Wednesday, March 30, 2011

" Why else would you be here?"

Today has been a good day. School with Protasho and Patrick went really well- not so much that they blew me away suddenly knowing English or anything... but we had fun and laughed and I could FEEL them learning things. I have learned to make everything.... EVERYTHING a competition for those two- and it tends to be quite humorous. The victor cheers himself out of class, and then the next day it's the other one and so on....

Also, we will be building soon for our ministry house. That may seem like a little thing but talking about it today Maureen, Fanny and I just cried! It has been stressful having some boxes piled in my house, boxes and bags at the Williamsons, and trying to do school out of two houses disruting their days...  this ministry house is SUCH as huge answer to prayer. I am more than excited about it... just to  have a small building that will be common ground (and to stop tripping over piles of books in my room!)

Tomorrow we take Wisdom to start him on his life long daily medication. We had his Cd4 count (white blood cell) count taken, and he was at 250. He should have been on medication when he got anywhere near or below 300- so this low number accounts for his frequent illness. It was a struggle to get his results (the first place lost his results and lied about it for 2 months, and the next place had "technical difficulty" but 3 tries later we are getting him settled with that tomorrow. )

This morning I was driving to work and in a roundabout, or circle, this woman- who was white- pulled right out in front of me out of turn and I slammed on the brakes and so did she cause she got scared so we were blocking traffic. To the man behind and the woman beside her, both Africans, she mouthed "sorry" and made a sad face while they beeped at her. When she turned to me, she got a smile on her face and waved. I thought this very odd. It was like she felt because we were both white we had some sort of secret comrodary. I was irritated (and also beeping) and she got almost a look of offense that I was not smiling and waving back. I was baffled. I have been thinking about it since. Should I have had some sort of connection to her? Honestly- I don't think so. I didn't see colour, I saw wreckless driving. I would have beeped if she was chinese or arab or made of skittles it didn't really matter.

It's weird to think about these things. On saturday I went with my freind Chanda to an art exhibit at the Swedish Embassy. Every single white person we saw smiled and said "hiiiii" to me like we were long lost freinds, but ignored Chanda. The only person who said anything to Chanda was one of the workers who greeted him in Nyanja but ignored me. I think this is still kind of racism. It may not be hateful or vengeful but it is classification due to race. Why can't the worker say "muli bwanji" to me? He has no idea if I've lived here a week or my whole life. Why should I determine my interaction level with someone based on race. In the states you say hello to people you know and not to people you don't. Imagine if someone went around greeting only the people of their same race in the US- it would cause an uproar.

It's just funny to me how people assume here. There are men who sell CD's on Cairo Road in town. They come to your window and say the names of the CD's they have. The other week, one guy was walking toward us and shuffled his collection then when he got to the window he said "Madame, Gospel??" Chanda laughed, and I asked why he was laughing and he said it was because he purposely put all the gospel in front of the rap and all the other stuff, because he knew I was a missionary.I asked... "What? How on earth could he know that??" And he said "Why else would you be here."

God is working in my heart as I deal with missing home and some relationship issues here. I caught myself feeling sorry for myself a bit and missing life as it was before- but that never seems to last long. I still feel a bit blue and I'm having some insomnia issues... but God has a plan and He's working it out His way. Thank goodness for that. I am considering this trial joy- it is producing endurance.

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