There's no such thing as solving for x

It’s been a solid couple of days.  And by solid, I mean I’ve been humbled, encouraged, frustrated, excited, dreadful, joyful, overwhelmed, surprised, homesick, and emotional at the thought of leaving.  I guess a “bumpy” couple of days would be a better description. BUT here's me trying to explain what we're doing!

MONDAY highlights

 Britt and I found a smoothie place down the street from ICS (the International school).  I had a strawberry banana smoothie AND a peanut butter banana smoothie (yes, we went twice in the span of 4 hours).  BEST. DAY. EVER.

We had a 4 hour team meeting on Monday night to talk about the program.  It’s tough, because there’s no such thing as “solving for x”.  It was really interesting to see Katie and Rudy working together as a team – to lead the groups to success, Rudy breaks everything down into the “business plan model” (income – expenses = profit), while Katie is much more on the “we have to encourage the guardians and bring them together as a GROUP”  (Rudy is an engineering professor, Katie has a Ph.D in developmental psychology.  Some things just make sense).  But it was neat because BOTH inputs are crucial in helping these groups move forward.  It’s tough because there’s not a right answer and things will always go wrong.  This program is different because it focuses on helping the guardians to be independent instead of forcing them to be dependent on outside aid, but that also comes with a lot of room for failure.  I can only imagine the pressure of feeling the weight of the lives of these guardians on your shoulders – Rudy and Katie started Because of Kennedy and have taken 200 families under their wing – it would be SO hard feeling like you were responsible if they didn’t succeed.  So the night was full of a lot of circled conversation and people trying to prove their points and arguing and laughing, but it was REALLY cool to see the genuine heart behind the program.

My first bead! (Katie taught Britt and I how to make paper beads so that we could help lead guardian training on Weds.)

TUESDAY highlights

-          GIRLS TRIP TO THE MERCATO (the biggest open air market in Africa) to buy supplies for the necklaces.  It was insane – people everywhere, the most RANDOM things I’ve ever seen for sale, and the most BIASED forengie prices.  When we asked Tsion (the nanny) to take us to the Mercato, she looked at Katie and went “Go to the Mercato? With 3 white people?”  When we got back in the car to leave, she turned around and said “You guys are coming with me every time from now on.  That was hilarious!” Lesson learned: forengies make you popular.

Almaz and Meseret.  They made me rings out of
candy wrappers! The other kids just wanted in
on the picture

-          At the guardian meeting in Burayu, we had a long discussion about the difference between SVO/BOK and Compassion.  One of the women challenged the program (she wanted to know why her child wasn’t being given as much as the Compassion kids were) – it was amazing to watch as other guardians stepped up to defend the program.  They are so adamant on making this about leading towards self-sufficiency instead of increasing dependence.  It was just a cool testament to watch women stand up and speak to each other on behalf of the program because of what it had already done in their lives. We didn’t have to say anything.  Another woman brought up how her child didn’t have an individual sponsor yet, and wanted to know if that would ever happen.  It’s the first time I’ve ever heard someone bring up the fact that their kid wasn’t sponsored.  I got to see that it’s more than just the $$ that these families desire.  There’s something powerful about knowing that someone specifically chose you and is praying for you and cares for you.  We assured her that there were random people praying for her family and giving $$ (the random donations are how she’s able to participate in the program) and that we were working hard to get her son individually sponsored so that he (and she) would have a personal relationship with someone  who deeply cares for them.  It was just neat – I’d never really thought that people who weren’t individually sponsored cared because they were still getting the financial benefits (through outside donations), but it’s so much more than that.

-      

     WEDSNEDAY highlights

- AMBO TAKE 1: Teaching how to make paper bead necklaces.  Each of the guardian groups is working towards starting a business.  Every member of the group contributes 5 birr a week towards their group’s savings account.  Most of the groups have saved about 8,000 birr, but they need about 20,000 to start a small business (one group estimated their starting cost at 120,000 birr.  At this rate, they’ll be starting in 21 years.  We’re working with them to “re-evaluate” their short term vision, but their long-term one is AMAZING).  In order to increase their savings accounts faster, we’re teaching them how to make necklaces out of paper beads.  We’ll buy the necklaces from them and then sell them in the US.  Half of the $$ will go directly to the guardians who make the necklace, while the other half will go into the group savings account.  This way, the work they put in helps supply food for their family NOW, but there’s also a long-term benefit.  The necklaces aren’t meant to be a sustainable business; they’re just a step to help speed up the process of getting to where each group is able to start one. 

I've never been so excited about seeing someone cut in a straight line.
When the first woman (Firewot) succeeded, I held it up, made everyone
clap for her, and gave her a HUGE hug.

We had to start teaching from the VERY basics, because most of the guardians had never used a ruler or scissors before.  Katie led the main instruction with a translator and then we split into groups to work individually.  I’ve always taken for granted how to draw a straight line with a ruler, but there are so many things you have to make sure you do! (line the ends of the ruler up to the marks, hold the ruler down as you run your pen along the edge of the ruler, etc.)   I’d also never thought about how to teach someone how to cut without creating jagged edges.  Since my group didn’t have a translator, it was a lot of hand-over-hand demonstration (you should try teaching someone to measure in a different language.  It’s way more fun than in English).  Once one person mastered a skill, he/she would stand up and explain it to the rest of the group! It was a BEAUTIFUL picture of international teamwork.

The necklaces are also a really good way to teach the guardians to work together.  While most of the groups developed “specialists” in each skill (cutting, measuring, drawing lines, and rolling), they were all really excited to teach each other. 

Abavech, Alam, Abebu, and Diribe with their first beads! 

Mulu!! (I don't know if you can see this, but the bead is on
top of her head) 

Abebu and Firewot

Diribe laughing at me – I’m trying to memorize all of the Ambo guardian’s names, so I’ve been taking their pictures and writing their names down.  I gave Diribe a hug and said “Denanush” (hello) , and then one of the other women said “Salamnachu, Foto?” (“What’s your name?”, “Photo”?) and they all laughed (it’s my natural progression of meeting them: “Hello, What’s your name?, Photo?”).  BUT even though they laugh at me it’s totally paying off – I’ve gotten a few of their names down, and it’s WAY worth seeing their face light up when I’m able to call them by their names. 

This is Feraol.  I’m proud to say that I got him to take his first selfie EVER. He’s laughing at me (it’s become a common trend).

HIGHLIGHT OF THE DAY (other than getting to make beads with men and women who I can laugh with and learn with and spend time with even though we can communicate a maximum of 10 words with each other) was watching 2 of the Burayu guardians (Buzi and Yodit) come and teach the Ambo guardians how to make paper beads, and then lead the self-help groups in the afternoon.  The Burayu program is a year older than Ambo so Buzi and Yodit have been involved in the program for a year longer than the Ambo guardians.  It was SO cool to see them sharing their testimonies of how the program had affected their lives and give their advice to the Ambo guardians.  I’ve never seen the guardians so engaged during a meeting – it’s just really powerful/affirming to hear from someone who has walked the same path as you encourage you.  AND it was cool to see the unity between people who had never met, but who were all fighting poverty together.

Feraol and Amansisa.  They were my "guadenyas" ("friends".  I don't know if it's Amheric or Afan Oromo, but I know what it means!) They both ROCK.

Sost Sou

Saturday was our first official adventure day with a local! (And it was the 22^nd, which means I have exactly 1 month left here).  Since everyone likes stories with pictures WAY better, here’s a summary of the day in pictures.

To start the day off, we took our FIRST TAXI!!! (yes, this is a selfie in a taxi.  I REALLLY wanted to take a picture but I REALLY didn’t want to look like a tourist, but then I realized that people could tell I was a tourist by looking at me, and I’d rather remember my first Ethiopian taxi than care about the impression people get of me in a 20 minute taxi ride.  So we took a picture).  At first I thought Brittany and I would be able to figure out the taxi system to get places by ourselves…. Most definitely not.  To catch the taxi, you stand on the side of the road and wait for one to pull up.  You have to push past all the other people who are standing next to you in order to get INTO the taxi, and then you crawl in the van that seats 12 but holds 20.  There’s a guy who “operates” the door, and the taxi starts moving as he hops in, and you’re usually up to a decent speed before he closes the door.  Then he starts collecting $$ from everyone as they tell him where they want to go.  We definitely would have gotten ripped off if Meti weren’t with us, so she was the “forengie protector” of the day.  Most people were REALLY nice, and they laughed at me when I tried to speak Amheric.  One guy even gave me lessons during one of our taxi rides! We ended up taking about 10 taxi’s that day – because they’re “group taxi’s”, each one only goes between a couple locations.  So it’s kind of like a mini-bus system, but you get to tell the driver where to stop in between the locations.  Apparently a “private” taxi is 300 birr/ride: we made a maximum of 6 birr/person.  P.s. “Sost sou” means “we are 3” (that’s what you tell the $$ collector when you pay in order to pay for 3 people).

Stop #2 was at the lion zoo! Meti asked last weekend what my expectations of Africa were, and I told her I didn’t have any.  Except when I picture Africa I don’t picture cities, I picture safari land and lions.  Somehow we got across that I’d never seen a lion (I forgot about the ones at the Atlanta zoo), but she got really excited and said she would take me the Lion Zoo! It’s exactly what it sounds like – a zoo with the main attractions of lions.  And then about 10 monkeys, and this old man bird (his hair is graying and everything).  I told him he was ugly and I think he got offended because he squaked at me, so I took his picture to make him feel better.  The zoo here was a LOT different than the Atlanta zoo (go figure).  We walked around this one in 20 minutes max, and there was zero effort to even make it look like the animals were in their natural habitats.  The lions just sat in cages all day with a little room to pace – some of the monkeys had a tree to climb on, but that’s about it.  If I were an animal, I would DEFINITELY rather be American.

Stop #3: Addis Ababa University! We couldn’t go in because we didn’t have student badges, but this is the Technology part! It’s almost like the entrance to GT… 

Stop #4: LUNCH!!! We stopped at a restaurant across from the university, and it might have been my favorite part of the day. Mainly because I felt like a local because it’s where a lot of the college students eat! And we got to eat lunch traditional style (aka with our hands and all off the same plate).  It was a lot of fun.  Weirdest thing ever happened to me – I was CRAVING Shiro (mashed up beans).  Like, that’s all I wanted to eat.  I think Ethiopianization is happening faster than I thought.

Stop #5: Mt. Entoto! Some Americans I met at the international school told me a lot of people go running/walking on Mt. Entoto, and Meti had never been before, so we decided to give it a try.  It was kind of a bust.  I don’t know what she was expecting, but she’s definitely not a hiker.  It took us 4 taxi’s just to get up the mountain, and then when we got to the top it was just a little country town in the mountains.  I LOVED it, and I hope I’ll get some time to come back and bring a book and just walk around/sit on top of the mountain and read.  The view must have been beautiful, but I think I was the only one who wanted to hike to find it, so we kind of just walked around for a bit and then went back down the mountain.  It was really cool to see the rural community that was just functioning by itself.  There was a beautiful Orthodox church on top of the hill, so Brittany and I might try to go back one day and explore a bit. 

Stop #5.5 Sugar cane! On the way home we passed somebody selling sugar cane, so we decided to try it.  I’ve seen a lot of kids eating it, but it’s WAY harder than they make it look! You have to rip off the skin with your teeth, and I couldn’t even bite into it! We got lots of funny stares and chuckles when people saw forengies trying it in the middle of the street… whoops. 

 Stop #6: Waiting for our ride home.  We waited for Katie to come pick us up at a café, and Brittany and I decided we would try to be different.  I ordered the “peanut tea” and she got the “pineapple tea”.  We thought it would be tea flavored with peanut/pineapple.  Turns out it’s just hot water with flavored powder in it.  Mine tasted exactly like hot, thinned out peanut butter. It was really good at the time, but I don’t think it’ll happen again.

 Random picture of a lamb in a window.  We went to a traditional restaurant for lunch yesterday, and I was walking down the stairs and this guy stuck his head out at me.  I thought it was really funny that they would be keeping a lamb inside a seemingly abandoned building.  When I was taking a picture, Kes Cimdii walked up, laughed, and said “Tibs!!” (Tibs is their traditional food).  All of the sudden, the lamb in the building wasn’t so funny anymore :[

Overall it was an AMAZING day.  I loved getting to know Meti better and was so thankful for the way she just laid aside her day so that she could show us around the city.  It was really good to get out and feel like we were taking advantage of Ethiopia, and I loved getting to see things from a local’s perspective. 

p.s. random thought #2 – we’re trying to start small groups in the youth program, and trial #1 was yesterday.  Deep relationships aren’t really valued here, so it’s a pretty new concept that not a lot of them are used to.  Usually I would be against trying to “change a culture”, but I’ve seen SO much come from the ability to be vulnerable with my friends, so I actually think if we can model how to open up to each other, it could be something really cool for their community.  Yesterday we lead Zenebech, Gamede, Liquitu, Simbo, Bontu, Abezu, Sena, and Lensa.  Prayers for openness/fellowship/our ability to be open and vulnerable with each other would be greatly appreciated! 

"One Camera"

"One Camera" is what the kids say when they want you to take a picture of them. Or "YOU! YOU! YOU! YOU!" I keep trying to tell them my name is "Marnie", but for some reason they keep getting me confused with someone named "You"

Anywho.... here are some photos! Enjoy! 

Lunch at the church! 

This is Turri and his family (he has a set of twins who are in 2nd grade: Leilo and Lelise).  We got to visit his home on Weds - he is AMAZING. His wife took 1 child and left to go to an Arab country to find work (she's been gone for 3 months and hasn't sent any $$ back), and he chops wood every day to support his family.  He is an incredibly hard worker and has a lot of faith, but also gets beat up by life almost every day because of the struggles of making it by.  Prayers for him and his family would be really appreciated.

Africa has turned me into a mass murderer.  Mosquitos... beware.

Guardian meeting in Ambo 

My helpers for the Abraham skit (Abraham is the one with the hat... we ghetto-fied him) 

Meet Marta.  If I had favorites, she would be one of them.  She's in KG (Kindergarten) and EVERY day when we get to Ambo, she's one of the first ones that SPRINTS up and gives me a hug. 

Sinjaleta (I love you) in sign language.  Rudy taught the kids on Friday. (No Carey, this isn't what you think it is) 

Dia por Dia

Every morning I wake up, thank God I’m alive, get excited to eat my gummy vitamins and cereal, and think “I can’t do it again today”.  Almost every morning I’m overwhelmed with feelings of inadequacy, exhaustion, or a strong desire for homey comfort.  I think about having to get everything I say translated, or trying to form relationships with the guardians I can’t communicate with, or playing the same games with the kids, or having the same basic conversations because that’s the extent of people’s English, or trying to teach 100 Kindergartners who just want to play with my hair and I’m like “Nope.  I can’t do it today”.

Being helpless has never been felt so cool.

Because EVERY morning I have to say “God, you say that your power is made perfect in my weakness.  You say that you will give me strength when I am weary and that when I turn to you, you lift the veil from my face and I am transformed into you (2 Corinthians 3:16-18), so Lord I pray that you would do that today.  That you would love through me and serve through me and that I would truly be your hands and feet, because I can’t do it”.

And EVERY night I lay down and I’m like “God, I can’t believe you actually came through again”.  One day maybe I’ll figure out that that’s who He is and I’m just getting to experience what it’ like to walk dependent on the Lord.  Maybe one day I won’t wake up doubting that He’ll come through and won’t go to sleep surprised, once again, that He fulfills His promises.  But it’s been over a month now, and I’m still in awe.  This is what it means to not worry about tomorrow (Matt. 6) and this is what it means to take up my cross daily and follow Christ.  Part of me wants to fear going home and back to comfort because I fear that I’m going to lose what this feels like, but then I remember that that’s worrying about a day that’s WAY past tomorrow, so I pray for strength for the day and step forward.

Now for the non-thoughtful updates:

1. Brittany and I got to walk around our house on Monday! It was pretty funny – as soon as we left our compound we passed the Gleason’s coming home – they just honked at us and we waved and laughed, and then texted them to let them know we weren’t running away.  It was a pretty uneventful walk: we walked to a mentally challenged center across the street and made an appointment to come back and get a tour (we looked like SUPER forengies just walking around and asking for someone who spoke English), so hopefully we’ll get to take a tour this week! The best part was when Brittany got slapped on the butt by a random passer-by… we thought it was because we were white, but then he did it to the Ethiopian lady walking in front of us and she slapped him back, so it was REALLY funny.
2. On Thursday we (Katie, Brittany, and I) hung out at the church/school all day.  It was SO fun.  The kids left around noon (they get half days because they’re taking exams this week), so we got to hang out with a small remainder of the kids who stayed.  It was a lot more personal and I learned like 5 NAMES in a day (that’s a lot harder than you would expect!).  The best part, though, was when we got to share lunch with the church staff. This time we all ate off one plate and we ONLY used our hands… it rocked. And I felt like we were taking some advantage of the Ethiopian culture, so I liked it.
3. On Friday I lead my first VBS in Ambo! We had a guardian group at the same time, so I ended up leading it by myself.  It was actually really fun – there were 100 kids but they were REALLY well behaved.  We went through a skit of the story of Abraham and then made “belts of truth” out of yarn and cut up paper – it’s funny how little supplies you need to make a kid happy.  At least in Ethiopia.  While I was planning it I figured out I am NOT made for children’s ministry.  I just can’t keep things simple (hence the length of my blog posts).  Like, we’re trying to tell the story of Abraham “kid” style, but there’s SO much that happens between God telling Abraham he’s gonna be the father of many nations and Abraham having a kid (i.e. he sleeps with his servant.  But nobody wants to tell a 3 year old that so…).  So it ended up being WAY harder to plan that lesson than one that I’d lead to people my age, but it was still fun.
4. Funny story of the day – we were riding home from Ambo on Friday, and about halfway through the trip we were stopped by a government official.  This isn’t super out of the ordinary, but the weirdest part was when the police officer hopped in our car and we drove off.  He started asking Rudy all sorts of questions that got more personal as we went on (if we were living in Ethiopia, if we had a house, if I was Rudy’s wife (that was awkward), how much we were paying for the house, if we had a guard, how much we were paying for the guard, where we were from (when we said “America” he said “Oh! Today is my lucky day!), what Rudy’s salary was…. Lots of $$ questions).  I’m sitting in the back seat thinking “We just got hijacked. And now that he knows all these details about our lives, we’re about to get held for ransom”.  I pulled my wallet and my passport bag out of my backpack and put them in my pockets (I was ready to run… Dad, you would have been proud of me), but then about 30 minutes later we stopped on another side of the street, and the guy got out without even saying bye.  It was weird.  Rudy saw me putting my wallet back in my backpack and laughed at me, but he would have been TOTALLY jealous if we had gotten kidnapped and I had my passport and he didn’t.  (Dad, I promise, it’s just a funny story.  We’re not actually gonna get kidnapped.  People are very nice here).

That’s all for now! More to come about more adventures in Addis with my first Ethiopian friend! And pictures to come eventually...

So the internet ROCKS this morning...

it let me video chat, check my emails, post on the JCGSFF blog, AND upload pictures.  So I'm taking full advantage of it... enjoy! 

Kids in the compassion program eating their Saturday meal - a biscuit with rice

Yonas's house: one of the kids who is sponsored in the Burayu program.

Ethiopian Traditional Restaurant! We all just ate off the big plate in the middle.  As for  what we were eating... I didn't ask.

Worknish's house (the one in the orange).  Her husband died 5 years ago and  now she works to support her 5 kids by herself (the other 2 are in school). She's part of the Ambo program.

The classrooms in Burayu! 

Burayu Church! Under construction... probably will be for a while. It doesn't stop people from having their offices in the midst of construction though! 

Inside the church.  It's way bigger than I expected it to be.

We got to watch the Ethiopia FOOTBALL (soccer) game with the youth of the church on Sunday! It was my first game watching football with foreigners - WAY more fun than Americans. This guy wasn't with us, but apparently it was his first time watching a football game with a white girl... he wanted to document it.

The drive home from the game was INSANE. It's a 45 minute drive, but it took us an hour and a half because of all the mobs in the streets.  People would jump on top of cars, vans, and buses while they were moving and just ride around the streets.

We got stuck in a round about with a mob of people.  The only casualty was the left side mirror on the van.

Lesson learned: don't sit in the middle of the girls.

This is what happens when you add Crystal Light to Ambo Water (water with gas). EPIC fail.

Overwhelmed

Today was the first time I cried about how much abundance I live in.  It was funny – it wasn't seeing kids come to school with no shoes and tattered clothes or visiting a home made of mud with 1 bed for 6 people that set me off.  It was sorting through the suitcase full of donations of jeans that my mom had pulled from the thrift store because no one was buying them and clothes that I had grown out of or deemed “tacky”.  It was making a pile of these clothes and giving them to Ahsna, the kids’ nanny, and seeing the delight on her face when I told her that I had brought clothes that didn't fit me and that I thought might fit her.  And then it was her coming upstairs to give me a huge hug and a kiss on the check and to tell me in broken English “I love!” and “Tomorrow I wear!”  And that’s when I leaned against the wall and cried.  Because Ahsna’s day was made through thrift shop jeans (I think they’ll be the only pair of jeans she’s ever owned) and hand-me, hand-me, hand-me downs.

I was overwhelmed at how easy it is to make someone feel so loved through something that was a convenience to give away.

And then I started thinking about how the other day, I complimented Amarech (the Burayu school director) on her hair barrette.  A lot of Ethiopian women wear them, and in my quest to become Ethiopianized, I asked her where I could buy one.  She ensured me that she would get one for me, but I insisted that I really wanted to buy it for myself.  2 days later she pulled me aside into her office and pulled a BEAUTIFUL barrette out of her pocket.  I don’t think I've ever been so excited about a git in my life (I’m sure I have been, but I reached that level of excitement).  I gave her at least 7 HUGE hugs and said “thank you” in every way I could (yes, I accidentally slipped “Muchimas gracias” in and we both laughed).  I’m sure she left thinking “I had no idea it was so easy to make someone feel so loved”.

3 Things I realized:

1. How much God must rejoice when we accept His gift.  I was overwhelmed by a couple pairs of jeans that weren't even mine.  How much more must He rejoice when His children whom (who? Grammar Nazi’s Trav and Carey… halp) He  fearfully and wonderfully made in His image (Psalm 139/Genesis 1) receive His grace and when we put our faith in Christ, accepting His free gift of eternal life  Romans 3:21-26 & Romans 6:23.
2. That Ahsna and I have the same desire to be loved.  And what a couple pairs of jeans can do for her, a hair barrette can do for me.  We make loving people so complicated sometimes.  All it takes is turning our eyes outward and appreciating others, and then finding little ways to let them know.
3. Giving out of abundance is okay.  I get caught up in thinking that if a gift is not a sacrifice, it is not a true gift.  If I’m giving clothes away that I didn’t really like or donating $$ that I found on the side of the road, it doesn’t really count as a donation.  But clothes are still clothes and $$ donated is still $$ donated.  While I definitely think that there are times when we are called to sacrificially give, I think we get so caught up in making sure we’re sacrificing that we forget we’re allowed to give out of our abundance.  Sometimes if I don’t feel like I’m making a sacrifice I don’t give at all, and I don’t think that’s the way it’s supposed to work.  In 2 Corinthians 8-9 Paul is encouraging the Corinthian church to give generously.  He’s not asking them to sell their houses and live on the streets in order to buy someone else a house.  He’s not asking that they give up their college educations or 4 meals a week so that they can pay for someone else’s education.  He’s asking that “as a matter of fairness your abundance at the present time should supply their [the Christians in Jerusalem] need, so that their abundance may supply your need, that there may be fairness” (2 Cor 8:13-14). At that time, whle the Corinthian believers could contribute their abundance of finances, the Jewish believers could supply an abundance of prayer, ministry, and spiritual strength.  That’s EXACTLY what I’ve seen here.  Because of Kennedy can supply finances and Stand for the Vulnerable Organization (SVO) can provide an incredible amount of prayer and ministry support.  Dana’s family (Dana is a guy who came on the American team) can pay $42 a month for Kadist’s education, basic health fees, and her mom’s empowerment training. Kadist, her mom, and the rest of her family can provide an abundance of prayers when 14-year old Rob (Dana’s son) comes back from Ethiopia with cediph (sp?) and goes to the hospital to fight for his life (and then, still on medication, comes back to Ethiopia 8 months later to see Kadist and her family).  This is a partnership for the gospel.  That’s what it means to be a body of Christ.  Yes, I still think there are times when we are called to sacrificially give in order to love like Jesus.  But there are also times when we are given an abundance (of finances, love, faith, hope, happiness… whatever) and it’s out of that abundance that we’re able to bring glory to God.  2 Corinthians 9:11-15.

Today was supposed to be my Sabbath where I don’t get on my computer and don’t think about emailing people or Because of Kennedy.  Once again, Marnie’s planned failed for something WAY better.

52 Reasons I'm Thankful for my DAD

Because today is his 52ND BIRTHDAY and FATHER'S DAY, and I didn't think it served him justice if he was the only one that got to see how amazing he was today.

    

1.  He inspires me to stay in shape

2.   He loves our family selflessly

3.   He’s always willing to give advice, even when I act like I don’t need it

4.   He cries

5.   He plays pool and foosball with me

6.    He knows when I’m upset

7.    He gets to know my friends

8.     He gives me freedom to make my own decisions

9.     He’s ALWAYS willing to listen

10.   His family is his first priority

11.   He takes care of the lake house

12.   He teaches me to water ski

13.   He deeply cares about his girls

14.   He loves his parents

15.   He constantly tells me that I’m beautiful, so it’s not a question I have to take to other people

16.   He always has time for me

17.   He taught me to smile

18.   He showed me that it’s acceptable to eat a spoonful of peanut butter

19.   He showed me how to make the BEST peanut butter and banana sandwiches

20.   I can talk to him about anything

21.   We eat dinner on the back porch together

22.   He does the dishes

23.   He walks Sparky when no one else wants to

24.   He lets me nap while we watch afternoon sports

25.   He’s one of the hardest workers I know

26.   He taught me how to play golf

27.   He cries every time I come home

28.   He wakes up at 3:30 to drive me to the airport

29.   He is always inventing something

30.   He pushes me to THINK

31.   He’s supportive, no matter what

32.   He values serving others

33.   He’s realistic

34.   He hugs me when I cry

35.   He shows me what’s important in life

36.   He lets me drive his truck

37.   He sold his BMW convertible and bought an old truck, and then gave it two different colored fenders

38.   He shares life stories with me

39.   He asks questions about my life

40.   He tells me to be my own boss

41.   He endured an hour (plus) commute every day for a long time just to provide a stable life for our family

42.   He’s faithful to my mom

43.   He’s willing to admit he’s wrong

44.   He says sorry

45.   He’s made our home a WELCOMING environment

46.   He lets me drive the boat

47.   He lets my friends use the lake house

48.   He forgives

49.   He’s genuine

50.   He’s himself, no matter the audience

51.   He pushes me

52.   I KNOW without a doubt that he loves me no matter what

God is not a slot machine

But He sure has done an AMAZING job at answering prayers.  Whether it’s for His strength, love, peace, patience, deeper relationships, a feeling of purpose, better relations with my teammates, contentment, the desire to feel present, connecting with the guardians, getting to lead, getting to follow, understanding the gospel, believing in Him, and even asking Him to draw people in… He continues to remind me that He HEARS me and when I am walking with Him and ask in His name, He will provide.

This week has been AMAZING.  Whereas I had gotten into a bad habit of counting down the days until I got home (not that I was super homesick or unhappy, I would just think about landing in the Atlanta airport and getting to see people and I would re-check the date for the 3^rd time that day), now every morning I wake up and I’m like “Shoot, I only have 5 Sunday’s left”, or “I get to see these guardians 5 more times.  How the HECK are we supposed to best equip them in that short period of time?”

As always, I have no idea how to structure my thoughts, so we’ll go with bullet points of the 

HIGHLIGHTS of the week.

• I found out there’s an autism center a 5 minute walk from our house.  Britt and I are going to go check it out on Monday: I have no idea what it’s gonna be like or if the people even speak English, but we’re gonna try.
• On Monday we went to ICS and I got to run. My body has finally adjusted to the climate/lack of pressure here, so I didn’t feel like I was going to die. It was kind of nice.
• Monday part 2: we decided we were going to divide and conquer Ethiopia.  When we were planning out our schedules for the summer, we realized that we were trying to do a lot, and the 4 of us trying to invest everywhere wasn’t going to be effective.  So Rudy and I are going to Ambo on Weds. and Fridays, and then we’ll help out with Burayu on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but kind of be the background people. (MOMMA I hope you caught that – I was the one that suggested that we divide and conquer because we were spreading ourselves too thin.  20 years later and I finally learned a lesson :] )
• Tuesday was tough – I realized how much I find value/purpose in being able to lead: I spent the day watching Katie teach the guardians and Katie/Rudy teach English, and I wanted SO badly to just step in and take over.  They were doing a GREAT job, I just felt useless.
• Kind of contradicting that, the one thing I DID do on Tuesday was get to teach the kids a song about professions.  We made it to the tune of the GT Fight Song and everything :]  Miller Templeton would be so proud. 

“When I grow up I want to be

A driver or a soldier or a painter I could be

A pilot or a teacher, or an engineer!

When I grow up I want to be”

(you have to REALLY adjust it to the tune, but it works, I promise.  Make sure you add hand motions too) The kids kind of have a hard time with it, but we have 4 weeks to get to video-worthy material.

•  WEDNESDAY ROCKED. Slash was the most humbling day I’ve had yet.  It was our first “solo” day in  Ambo, and other than our driver being 2.5 hours late, it was a GREAT day.  The staff had scheduled home visits for the morning, so even though we had to shorten them because we were late, it was still amazing.  I loved getting to go with a smaller group – we got to interact with the guardians on a more personal level and ask them more specific questions about their lives/the program.  It’s amazing what a difference visiting their home makes in establishing a deeper connection with the guardians– by welcoming us into their homes, they’re letting us into the most personal part of their lives.  It made me want to spend all day hanging out at their homes, getting to know them, loving on their kids, and watching them as they work.  Most of them work straight out of their homes (it was pretty funny… the first house we walked into was a bar (aka a sitting area outside the woman’s house where she served alcohol).  One of the first things we do is pray over the house, so I think the men at the “bar” felt awkward (it was 10:30 in the morning and they were already drinking.  I didn’t think it was Spring Break, but maybe it’s different on the Ethiopian calendar)). I left feeling really overwhelmed with emotions that I couldn’t really describe – I was so humbled, but I also felt so loved/welcomed/appreciated – it was a weird mix, but pretty neat.

o   Guardian training was AMAZING.  We had 3 groups come back-to-back, and I had the opportunity to lead the last group.  It was phase 2 of Marnie being humbled for the day: I’m a much better teacher in my head than I am on the spot.  It’s WAY harder to engage a group than I expected and trying to think for them and challenge them on the spot is difficult.  It’s kind of like when you’re watching someone play a word game: you can always pick out WAY more words when you’re watching someone else play than when you’re the one racing against the clock (maybe that’s just me, but still).  Maybe it’s because I’m “assigned” Ambo for the summer, but I felt a connection with the guardians that I didn’t feel with the Burayu women.  It was powerful getting to teach them/hear their visions for themselves and their group’s future businesses, because all of the sudden I wanted to do EVERYTHING in my power to help them succeed.  They became REAL guardians with REAL families that they have to provide for with REAL struggles but with REAL hopes, instead of just women who are part of a sponsorship program.  I left feeling burdened with the responsibility to ensure that they succeeded.

•  THURSDAY ROCKED TOO but in a much different way.  Thanks to reading “Kisses from Katie” (an autobiography about a high school graduate who moves to Uganda to serve and is now 23 with 13 adopted kids – don’t worry Dad, I’m not correlating this to my life, it’s just a good read) and seeing my purpose/value in being here this summer, I felt SO much free-er (is that even a word?) to serve from the background.  This translated to dedicating myself to simply loving as many people as I could with everything that I had, with the hope that they could better understand the kind of love God has for them.  Katie Davis (author of “Kisses from Katie”) points out that people aren’t able to understand God’s love when they’ve never been loved themselves, so my goal on Thursday was just to hug as many kids as I could, hold as many hands as possible, and pour myself out so that everyone I interacted with knew that they were loved.  I still did a pretty crappy job of it (especially with the people on my team), but it was really cool being able to try to ONLY serve through loving, and not through leading/doing/teaching.  I know it sounds trivial, but I get so caught up in doing and forget that loving people is just as important, so it was a cool challenge to have loving be my only responsibility.
• FRIDAY was another amazing day in Ambo.  Each of the guardian groups had INCREDIBLE visions for themselves (one group wants to make a construction materials shop, another plans to breed cows to sell milk, and the third wants to make a space to grind spices).  It was cool because they were so far more advanced than we had expected, but they still have such a long way to go in meeting their visions.  I know nothing about what it looks like to start a business, but I never realized that skills that I take for granted (reading, writing, forming a budget, figuring out what I need, brainstorming, etc.) are skills that most of the guardians have never developed (in 1 group, 3 out of the 20 knew how to read/write).  This also means that I can challenge them in creating short-term steps and teach them how to think outside the box to raise money– aka I can help them reach their goals.

o   I also got to teach English by myself (Rudy got pulled out right as we were stepping into the first classroom for a meeting with a guardian), so I walked in to Grades 3 & 4 with no translator.  It was AWESOME. The kids were way more well-behaved and seemed to know more English, so after I realized they knew their colors/most of the professions, we worked on conversations about them.  For example, most of them know the colors, but they don’t understand the question “What is your favorite color?” So we practiced talking to each other and answering questions… it was REALLY fun.  Again, it was a TOTAL “Think on the spot” time.  I was humbled (for the bajilionth time this week) because I realized while I was teaching how much I took from watching other people teach – it reminded me how important it was to sit back and let other people lead sometimes, because I have SO much to learn from others. 

That’s the end of my novel for now.  I could write 10,000 other things, but hopefully this makes up for not having posted in a week.  Grand summary: this week rocked. It’s been humbling and exciting and frustrating and terrifying, but it’s been also been a week of realizing how fun it is getting to rely on God and let Him lead instead of trying to lead myself.  He has way bigger plans than I do.