A Story and some Highlights ...

Here is a funny story from our flight here: It was the middle of the night and most people were sleeping. My Dad and Matthew were. As I was sitting there, I heard Mother whisper my name across the aisle, but it was a frantic hushed tone of a whisper...."Hey Beth honey - I just got my glasses out of my purse, but I can't find them anywhere. Can you see if they are on the floor anywhere?" Well, as soon as she said, "I just got my glasses out....", I thought I knew what was coming, but I let her finish :) My hunch was right! So when she finished, I didn't say a thing but just pointed to her eyes. She had a puzzled look on her face, so I pointed to her eyes again! I had to point to her eyes THREE times before she realized what I was doing. Upon "getting it" and reaching up to find her glasses upon her nose, right where they belong, we both laughed so hard (but as quietly as we could since just about everyone else was sleeping!) we were crying! For a while, I couldn't even look at her, or I would have lost it! The look on her face was priceless and we have had a good laugh with that one a few times since!

Last night we were invited to a potluck/bonfire/worship meeting with some other missionaries from other churches here in Choma. It was a great evening and we managed to stay warm around the fire. We were grateful that it wasn't quite as chilly as the previous few nights. We sang songs and choruses that I knew (even some Matt Redman songs!) and heard about some of their experiences reaching out to the people here. It was wonderful worshipping the Lord together with other Christians, in a foreign land. It gives you a whole new perspective of the Gospel being preached to the nations! The ride there was quite an experience! Bumpy roads have taken on a whole new meaning for Matthew and me now. Evidently in the rainy season, it is even more interesting - The huge ditches we went up and down in, would then be filled with water! One of the families there had some boys close to Matthew's age, and they were from Florida, are homeschooled and they immediately become good friends! They would like to have us over to their home, so we are looking forward to that.

So far, we haven't had too many different foods, but we did taste our first "nshima", which is ground corn mashed up. We both ate it, and decided it's "ok", but it sure would not be our choice of food for every meal of the day, which is what most of the people here have. Apples, bananas, peas, cucumbers, carrots and tomatoes are plentiful right now, so we are enjoying them. We went to the butcher in town yesterday (Friday) for chicken and he won't have any till Tuesday. We did buy some nice beef, though. That is more plentiful these days, and actually was rather cheap – about $2.50/lb..now that took some conversions on my part, kwacha to dollars and kg to pounds! Ken would be so much better at figuring out this stuff...yes, I still miss him :)

A final highlight...singing "Jesus Loves Me" and This Little Light of Mine" with 3 litle boys who were outside kicking football. They have a sweet little addition to the chorus of "Jesus Loves Me" that I am so eager to share that with my grandchildren! I want to learn it in Tonga as well, so we'll see how that goes.

If any of you youth campers have stories to tell, Matthew would love to hear from you, so just email them to my daughter Sarah!

Leza amulongezye!
Love, Beth and Matthew