one day at a time.

PS 118: 24 “This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it.”

[David Carson quote from http://www.christianity.ca/NETCOMMUNITY/Page.aspx? pid=4849]

WHAT IN THE WORLD IS A MISSIONARY?

2010-07-05T16:52:00.005+02:00

The mission field. Now there’s a broad term. Where is it, this “mission field” we refer to so loosely in the church today?

How does one define “the mission field”? Is it a place that is on another continent? Is it somewhere that I am not used to being? Does it have to be a foreign land? Must it be a nation where the lifestyle is very different from my own, where the language and food and culture are unfamiliar to me? Does “the mission field” have to be poor? Or hot? Or a long way from home?

For my grandparents, missionaries sent to the fields of India and China, the term was quite specific – the mission field was a foreign land unreached by the Gospel, and one from which you may never return. My father, seen here on his 80th birthday, was born in India, raised in China, then interned as a POW by the Japanese when war broke out. I will never understand, no matter how I try, the cost that he, his parents and sister counted to be on the mission field all those years ago. He has kept a sweet spirit and a gentle, forgiving nature despite all that he went through. Now there’s a big clue to the thesis that follows…

I am a product of a Christian family and I have sensed that “missionary calling” – whatever it may be - pulsing in my veins for most of my life. Now I live in Mozambique and the longer I live here, the broader my definition becomes.

I have worked in a variety of jobs over the years – teaching, church administration, retail, nannying, waitressing... My very first job as a teenager? “Hello, this is St Ives Sports and Toys. Can I help you?” said of course in the most grown-up tone a fifteen-year-old can muster.

As I mentally retrace the timeline of my life, I can detect few patterns, many unexpected detours, loads of unfulfilled dreams and much boredom interspersed with very occasional bouts of excitement and fulfilment. It was during those rare seasons of delight that I received a tiny taste of all that I was hoping for and felt the heightened tension between the now and the not-yet. I knew that I knew that something bigger and better and more wonderful was just around the corner. But what was it and how would I get there? Was it... wait for it... drum roll please... “the mission field”?

I am a dreamer. I always have been. I have longed and hoped and dreamed big all my life. When people tell me to dream bigger, I laugh because I cannot imagine what bigger is. Perhaps that is what God means when he talks about the “exceeding abundantly more than all we can ask or imagine...” But bigger than MY dreams? Is that really possible?

Then it dawns on me. Of course it is not possible. If it were possible, I would have been there a long time ago. It also dawns on me that, if I had been able to find my own way there, in my own timing, I would not have coped with what I found when I arrived. I would have enjoyed the view for just a moment then choked to death on all the circumstances I was not yet equipped to deal with.

I look back now and the pattern finally becomes clear, the common denominator in all my jobs and relationships and trials and joys and sorrows – everything has been a preparation for now. And now is a preparation for what comes next. So even here, living in Mozambique, the quintessential “mission field” for the hard-core “missionary”, I still feel that tension between the now and the not-yet.

You see, all these years were not a preparation for the mission field. They were preparation for discovering greater depths of the heart of Jesus. Plumbing those depths will never, ever end because the heart of Jesus is bottomless and the goodness of His will for the earth unending.

I do not belong on the mission field. I belong in the perfect will of God.

If I am in the perfect will of God, doing all that He asks me to do, then I have found my mission field, no matter where in the world I am. I happen to live in Mozambique because, for now, this is where God needs me to be - for what I can give and also for what He wants me to receive.

Somehow, in God’s economy, giving and growing go hand-in-hand. The more I give, the more I grow. He has placed me, in every season of my life, in exactly the spot He has wanted me to be. Now, here in this nation so rich with possibilities and so desperate for breakthroughs, I receive so much more than I can give no matter how fast I try to pour myself out on the needs around me. This is the perfect economy of God.

I love that God has brought me here and that I am in His perfect will. I love the mission field in which He has planted me for now. Not because it is easy (it is not). Not because it is fulfilling (it is occasionally). Not because I get to pour out all that I am (some days yes, some days all I want to do is hide away and pretend I am somewhere else).

I still dream. I still search for ways in every day to express my passions. I still sense that heightened tension between the now and the not-yet. The difference now is that, instead of stepping out on my own to fight my way into the future, I am trusting God to lead me there one day at a time, via the mission fields of His choosing, where I am needed and where I need to be.

He is teaching me to squeeze all the possibilities out of each of the days between the now and the not-yet.

So, what does your mission field look like? Where is it? And when, oh when, will you get there?

If you are able to say that you are following God the best way you know how, obeying His voice one whisper at a time, and that tomorrow you plan to do the same, then look around you and take a deep breath.

You’re standing in it.

You can call me a missionary if you like, but only if you are willing to use the term for yourself as well. I am a simple Christian woman doing my best to live God’s way, one day at a time. I am no more nor less valuable to the Kingdom than anyone else. Today I will give of myself, as you will. And today I will pray that I grow a little more in grace and patience and wisdom, as I pray for you also.

Yes, I live in a nation full of needs. So do you. Together, let us walk through another day serving God the best way we know how, encouraging one another in the work of the mission field in which each of us is planted for now.

The harvest is plentiful in your field and in mine, so let’s get to work.

HIS GRACE IS SUFFICIENT

2010-04-04T17:33:00.002+02:00

Last night there was a gecko in my bed. It was only a small gecko but the size is not relevant – it was a slithery lizard and it did not belong where it was. I evicted the invader quickly and with minimum fuss, flicking it gently out from under my mosquito net which, by the way, is meant to keep such interlopers away at night. I know there are geckos residing in the rafters because I wake each morning to look up at new deposits of gecko droppings on top of my crisp white net – just one of many good reasons to use a mozzie net in Africa. The geckos are welcome to share my room so long as they are on the outside looking in while I sleep at night.

I tell you this story by way of proving how very far God has brought me since I left Australia in January 2008 and how very deeply He has worked in me, to bring me to peace and contentment and joy. Yes, even with a gecko on my pillow. Oh how far I have come!

I am of the firm belief that the grace of God is sufficient for anything to which He calls us. There is the danger that some of you may think me trite, especially on this oh-so-holy day of the year, to be thanking God for the grace to live with lizards. Be that as it may, I do see His provision and strengthening in new ways every day here and, so very often, it is in relation to creatures with which I would never choose to associate back home.

Last week His grace was sufficient when I had to deal with the huge rat hiding in the rice sacks stored just outside my front door. The rice is bagged up for the food packages given out each week. Did I mention that it was a rat and it was huge? So huge in fact that even the Mozambican men who came to rescue me commented on how huge it was. When I said “I had to deal with the huge rat”, what I meant was that I sent out an SOS to the workmen next door to come and rescue me.

His grace was sufficient when a cockroach fell onto my shoulder and crawled across my arm while I was praying. His grace was sufficient when an ant started biting me in an embarrassingly inaccessible spot while I was having a meeting outdoors with someone I had only just met. His grace was sufficient when a mouse ran between my feet as I chased it with the electrified tennis racquet I normally use for zapping mosquitoes. The proof that His grace is sufficient is in the fact that I find it hilariously funny to chase a mouse as I wield what I affectionately call my “fanger”. My friend Vella killed a mouse with a dustpan. Splat. I like her style.

His grace is sufficient when the heat saps my strength and leaves me feeling weak and dizzy. His grace is sufficient when more toddlers than I can possibly carry all want to be cuddled at once, running at me and knocking me over in the sand. His grace is sufficient when the bananas – again! – get infested with fruit fly within hours of my buying them. His grace is sufficient when the rain pours in my window and floods the drawers, the floor and my clock radio.

His grace is sufficient when I walk into the Baby House and think of Dino who died a few months ago. I miss Dino’s smile and his giggle and his funny little run when he would rush to me for a hug.

His grace is sufficient as I watch, speechless, helpless, while a young woman drags herself across the busy, blisteringly hot road on her hands and knees, unable to walk.

His grace is sufficient when I am asked for money and food and even for my shoes by the poorest of the poor. His grace is sufficient when I am racked with guilt as I keep my shoes on and walk away.

You see, His grace is sufficient for all He calls us to. Some days, His grace enables me to laugh and other days, to cry. Some days His grace lifts me up to thrive and, other days, grips me tight enough just to survive. His grace – the grace that led Him to the Cross where He gave His life for me – now leads me to live in a place where I need Him every day in ways I never could have imagined or prepared myself for.

When He calls, He provides all that we need for that call, no matter who we are or where it is we go or what we are called to do.

May the God of all grace be your sufficiency this Easter season and may you know to new heights and greater depths than ever before the grace that is sufficient for you, in every way.

LOVE BEARS ALL THINGS

2010-03-30T03:59:00.004+02:00

As I read back over my Mozambique blogs, I realise that I talk like it is easy to live here, as though I roll with the difficulties effortlessly and that it is all one big adventure. Perhaps I have misled you into thinking that I am on top of it all, that as I seek to keep my attitude right and my mind focused and positive, I can handle anything. Possibly I have given the wrong impression by allowing you to think that this amazing adventure is an easy journey to negotiate and that I am a successful negotiator of its many twists and turns.

Please trust me when I say that I have not intentionally misled.

As I read, I realise that I have not been entirely honest. The positive thinker in me, the faith-filled believer in the God who is always good, has determined to believe all things, hope all things, endure all things... [1Cor13:6] Preceding those verses, though, is a challenge to love, and this is where the adventurer in me gets a little shaky.

It is true that I have decided to live my life with eternity beating loudly in my heart, so that every decision I make in each day is informed by this. How grand that sounds! How godly and shiny and unflappable I must be to live this way each day. How very glossy life is when expressed in terms that resound throughout eternity!

Did I mention the six toilets I scrubbed one Saturday morning not long ago? I would like to say that eternity was resounding strongly in my heart as I did it. I would like to say that I prayed over each of those toilets, so that every person who found themselves in a sparkling cubicle that afternoon would sense the eternal weight of their calling as they benefitted from my hard labour.

I wish. It was a stinky, sweaty, messy job and my attitude stunk to match.

I would like to say that moving house is a breeze – I have lived in a different place on average every three months in my time here in Mozambique. But I recognise now that moving throws my soul off balance every time and, just when I am beginning to find my balance again, I move again. Often it is my new housemates who suffer as I take time to gain my equilibrium in a new place.

I pray for a home, a real home where I can settle for awhile, but that is unlikely.

Faith says to believe but sometimes I find it hard. There, I said it.

I would like to say that I negotiate community living well, with grace, patience and selflessness. This I call my “Attitude Wars” where, each day, there are incoming bullets that need to be dodged. The bullets are not shot purposely and often shot without the shooter even realising the gun was loaded. I confess that sometimes I am the shooter and, occasionally and to my utter shame, it is totally premeditated. My attitude wars, when I am on the defensive, lead my actions and, when my attitude stinks, my actions - my words and expressions and body language especially – follow.

I am not good at living selflessly, at putting others’ needs before my own and sacrificing for those with whom I share this wonderful, difficult, crazy environment. Ironically, the more people around me, the lonelier I feel and I wonder how this is possible.

The big picture is that I have sold all and moved to one of the poorest nations on earth to serve. I have been told I am brave and selfless and I have been tempted to believe it all. But those attitude wars keep my feet firmly on the ground. God is concerned as much with the macro-focus of how I love as He is with the big picture.

When I get to Heaven, He will not ask, “Did you sell all you have?... Did you have the faith to go?... Did you speak My word?... “

He will ask one thing and one thing only: “Did you love?”

It has become easy now for me to stop in the middle of a busy day for the toddler in the sand wanting my attention. I like now to give my “down time” on a Sunday to pray with the old vovos sitting outside church waiting for lunch. I look forward now to going to the Tuesday prayer meeting where I will be the only woman and the only non-Portuguese speaker. When I can call it “Ministry”, it happens now without too much internal fuss. But when it is “life” happening amongst the brothers and sisters with whom I live each day, it is different and it should not be.

I am called to love, no matter who is standing in front of me. I have written before about stopping for the one. Why is “the one” out in the sand, crying for a hug, easier to stop for than the one in my own home? Where did I learn that Big-M “Ministry” starts when I step out the front door each day? What about the small-m ministry that begins over coffee in the morning?

I live in community with many others from all walks of life and from all parts of the world. It will not ever be easy and I think that is just how God wants it. We are “grace-growers” for one another. If I can win my attitude wars here in my own home then, surely, I have more chance of winning the war beyond my front door as I walk out to face each day.

“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful... Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”

COUNTING BLESSINGS

2010-03-12T13:47:00.010+02:00

It is Friday morning, 4.45am. I wake to the gentle scraping of sand being raked into neat submission as one of the younger boys begins his daily chore near my window. He does not have to work at 4.45am but I guess he is a very early riser. Not owning a watch, he gets out of bed when he wakes, gathers his equipment and walks alone across the sand in the pre-dawn stillness.

At this time of year it is not yet cool in the early morning but bearably warm. As he works, he waits for the sun to light up the ordered rows of rake-marks that will be scuffed away in just an hour or two. 300 pairs of feet do a lot of scuffing in the sand.

This is the most peaceful time of the day here at Zimpeto, before all those feet carry their sleepy owners out of their dorms and onto the playground, hungrily awaiting their breakfast of bread and tea in the refertorio. It is at this time of day that faith rises in me, everything looks clearer and I know that anything is possible. The stresses of yesterday were laid to rest before sleep last night and today’s busyness has not yet stirred me into action. The knocking at the door will begin at 6.00 with the younger boys wanting balls pumped up and bandaids for their grazes. So I figure I have about an hour to sip my coffee, get quiet on the inside and listen – just listen.

Around here, listening to the still small voice within is hard to do because there is always noise. I live with 300 kids so of course there is always noise, except when they are eating or when they’re asleep. You know that dinnertime hush that falls on a family as they dig in to their meal together after a long, active day? Here, at 7am and at 12 and again at 5pm, I physically feel the hush descend for just a few minutes and my whole body sighs from the inside out.

First comes the siren, the loud, intrusive and very successful means of getting 300 kids to the table at once. Then some yelling or singing, clapping and all those voices yelling “Ahhh-men” in unison.

And then... nothing. No sound at all. Silence. Breathe out. Be still. Get quiet on the inside and listen. And rest for just a moment as the hush settles like a thick, cool fog that you hope will last forever.

The fog only lasts for 15 minutes though and then it is gone, blown away by the whirlwind of 600 feet and 300 voices and the babies in the sand and the boys on the slide and the band practising with the sound turned up high and the banging at the door as Aurelio brings his ball full of holes back to be pumped up for the third time today. Sigh, focus, get to work.

All the children go into their dorms at 9pm when silence descends once again but, by that time, I am just-about ready for bed myself. Refer above to the raking under the window at 4.45am.

So my quiet time, my thinking time, my praying and processing and just-being-still time has to be early. It is my favourite time of the day. It is my time to ponder the big questions of life as well as the little soul-issues scratching at my heart until I dig a bit deeper and find resolution. If not resolution, then I settle for acceptance, for peace with the status quo for today. Perhaps tomorrow morning, in the stillness of the dark pre-dawn hours, I will come to resolution. How good it is to know that there is tomorrow, and tomorrow and tomorrow.

This is why the gentle sound of sand being raked before dawn each day is not a disturbance but a gift I look forward to as I fall asleep at night. I sometimes wonder who it is giving me such a gift and if I could ever explain in a way that he would understand. I am so thankful that, every morning, he crawls out of bed in the darkness, finds his rake as he rubs the sleep from his eyes and goes to work on the sand under my window.

Who would have thought that a little boy tidying the sand before dawn would change me every day. So, thank you to my little friend for a gift you do not know you are giving and for which you ask nothing in return. It is a free gift indeed.

Catch you tomorrow, same time, same place.

Dino - Child of Zimpeto, Son of God

2010-01-22T02:12:00.014+02:00

Dino. Three years old. A giggler. A smiler. A cuddler. A child of Zimpeto and a son of God. Desperately underweight and malnourished when he was brought to the Centre two years ago, Dino thrived on the care and attention he received. He grew gradually into a chubby, happy, good-humoured boy known as “Mr Dino” because he seemed old and thoughtful beyond his years.

Everybody fell in love with Dino. He was one minute hilarious and laughing without a care in the world, the next pondering and serious as though he were weighing the world’s problems and deciding what he could do about them. Mr Dino had a plan.

Two weeks ago, Dino died. After months of undiagnosed infections with high temperatures, Dino was admitted to the hospital where he stayed for a night. The next morning, in respiratory failure, his little body had no more fight left in it and he left us.

The last time I saw Dino, it was just a few weeks ago - a day or two before I flew out to visit Australia. He spotted me as I was walking across the hot sand. I was in a rush as usual to see someone about something so seemingly important then but now, from this view, utterly unimportant. I saw a little round body stand up in the distance, brush the dirt from his hands and begin to move towards me. I paused, mentally calculating the time it would take to get all the jobs ticked off my list so I could try to find a respite from the oppressive afternoon heat.

Dino was overweight – a miracle really after the physical trials of his first year of life – and still not the healthiest of children, HIV positive with various issues not yet clearly diagnosed. He shuffled towards me, arms out wide and his little feet stirring up a cloud of dust as he dragged them through the hot, hot sand. He looked unsure. Perhaps I had walked past, too busy, just one too many times for him to trust that I would stop for him this time.

As the thought registered, it pierced my heart. This babe, this precious child who had lost everything important in the world before his first birthday, was turning to me now with arms open wide. I stopped. I grinned. I crouched, bent low and spread my arms out wide.

Dino squealed. His face lit up. He laughed – one of those from-the-belly bubbling-over laughs so pure and free and joyous that I laughed with him. He shuffled faster, arms pumping at his sides. I thought he would topple forward, his feet not moving as fast as the rest of his body. But he knew what he was doing, his timing was perfect. Dino had a plan. Just as he reached me, his momentum lifted him off his feet as he fell towards me, giggling, reaching. Trusting.

As his arms encircled my neck, I picked him up and lifted him to me. I held him tightly and we swung together in a circle, stirring up more dirt that billowed and wafted, sticking to our damp skin. We turned and we turned and we turned, laughing and puffing and clinging tightly to one other. Ah the purest of joys!

Dino’s place on this earth can never be filled by another. He is irreplaceable in the hearts of those who had the privilege of loving him for a short season. In Heaven there was a place prepared for him and ready for his arrival and now, after three years of pain and grief and sickness and love and joy and laughter, He is home.

Our kids do not belong to us. We have no ownership, no rights. We do, though, have an awesome responsibility to nurture them as best we can, filling them to the brim with all the love we can muster for as long as they are entrusted to our care. It is impossible to know how long that will be so every second and every smile and hug and touch count in ways that go deeper than we can know.

My heart aches to see Dino again. I think of Paulo and Tino, Irene and Thabo, and all the children we have known and lost. It is not fair. It is not right. The world is out of balance when children can starve to death or die of diseases inherited through no doing of their own.

It is not right that children suffer. The “problem” – and even to name it “a problem” minimises its enormity and the injustice of it all - is huge and I feel so very, very small in comparison. Asking “Why?” brings an overwhelming sense of helplessness which leads me to numbing inaction in the face of such a huge question. So instead I ask, “What now? What next?”

I and the workers of Zimpeto had the privilege of loving a precious boy for much of his too-short life. Dino was loved and he was happy. Now he is no longer sick and he cannot be rejected or harmed anymore. He is in the safest place of all, in the arms of the Father who knows him better than we ever could.

Now, all I know to do is go back to that place of miracles where most of our children are loved into full and active lives and where, sometimes, they are loved into the arms of Jesus.

Dino. Son of God and a child of Zimpeto. He was with us not nearly long enough and now is in the arms of the Father who loves him perfectly. May we learn how to do the same with those of His children that He asks us to love here on earth.

Dino, on the left, with his buddy Francisco.

A BRIDGE BETWEEN WORLDS

2009-10-31T13:49:00.005+02:00

The question I am asked more than any other is, “What do you do in Mozambique?”

My four-year-old niece prayed for me during my last visit home, “God, please help Wennie to look after the babies in Africa.” It is a fair assumption that I “look after the babies”, considering that I live in the midst of a 300-child centre and I do talk a lot about them to anyone who will listen. I spend time with the children of Zimpeto but that is not my official role – for me, being with the children is refreshment at the end of a long day or on a quiet weekend.

My main role is to look after the visitors who come to spend time with our kids and to experience the many ministry opportunities here. We receive more than 1000 visitors each year from all over the world. They play soccer, do craft, teach guitar, talk to, pray with and love on the children. For their two or three week stay, visitors pour into our kids the kind of focused attention that most of the resident missionaries, as much as we would like to, generally cannot.

My life in Mozambique began as a visitor to Zimpeto. Then when I moved here to live, it took me a day to travel but, in hindsight, a lifetime of preparation to get here.

I had spent much of my life turning away from the suffering of the poor, avoiding the horrendous statistics about child poverty and infant mortality, refusing to acknowledge how very rich I really was. Whenever a child sponsorship ad came on TV… cue soft music, zoom in on an emaciated little body, “For $30 a month, you can change Arsenia’s life forever…” I was one of those who could not watch.

I would shut my eyes tightly, reach for the remote and press any button I could find just to change the channel and avoid looking upon such agony. Then one day I stopped avoiding and began to look - to really look. I remember the moment. I made a conscious decision to see what my heart refused to acknowledge until that point. Denial was no longer an option. My own sense of helplessness could no longer excuse me from avoiding the truth. So I whispered, almost hoping my prayer would not be heard, “What can I do?”

In that moment, I stepped beyond helplessness and into a world of possibilities. It did not occur to me that I could make even the slightest difference. The problem was too big and I was way too small and inconsequential. Never did I think…

I was a visitor to Zimpeto for three weeks in 2006 and nothing has been the same for me since. I visited because I wanted to see. I wanted to feel. I no longer wanted to numb myself to the pain that others in the world were suffering. I wanted to confront my own sense of helplessness in the face of such pain and inquire of God, “What can I do? As tiny as I am, what can I do? You’re big, I’m not. You’re the God of the exceeding abundantly more than I can ask or imagine. So what can You do through me?”

Now I live in Mozambique. It was never part of the plan and I am still surprised that I am here. I laugh as I think of it! God has truly done “exceeding abundantly more…” and I am daily amazed.

Now I have the privilege of walking others through their oftentimes first visit to Mozambique and to Africa. I am one of a team that is building a bridge between worlds, walking brave souls back and forth as they negotiate this narrow way. I am very aware with each day that comes and each visitor I meet that it is impossible to step into this particular world, even briefly, without being changed deeply and forever.

The change works both ways.

The poor have no voice. They have no forum in which they can speak and be heard. The orphan, the widow, the sick and the outcast - they have no way to proclaim their needs in a form that will be heard by the rest of the world. They do not have the resources to change their circumstances or their future, no way to get their message through to a world that communicates via email and skype, cable television and Oprah. Their silence condemns them to unending powerlessness.

Perhaps, by welcoming visitors to this ministry, we can provide one small forum in which the poor can speak. 1000 visitors who pass through our gates each year hear the voices calling to them from the garbage dump, the hospital and the jail. They hear the stories of our children - the many, many stories of illness and abuse, of starvation and rejection. They stop long enough to listen and to learn.

Our visitors go into the community to pray for the sick and distribute food to the hungry. They cuddle the tiny malnourished babies in the nursery and visit the widows’ home while the old vovos – the Mozambican grandmas - tend their newly-planted vegetable garden. They watch the young mothers bring their newborns to the clinic for milk and they chat with the many lined up waiting for medical attention. They drive through the city and weep for the blind beggar tapping at the vehicle’s windows, palms turned upward and eyes cloudy and dull. They look away, deeply disturbed by the sight of the young woman dragging herself roughly across the busy road on her hands and knees, somehow waving two lanes of traffic to a halt as she crawls over the hot, potholed roadway.

When you come and you listen - and you hear - you empower the poor. By listening, you give them a voice with which they can share their needs. Then you take their message back with you. You go home and you pray. You stir others to pray, or to come, or to speak up, or to raise the finances so desperately needed here.

Through the visitors who come to Zimpeto, the voice of the poor resonates around the world.

I do not take care of orphans as part of my role here. I do not play with them each day or feed them or tuck them into bed at night. My role is to facilitate others to come and to see, and then to go home with a good report, bearing witness to the hand of God working for a nation in need.

I work as part of a team that brings worlds together, in the hope that one can support the other in ways that will change both forever.

For more information about visiting Zimpeto Children’s Centre, email zimpetohospitality@irismin.org

ASK WHERE THE GOOD WAY IS

2009-09-12T13:30:00.010+02:00

[A brief look back to a busy, busy day in July...]

Yesterday the world was spinning faster than I had experienced for a long time. I am learning to say “despera por favor” with a smile. “Please wait…”

Needs to be met. Issues to be faced. Problems to be solved. Questions to which I must respond… now! Phones to be answered, again and again and again. There are days when I juggle three phones at once. I have learned to hold two conversations at the same time; after all, I have two ears and two hands.

Yesterday there were plans to be finalised, messages to be delivered, money to be sorted, accommodation to be organised, directions to be given, vehicles to be coordinated, transport to the airport for 37 people all at once… hugs, thanks, goodbyes… oh no, I forgot to find the lost suitcase! As the day progressed and the world turned faster and faster, my head began to spin with it. I wondered how to do everything that needed to be done without dropping the ball, my bundle or the many papers I was carrying around to reassure me that I was on top of everything.

I headed for the Baby House to deliver a message. The plan was to be in and out in a moment. No time for distractions or play or loving on babies today.

Within seconds, I’d delivered my message but Lourenco had spotted me. I began to back out the door. He ran towards me, gathering momentum even as his feet tripped over each other. He leaned forward precariously as I began to turn away, his arms wide and face beaming even as I thought, “I don’t have time for you today.” As he reached me, he fell into my arms and I I instinctively swung him into the air. Somehow my day was hijacked by the smile of a precious babe.

To think, I almost missed it.

As I held him, he placed one tiny hand on each of my shoulders and turned his head, leaning his cheek firmly against mine. I felt his little body relax as he leaned against me. His breathing began to slow and deepen.

My day’s agenda faded as I held him close. I began to sing quietly to him, “Yes, Jesus loves you…” as his arms loosened and his hands dropped from my shoulders. The echoing noise of thirty children playing within the concrete walls of the Baby House faded as I focused on this one beautiful boy wanting a few moments of my attention.

Lourenco has no mother to rock him to sleep at night, no father to swing him high in the air and catch him as he squeals with delight. He has spent the first two years of his life without a family to remind him that he is loved and he is special and that there is hope for him to be all that he wants to be in his life.

Yesterday, for a few moments he had me. It is not enough but it is something. Somehow my heart was hijacked, just for awhile, by a toddler innocent enough despite his losses to still believe that a hug is enough. He stirred an instinct in me so viscerally powerful that it took my breath away. To hold an orphan seeking love is worship of the highest order.

And so I surrendered, my heart taken captive by the guileless trust of a child. He knew that, as he ran and toppled in my direction, my arms would catch him and lift him high. This babe who has no earthly reason to trust, trusted me. It is why we are here: to catch them before they fall and lift them as high as we possibly can, holding them there until they can soar on their own.

For a few moments yesterday, the world stopped spinning, my heart stopped racing and rest took me over. I breathed out the busyness of the day as I sang over him. He was being filled and refreshed by love, even as his tiny body relaxing in my arms was refreshing me.

I swayed gently and continued to sing as he leaned his head back and his eyes gazed at my lips singing life over him. My back found the wall and I slowly slipped down and onto the cool concrete floor, babe in arms. His eyes drooped and closed and he fell asleep. All the riotous noise of thirty children faded into the background as I gazed at his sleeping face and thanked God for reminding me why I am here – to stop for the one.

“The one” in this moment was a toddler needing a cuddle. Perhaps the one tomorrow will be a Mozambican tia needing a smile or a staff member a word of encouragement for all the work he does. Perhaps it is, as today, one of the 60 or so visitors wandering the Centre, their hearts being stirred for a harvest field so ripe that they can smell the richness of the crop as they walk through the sand, praying and laughing and loving on our children.

Today, Lourenco’s soul needed refueling, as did mine. He reminded me to slow down, to breathe, and to stop for awhile. As he slept in my arms, I poured love into him with my touch and my words and my prayers. I quietly thanked God for these moments, for using the outstretched arms of a toddler to draw me aside from the busyness of my day, reminding me that He leads me beside still waters and He restores my soul. I could so easily have missed it. Even on the busiest of days, He is my Restorer - and Lourenco’s.

Half an hour later and the world was no longer spinning, my heart no longer racing and my head now thinking more clearly about the next steps to take in this day full of challenges. I whispered my thanks to this little boy for giving me more than I could possibly give back to him. I handed him carefully to a tia and slipped away, walking more gently now, back into a day filled with opportunities to serve, one person at a time, with a smile.

“…ask where the good way is and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.” Jer 6:16

LIVING EACH MOMENT

2009-09-05T12:33:00.004+02:00

Finally! Blogger is allowing me to upload again. Forgive my five-month silence and thank you for the gentle - and the not-so-gentle - prompts to keep writing. A day feels incomplete to me until I have poured some words out as my soul seeks to make sense of the world in which I am living.

Now, here, in a land so different from the one in which I have spent most of my life, I need to write more than ever before. As I write, I hold circumstances with all their attendant joys and sorrows up to the brightness of the sun. I peer closely to find meaning in each shifting glint. As I construct sentences and paragraphs, revisiting events and conversations of the day, I glean meaning from the state of affairs that stretch my soul each day. I seek to discard the chaff and, hopefully, retain the nourishing life lessons that shift me closer to being all I can be, giving all that I can give.

There are days when the arrogance of my human soul astounds me as I attempt to draw logical understanding from unutterable suffering. Mostly, there is no sense to be made. On other days, when my soul is tired and needs to rest from trying to understand all it witnesses, I rest from thinking and I just feel. Oh what a relief that is! Even when the feelings are deep and painful and shake me to the core, it is a relief to lay down my need to understand.

I am learning just to be. I am seeking to master the art of breathing slowly and deeply through each minute and each circumstance, no matter what comes my way. I have entrusted my soul to someone greater and my circumstances to the goodness of the God who designed me for the life I have been called to live. Ah the peace in trusting!

Since my last post, life has moved apace as it only can in Mozambique. I have watched again and again as friends and coworkers grieve the deaths of friends and family members. I have witnessed three Mozambican marriages, welcomed several new babies into the Zimpeto family, moved house for the fourth time this year, sadly farewelled old friends and welcomed new ones.

I had my first run-in with a shapa (public minivan) as its driver tried to squeeze between my vehicle and the truck coming in the opposite direction. The shapa driver was obviously a man of faith – after all, faith is being sure of what we do not see: he tried to get his vehicle through a gap that did not exist and he succeeded. Despite the shapa catching my side mirror, there was no damage to my vehicle. Note to self: never assume two lanes mean two lanes.

Here at the Centre, I continue to struggle with the language, inflicting my appalling but gradually improving grammar on anyone who stops long enough to listen. I will never surrender! The toddlers now occasionally understand and respond to my Portuguese. The teenagers still laugh. Some of the little ones have come close to mastering my name: more “Winda” than Wendy but that’s OK with me, especially when grubby fingers are reaching for a hug while faces beam, content and satisfied and asking for nothing more than a cuddle and a smile. And a song sung to the strumming of my new guitar, sent to me by some school students in Sydney, Australia. Thank you!

Days have turned into weeks and weeks into months as the year flies past. The mild, perfectly pleasant winter is now making way for spring and I am continually challenged to make the most of every moment of my days. And still I can say with all my heart that I would be nowhere else in the world.

DID SHE SAY “THE PALACE”?

2009-03-27T17:21:00.006+02:00

When I moved to Mozambique, I took with me certain expectations, many of which have already been realised.

I fully expected meltingly hot summers that lasted for half the year. I knew that clean feet would be a thing of the past and that noisy children would be raking the sand under my window at 5am in the morning. I understood that the hot water supply would be inconsistent, that the electricity would shut down regularly and that internet access would be slow at best and non-existent at worst.

I hoped for regular meals out and an occasional hot afternoon meandering slowly through the upmarket, air conditioned mall in town. I longed for adventurous drives into the bush to stay with the locals, and road trips with new friends to view the magnificent northern Mozambique coastline. I dreamed of glorious orange sunsets and clear African skies reaching on forever. I even planned some holidays, perhaps to Swaziland or Tanzania or South Africa’s Cape Town way down at the bottom of the continent.

Never in my wildest dreams did I expect the adventures of last night.

I received the call with only 23 hours notice that something was up. I was invited to a reception and was I free? Of course! I had never met the woman on the phone – she was an Australian working at the US Embassy, which made no sense to me at all. But a free night out is worth a lot to a tired, dusty Aussie living in Africa, so of course I said yes. I hung up the phone then thought, “Did she just say ‘The Palace?’”

At 10.30 the next morning, the gilt-edged invitation was hand-delivered to confirm what I had begun to suspect was someone pulling my leg. “The President of the Republic of Mozambique invites Senhora Wendy Walker to an Official Banquet at the Palacio de Ponto Vermelho...”

And so it began. I was officially invited to the Palace for a State Banquet being hosted by the President and First Lady of Mozambique, in honour of our very own Australian Governor General who was dropping in briefly during her ten nation tour. Being an Aussie living in Maputo is serving me very well indeed.

So, how to proceed? First, a quick dash to the nearest clothes shop forty minutes away. But no, the car wouldn’t start. After an hour’s delay, I borrowed a vehicle and was on my way. Then home with a new skirt to ask Laura’s help with the rest of the outfit. Only then did I think to get the invitation translated precisely. Oh no! Formal! A cotton skirt would never do.

I am an Aussie gal living in a developing nation in a compound with 300 kids. I play in the sand. I climb splintered wooden play equipment. I carry babies around at every opportunity. The only reason I wear shoes is to avoid catching those tiny little worms that bury into one’s skin and lay their eggs there. I fight a daily war against dust and grime which I will never win so I may as well signal surrender and relax. The closest I get to formal is tying a capalana over my cut-offs and swapping my grey thongs for black ones for church on Sunday mornings.

It did not occur to me to bring a formal gown from Australia to my orphanage-home in Mozambique. What an oversight.

Laura took charge. God bless Laura. “Wendy, we’re going into town. We have to SHOP! Meet me at the car in 15 minutes.” So Laura drove me all the way into town to buy clothes. She also drove me all around town showing me how to find the Palace and how to get home at the end of the night. Here I was thinking, “How hard can it be to find a palace in the middle of Maputo?” I never would have made it there and back in the dark Mozambican night without this tour.

We had less than an hour to find something floor-length and formal. For the first time in my life, I was thankful that my dress size is more Harare than Hollywood. The first thing I tried on was a floor length skirt. Perfect fit. Done. Second shop, black wrap top. Done. I believe I just witnessed a miracle. In and out in forty minutes for a job that could have taken months back in Australia.

Home. No time to sit down with just over an hour to get back out the door. I borrowed a selection of handbags and shoes and wraps and jewellery from my “ladies in waiting”, all as excited as I was. Showered then searched for the blow dryer for its first use in Mozambique. Then makeup (I had to remember... is it liner or shadow first?) and finally worked out the rest of the outfit. No time for trial and error. The last thing I did was slip on some borrowed sandals - perfect fit! I felt like Cinderella being dressed for the ball. Then Sandra took photos and sent me on my way.

I hiked up my long skirt and clambered into the big old filthy, noisy, borrowed ute, wearing very unglamorous sandshoes for the drive. It was about then that I started laughing and did not stop all night. I drove the fifty minutes through smoky, smelly Maputo, dressed up to the nines, feeling very much like a princess driving a pumpkin.

I pulled up at the boom gates to the Palace but was refused entry, even with my fancy invitation. What to do? “Nao falo Portuguese! Do you speak English?” I begged as several guards with rifles gathered around my car. Then, right next to me, an official vehicle with flags on the hood pulled up. Someone opened the back window and called, "Wendy, is that you? Follow us!" It was the woman from the US Embassy who had phoned the night before to invite me. I realised I must be even more conspicuous than I thought. I took a deep breath, waved and smiled at the armed guards then drove past them. I was in.

I pulled up behind all the clean, sleek white government cars and slipped out of the high cab of the ute, hoping not to catch my now-dusty dress on the way down. Then I realised I still had my sandshoes on. Back up into the cab, changed my shoes and got out. I looked across the road to see the official party from the other car waiting patiently for me and watching every move.

I made it half way across the road before a guard caught up and told me to move my car. Back I went, inelegantly hitched up my shiny black floor-length gown, climbed in and started the car again.

I tried to back up over the curb and onto the footpath as instructed. I was still being watched as the car chugged loudly then stalled. I started up once more then skidded the tyres trying to get the back wheels over the high gutter. Finally and after much revving and screeching, I gave up with half the hood still hanging out over the road. I motioned thumbs up to the guard then refused to look his way again, in case he made me move the car further.

Out I climbed once more and honked the horn accidentally on the way down. I scurried away from the guard, inasmuch as one can scurry in slip-on Cinderella sandals, and joined the very patient group waiting for me. I was laughing as I introduced myself. Why were they not smiling?

Finally – finally! - I walked in with my new friends who then left me on my own. I took a deep breath, walked up to complete strangers, held out my hand and said, "Boa Noite. Chama me Wendy. Do you speak English?" Every Australian I met knew other Aussies there with whom they wanted to chat so, feeling like an unwanted extra, I made for the Africans and was welcomed warmly.

At Table 17, I sat between a Presidential Aide and the Tanzanian Consul to Mozambique. What delightful company they were. I learned that not all Presidential Aides speak English, that my poor Portuguese is apparently very amusing, and that Kilimanjaro and the Serengeti are a must-see for anyone living anywhere near Tanzania. I believe an open invitation was extended. I believe...

The military band played the Australian National Anthem (oh my) and O Presidente da Moçambique made a speech which was translated via headphones on all the tables. The translator kept referring to the "Australian General Governor" which made me giggle, quite inappropriately.

We – about 200 mostly Africans with some washed-out Aussies in the mix - were seated at round tables in a giant white marquee with crisp linen, fresh flowers and air conditioning. The special guests were seated on a long table up high at one end. Imagine the Last Supper African-style. GG Quentin Bryce looked stunning in bright pink but so skinny and fragile compared to the Mozambican women that I fully expected her to be blown over at any moment.

On the table were red and white roses with a tall, wooden giraffe standing up in the middle of each arrangement. The food was part Mozambican (kassava, maize meal and bean leaves) and part “western” (turkey, prawns, citrus sorbet and spinach mousse) which was a bold blend of cultures, no less. The entertainment was provided by several apparently well-known Mozambican musicians – Amelia Moiane, Madala, Gabriela and Eyuphuro. It seems that one single name is all the rage no matter where in the world one is famous.

After three hours of superlative service by white-gloved waiters, the fascinating company of Kilibi and Cassimiro and some scintillating conversation in which I learned much about African ways, the President suddenly rose to leave. The band played the Mozambican National Anthem and we all stood and clapped. Within moments, our tables were being cleared and we were ushered out.

Everybody waited out by the road for their government cars to pull up and I realised that my big ol’ 4WD was parked right in front of the crowds waiting for their drivers. I paused then decided that any semblance of dignity had been lost when I stalled the first time, or perhaps it was when I got out of my car wearing sandshoes. Or was it the horn-honking? I clambered in, watched by about 50 people. Started up. Then stalled again. Perhaps my dainty little Cinderella slippers were the problem. So I changed shoes, started up again, pulled onto the road right in front of the crowd where the car shuddered loudly to a stop once more. Something was wrong and it was not about the shoes.

Gradually the crowd dispersed to their cars, driving around me and leaving me stranded in the middle of the road. My car was in the palace grounds, all the guests were now gone and all was silent. A dozen armed guards were staring at me, wishing I would leave so they could all go to bed.

Eventually one of them took pity, came to my window and motioned for me to get out. What's a girl to do? The man had a gun. I got out, by now an expert at hiking my skirt up and slipping off the car seat. I stood in front of all the guards in my floor length black and my sandshoes. And I laughed, smiling and gesturing palms up with a shrug to say, “I have no idea what I’m doing.” I am sure the young man on the end laughed. I’m sure of it.

The guard had the same trouble as me and kept stalling which made me feel so much better but did not help me get home. The car was stuck in 4WD and there was nothing I could do about it. So I could drive home but only in low gear, slowly. I thanked my helper, climbed in once more, waved to the guards, and called “Obrigada! Boa noite!” I smiled directly at the one on the end who, I swear, lifted his hand just a little by his side to wave back. I drove off into the night as we all breathed a sigh of relief.

This night was an adventure beyond anything I could imagine for myself. It was a free gift I will always remember. It is not, though, the presence of the President that I will think back on particularly, nor the speeches nor the military band nor even the grandeur of the Palace.

I will think back on the overwhelming peace with which I was enveloped as I walked through what had the potential to become a tense and frustrating day. I will remember the selfless joy of friends helping me, laughing with me and ushering me into a dream, blessing me with their time and energy and cars and clothes and shoes and even their money.

The magnificence of a Presidential Banquet was somehow eclipsed by the charm and wit of dinner companions as interested in my culture as I was in theirs. The five course meal drew less appreciation from me than the gracious patience of Mozambicans willing to converse with a westerner who does not yet speak their language. The frustration of a broken-down car was completely overshadowed by one guard willing to step from his post to assist me, and another smiling ever so slightly as we shared a joke.

I will forever remember the humour I discovered somewhere deep inside me as two worlds collided and laughter lessened the impact. This is the place where I want to reside, where laughter and peace lead and all else must follow.

Now, if only I could find that other slipper...

A DAY IN THE LIFE...

2009-03-27T09:58:00.005+02:00

9.30 Anna and I leave in the "Black Panther", a low sporty little sedan, a bit beaten up and fragile. This car is a Godsend I've been leant – seems to me not the most practical sort of car to own in Mozambique but so much fun. We’re off for a morning of errands, planning to be back by 1.00. I begin to adjust to the Mozambican traffic again, remembering that trucks get right of way because they're big, two lanes mean four or possibly even five at a pinch and indicators mean nothing at all.

10.00 Airport to change US dollars to Mozambican metacais for hospitality department shopping. While I wait in the car, illegally parked, I watch a young boy of about 9, shoeless, dirty and dressed in rags, search through the bin next to the car and take out two empty water bottles. He puts them in an old rice sack, throws it over his shoulder and moves slowly on. I cry and I pray. I feel incredibly conspicuous in my nice black car. I vow to remember to buy some packets of biscuits to keep in the glove box for begging children.

10.15 Anna’s back but the car won’t start. We call Vasco (head of vehicles for the Centre) who says: "The Centre mechanic didn't come to work today. I'll try to find him.”

10.20 “He’s at home. He’ll be there in half an hour." Anna buys drinks while I wait for Julio.

11.00 Call Vasco again, who says, "He's nearly there." We sit on the ground out front of the airport and wait, receiving many second glances. I see no other white faces the whole time we’re there.

11.10 Jonny pulls up, having heard that we broke down. God bless Jonny! Opens the bonnet and tinkers. Soon a Mozambican man offers to help. He starts the car in just a few minutes.

11.30 Anna calls Vasco to cancel the mechanic. “He keeps telling me he’s almost there. He’s not there?” Mission resumes.

11.45 “Game”, my favourite place to shop. Imagine a huge Kmart and Bunnings combined, without the clothes.

12.30 Buy a new printer for hospitality. Forgot the ink, which means another trip into town another day.

12.45 Lunch at Sagrez, my favourite place to eat – right on the beach. While sitting, all we can see is the ocean, brown, hazy with scum floating on top. Cooling sea breeze, I forget for awhile where I am. Have the typical Mozambican lunch of Portuguese chicken, salad, rice and soggy chips. Hawkers hold up their touristy trinkets from the beach beyond the low green wall, calling “Sensa... Sensa...”, “Excuse me...” quietly to get our attention.

1.45 Stand to leave and notice, for the first time, the piles of garbage all along the dirty brown sand’s tide line, blocked from our view while sitting and enjoying our meal. What a mess.

2.15 Shoprite for groceries. Usually I go on the “visitors’ run” in the minibus once a week and buy very little for lack of space on the way home. Today Anna and I have a whole boot we can fill if we want to. I stock up on heavy items like canned toms and long-life milk, while Anna is here to help me carry and we have lots of space in the car. Anna buys six weeks’ worth of nappies for Gilda, the disabled girl she cares for in the girls’ dorm.

In the fresh food aisle (the term “fresh” used loosely here), a young girl, maybe ten, sidles up next to me and stands for awhile. I pull my handbag closer, thinking she has seen me withdraw money from the teller a few minutes earlier. She holds her hand in front of me and on her palm is written a word in ink: “ioma”. Then she zips her lips just like a teacher to tell me not to speak and shows me the word again. She’ll be thrown out if found begging in the supermarket. I don’t know what this word means but I suspect it’s Shangaana, perhaps for money. I look deep into her eyes and smile, and she looks back for a moment, sadder and more lost than I can imagine it’s possible to be. Then she turns and walks away, disappearing into the crowd of people shopping for luxuries like soap and cereal that she has probably never had. I want to chase after her and hug her and bring her home and feed her and tell her I can make everything better. But I can’t. Every day here, my heart breaks in a new way. Imagine how Jesus must feel.

(On a lighter note, last week at Shoprite a short, gorgeous black man started a conversation with me in the laundry products aisle. I had begun to suspect somewhere near the insecticides that I was being followed. He said he was Sudanese and he obviously wanted to chat. We talked for a moment then I excused myself, saying I had to meet my friend. He asked for my phone number, “So we can talk...” First time I’ve been asked for my phone number in quite a while. And it had to be in Mozambique, in the supermarket, next to the bleach, by a Sudanese refugee “wanting to talk”.)

3.00 I put the groceries in the car and dash up the road to Woolworths (imagine a classy deli back home with packs of ham costing $9 and individual frozen meals $13). I wonder if it's worth the effort in the heat. I nod at the guard as I enter. I buy yoghurt that I can be reasonably sure won't go off by the time I get home. I buy half a dozen eggs at almost $1 each – the only eggs I can find in Maputo with yellow yolks. Shoprite yolks are beige and, I suspect, bereft of nutrients. My weekly splurge.

3.15 We head home, Anna looking for brooms for sale on the side of the road and me looking for a bed. We see a bed, after six weeks of searching! We pull over, right outside the Bocaria, the garbage dump where the smells and the smoke are almost overwhelming some days. Today, it’s not too bad at all. We wait for several minutes for a break in the traffic then take our lives in our hands and cross in front of several shapas fighting for lane space and heading our way at speed.

We check out the silver-painted metal bed, propped up on empty cans in the sand. The maker appears and I tell him, “Nao fala Portuguese”. I don’t speak Portuguese. Somehow, he gets the opposite message, so directs all his comments to me and won’t listen to Anna, a consummate Portuguese speaker. He eventually realises his mistake and we all laugh. We take his number. Yes, he has a phone. He makes beds from scrap metal and sells them by the side of the road, in the sand. He has no running water and probably no electricity. And he has a mobile phone. Very normal here.

4.00 We get back to the Centre and wait for the guard to open the gates. I pull through and feel the piled-up sand in the middle of the driveway drag against the bottom of the newly christened Black Panther. One of our Mozambican workers appears in a car from the opposite direction. I assume he'll pull back and let us through, there being room for only one car at a time. Instead of reversing, he keeps coming towards us. He doesn’t stop – he slows and pulls to the side and motions for me to do the same. I know that if I pull into the soft sand, I’ll get stuck. He keeps driving towards me so I have no choice. I pull to the side. I get stuck. He waves and keeps driving.

We’re stuck. Anna gets out and tries to push. Another worker drives towards us. He slows, looks, waves and keeps driving. Two men walk over, look, nod, and keep walking. All the while, Anna is pushing and I’m revving and we’re getting nowhere. Then, the boys on the soccer field (really just a red dust bowl) see us and a swarm of them start yelling and running towards us. I think, “I don’t want children near a bogged, slipping car” but then realise I have no choice. And they’ll love to be the rescuers of we damsels in distress. So, seven little heroes push and push and get the car out, and cheer. We’ve made their day and they’ve made ours.

4.15 Home, groceries unpacked. We took three hours longer than expected, as we always do here. My western planning mentality seems unable to adjust to how long it takes to accomplish anything. I’m exhausted. Over the next two hours I receive eight visitors, three phone calls and half a dozen texts, for all sorts of reasons. This is why going out for a day of running errands is actually quite restful, even with break-downs and bogs and begging children in the supermarket.

BACK WHERE I BELONG

2009-02-21T14:06:00.012+02:00

It has taken me by surprise, the ease with which I have transitioned back into this hot, dusty land and this very different life. I realise now that my heart was here all along, in a place where I must keep things simple and live just one day and one hour at a time. Here, I must resist the temptation to hurry through each day. Neither the heat nor the Mozambican pace allow for rushing.

My western tendencies to list-make and race through each job were thoroughly reinforced In Australia as I tried to get everything done before my return to Mozambique. Post-trip, it has taken a month of regular frustration to remember that rarely does anything happen fast here. Once I accepted that fact, what a relief it was.

The babies I left last June are no longer babies but toddlers wobbling around and singing and dancing. Even in Mozambique, the Wiggles are tops. This past week has seen the temperature remain relentlessly in the mid 40s so yesterday the tias in the Baby House had a creative idea. Flood the play area. Yes, indoors. Fill the concrete-floored play area with several inches of water, strip the kids to their undies and let them loose.

Big plastic tubs overflowing with water and several toddlers squeezed into each, laughing and splashing and squeeling together. Three-year-olds belly-flopping on the flooded floor and splashing each other with all their might. Carmina, who cannot walk, rolling back and forth, smiling wider than I have ever seen and, of course, wanting me to roll with her. Bigger kids gently holding babies up as their feet kicked at the water. Four-years-olds competing for the biggest splash as they landed hard on their bottoms.

And a hose. Did I mention the hose?

These moments capture the essence of why I am here in Mozambique, one member of a disparate band of international interlopers from a dozen nations, all wanting to “do something”, to “make a difference”, to “serve the one…”

Cliches aside, yesterday I was reminded that our 300 kids are free. Free from starvation, free from the terrors of being orphaned and alone and living on the streets. Free from leaking, falling-down homes ruled by poverty, neglect or abuse. Free from the fear of what tomorrow may bring.

For now, our kids are free to be kids.

It is not ideal, this community living. 300 children in one “home” does not always work as we would like. We need more workers in this overripe harvest field, and more funds and more ideas and more grace and more strength and more breakthroughs.

But it is what it is. And each day is a new day. And God is good and He is faithful. And yesterday I watched 30 kids play in the water, screaming with delight, without a care in the world. That is the miracle I witness every day here in a land groaning for help but not sure how to receive it. Just a few of Mozambique’s children are free, and saved, and sleeping in clean beds tonight under mosquito nets that literally save their lives.

Our kids will wake up tomorrow knowing that they will get three meals in the day. They will receive some education tomorrow. Their attention will be drawn at some point in the day to their Creator, the One who saves and heals and gives hope. And they will be loved and protected and taught about life.

When the lists in my day seem overwhelming, when more people are asking for my help than I can possibly manage, when my body begins to betray me once again by refusing to go one more step through the sand in the stifling heat, I remember where I am and how far God has brought me.

I watch the toddlers, some who were malnourished almost to death when brought to us, who are now walking and laughing and calling “Mana… Mana… “ and singing “If you’re happy and you know it…” with gusto. I watch Lena and Enoch learning to walk, and twins Francisco and Lorenzo racing towards me for a cuddle. I see Nemais, this time last year in a coma in the hospital, now kissing chubby, gorgeous little Louisa on the cheek, and Antonio proudly balancing his shoe on his head. I watch Alirio trying to push Minda off the slippery dip and Vasco tying a doll to Lucia’s back, Mozambican-style.

Our kids are free to be kids. How much better can it get?

Then I hear of an unnamed girl, about three years old, who was to come and live with us here. That was the plan. She was in the orphanage down the road which provided desperately inappropriate care to its children for many years. The orphanage has a new director now, a wise man who quickly recognised the deficiencies, humbled himself and asked for our help, passing 16 children to us almost overnight.

The previous director, on leaving, took a few children with him including the little girl who was to live at Zimpeto. It was illegal. It was akin to kidnapping. It was evil.

She died last week. I do not know how she died, or of what. I know that she was meant to be with us. I know that she should have spent yesterday playing in the water and squealing with delight among her new friends. I know that she was a defenseless child with no power to fight for herself. I know that she may have died anyway. Or not.

It is our job to defend the weak, to help the afflicted, to speak for those who have no voice.

But she was taken away, right on the edge of being saved. And she died.

I see life and joy and hope and it is good. I also see death and suffering and tragedy. I see evil and the pain it inflicts on the weakest and youngest of this society. And it breaks my heart again and again. I watch our babies grow and our toddlers walk and our preschoolers learn to write their names. I cry for the ones who got away from us and occasionally I point my finger heavenward and demand to know why this has to happen.

For now, our kids are free. Who knows what the future holds for them but here, for now, they are fed and sheltered and loved and carefree, as it should always be for children. Pray for our kids and for the many we have not yet met. Pray for the weak and helpless of Mozambique, both young and old. Pray for the workers here, that God’s strength and grace and creativity would lead us.

Pray for God’s will to be done and His Kingdom come here, in this corner of the world, as it is in Heaven.

I DREAMED OF AFRICA

2008-12-19T11:21:00.005+02:00

Half a year is all I have spent in Africa and yet, to me, she is a lifelong friend. She is one of those faithful, complex friends who stubbornly refuses to let me to be anything less than all I can be in this life. Mozambique, a land of magnificent beaches and denuded, dusty wasteland has been the key to this friendship and, as she attempts to raise her head and smile at her future, I yearn to assist her somehow.

I hear talk of Africa and lean impolitely to eavesdrop anyone speaking of my beloved friend. I hear her music and my heart begins once more to beat to her rhythm. I see photos of her dark brown children and ache to be there again, cradling her babies and telling them all will be well.

I will be her friend forever and that will never change.

It is inexplicable. I do not understand. My time in Mozambique was fraught with struggles. The challenges to my physical body were great and the pressures upon my soul overwhelming. The intolerable heat melted my stamina, day after stifling day. Red dirt stained my feet and sweat tracked its way through the layers of grimy dust that collected on my skin. Acrid smoke burned my nostrils as the hot wind fed the piles of smouldering garbage on the streets. Malaria-ridden mosquitoes mocked me with their droning buzz at sunset and through each stifling night.

How could I love Africa? How could I not.

Mozambique, so poor and yet so rich, somehow won my heart. Her people are her future, the hope of a nation that has been bowed low by years of war and floods. She has been victorious in some monumental battles in her history but now fights the enemy of poverty which obstinately refuses to release its hold.

Her mothers sit in the dust on the roadside, selling what meagre produce they have gleaned from the bare earth. Her children have only a vague hope of learning more than the most basic literacy and numeracy skills. Her babies are so often deserted, abandoned for the sake of one less mouth to feed, left at the police station or on the street or under a tree or in a plastic bag in a dumpster. Her men change women and families at will, evicting the children of other fathers and forcing these little ones away from their mothers and onto the streets.

Her people, with downcast faces and pain-filled eyes, long for better but have not seen it in their lifetime. How to hope, how to grow, how to aim for better when there is no picture in their minds of how it looks? Hopelessness is a disease here, a virulent, cancerous growth attacking the soul of a nation with little strength left to fight.

And so I look, and I listen, and I refuse to let my heart stop feeling even when I think the pain will kill me. This pain – this ache for the people of Mozambique – is nothing when compared to their suffering. It is an itching flea bite compared to the gnawing, deathly throb of a lifetime of hunger and defeat. I have lived a rich, fulfilling, blessed life and have been given much. Is it possible that, from this well of good things I have received, I may be able, just for a time, to pour some of the good of that into a land that needs so much?

I am not arrogant enough to imagine making much difference. I am only one. My heart is full but how much can just one full heart achieve? So I revisit the memories I hold so close and I begin to dream once more. One smile on a baby’s face as she feeds on the nourishing bottle I hold. One squeal of delight as a schoolboy reads his first page of text at my coaxing. One high five from the teen seeing his first birthday cake and candles as his friends chant, “Feliz Aniversario”. One wildly delighted scream as a child from the streets tries to hold onto his very own cake of soap in the shower. One song sung with joy in the garbage dump as the hungry are fed and their rotting skin infections and weeping, mouldy scalps are tended to. One wave from a twelve-ear-old working the streets who is going home for the night with a pocketful of change, released from seeking customers just for a while.

One day, one person, one opportunity at a time is all I can give, and it is enough for now.

The heartbeat of this nation grows stronger by the day. There is undeniably much hard work to be done and much distance to be travelled on the road to growth and prosperity. Healing is coming surely but too slowly for the many street kids and abandoned babies needing food, shelter and love. And it is from this source that I hear my name being called.

I heed her once again, this dear friend whispering my name and longing for my attention. And so I will return to the place where my heart began to beat to a new rhythm. I return, unsure of what to expect this time around but knowing that, as much as I can give to this friend in need, much more will be returned to me. No matter how much I pour out for my friend, she pours more into me than I can contain.

This is the way of true friendship and I will be her friend forever.

DOWN BUT NOT OUT

2008-08-08T12:38:00.010+02:00

Pitstop: when a racing car stops in the pits for refueling.

Layover: the time during a long trip that is spent at a terminal after disembarking one vehicle and waiting to board the next.

I boarded the shaky old Air Mozambique plane in Maputo two months ago. I thought I was popping home to Australia briefly to bring whatever support and refreshing I could to my weary family, after months of illness and struggles back home. I didn’t want to disrupt the rhythm that was beginning to develop in my work in Zimpeto, but knew that a quick trip back to my family was necessary.

The night before my departure, I sat on the floor of the Baby House, farewelling the one-year-olds as Francisco dozed in my lap, Alirio gulped from the bottle I held to his lips and Antonio climbed along my left leg, leaving a wet track of drool to mark his movements. I promised to return soon, telling them not to miss me even as I told my own heart to shut down now rather than endure the pain of walking away and not seeing these precious babes for a few weeks.

And then I left them, trudging through the sand as my heart began to ache. I finished packing, slept badly and made my way to the airport next morning. As the rattly plane took off to the north, I held my breath, tracking my way over the broken tin roofs of the Maputo outskirts. I cried for the babes I would not see for weeks and, even then, began to make plans for when I returned in July.

Ah, the best-laid plans…

Within a week of touchdown in Sydney, I was in a hospital bed, paralysed and unable to walk or write or even to smile. I had been hit hard and suddenly by an illness that gave no warning of its imminent arrival nor of its devastating power. Guillain-Barré Syndrome is a rare, non-contagious disease of the immune system, affecting the nerves which lose their ability to send messages to the muscles which, in turn, stop working.

After a harrowing day of invasive tests and endless, probing questions in the emergency room, I was admitted to hospital. From that moment, when the battle lines were drawn and the enemy’s name had been clearly established, I began to fight with every morsel of strength and determination I could muster. And with the steadfast support of my already worn-out family and the sustaining prayers of friends all over the world, there I stayed for six weeks.

This was a layover I never saw coming.

One day, tingling toes. The next, numb fingers. A few days later, paralysed legs. My body was betraying me with no warning, no alarm bells, no quiet whisper to prepare me for the coming trial. I was being betrayed by a body that had always served me well. One moment I was fine then, suddenly, my toes were buzzing. This body just stopped working, as if rebelling against some unseen enemy that I racked my brain to identify and blame.

Even in the diagnosis, there was nothing at which to aim my wrath, no virus invading, no bacteria causing this breakdown of my nerves which refused to do their job of making my muscles move. My body was attacking itself. My own immune system was in rebellion, eating away at my nerves’ endings, rendering them powerless to do their job of firing off messages to my now lifeless muscles.

“Your body will heal itself.” “Your nerves will regrow on their own.” “Soon, the deterioration will cease and you’ll begin to get better.” In other words, “We don’t know how to fix this”.

And so we waited.

For two very long, tense weeks, the paralysis spread, just a little each day. And somehow I coped. I refused to consider the worst. I could not allow my mind to think the unthinkable. I rejected fear and I snubbed depression. In my mind, I hunted for every positive thought and every faith–filled verse of victory and healing I could remember from my bible. And I mulled on these hour after hour, even as my blood was being pumped with round upon round of hopefully, possibly, maybe life-giving immunoglobulin, retrieved from the healthy blood of a charitable donor.

Note to self: give blood. Just do it.

Hope soared in the second week as my legs began to gain some strength. I’d hit bottom and was coming back up. I could relax. The worst was over and only good would come to me from here.

The next morning I looked in the mirror, horrified. I could not find my smile. My face was lifeless, vacant of expression or movement even as I tried to force my muscles to act. The weapon I used more than any other to fend off melancholy and hopelessness had left me. I was certain that someone was playing a sick joke, returning my legs then stealing my grin. I was smiling on the inside but my face would not obey. I looked tired and sad and defeated.

I wanted to shout, “I have not lost this battle! I’m going to win! I’m still smiling on the inside!” If I’d been able, I would have made fists with my weakened hands and shook them at my unseen enemy, threatening my invisible foe. Another sick joke: I could not make a fist.

I was scared for the first time. What if my supporters saw my dull expression and began to doubt, to falter in their conviction that all would be well? I needed them to be unwavering and resolute on my behalf. Our determination fed off each other. Please, God, help them to keep smiling for me.

And they did. My team, my cheer squad, my fellow warriors, stood firm, stubborn in their support. They kept smiling when I could not. My family, my friends, even my exhausted, indomitable nurses, kept smiling and laughing and feeding me with their good humour and faith. And so, because of them, I was able to keep smiling on the inside.

My smile deserted me for only a few days and then it made its sunny return. From that moment, I knew that I knew that all would be well. I continued to heal, regaining movement in my arms and legs over a period of weeks. My smile grew stronger daily and, when my wink returned, I knew the sun was shining more hotly than ever, bringing healing in every bright ray.

Each morning when I woke, I’d lie in bed and test my limbs: fingers first, then hands and arms. Move on now to toes then feet and legs. And, finally, my face. Smile… big… bigger… blow a kiss, make a fish-face, blink and wink. Check… check… check!

By this time, hospital had become a comfortable place for me. I began to fret about having to leave soon. What if I fall? What if there’s no one to help me? What if…? What if…? My weakened body was housing two different personalities: one brave and fearless, ready to go home and start life all over again, and one who wanted to stay in hospital where everything had become routine and predictable and safe, where I was cared for and where there were few demands placed upon me. My nurses had become my new best friends and I was having difficulty imagining how I would cope without them.

But, cope I have. Two weeks since discharge and all is well. My body grows stronger daily and only occasionally lets me down. The 14 stairs to my room have taunted me into action and helped me to work harder than I thought I could. And my heart has begun once more to wander back to the hauntingly beautiful land I left two months ago as I wonder what comes next for me.

One step at a time. The world awaits and will be there, waiting still, when I am well again.

This pitstop was not one I saw coming. If I had, I would have driven by, as fast as I could. But life had other plans. And I, despite being pummeled and bruised, was not defeated. In fact, I am now able to embrace the months of quiet and solitude handed to me so surprisingly. As my body rehabilitates, my soul has time to do the same.

This time is a gift given in the most unusual of ways. And this pitstop allows me time and space for the refueling my spirit needs before the next leg of the race we so lightly call life, which I will strive to treat with the greatest respect from here on in.

Here’s to life.

WORLDS APART

2008-05-29T12:38:00.009+02:00

Four months. That’s all the time it’s taken. I have been lost and I’ve been found in just a few short months. I have been lost to the old world I inhabited for most of my life. And I have been found, discovering the depths of God’s goodness and His resources hidden deep within me as I have shifted and adjusted my stance to find my balance in this dusty brown land.

I am torn between two lives and I am shaken to the core by all that I have seen and experienced. I will never look at the world or myself, or at God, in the same way again. The shift has been colossal for heart and for mind, and I know I am not yet through this inner renovation.

In a week I will travel back, just briefly, to the home I left in January. Already I am disconcerted by the culture shock setting in, even before I’ve thought about dragging the suitcase from under the bed.

I know that everything will look different from now on. It is unsettling, to say the least. Viewing the world from here in Mozambique, I have discovered a thousand colours I never knew existed and now all the world has taken on the hue of this fresh palette. Some of it is to my liking and some does not suit my tastes at all. Everything is different and bears little resemblance to the world from which I came. This is the point at which the fiery testing and the rich adventure of new exploits collide.

I look back and realise that the Egypt I left behind seems dull and unexciting, holding no challenge for me now when measured against the tests I’ve faced here. I cannot go back.

I cannot stay where I am – transition is all about getting somewhere. Settling down to inhabit the place of transition is a dangerous plan because, in transition, everything is out of balance and nothing is clear.

I look ahead and see mountains so huge that they will be impassable with anything less than superhuman effort and the miracle of God’s perfect leading.

And so I move forward one small step at a time, refusing to glance back at the comfort and ease of the land I have left, and forcing myself not to panic as I look ahead to a land I do not yet recognise.

The old world is lost to me forever. The new land beckons but is not yet clear. I take one step and then another, trusting in the leading of the Creator, over whom time and distance hold no sway.

My life is no longer my own and so I follow the One who goes before me. To where, I know not, except that He is ahead of me, shining a light to guide me. As I journey into the unknown, I follow His lead and I trust.

He is the beginning and the end. That’s all I need to know.

HUMANITY DEFINED

2008-05-18T15:37:00.003+02:00

Last week, a friend asked me a question:

“Been thinking about you. Does it feel like you have slipped through into a different world that actually bears far more relation to the majority of humanity than the rarefied life we enjoy here in Australia?? (Just a thought …)”

My response (copied below with some edits) surprised me. I tend to err on the light side when it comes to describing regular Mozambican life. It’s hard to know what people want to hear and how much of “the whole truth” a hugely varied audience can cope with, without disturbance.

Quite possibly, though, this is the height of arrogance, thinking it my role to control the flow of information about a nation bent low by so many years of unutterable suffering. Perhaps disturbance is why I’m here. To challenge the status quo. To speak up for those who have no voice by telling the truth plainly, without embellishment.

The truth I confront every day in this nation needs no embellishment.

Perhaps this is the most important job I have ever had – describing what I see. And perhaps those who read will be stirred – to give, to go, to pray, to send. To allow the plain truth to sink so deeply that their hearts are torn in two, the way God’s heart breaks each minute of every day for the people of Mozambique.

Following is my response to my friend’s question:

“Interesting question. I think I'm in some denial because life for most people here is just so unimaginably hard. I can't process it within the framework I have for understanding what a ‘good’ life is. I hear of someone I know, or know of, dying every week. Many of the kids in the school live in canesu huts - straw walls and, if they're lucky, a tin roof held down with rocks, usually leaking. I work with kids in the school who don't know they live in Mozambique and who go home into the community at the end of the day to find rats roaming through the puddles on the floor of a one room hut. I teach teachers who've never seen a jigsaw puzzle or a map of the world.

“We received a one-year-old a few weeks ago who had been cared for each day for months by her siblings - three and five years old - while the teenage sister went to school. She was literally dying of starvation. No idea how to process that, so I think I just don't.

“Some of our babies have big scars on their bellies where a witch doctor has cut them as part of some ritual.

“One of our babies, Lucia, was here for a couple of months when her mother suddenly showed up. She told us that her family had stolen Lucia and given her away as retribution for something the mother had done. How do I process living in a culture where this happens?

“No matter where I go, even here at the Centre behind barbed wire with guards on duty 24 hours a day, I can't put my keys or other belongings down because they will vanish instantly.

“There seem to be no rules to live by and no law that can be enforced. The police pull you over and demand bribes to let you go. Men swap women like cars and children seem to be viewed as dispensable and of little value. How to process all of this, to live here, to love and bless and stay full of hope? How to offer dignity to a people so beaten down by years of starvation - physical, emotional, spiritual - that they've lost the ability to value themselves and each other?

“And how to feel anything other than powerless in the face of all this?

“I'm thankful every day that I'm here, living in the midst of it, albeit in my cushy apartment with running hot water, tiled floor, electricity and a screen door. I LOVE my screen door! And I know that, without some comforts and ease to my lifestyle here, I’m not sure I’d last the long haul. Sad but true. I wish it weren't.”

The Bible says that to whom much is given, much is required. I have been given much. This year, this challenge, this time away from all that is familiar and comfortable and predictable – this is one of the most precious gifts I’ve ever received. The question for me now is, “What do I do with this gift?” How do I respond?

All I know to do right now is walk carefully through each day, one step at a time, and every time an opportunity presents itself, grasp it violently and with both hands and refuse to let go until I’ve given love away, the very best way I know how.

OF MOZAMBICAN MICE AND MEN

2008-05-09T11:24:00.010+02:00

Mozambican mice are so smart that they feasted on the cardboard mouse bait box, leaving the bait behind.

Mozambican mice are so bold that one of them, in broad daylight, ran straight through my legs to escape my clutches.

Mozambican mice have great taste. They loved eating my favourite purple sweater.

Mozambican mice are so brazen that they built a nest in Sarah's favourite shoes.

Mozambican mice are so ingenious that they found the paracetamol tablets in the plastic blister pack, in the cardboard box, in the pocket of my handbag in the top drawer, then chewed on a pain killer. Perhaps to ease the pain caused by eating purple wool.

I have declared war on mice. I and my comrades stood in our kitchen and declared war. Out loud and with great passion. When did mice get so smart? They can have the cornflakes. They can have the popcorn and the noodles and the teabags and the nuts. But they will not – ever – get to my sweaters again.

I will not surrender!

My purple sweater now has a three-inch hole eaten into the front. Could they have eaten the back? Could they have chosen the boring black number on top? No. These mice have taste as well as street smarts.

So, as winter approaches and I discover that Mozambique actually does get chilly for a few months of the year, I mourn this loss and search for unique and creative ways to get rid of mice. Perhaps my fancy new $10 “Electonik Insekt Fanger” will work. This is a dodgy piece of equipment that looks like a tennis racquet but is battery-powered and live-wired instead of strung. You can actually hear the “zap” as you swat the malaria-ridden mosquitoes. Very exciting! And extremely satisfying.

Now to find that pesky mouse…

ROSINHA

2008-04-29T13:58:00.011+02:00

" 'Lord, when did we see You as a stranger and welcomed You in,

or naked and clothed You?'

And the King will reply to them,

' Insofar as you did it for one of the least

of these, you did it for Me.' " Matt 25: 38

Rosinha. Thirteen years old. Found wandering aimlessly, naked, down the middle of the main road outside the Centre, late at night. She said she’d been walking forever. She said she’d been thrown out of home by her father. She was scared.

Rosinha was obviously traumatised. She was not in her right mind. She would not sit down and she could not stand still. She prowled back and forth endlessly like a trapped animal. She talked on and on without making sense. She did not know where she was. She could not tell us where she lived or what had happened to her.

Rosinha, to me, is the personification of the darker depths of this nation and a reminder of the hidden suffering of so many children still out of our reach. I cannot imagine what she had been through. She is just a child.

We could not take her in to the Girls’ Dorm overnight. We would not risk the safety of our resident children. Rosinha was offered warm clothes and a place to rest, protected in the guards’ hut at the front gate. She would be safe until morning when some decisions could be made.

But she did not stay. Rosinha came within our reach for just a few hours but, by morning, she was gone. Later in the day, we heard reports of her being seen many miles down the road.

Nothing here is simple. Western assumptions of civilisation and safety do not apply. The rules we play by in this developing nation are different and oftentimes unfathomable to us.

And so, this night, one desperate, damaged, broken-hearted little girl walked back out into the night, alone.

When I found out that she was gone, a chill ran through me. I cannot yet think of her without feeling gut-wrenchingly guilty. Perhaps we did not serve the one in front of us as we are called here to do. Perhaps we missed an opportunity. Perhaps we could have done more.

Or, perhaps we had to confront and acknowledge the fact that sometimes we can do nothing in the moment when up against such a dark and giant foe. And that perhaps the big picture is what we must focus on.

This explanation does not satisfy me or ease my soul one bit. Nothing is simple here, or straightforward, or predictable. But how does one deal with the fact that a child in desperate need was within our grasp then lost once more to the streets from which she came?

I pray that these feelings of culpability and discomfort stay with me as a reminder for as long as I can picture a thirteen-year-old girl drifting, all alone, through the Mozambican night.

DREAMING OF A FUTURE

2008-04-20T15:07:00.006+02:00

How to teach a teacher to manage a class of 69 twelve year olds and to teach well at the same time? This is just one of the questions I confronted during three mornings of seminars last week. My job was to inspire, encourage and envision 24 Mozambican primary school teachers.

With classes of up to 70 students, very little room and few resources, the children do little but sit shoulder-to-shoulder on their wooden benches, hour after hour, repeating new learning parrot-fashion and copying from the board. The teachers have their routine down pat: “Sit. Stay. Be quiet” while banging a rod on the desk. The occasional ear-tugging is the back-up strategy. [One of the Year 1 classes, above, has only 36 students which is small by Mozambican standards. Their teacher is Professor Jossefa.]

I dare not judge. The largest class I’ve ever taught is 28. Back home in Australia, my classrooms had running water, air conditioning and glass in the windows. The students always had coloured pencils, paints, story books to read and room to move. Most had at least one parent or caregiver willing to read with them each evening. The teachers I worked with had finished high school and been to university.

Life in a developing nation is just that – developing. I can judge by the standards I have learned to work to in the prosperous “developed nation” from which I come. Or, I can lay aside all that is familiar and allow God to renew my thinking about such topics as education.

Education is all about finding the level of skill or knowledge in one’s students in a particular area and raising it, one small step at a time. My role here is to do the same with the teachers. And my first goal? To raise the bar of expectations the teachers have about their own jobs, and to stir up some joy. To give the teachers permission to enjoy their work and their students, as they begin to believe that a nation can be changed by quality education. And to encourage them to dream.

The teachers were given opportunity to review the basics of teaching strategies and behaviour management. I used dried beans as rewards for hard work and thoughtful input until one participant pointed out that many of them could not afford to give away even a few beans a day. Strike 1. I referred to the teachers “getting out of bed to come to work each day”, only to realise later that some of the teachers do not own a bed. Strike 2. I gave them name tags to wear only to discover that many of them did not know how to peel off the back or where to stick them. Strike 3. Ah, the great cultural divide!

The teachers are not the only ones learning slowly, one step at a time.

They were also taught to throw a frisbee and to do jigsaw puzzles. Some learned that envelopes need licking to stick, that a biro has to be pushed on the end to work and that blu tac is used to attach things to walls.

With time and thought and much prayer, I must translate my knowledge not only into a new language, but also into a form that is relevant to teachers who have only chalk and a blackboard to teach with each day and, on the whole, very limited education themselves.

Next holidays, there will be more seminars. And more games and resources and theory and strategising about how to teach 69 students all at once. Please pray for the teachers here and for their students. Developing nations, to develop, need good education. Good education comes only with great teachers. And this is my dream for them.

NEW FRIENDS

2008-04-04T10:30:00.023+02:00

Meet Dionisio [photo second from top]. A few weeks ago, Dionisio was so sick, he was rushed to the hospital for the third time in two months. Today, he is a healthy, though underweight, 2 1/2 months old and putting on weight daily. Does this little guy love to drink!

Until he is stronger, he will be kept away from the Baby House, where many children have been sick in past weeks. So, it falls to the missionaries to look after him in the meantime. Nobody is complaining and everybody wants him!

Two new babies have arrived this week - Lucia [top] via the police and Ilirio [bottom] from the hospital. Both are wonderfully healthy, which is unusual for new babies brought in. Lucia, 10 months, is set to become the life of the Baby House, with a delightful personality and an infectious laugh. The Baby House is now full - 40 children - so please pray for God's strategies for the next steps.

It is estimated that there will one million orphans in Mozambique by 2010. We are blessed to have 350 of these precious children in our care, 40 of whom are under five. Our primary school attracts another 600 children to our Centre each day. We serve just one at a time as God brings them to us and trust Him to expand the work in His perfect will and timing.

This is the noisiest, most active and exciting place to be. There are children everywhere! Living in the midst of them is, on some days, incredibly fulfilling and, on other days, a huge challenge. Of course living with 350 children would hold its challenges! And I would choose to be nowhere else. I am daily thankful and amazed that God has led me here and asked me stay. I am blessed beyond measure and thankful for each moment.

BABY IRENE

2008-03-21T11:28:00.012+02:00

Psalm 84: 10

"A single day in your courts is better than a thousand anywhere else."

I write today with a heavy heart and sad news.

One of our dear babies, Irene, died suddenly during the night. Irene (bottom row, second from right) was 10 months old and had been here at Zimpeto for about 4 months. Her mother abandoned her and disappeared, so her grandparents took her in but were too poor to care for her properly. They brought her here very sick and skinny and, in past months, she had put on much weight and was doing well.

All is not completely clear yet but the doctors suspect she contracted malaria and, before there was time to treat the malaria thoroughly, many babies in the Baby House came down with a stomach/diarrhoea bug. Irene was one of these and she was not strong enough to deal with it. She died on the way to the hospital at around midnight, in the arms of Tracey, our Baby House Director.

Irene's grandparents are being informed this morning. Please pray for them and for all here at Zimpeto. Pray particularly for the medical staff and Baby House workers: Tracey, Neil and Hilda (assisting Tracey), Janni and Solange (nurses) and the tias (carers).

I sit here this morning listening to the noise of the school children having recess, playing clapping games, singing and chasing each other, preparing excitedly for an Easter long weekend. We are here to protect such as these, and it's an honour beyond words. The Baby House is a particularly precious place to be, where the littlest and most dependent of our charges live.

There is no simple way to explain the death of a baby. There is no way to fully express the fragility of life here in Mozambique. Nothing is predictable or controllable or easy. And so we hide under the shadow of the wings of the Father, continuing to move forward one step at a time, caring for each little one He has brought to us. This is all we know to do - love the ones in front of us in the moment and do our best for each.

There are 37 children in the Baby House, some strong and healthy and some fragile, sick and weak. Namais has just, in the last hour, been taken to the hospital, also very ill. Please pray for him, for all our little Baby House residents, for our team, the Baby House staff, and our leaders Ros and Steve.

Pray for the Father's covering on this most amazing of places.

PEDRITO

2008-02-23T16:07:00.008+02:00

"Let the children alone,

and do not hinder them from coming to Me;

for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."

Matt 19:14

Tonight I met Pedrito. Eleven years old. Wearing blue jeans and a bright yellow t-shirt. He carried a basket of peanuts and a little plastic container to scoop them into the hands of his customers. He had a sweet smile that drew my attention and kind eyes, alert and sad all at once.

Pedrito was wandering the streets of downtown Maputo at 8pm. He was all alone. He silently edged up to our group of four– three women from America, Botswana and Australia and a young man from England.

When he joined us, Pedrito offered us peanuts for sale. We smiled and refused him gently. He then moved closer to our young English friend, the only male in the group, and made the offer again, standing nearer to him.

I watched as Dan bantered with Pedrito, one speaking English and the other Portuguese and still managing to share a joke.

Pedrito looked like any normal, healthy eleven year old boy. He smiled. He laughed. He was quietly friendly. He stood patiently near Dan even after we refused to purchase any nuts from him.

It was Katie who worked it out first. Katie, who works with girls from the streets, helping these young women find a way to live that does not require that they sell their bodies to strangers. Katie watched and listened and put two and two together.

The girls working the streets often carry a basket of peanuts as a covert sign of availability.

Pedrito’s goal for the evening was not to sell peanuts. Under Katie’s gentle questioning, he freely admitted that he was offering himself for sale tonight. That he was selling his body for money. That his name was not really Pedrito. That he wasn’t selling nuts. That his mother was waiting for him at home.

We do not know if Pedrito chose this work to make some money for himself or his family, or if he is being forced to work the streets of Maputo. We don’t know where Pedrito lives. Katie gave him some money and told him to go straight home. We prayed that this money would be enough to get him off the streets for one night. He wanted no more help from us than a pocketful of change.

We do know that, tonight, God put us in the same place at the same time as this precious boy. This was a divine encounter of the highest order. We prayed that the Presence of Jesus would go with him, that he would be touched by the love given to him in a brief encounter with us and that the gift from some strangers of a night off the streets would make him think. We prayed that the Holy Spirit would whisper love to him and lead him to freedom.

A few minutes later and a few blocks away, we saw him again. We watched from a distance as Pedrito crossed the road. A man in a parked car nearby called to him. I held my breath. Pedrito went up to the car window, they talked for a moment, and then he turned away. He walked up the street and noticed us watching him. He smiled and laughed. He was going home.

For this one night, he was safe. What will tomorrow bring for Pedrito and his friends?

WEDDING DAY FROM AFAR

2008-02-22T07:28:00.007+02:00

I’ve been asked several times this week, “What is the hardest thing about living in Mozambique?” I had to think for a few minutes. The transition from my life in Australia to living here in Maputo has been quite smooth and uneventful thus far, aside from a day or two of rioting at our front gates. This had nothing whatsoever to do with us here at Zimpeto. Honestly.

The uninvited guests in my room haven’t troubled me particularly – two geckoes, one large frog, a myriad of cockroaches (may they rest in peace) and, last night, a mouse brazenly chewing on a cardboard box in the corner. I have become quite unexpectedly blasé about such visitors and suspect that they’re more bothered by me than I am by them.

The food is fine – so long as it’s thoroughly washed due to a high prevalence of cholera in the area at the moment. The weather is hot and humid and unseasonably blustery but quite manageable. The noise of 350 children playing after school, many of them choosing the sand just beyond my front window as their ideal play area, generally delights me and occasionally forces me to reach for my headphones and some loud music.

All in all, there is a rhythm developing to my days here at Zimpeto that is beginning to feel like the start of something wonderful.

Even as I say this, though, I feel a sadness rise as I think of home today. This is the first day since I moved here a month ago that I wish I were there.

My big brother gets married today. It will be a wonderful celebration and my family will all be together. And as I, here in Mozambique, think of not being there to witness this special event, I’m sad. I’d like to give my brother and his wonderful bride my love in person, to hug them and wish them well. They know my thoughts and my love are with them even if I’m not.

It will be a joyous and special day. Whether together in one place or separated by distance, family is family and nothing changes that. I am blessed to have a family like mine, parents and brothers and sister who love and support me, nieces and nephews and the start of another generation on the way.

At Zimpeto, I get to give to children the love that’s been given to me. I was raised in a family and now I have the opportunity to give from the fullness of this blessing to children who have no family of their own.

To be here today, missing such an important family event, is a small price to pay for the blessing of being able to pour out what has been poured so abundantly into my life. I know my family understands this and blesses my choice to be here today. The children of Zimpeto are the family I share my heart with during this season of my life.

What better way to spend a family day.

LESSONS FROM MOZAMBIQUE

2008-02-08T19:10:00.000+02:00

8 Things I Learned This Week…

1/ Where I live, in the city of Maputo, there is electricity and running water. This I knew.
2/ When the city shuts down due to rioting, the electricity shuts down too.
3/ When there’s no electricity, our big back-up generator kicks in.
4/ When there’s rioting in the city, there is no diesel to run the big generator.
5/ When the big generator runs out of diesel, the little generator kicks in.
6/ The little generator runs on diesel too.
7/ At least there’s plenty of hot water because it’s heated by gas.
8/ The hot water, although heated by gas, runs on electricity and, when there’s a riot in the city…

What else did I learn yesterday?

* That the average income of a Mozambican is less than $1 a day.
* That many Mozambicans cannot afford to catch a chapa (minibus) but must walk everywhere they go.

* That many of those who can afford to take a chapa, spend much of their meagre income on this, the only form of transport available to them.
* That chapa drivers are finding it difficult to make a living by driving their chapas due to rising gas prices.
* That poverty is a complicated issue about which we cannot make sweeping generalisations.

How to meet the needs of the chapa drivers and the people who use them? I don’t know but God has a plan.

* Let's pray for change that is long-term and brings health to the economy and, thus, better quality of life for the people.

* Let's pray for wisdom, courage and integrity for the Government of Mozambique and for President Guebuza.

* Let's pray for God to make the way ahead for this nation as it struggles to overcome years of devastating poverty.

* Let's pray for change that will return dignity to the lives of the 21 million people who live here.

UNREST

2008-02-05T15:27:00.000+02:00

Rioting broke out early today in Maputo, spreading from one end of the city to the other. All main roads out of the city were blocked and at least two deaths have been reported.

Here at Zimpeto, we watched throughout the morning as rioters taunted police along the roadway at the front of the property. Our gates were locked, our guards vigilant, school cancelled for the day and all our children out of sight in the hall. They seem used to such upheaval and were excited at the chance to watch a DVD rather than sit in a hot school room all morning.

Zimpeto is on the outskirts of the city, located on the main road north from Maputo. Out on the road, tyres have been set on fire and cars overturned. Police and soldiers have been using tear gas and rubber bullets to quell the dissent. We have heard that the situation in the city is even worse. A pall of thick, black smoke hangs in the sky to the south.

The people are demonstrating against the doubling of chapa fares. Chapas, or minibuses, are the only form of transport for most people here in Maputo but the fare rise will make chapas unaffordable for many.

It is difficult to comprehend how a bus fare doubling to 70 cents could bring such a strong reaction. Imagine, if you possibly can, carrying a heavy sack of dull, dry corn through the dust and heat of Maputo to sell at the markets. You wrestle the sack onto the already-overloaded roof of a chapa and and then you squeeze in, bending low for the hour-long trip. If you can make some money on the corn, you will be able to buy bread and rice to feed your family this week. If the bus fare costs more than you can make on your produce, you will not be able to buy food.

I had hoped that living here for a year would bring perspective to my sheltered world view. I don’t know, though, how to process all that I see. Two weeks here and I am reeling from the stretching my soul feels as I try to make sense of the lives most Mozambicans live. Perhaps “making sense” is not possible. How does one rationalise such poverty and suffering?

I feel my heart’s not big enough to deal with all I see around me. And so, some days I switch off and refuse to notice. Other days, I fall into the refuge of the Father’s Heart and pour my confusion and frustration onto Him in prayer. And then there are days when the pure, guileless love to be found in the Baby House is my refuge. By pouring out affection on these precious babes, I am filled and refreshed over and over, and this is the economy of God.

As I watch from my door, the streets seem calmer now. We hear no more yelling or guns or army vehicles rumbling down the road. The children have been released from their confine, too late for any lessons today. Staff make their way to offices and classrooms at Zimpeto. Nobody will be driving anywhere until tomorrow. And I am sure that I can hear the Baby House calling…

FIRST WEEKS

2008-02-01T19:20:00.000+02:00

I've arrived in Mozambique and have had two weeks to settle in. Como esta? Nao comprehende? I've dived straight in and started Portuguese lessons in town each day.

I'm living in a two bedroom flat in a building just off the main play area (see photo on right). It's noisy much of the time and in amidst all the action. My Brazilian flatmate threw a barbeque on Saturday night and I was able to make some new friends.

On the same day that I arrived, the Centre took in a 2 week old baby, deserted at the hospital after birth. She's been named Eliana and is doing well. She's my new "special friend" in the Baby House and always in need of some extra attention.

We have regular blackouts here - about 5 in the past week - and a generator that usually kicks in after a few minutes. Last night we were sitting around the kitchen table when the lights went out and the conversation didn't miss a beat. We just kept talking until the lights came on again.

As I sit here in my room, I hear the noise of this busy place all around me and know there's nowhere else I'd rather be. God has made the way ahead of me and I'm so excited to be here. Settling in and adjusting to the huge changes will take some time and that's OK. This is a year of transition for so many of us - transition isn't easy but life on the other side is beyond your wildest dreams. Imagine how big God is - and dream accordingly. Then see what He does!

Oh... and to the Aussies - Happy Australia Day for the 26th. I had vegemite toast in honour of the day. Monday is "Heroes Day" in Mozambique so a public holiday. The Centre of course keeps functioning as normal. When I find out who the heroes are, I'll let you know.