Saturday, February 23, 2013

A sense of belonging

This week was a very productive week,both swimming wise and socially. We met with the Headmaster of Franschhoek High School and got a mini plan in place for teaching swimming. It is hard for the older students to attend in the morning during regular classes, but we settled on two afternoons a week to start. On Tuesday and Thursday from 2-4pm, the pool will be open just for the High Schoolers to learn to swim. Once we get an idea as to how many students are interested, we will add a bit more structure; it is a start though and we are thrilled. M-F mornings we will have some younger classes come. Today we had our first class, 25 Second graders! The class was fairly evenly split between boys and girls, so we taught the boys first, and the girls after. It was challenging  yet extremely fun and rewarding. These kids are SO EAGER to learn, i fought tears the whole time. We have been given such an amazing opportunity to pour into their lives. Not just swimming, but love, acceptance, confidence and courage. Their teacher could not stop thanking us for coming, she seriously spent a few minutes just trying to grasp that people would travel so far voluntarily to teach her students and other students. She said she will bring them 3 times a week!!! Here is a photo we took after lessons.














Later we also had lessons with a much smaller group, around 10 students. That went well except for the fact that the pool was so freezing they could not get used to it and hopped out after about 25 minutes. We still had fun and so did the students. We took a photo with them as well.

Now onto our social/spiritual connections. Last Sunday was the first time we could visit a church since leaving home, and we were really in dire need of connecting with other christians. We visited Shofar, which is an amazing, multi cultural congregation. It is one of the few English speaking churches, which is a huge plus for us :) They have two services and we went to both to see if we liked one more than the other, both were fabulous and we felt right at home. People here are so nice and welcoming, we felt a true sense of belonging. I wrote a bit about the church in my last blog, but I am just doing a bit of follow-up. We ran into the pastor on Tuesday afternoon and he asked if someone had contacted us about attending a small group, we said no, and he assured us someone would be contacting us shortly. Boy was he right. Later that day I received 2 phone calls, a text message and an email regarding joining a small group-the same group not different calls ofr different groups. We were impressed with the diligence someone was taking to track us down and really make room for us in their group. We attended on Wednesday and LOVED it. We just connected right away and stayed til 10:30 talking to people(It ended at 9) They invited us hiking the next evening, Thursday, and another hike in Cape Town(an hour or so away) on Saturday. Thursday's hike was a great experience! On our way up the mountain we stopped to watch the baboons on the side of the road-AHHHH i was so stoked! I have been wanting to see baboons the whole time we have been here so i was ecstatic that we saw 2 troops, including baby babies :D Thankfully the baboons here are wild and haven't had a lot of interactins with humans so they are kept to themselves and were unfazed by us observing them for 15 min or so. Apparently the baboons in Cape Town have been fed too much by humans, so they associate humans with food and tend to attack people and are considered more dangerous. Here are a couple shots I got of them







We then proceeded up the mountain til we got to Mt. Rochelle, our hiking starting point. It was a breathtakingly gorgeous hike, the view at the end was incredible. Here are some photos but they don't do the view any justice.

We stayed at the top for quite a while, it was so peaceful and incredible, i can't wait to go again!!!! I must finish here as we are leaving in 35min to go to a 21st birthday in Cape Town! Minnie invited us, it is one of her friends' daughter. Have a great weekend!










WAYS TO PRAY:
*Consistency with teachers bringing students to lessons
*For the weather to cooperate and the wind to die down.
*For us to be able to love on these kids with God's love. We don't have it in ourselves to love them the way they need. We want them to experience the love God has for them.

2 comments:

  1. I love this update! So cool to see the baboons! ("I am a baboon. And you are not")
    Sound like swim stuff is coming along!! Love you!!

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    1. I forgot to post the one of the female in heat, her bum is pink and swollen!! Lol oh rafiki. Thanks for reading. Love you more!!

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