However, what if it keeps ON raining (not quite like in Noah’s day), but enough for your house to be flooded and your seedlings for next year’s crop to be rotting underwater?
In Oshakati, many people were left homeless in the recent flooding and were moved to tents on higher ground.
Last Friday we joined forces with Doris, the Zulu lady who teaches me traditional dancing, and went with her to one of the camps.
The council had laid a pipe out to them (they are a few kms out of town so it is a hike to go and get food), so they have water. There are a few communal long drops. And lots of children, dogs and small cooking fires.
When Doris started playing her drum the children came pouring out (it was school hols) to dance and sing and play.
You will see on the series of photos I will post:
1. Doris and I teaching the children a ‘drum dance’.
2. Some dear little faces among the children
3. Our family presenting the gospel in song and story
4. Étienne playing ‘chase’ with the children. Caris’ Oshiwambo name is Ndapewa Oshali (‘I am given for free’. Caris means ‘grace’). Ndapewa on its own is quite a common name for girls; the parents are saying ‘I am given (a child)’. Étienne’s name is Shishani, which means ‘crown’ – Étienne means ‘crown’. All we could hear for 10 minutes is ‘ila, Shishani!’ ‘Come Shishani (chase us!)’.
5. Children wondering at Caris’ skin colour. When I was telling a story, one young girl kept touching my foot very gently. Rather disconcerting … but she smiled so widely, I had not the heart to move!
6. Tyre rolling is quite an art – but, as it is the only ‘toy’ many children have, they soon master it. Bicycle wheel frames have a long piece of string tied to them and a stick to that. By twirling the string you get the rim moving very fast (well, I don’t – I just get a knotted piece of string!).
7. Caris and Étienne participating in the dancing.
8. A woman gathering her worldly possessions ready to move back to her house (via a local taxi).
Questions upon which to ruminate:
* Do you think your life would be easier or harder with few worldly possessions?
* Which 5 ‘possessions’ in your life do you consider indispensable – e.g. what worldly possessions could you not live without?
I can live without hot water, but not willingly - I do love my shower. Recently, we had no water for 24 hours, with no idea when it would come on again (John 11.39). We don’t often have water cuts but I always keep a few litres handy – just in case. However, life without running water would be very hard for me.
There is no public transport in Namibia, unless you count a newly established passenger service (on a goods train I think it is) that commutes between Windhoek and Ondangwa. This, however, stops everywhere along the way and takes over 20 hours one way!
If you want to go to a distant main town, you go to the nearest main town to the taxi rank of microbuses. There, you choose one and wait till it fills up, as that is its departure time! Woe to you if you choose badly. David took Simon Gillham to Oshakati at 7.30 am last time he was up so he could catch a taxi back to Windhoek. The taxi sat there till after 3pm before finally leaving.
If you want to go locally, you catch one of the cars that trawl the streets, hooting at anyone who even vaguely looks like they want a lift. (Not always very good drivers or reassuring-looking vehicles and not always easy to find a place squeezed among the 20 others already in the car – well, that what it looks like sometimes. I avoid full cars but there is no guarantee that it won’t fill up once we are in. Every extra passenger is another fare.)
We have two taxi runs in Ongwediva.
1. One taxi run will take you from one end of Ongwediva to another (about 3kms) or into Oshakati (about 8 kms) for $6.50 flat rate.
2. If you want to go to Ondangwa from our house, you need to first catch a taxi to the main road (Ondangwa to Oshakati) and then another that plies its trade between Ondangwa to Oshakati ($10.50 for 30 kms). If you imagine a T, the cross bar of the T is the main road and we live at the foot of the T.
As David travels a lot, he often passes people sitting at the side of the road (esp on isolated and less-frequented roads) waiting for a taxi or other willing vehicle to come along and take them to their destination. David often picks them up (bear in mind this is not South Africa and up North this is a standard mode of transport and he has never had any trouble). One plus is that he gets language practice, if they have a common language that is! It has also presented a number of Gospel opportunities. When he was away recently, he picked up a nurse. She asked him what he did and he told her. ‘Well, teach me the Bible, too”, she said. “I have never been taught anything!”
As you pray for David, especially, do pray for many such opportunities for him.
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