Arandis, Namibia: 2007-02-04

Wednesday, February 07, 2007

Boniface Ndagijimana

7 February 2007

Boniface "Boni" is a 32 year old, recent seminary graduate and is engaged. He is from the country of Burundi, which is located northeast of Namibia. Currently, he is living at Nan's house and considers Nan to be his spritual mother. Though we never got into how the whole relationship started, Nan has been a big help to him. Right now he is helping Tresford with his Arandis Christian Center ministry.

He and Tresford generally share the duties and responsibilities for the Sunday church services. Boniface's goal is to set up his ministry in Okahandja, at Vyf Rand, a squatter's camp. He knew from other conversations we had that I had been to both but he asked if I had ever been inside. I told him I had not and he began to describe how hot and dark they were, the flies, the lack of utitilies, furniture...you just sit on the ground he said. It didn't matter to him though. That is where he wanted to be.

One night, when we were talking about different things, he told me to always remember to "plant the seed" when building relationships with people. That is something he always trys to do. But, he added, when planting the seed try to locate the void, something missing, in the other person's life. Try to provide what is missing, plant your seed there. And, never give up.

I introduced Boniface to quesadilla's. He enjoyed them and said he think's he'll surprise Nan one night and make them. I think that was the night that he had been late getting home from something to do with the church and he was missing his "leadership" series on television. So, I'm thinking something like our PBS here. Well, later on that night, the leadership series he was talking about and had been watching all along was "The Apprentice". I gave him a brief lowdown of Mr. Trump. I guess it's all about perspectives.

I've included a video clip of Boniface and Tresford leading one of the songs at the Sunday service. Distinctly African, this is some of the music that just seems to have me wanting to listen all day long.

posted by Don @ 7:12 PM 1 comments

Tuesday, February 06, 2007

A final thank you!

6 February 2007

Thanks to everyone who provided prayers and support for me during my time away in Namibia, as well as financial support for the children of Hope's Promise. Know that it means a great deal to me to have such a support system in place here and it meant a great deal to the children to have people they don't even know helping and caring enough to help sponsor them.

Although this trip is now officially over, the experience will continue. As I've said many times recently, the work there is not finished.

Prior to going to Namibia for the first time in 2006, one of things that weighed heavily upon my decision to go was the question I posed to myself, "Was I starting something that I would not be prepared to finish?" When deciding to get involved with the lives of the children and people there, I felt I needed to ask myself that question. So many empty promises have been made to these children and people of Namibia. Could I, or would I, simply be just another American who might only be showing up for two weeks to get the warm and fuzzies that I was doing something good, telling them that I cared about them and would pray for them, that I would not forget them, and never follow through?

Was I going for my sake, for my satisfaction or was I going to enter into the lives of these people and truly make a difference in theirs? What about the difference they would make in my life? Was I prepared for that? To accept that?

Yes, I have returned home. But once again, part of me was left behind, to help continue what I've started.

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For those of you who might be interested, I've posted the working demo of the presentation I did for Brenda. I'm in the process of changing out some of the pictures to include some from Rehoboth, so Sylvia is also able to make use of it. What she was hoping to accomplish with the presentation was to give the people she was talking with an idea of what Namibia is like; what Arandis, Rehoboth & Block E, Vyf Rand are like. I've also included pictures from Swakopmund, its ocean and sand dunes, Windhoek and Etosha. Some you may recognize them from a previous trip, but most of them were taken as part of my recent trip.

posted by Don @ 8:37 PM 1 comments

Monday, February 05, 2007

Settling in back home

5 February 2007

I am attempting to settle back into my life here. My internal clock is still halfway between Africa time and US time and I find myself getting sleeping during certain parts of the day and wide awake in the middle of the night. Karen left for Connecticut today for classes and will not return until Thursday. Oh well, we did say hello in passing!

I also went back to some of the previous posts and was successful in finally uploading pictures. So, if you scroll back down, or revisit some of the posts, you will likely see some new photographs. There are more to come, as well as additional videos.

posted by Don @ 1:50 PM 1 comments

About Me

Name:Don (& Chandre)
Home:Nashua, NH (Arandis, Namibia)