Namibian Cell Phones

My post about the phone numbers brings up something that amazed me this time in Africa- the popularity of cell phones! Imagine you have lived somewhere where you were unable to have a telephone and then all of a sudden in comes this miraculous thing called cellular phones. My experience is that Africans have adopted cell phones whole heartedly. I am a tried and true anti-cell phone person and seeing the invasion of this technology saddens me. Not that I don't think people should be able to be in contact with others but I hate that we all have seemed to have lost a sense of being present. I hate that people don't talk to each other anymore in line, or talk with their check out person- why bother when you can call up anyone else you know and talk to them? About anything? As a dental hygienist, I have had patients interrupt my work to take a call. One woman actually motioned for me to continue while she chatted. Not likely! What has this got to do with Namibia? Well it is the same if not worse there. People take phone calls during meetings or text while in the middle of conversations there. It made me crazy. But that said one of the things that amused me was how the church was the one place that many people had access to electricity to charge up their phones and so you would see them plugged in to all the outlets possible during worship. Then when one phone was charged they would remove it and place another in the plug. I wanted to take some shots of it at one church but we left early and I did not get a chance. Here is the one picture I got with the phones in it.

Faces of Eembaxu

It is always the people that I meet that capture my heart when I travel and eembaxu was no different. While we could not readily communicate, many people did not speak english and I spoke no Ovambo, so conversations were short to say the least. But words are not necessary. Smiles translate well and quite often women would, by gestures, show me what I needed to do or what they wanted from me. One of my favorite "interactions" was when I was trying to get the address of 2 women from the women's conference. They had an exercise in friendship and I was given one woman's name and another was given my name. We were to pray for that woman and hold her in our heart. My being from the US presented a challenge. I gestured for them to write their address in my book but they wrote their cell numbers. They wanted me to give them my cell number. I was finally able to communicate that what good would phone numbers do us? We couldn't talk very long not knowing the other's language. At least a note can be translated. When the understood what I was saying we all shared a big laugh. Below are photographs of some of the beautiful people I came to know in Eembaxu.

Faces of Eembaxu

People of Eembaxu

Eembaxu continued

Sometimes I am just so amazed at how good God is. When I left home I knew I was missing the Women of Faith Conference at the Izod center. For the past 10 years I have been going to these conferences and having my soul filled and lifted by the praise of 10,000+ women all at one time in one place. I had arranged for tickets for 26 women from my church to go and I was sad to be missing it. So imagine my surprise when the weekend that my sisters in faith in NJ were headed to the WOF conference I ended up being present for a Women's conference in Eembaxu. While different from the one in NJ this one was amazing. I loved being present to see how these women in Namibia support each other, share their faith, learn together, raise money to do important things for their community and most of all search together to find out what God's plans are for them. I left from my time in Eembaxu inspired, uplifted and even more in love with God... He is awsome.

Women from the conference (that's me on the left.)

Pastor Ruusa

Sunday Worship

Eembaxu

After traveling a couple of hours through the country we made it to our church. We stopped along the way at a store for Pastor Ruusa and Teopaulina to pick up some food. While I waited in the back of the truck I met two people. The first was a young man who was asking me something but I couldn't understand him. It wasn't just the language problem, it was hard to understand any of the sounds he was making. I saw his tongue and saw karposi's sarcoma lesions all over it. The poor young man was one more of the victims of HIV/AIDs in a lot of the African countries. My heart broke for him and he became my first real face of AIDs. He walked away when he realized I couldn't understand him. I felt so ignorant and useless. (Actually I didn't even begin to realize how ignorant I had been- I had been thinking HIV/AIDS was not such an issue here in the US anymore. I hadn't read about it in a long time. Once I returned from Namibia I started noticing it more and more in the news. Contrary to my naive belief, we are still under the grip of the disease here too. The statistics are beyond frightening. How did I ever get so complacent as to not pay attention to this?)

The second person I wet was a young woman who was a Peace Corp volunteer from Texas. She was teaching in a small school in a very rural area of Namibia. We chatted for a little bit, waiting for Ruusa and Teopaulina to return. We got on the subject about what she was looking forward to when she returned home to the US. Besides family she said she wanted pizza, good pizza. I asked if she was going to be in Windhoek any time soon and she was- she was picking her mother up from the airport in a couple of weeks. I told her to go to the Gourmet Biergarten on the main street in the city. We had the best pizza there. Better than most places here in the US. How surreal to be sitting in the back of a pick up truck somewhere in Namibia being able to recommend a pizza place to local. It was so funny.

The women came back and I said good bye to my new friend and we were back on the road. Before long we arrived at the church. Pastor Ruusa's home was a traditional homestead connected to the church and I was so excited to be able to spend time here.

The church of Eembaxu

Pastor Ruusa's homestead

The family's living space was in the building to the left. My room was in there as was the area set aside for me to prepare meals for myself. WHAT??? I have to admit I was kind of freaked at the thought that I had to make my own meals but it was really a misunderstanding. There was a women's conference going on that weekend and the pastor had a lot to do for arriving participants. There was no time that day to prepare a meal for me. After that I was well taken care of and just wish I had more time to settle in so that I could have tackled cooking in Namibia but instead I settled for a slice of bread with peanut butter.

Heading to Eembaxu

Ok, Let's return to the story of Namibia. After heading north we made it to Ondongwa. Upon arriving at the hotel we found the pastors from our sister churches waiting to bring us to their homes. I was supposed to travel with Pastor Pieters but he was unable to make the trip north with us so I went to Eembaxu with Pastor Ruusa and Teopaulina, both of Eembaxu. Teopaulina had a beautiful red truck and I threw my duffle into the back and then asked about bringing my camera bag with me into the cab. It was then that Pastor Ruusa informed me there was only room for two people in the truck and that I would be riding in the back. You know, I travel in Africa looking for adventure and here it was. I quickly grabbed a jacket and a small pillow I travel with to sit on, put a hat on my head, slathered on some sunblock and off we went, in what direction I do not know, Eembaxu does not make any map. I will say I loved driving in the back of the truck. It brought back memories of being a kid riding in my dad's pick up, this was in the days before safety concerns. 

This was what I saw from my spot in the truck

This was just one little glimpse of the countryside I saw as we drove for around 2 hours through the rural areas of northern Namibia

Thankfully someone snapped a picture of me as we headed off for Eembaxu. 

Check this out!

Heading North

We arrived in Namibia on Wednesday afternoon. We headed to the ELCRN guesthouse in Windhoek for an overnight stay and then headed to our next stop, Tsumeb on our way up to Ondongwa. It was from Ondongwa that we would be setting our for our northern sister church visits. 

OUr group in front of the ELCRN guesthouse

This woman, Nailoke (which means let it rain), set up a business of baking breads in a solar oven. She measures out the dough carefully and puts it in soup cans. She then puts the cans in a box that is lined with mirrors. The plexiglass lid is closed and the sun does the work. With in a few hours the sun has beaked the bread which she then sells. 

I bought some bread from her and it was slightly sweet, almost like a corn bread. I wished I could have gotten more but it was early in the day and the bread wasn't ready yet.

This is our whole delegation outside of our hotel in Tsumeb

Getting started

OK, For 6 months I had been talking about heading to Namibia on a companion mission. We left on June 16Th and returned on July 2. I am finally getting around to writing about the trip and sharing some of my photos from the experience.

SO we left from Philadelphia airport on a Monday evening and arrived Tuesday morning in London. Our flight to South Africa wasn't until that evening so we headed into the city for lunch and a visit to Westminster Abbey.

A Little Glimpse

My trip to Namibia was absolutely amazing and I am having a hard time readjusting to being back home. Not quite sure what my brain funk is but I am working on it. So.. Until I get my act together and get through all my pictures here is one picture of me (look to the far right, I know I blend in with my Namibian traditional dress) and a group of women form the women's conference at my sister church of Eembaxu. I just look at this and start dreaming of being back there. I already told the Pastor leading the program that I want to be on the delegation in 2010. Now to figure out how I will pay for it!

No, I didn't fall off the face of the earth...

And Yes, I am back from Namibia... I am just trying to get back into the swing of life in the US after another life changing adventure in Africa. I am working on my pictures and will be posting soon... I know you are all waiting with bated breath.

Camping at Jellystone

This past weekend Marked the occurrence of something that has been years in the making. Friends of our go camping a few weekends every year and they have been asking us to join them. Jay's position has been that the only camping he does is at the Hilton. Our friend, Jim, approached him asking if Jay and I would bring the camper up on Friday with their kids. He and his wife, Krista, had to work until noon on Saturday and could use our help. The only problem was that I had an Uppercase Living party on Friday night and could not go up until Saturday too. Shelby was working on Saturday and could not go up at all. So Jay, on his own went up to the campground with 2 of our friends kids and the other 2 couples that go too. I noticed Jay had called my cell after 11 on Friday night and I was concerned he wasn't having a good time. We got a few phone calls on our ride up and I was wondering what shape I would find Jay in when we arrived. As we came around the circle in the camp we noticed signs for a yard sale... at lot #15- that was Jim and Krista's lot. There were all kinds of things on display for sale, there was even a box of free stuff. All the people already up at the campground were having some fun and pretended they were selling all of Jim and Krista's stuff. They had even gone to a hardware store and bought real signs for the truck windows.. It was really funny, Especially since I didn't realize it was a joke at first. When we got settled in I noticed Jay had commandeered a recliner and seemed totally at home in the camp. We had a great day just hanging out with friends, eating dinner out in the open and celebrating another friend's birthday. So, does Jay think he will go up next year for a whole weekend? The jury is still out on that one.

The best thing about camping was being able to lay back and relax

All day long skydivers were floating overhead

I just loved everyone being together, hanging out, talking and laughing

Sam

Riley

The Campsite view

Brody

Friendly (?) game of Lacrosse

A Final View of the river as we head out

Dorothy RDH

Its really interesting. I have been doing dental hygiene for over 20 years now but I have very few pictures of this part of my life. I guess that is kind of good, I mean who wants their hygienist snapping pictures as she is working in their mouth but still it is weird to have something be such a big part of my history and yet have very little to remember it. As I am looking to get an album together to bring with my to Namibia I decided to get a couple of pictures from work to add to the book. So here are my instruments that I use on most patients (I have more than one set and I clean and sterilize them between patients.) And then Here is a picture of me working on a friend's daughter. She graciously agreed to be in the picture for me. So now I have proof.. I really am a dental hygienist 

Less than 4 weeks to go!!!

Well, In less than 4 weeks I will be heading to Namibia! I cannot wait. I cannot believe it..I can hardly breathe I am so excited. There will be 11 of us traveling on this mission. We had our last meeting before the trip on Saturday and everyone seems ready. We will be spending 3 days visiting with sister churches for our churches. My church is in a village called Eembaxu. The amazing thing is we cannot find this village on any map and it is only mentioned a couple of times on Google. I cannot wait to learn where it is and meet the people there. I am just so excited. As the trip gets closer I will post a more detailed itinerary so that you can follow along with me as I travel. I am trying to embed a video from YouTube about a previous group visit for those interested in getting an idea of what I will be experiencing while I am there. I hope it works

New York Botanical Gardens with Dad

I spent the day today walking around the NYBG with my father. It was a perfect day to enjoy being outside and the gardens were, no surprise, beautiful.