A township experience.

This past weekend our team was able to experience life in the township in a way that none of us had before.  We spent the night.  There is a church (Holy Spirit Church) in Walmer Township that hosted us.  Two of us were adopted into each home for the evening.  You probably are wondering is that safe?  Why would you want to do that?  And many more questions.  Well believe me when I say I had a bunch of questions.  I wondered if it was safe.  We stayed Saturday night and then went to church in the morning with them.   With all my experience in the township I knew that Saturday was the one day to stay away from it.  You see there is a lot of drinking that goes on because it’s the end of the week. The following is what I saw, experienced and felt during this experience.

So when we started to plan this I truthfully didn’t want to do it and wasn’t excited at all.  But I am a leader and couldn’t let my team know or see how I was really feeling because they might follow suite.  So I faked excitement and battled with lots of emotions.  Saturday afternoon came and we all met with one of our contacts Pastor Timba and his family to answer questions and head out.  We arrived at the church and for about an hour we sang songs and worshiped.  Then they split us off and introduced us to our host families.  I stayed with Sarah Buller at one of the elders houses,  His name is Wiseman. 

Once I parked the Kombi (our van) in a safe garage Sarah and I began our half hour walk to our house.  Wiseman drove his car with our bags to his house.  All his nieces and nephews and other people our age walked with us.  It was a nice walk.  We were able to get to know them.  Lots of questions were asked from how old we were to if there were black people in my town.  Half way to the house a couple of drunk boys came up to us and started to cling.  Luckily the girls we were with knew them and got them away. 

So now we are at the house.  No it wasn’t a shack.  It was a government home.  Really nice.  We talked and watched TV for a little bit.  Then went with Wiseman to get petrol and electricity.  This whole first couple of hours I was trying to calm all my nerves down and be okay with all that was happening.  We got back to the house and talked with Wiseman’s wife.  Im sorry I don’t remember her name.  Then came dinner.  It consisted of dry Milipop (its like cream of wheat) potatoes, carrots, lamb, of which was all cooked together for a long time making it very tender.  I had to let out a little sigh of relief when there wasn’t anything weird or gross put in front of me.  Some of my teammates I later learned had sour milk and oats.  Dinner was filled with more getting to know each other conversation.  After dinner we watched some more television this time a soccer game was on.  Then we headed to bed but not before the whole house prayed. 

Sarah and I stayed in their 12 year old sons’ room.  He stayed in the living room on a mattress.  Bed routine wasn’t to different from normal except that instead of a sink to wash our faces in it was a basin on the ground.  Which gave Sarah and I a couple laughs.  Falling asleep wasn’t to bad.  I was afraid that it was going to be really noisy.  But really the only noise was about 20 dogs barking.  Once we got use to it sleep happened quickly.  About 3am I woke up to absolutely no sound at all.  It was dead silent.  A little eerie. 

Sarah and I woke up around 7 and got ready for church then breakfast.  Which was oatmeal and this homemade bread.  The bread Mrs. Wiseman made on a tin bucked with a fire underneath.  It was really cool.  After breakfast the family got ready for church which included telling us that we needed baths.  Well more like telling sarah that she doesn’t know how to take a bath.  It was a little funny. Once every one was ready we headed to church.  Church was filled with singing and dancing.  They really can worship.  Then after church we headed back to our house in Parsons Hill.  Then had fun telling each other stories and laughing.