Garden Centre

After a good morning in Macassar I decided to call in on Michael in Chris Nissen on my way home to see how his gate is holding up and just to enjoy being with my mate.

One of the things that never fails to amaze me about our friends there is just how generous they are and this morning I left Michael's feeling like I'd been to a garden centre.

My garden is going to be looking great by next summer!

Gateway To..

I don't get to spend as much time as I used to getting involved in practical projects and just generally helping to bodge fix things together again. So I was chuffed when Michael rang for a bit of urgent help yesterday.

A few moons ago Michael and I put a gate on the front of his property but at the time he was short of hinges (some might say he was unhinged asking me to help!) so he bodged fixed the gate to the post using the upright as the hinge.

Girls Will Be Girls!

I had a very eagerly anticipated "girly" coffee morning with 4 special ladies at my house today - it was time to get my wonderful HOPE home based carers out of their community for a few hours to just spend time chatting, laughing, eating and reviewing the past year! Each lady is a special nugget of gold, they will definitely be taking their places at God's top table one day!! It was so good to enjoy some lovely food and to potter around the garden chatting about patients and friends and our lives.

A Tale Of Two Guys

Here's a tale of two guys I care for very much and have a huge amount of respect for and two guys who are struggling through very different but equally tough times.

As I said a few posts below Ernest has just suffered a massive stroke. Thankfully he has an amazing family around him who are taking excellent care of him. As an outsider looking in it's a real privilege to see just how well loved Ernest is. My family circle consists of Paula, my fantastic sons and my brother. Ernest had 40, yes 40 members of family by his bed the afternoon after his stroke!

Neighbourhood Watch CNP Style

So often in life it is the same people who do everything and this is often met with criticism or complaint.  In the case of Chris Nissen Park we are always so thrilled to see men and women who are solid, full of Jesus Christ and committed to serving in their community taking on the roles.

It is so exciting to see again two of the HOPE Home Based Care team taking the lead in Chris Nissen in the fight against crime. All of these ladies are loved in the community and we are proud of them. In particular go Anne and go Aunty Poppy!!

The Ladies Strike Again....

We love this sort of thing... you only have to flick through the local rag and see your amazing Chris Nissen women doing yet more good work!

Friends In Pain

I'm really saddened to have to say that Peter died over the weekend while we were away. He'd been battling throat cancer for a long time now, but that doesn't make it any easier.

Peter was a great guy who rarely asked for anything and on the few occasions when he did you knew he was desperate. Peter was part of my men's bible study group in the community and together we spent many many hours trekking around in a vain attempt to obtain his ID book.

Royal Treatment

Sometimes in life special people get rewarded. I was so thrilled to see that our local community newspaper printed an article on my HOPE Home Based Care team. We were recently blessed for lunch by our friends at Taste Restaurant and the paper picked up on it. Let's hope we get some local interest, these amazing women do what they do for nothing!

Mission In Practice Impossible

Once a week whilst studying at All Nations our tutorial groups were posed with a conundrum under the guise of Mission In Practice. There were rarely straightforward answers and more often than not no real answers at all, just plenty of discussion, some good arguments and the occassional chance to wind someone up for a laugh!

So here's one for today..

Learn To Earn

Yesterday we realised another dream as we were able to take 3 ladies, from the 3 different communities in which we work, to visit a local empowerment project, Learn to Earn. It is based in the largest township outside of Cape Town (around 1 million people!). Their motto is 'a hand up, not a hand out', which we love -that is the only real way to empower people.

They offer courses in sewing, cooking, woodwork, computing, graphic design and admin skills to the unemployed, asking them to contribute 5% towards the cost of the course (ie: approx £20 to £40).

Snowing In Africa

As we were driving home yesterday morning we were amazed by how much snow there was on the Grabouw side of the Hottentots Holland mountains. Sadly I completely forgot to take a picture of the snow until this afternoon when I was on my way into Chris Nissen to deliver the maize meal and sugar to Tiny Bubbles Créche from the boys school.

Wheels Coming Off

If like me you like spending a bit of time watching stuff on Youtube you may well enjoy the stuff where people get hurt. I'm particularly fond of the faceplant clips of cyclists going over the handlebars, but to be fair, I'm happy to watch just about anything that involves someone else getting hurt through their own foolishness. As the old (or perhaps more modern) adage goes; life's only funny until someone gets hurt, then it's hilarious.

Life Is Messy

The nature of the work we're involved in is completely relational and as such it tends to be quite slow with many ups and downs. All too often the downs are more noticeable than the ups but that is the reality of many people's lives and as we get to know folk and walk with them we experience their highs and lows with them. Obviously this brings joy and sometimes heartache but we love what God has lead us to do. It's a real privilege to get to know certain folk intimately and to be there for them as they walk the narrow path with God.

Toad Slobber

We're enjoying one of South Africa's many public holidays. Today is Youth Day which is a really important date in SA's history. We first became aware of this holiday whilst in Tanzania where today is celebrated as the International Day of the African Child. The date was deliberately chosen to coincide with the massacre of children during the Soweto Uprising in 1976 when on June 16th about ten thousand school children marched in a column more than half a mile long, protesting about the poor quality of their education and demanding to be taught in their own language.

Visiting Friends

One of the real highlights of living far from friends and family is when they come to visit!  We have recently enjoyed a bit of whirlwind visit from good friends John and Tricia who hail from one of our partner churches in the UK.  Joel was particularly excited to be seeing them as he well remembered their house in Cheadle as being the one where the airplanes fly over every 30 seconds!

Time Flies When You're Having Fun

Despite the silence on the blog we're still alive and very much kicking. We hate it when we don't keep the blog up to date but sometimes things happen in life which are just not appropriate to be shared in a public way so it's best just to say nothing. All we will say is that the last few weeks have been very tough as we grapple with issues which have been bubbling for some time and whilst we're prepared to put the past behind us and move on others aren't which is tough to deal with.

So here's an overview of just what we've been up to....

Cracking Friday

One of the things I've always enjoyed about my role in Chris Nissen and now in Macassar and Firgrove is that I get to spend a lot of time sat with folk enjoying a good chat and a cup of tea (although I only drink Rooibos these days).

So on Friday morning it was a real pleasure to watch two worlds collide (not literally) as Ernest came to our house for the morning and Michael joined us too. They got on really well and were swapping plenty of stories about their days as skelms (rogues).

New Favourite Activity

One of the joys of our life is that during the school holidays we have to share the childcare and this morning is one such occasion. Paula is in Chris Nissen Park with the HOPE Home Based Care Team which means I'm stuck with the boys, my equivalent of a 'snowday'. It's a hard life.

So this morning we combined our new favourite activity of dog walking with our old favourite activity of throwing stones into the river at Radloff Park.

Door

This morning I was with Michael in Chris Nissen helping him to fit a door onto the front of his hokkie.

We had previously fitted the steel plates to the front of the door and at last we were able to hang it. Being a hokkie it's not an exact science trying to fit a stable door within a 'frame' that isn't true. Still, it makes for some interesting on the hoof adjustments but it's all good fun.

The main thing is that Michael was delighted to finally be able to close and lock the door. Tomorrow he's got a friend from church coming to fit glass to his last open window and then the hokkie will be secure.

Pirate Michael

This morning I was up unusually early to pick Michael up before the traffic got too bad and take him to the hospital for his cataract operation. Amazingly he was only in for about an hour when he rang to say he was ready. I've got to take him back tomorrow for something else to do with his eye and apparently the Dr will put a new lens in in about 12 months.

There's much that's wrong with the State healthcare system here but praise God that this op' has finally happened.

Joel thinks Michael looks cool as a pirate!