Now all we need is a good name for it since we mention "the trip" all the time and agree that it is MUCH more than just a trip. I think I'll start at the beginning to describe our plans.
Our plan is to tour the world two-up on our KTM 640 Adventure motorcycle. Along the way, we plan to volunteer our time at various Christ-centered mission organizations with the hope that we might be able to share the Bible and serve the community around us.
We have been saving money for "the trip" part of it but feel called to raise funds for the "volunteer" aspect so that where ever we go, we can serve the people there with generosity and grace while also supporting the organizations that do so much good for those around them.
We are in the very early stages of determining where we will serve and that's where you might be able to help. If you have been on a short term mission trip with a group you respected and enjoyed, let us know. We are currently working with Mars Hill Church in determining what orgaizations to look into and have started talking with a couple of them so far.
If you would like to donate, it's as simple as clicking on the "Donate" button on the right. If you already have a paypal account you can pay through that or there is a link to use a major credit card (although I think you might still have to set up an account with paypal, which is free and easy). All donations go into a separate bank account that will be used abroad to serve those around us to further the Gospel and fulfill the Great Commission.
So here's what you're looking for: Where are we going?
This is a rough itinerary and very vague. Partly because it needs more work and partly because we want to make sure we make ourselves available to be used by God to go places we might not know about yet, or stay longer somewhere unexpected.
Oct 1-15, 2010: Japan
Oct 16-Nov 30, 2010: China- Beijing to Shanghai to Hong Kong
Dec 1-20, 2010: Vietnam (North to South), Cambodia (probably just passing through), Laos, Thailand, Malaysia (to ship the bike from Kuala Lumpur)
Dec 24, 2010-Jan 15, 2011: Austria- Arrive in Darwin and travel to Carins and south to Sydney
Jan 16-Feb 15, 2011: New Zealand- both islands
Feb 16-29, 2011: Australia- From Sydney head south to Melbourne (side trip to Tasmania) and west to Perth (fly out from here)
Mar 1-31, 2011: India
Apr 1-30, 2011: Nepal (hopefully including a ~20 day trek to Everest base camp!)
May 1-14, 2011: fly to Moscow, continue riding to St. Petersburg and into Estonia
May 15-21, 2011: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary (probably just driving through)
May 22-Jun 5, 2011: Hungary, Austria
Jun 6-20, 2011: Germany (then ship off to Oslo, Norway)
Jun 21-Jul 5, 2011: Norway
Jul 6-25, 2011: United Kingdom, Ireland
Jul 26-Aug 25, 2011: Travel across Europe- France, The Alps (Switzerland, Italy), Croatia, Bosnia, Motenagro, Macedonia, Albania, Greece, Turkey
Aug 26-Sep 30, 2011: Turkey, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan
Oct 1-10, 2011: Egypt
Oct 11-Dec 29, 2011: Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Zambia, Botswana, Namibia, South Africa (fly out of Cape Town)
Dec 30, 2011-Jan 31, 2012: Argentina (Buenos Aires for New Years!)
Feb 1-15. 2012: Cruise to Antarctica
Feb 16-Mar 15, 2012: Chile (south to north)
Mar 16-Apr 15, 2012: head east through Bolivia, loop around Brazil, through Bolivia into Peru
Apr 16-May 15, 2012: Peru
May 15-Jun 1, 2012: Ecuador
June 2, 2012: HOME!
So there you have it! We will be gone for 20 months and traveling through roughly 55 countries (God willing).
How you can pray for us:
-that we would be connected to Godly overseas organizations and plans would move ahead smoothly
-that we can anticipate every practical need for our trip during this time of planning
-that we are able to raise funds to complete substantial work abroad
**We won't know how much money we will need to raise until we build definite plans with all the different ministries we will be serving throughout the 20 months.
Monday, November 9, 2009
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Wow time flies...
We are home!!!
It's a shame we lost track of blogging so for all those who were so faithful in trying to stay informed on what we were doing, we apologize.
Life really started picking up in February and we are so thankful for all the things that kept us busy. We also lost our convenient internet connection so it became a challenge to find an opportunity to log-in.
Here's a tiny summary:
We were the only volunteer's working with Agathos when we arrived. Just after Valentine's Day, Kevin arrived. He is 21 and from Connecticut. We then started teaching English at the primary school where all our younger ones attend. We taught three days a week for a couple hours each day.
In the beginning of March a football team from Wheaton College in Chicago came for a week and helped us get a lot of work done. They also left a lot of work for us to do after they left! The next week another volunteer arrived from New Zealand. Richard is 23 and is still volunteering at the cottages.
By then it was Easter which we spent with about 20 of our friends at Barbara and JD's house. It was a beautiful day and a total blessing to be able to be with all those wonderful people.
The day after Easter David, me, Kevin, Adam and Chrissy and their two kids Zek and Phoebe went on vacation. We drove 5 1/2 hours to Hluhluwe Nature Reserve and Durban for just about a week. We saw an elephant, tons of rhino, giraffe, zebra, water buffalo, wildebeest, antelope of every bread, hippos, crocs, vultures and more. The best though was seeing 5 cheetahs tear apart a fresh impala 25 feet from our pick up. We stayed until lunch was gone.
When we got home from vacation it was back to our construction work getting more rooms ready to house more orphans. And by that time we were using all our free time to hang out with the kids as our time grew shorter and shorter.
We flew out April 19th and spent a week in New York on Long Island staying with some friends (Katie and Josh). We LOVED New York! It felt so good to be back in the states! The highlight was seeing Lion King on Broadway and they spoke in Zulu instead of Swahili (like in the Disney movie). We could understand some of what they were saying and singing about which was amazing and a end to our South African experience.
On April 26th we flew to Cancun to be with Heidi's family for a week. It was very relaxing and a great opportunity to catch up.
Finally on May 3rd at midnight we arrived back to Edmonds and ready to sleep on our own bed for the first time in exactly 8 months. It was AMAZING!
We would love to catch up with everyone now that we are home. We have new cell phones. David's number is (425) 205-3051 and Heidi's is (425) 205-3129
OUr goal is to post a big album or several albums that have some type of caption with them so that everyone can see our pictures -- well the good ones at least -- we took 10,000 pictures!
We also just want to say thank you again to everyone who helped support us while we were in Africa and for all those who were praying for us. We were so blessed while we were gone and are so thankful to be back safely and in good health.
-David and Heidi
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Supplementary Photos now functioning!
Well, before I continue telling everyone what we've ben up to I'd like to announce that we found a way to post pictures! We are really excited so I wanted to show you some pictures that go with a couple of the previous posts.
This is the mother and baby rhino that were standing right in the road when Adam and Chrissy took us to Spioenkop Game Park at the end of January.
This is the dad that came out from behind a bush right by us to be with his family.
Also at Spioenkop.
When Betsy took us way up the valley to watch the kids put on a singing and dancing performance, this is the home that we went to. This is a traditional (and very nice) home.
This was the final dance routine and the one I referred to as "National Geographic" material. It was amazing.
In a previous post I said that after all the songs and dances, they all got together and did a breakdance-style thing where one or two people would come out of the crowd and show off their dance moves to the beat of the drum. Well, the Head of the Family got out there and did some shimmy and had everyone screaming and cheering. He has a dead and gutted meerkat on his head and is only clothed in different animal skins. He is the most respected man here.
This is our feast that we had after the show in the round house. These women were also spectators in the show. Betsy is on the left and I believe she knew all these women from her work here (with home-based care women). Betsy is fluent in Zulu so that was a real blessing going with her.
I think I mentioned that our river swelled like crazy one day at the very end of January. Well here's what the river looked like that day. Also, just a couple minutes after this picture was taken the river was up 2 feet past the tree that David is hanging on.
And here is the river on a normal day. So you can see that it rose maybe 8 or 10 feet but also got WAY wider so the flow was just insane.
This is our new group of friends. This picture was taken at Cameron's going away party on Superbowl Sunday. There are some people we don't know because they were other friends of Cameron's but I'll introduce you to the people I do know.
Starting in the back left is Chrissy holding her son Zeke, and then Adam, her husband. In front of Chrissy is Slindile and her new born baby on her back (they are living with Betsy right now) and her son (called "bookie" meaning brother) in front of her. To the right of David and I is Betsy and Barbara. Behind Barbara is Betsy's boyfriend Eugine. To the right of him is Cameron and Andy (his wife Roz was not in S.A. yet). Sitting down, starting on the right is JD, Barbara's husband, Mya (Sophie's daughter), Sophie (with a newborn she is caring for temporarily), Pheobe (Adam and Chrissy's daughter), and Sophie's son ( I forget his name).
And I think that pretty much catches us up to the present!
This is the mother and baby rhino that were standing right in the road when Adam and Chrissy took us to Spioenkop Game Park at the end of January.
This is the dad that came out from behind a bush right by us to be with his family.
Also at Spioenkop.
When Betsy took us way up the valley to watch the kids put on a singing and dancing performance, this is the home that we went to. This is a traditional (and very nice) home.
This was the final dance routine and the one I referred to as "National Geographic" material. It was amazing.
In a previous post I said that after all the songs and dances, they all got together and did a breakdance-style thing where one or two people would come out of the crowd and show off their dance moves to the beat of the drum. Well, the Head of the Family got out there and did some shimmy and had everyone screaming and cheering. He has a dead and gutted meerkat on his head and is only clothed in different animal skins. He is the most respected man here.
This is our feast that we had after the show in the round house. These women were also spectators in the show. Betsy is on the left and I believe she knew all these women from her work here (with home-based care women). Betsy is fluent in Zulu so that was a real blessing going with her.
I think I mentioned that our river swelled like crazy one day at the very end of January. Well here's what the river looked like that day. Also, just a couple minutes after this picture was taken the river was up 2 feet past the tree that David is hanging on.
And here is the river on a normal day. So you can see that it rose maybe 8 or 10 feet but also got WAY wider so the flow was just insane.
This is our new group of friends. This picture was taken at Cameron's going away party on Superbowl Sunday. There are some people we don't know because they were other friends of Cameron's but I'll introduce you to the people I do know.
Starting in the back left is Chrissy holding her son Zeke, and then Adam, her husband. In front of Chrissy is Slindile and her new born baby on her back (they are living with Betsy right now) and her son (called "bookie" meaning brother) in front of her. To the right of David and I is Betsy and Barbara. Behind Barbara is Betsy's boyfriend Eugine. To the right of him is Cameron and Andy (his wife Roz was not in S.A. yet). Sitting down, starting on the right is JD, Barbara's husband, Mya (Sophie's daughter), Sophie (with a newborn she is caring for temporarily), Pheobe (Adam and Chrissy's daughter), and Sophie's son ( I forget his name).
And I think that pretty much catches us up to the present!
Monday, February 4, 2008
Zulu Style
So things are looking up around here and life is getting fuller. We have now met a lot of people to call friends and it has given us more to do. We have begun a Friday morning Bible study with about 9 other missionaries who live in our valley.
There's Andy and his wife Roz from the UK who have two babies (one is only a month or so old). There's Adam and Chrissy who have two young children and go to our church and they are the one's we probably hang out with the most. There's Betsy who is originally from Seattle but has lived here for 4 years now and her boyfriend Eugine from Cape Town; and with Betsy comes Slindile who is Zulu and 18 years old and has two babies and is living with Betsy for the time being. There's Sophie from Australia who's been here for 9 years and also has two young children and is also looking after a new born Zulu baby because her mother is extremely sick. There's JD and Barbara who take good care of David and I and are very involved with the work at Agathos. There was Cameron from Australia but his going away party was today. And I thinks that's the group - lots of awesome people and lots of little kids running everywhere.
On Saturday Jan. 26th, the day after we met Betsy at the first Bible study, she gave us a call and invited us to a Zulu dance performance show. We had no idea what that meant but we found out that there is a Zulu woman who runs an after school program with a bunch of kids and teaches them traditional dances and songs to kind of keep them out of trouble. So we drove about 45 min. into the valley on dirt roads and then arrived at the traditional home. Homes are usually set up for the whole family, not just the immediate. This home had 5 buildings - two round rooms and tree square mud rooms.
We were invited into one of the rounds and sat on thatch mats on the ground and sipped a traditional Zulu drink ( something like sour milk made with ground up maze). We visited with the ladies there until the show started. We brought our mats outside and the whole village started arriving. There wound up being quite a large audience. The guys came out first singing Zulu songs. Then the girls came out and did a Zulu drill team type dance. The guys came out again and sang and then the girls had another dance. This one was much more lively and they came out without any shirts on. It was quite interesting and we got some good shots to send into National Geographic (just kidding of course). The whole time there was someone pounding the beat on a drum and someone with a whistle. The last performance was everyone dancing breakdance style - one at a time - showing off their moves.
After the show we went back into the round and had a feast. David sat on a stool in the corner because men are not supposed to sit on the floor with the women. He got a nice ceramic plate filled with all the food and was served first. Women are supposed to wait to eat until the men are finished but we just gave David a 10 minute head start. The food was all laid out on the ground and all the women ate with their hands. There was mashed potatoes mixed with ground maze with a tomato chutney type thing to dip your handful of potato in (delicious). There was Zulu bread (my ultimate favorite) with a broth dip and a whole chicken that got ripped apart as we dug in. They also had Zulu beer which is nothing like beer and has hardly any alcohol and tastes a little like vinegar. It only takes three days to ferment. It was such an awesome experience to see real Zulu life. The uncle of the family who was the "family leader" was dressed only in animal skins with a meerkat on his head.
There's Andy and his wife Roz from the UK who have two babies (one is only a month or so old). There's Adam and Chrissy who have two young children and go to our church and they are the one's we probably hang out with the most. There's Betsy who is originally from Seattle but has lived here for 4 years now and her boyfriend Eugine from Cape Town; and with Betsy comes Slindile who is Zulu and 18 years old and has two babies and is living with Betsy for the time being. There's Sophie from Australia who's been here for 9 years and also has two young children and is also looking after a new born Zulu baby because her mother is extremely sick. There's JD and Barbara who take good care of David and I and are very involved with the work at Agathos. There was Cameron from Australia but his going away party was today. And I thinks that's the group - lots of awesome people and lots of little kids running everywhere.
On Saturday Jan. 26th, the day after we met Betsy at the first Bible study, she gave us a call and invited us to a Zulu dance performance show. We had no idea what that meant but we found out that there is a Zulu woman who runs an after school program with a bunch of kids and teaches them traditional dances and songs to kind of keep them out of trouble. So we drove about 45 min. into the valley on dirt roads and then arrived at the traditional home. Homes are usually set up for the whole family, not just the immediate. This home had 5 buildings - two round rooms and tree square mud rooms.
We were invited into one of the rounds and sat on thatch mats on the ground and sipped a traditional Zulu drink ( something like sour milk made with ground up maze). We visited with the ladies there until the show started. We brought our mats outside and the whole village started arriving. There wound up being quite a large audience. The guys came out first singing Zulu songs. Then the girls came out and did a Zulu drill team type dance. The guys came out again and sang and then the girls had another dance. This one was much more lively and they came out without any shirts on. It was quite interesting and we got some good shots to send into National Geographic (just kidding of course). The whole time there was someone pounding the beat on a drum and someone with a whistle. The last performance was everyone dancing breakdance style - one at a time - showing off their moves.
After the show we went back into the round and had a feast. David sat on a stool in the corner because men are not supposed to sit on the floor with the women. He got a nice ceramic plate filled with all the food and was served first. Women are supposed to wait to eat until the men are finished but we just gave David a 10 minute head start. The food was all laid out on the ground and all the women ate with their hands. There was mashed potatoes mixed with ground maze with a tomato chutney type thing to dip your handful of potato in (delicious). There was Zulu bread (my ultimate favorite) with a broth dip and a whole chicken that got ripped apart as we dug in. They also had Zulu beer which is nothing like beer and has hardly any alcohol and tastes a little like vinegar. It only takes three days to ferment. It was such an awesome experience to see real Zulu life. The uncle of the family who was the "family leader" was dressed only in animal skins with a meerkat on his head.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
