We had a wonderful short trip to the Mara over this last Mid Term week end. Traveling here is not a given. It is always an adventure! The roads were pretty bad, the bathroom stop pretty sketchy, and the dust plentiful, but we made it to a beautiful place along a river to stay and renew and refresh. It was a tented camp but the tents were not like the ones you think about when you go camping! They had a bathroom on the back side, large beds, and a porch off the front. It was great. The kids swam during the day and we went on game drives early in the morning and late in the evening. The hours you can be out driving are from 6:30am to 6:30pm since those are when the sun is up. You want to go early and late because the rest of the day is so hot all you see is animals laying around in the shade of a tree. Sallie and I even got up at 5:30 one day to go watch the hot air balloons take off at 6:00! She is now saving up her money to go for a ride. The Mara is like no other place. It is an expanse with clear skies and plenty of wildlife. I am going to throw on a bunch of pictures here. Just scroll down and enjoy what we saw:
Sallie and Timothy
Sallie and Jim
Trevor playing on the porch
beautiful cheetah
Hyena
saw Mom and two cubs eating
Beautiful!
Sunset over the Mara
Just after sunset from our porch
You call this a tent?
Sallie with a long gone buffalo
Bee Eaters
Impalla
The Sky was amazing
We love Zebras
Crested Cranes all together
Great picnic spot near the crocs
Enjoying the ride
Big Croc!
What you do during the heat of the day
Zebra Butts - love this one!
Guinea Fowl
Lizard
Jim and driver John with the termite mound
River crossing with the hippos nearby
Sallie took this one
Old Buffalo
The Masai wear red
Janet Cat
Cerval cat
Balloons at sunrise
Wart hogs and babies (this is the only time they are cute!)
Jim took this one
Sunset on an different night
We had such a great time and just thank God for the provision!
Spiritual Emphasis Week (SEW) is going on up at RVA right now. They have an outside speaker and band come for a week to give talks with the kids. The speaker this year is Bay Forrest. He is an ex pro basketball player and he has a wonderful way of reaching the kids. We were talking about how you hear the voice of God. John 16:13 says, "But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come."
NIV
This is something that took me a long time to grasp. When you walk with Him you are never alone. The spirit is with you always to guide you. Sometimes we see the future as daunting. We want to see how it will all turn out. We have so much fear that we can't move forward until we know the end game. God calls us to follow Him and do His work even if we can't make sense of it all. John 13:12 says, "I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear."
NIV
We may not know the outcome, but we need to trust in the spirit to guide us "while we are on the journey." To me this means doing what He is calling me to do today. I can't know the future, but as long as I am obedient today, I will be OK.
BKCC project: The ground floor slab is being poured this week! This is a huge milestone. The contractor is moving along with the new Program of Works (schedule) and is really making a effort to stick with it. We hope to be able to walk from the front to the back on a slab in a few days!
The RVA Arts center: Things are moving along with this one too. We should be pouring our lower ground floor slab next week. I have been having fun using ArchiCad to place all of the equipment and furnishings so that we know where to run electricity and other things.
Upendo Village: This project is going along at lightning speed. They have the second floor poured and the columns up there complete. We should be seeing walls soon.
The Elementary school librarian passed away last week. He was a young man in his twenties. We hear that during his last week he was saying, "Mungu ni njema" "God is good." His kidneys failed and it was very tragic. He was the oldest of 12 in his family and had gotten an education and a good job. He was the bread winner for them and his parents are very distraught. Also, as the whole community was at his funeral, Rose's mother had her house broken into and everything was taken. Please pray for this man's family and also for Rose's family as they try and regain some clothing and household items.
There are so many other smaller things going on: SHAK remodel, Sorley's house and problems after moving in, Multi Cultural day and the events going on, Senior Store next week, Benson and Rose's house design, an old friend in town for just 2 weeks, SEW all this week. Life sure keeps us running here for sure! Please pray for us that we will have stamina and can manage all that has been put before us!
In His Hands,
Jullie T.
PS - Senior Store is next week so I may be late with my post
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