LIFE and DEATH

     This week I had the opportunity to celebrate life and death!  And as a side-note, when I die, I want an African-style funeral!  This past week, I attended the funeral of a Zimbabwe woman, Gloria, at Jubilee Community Church.  The atmosphere was quiet, respectful, as people entered the church sanctuary.  As we sat, waiting for the service to begin, various people would lead out in singing a song and everyone's voices would swell in different harmonies, joining the acapella worship.  Once the service started, there was at time of preaching, and different people shared about her life or sang a special number.  The music was what really struck me with its beauty and joy!  Another thing that stood out to me was God.  Each new speaker greeted the congregation in the name of The Lord.  Heaven, and joy in sorrow, were predominant themes.  At the end, Gloria's brother came up to give 'thank yous', and he graciously thanked the people who contributed to the service, he thanked Gloria's husband for taking such good care of her when she was alive, and above all he thanked God for granting her to them for such a time and for His grace in her life.  When my time comes to die, I hope that God has also been such a part of my life that you can't help but mention Him at my death! :)
     As for life, today I joined in the celebration of a precious little girl's sixth birthday.  She is a bundle of joy, and yet so mature for her age--carefully unwrapping her presents without tearing the paper!   It is so exciting to think about what will all happen in her young life!  Apart from presents and playing card games, we all ate brunch together--pancakes and waffles.  Very delicious, and since some of the people in the house are on a Banting diet, they had even made some that I could eat (hurrah!).  I had never heard of the Banting diet before South Africa, but I was very happy about it today :)  Then, after the meal I made the unfortunate discovery that my age is the same whether I am dyslexic or not.  The rule was that those between 5 and 50 had to clean up the table.  Either way I look at my age, it is the same number :(  But many hands make light work and I was actually sorry when the place was spic and span again!  ... So then I went home and cleaned bathrooms because it was my turn, but that wasn't quite as thrilling.  Ah well, life might get monotonous without the grime as well as the sublime :)

A morning surprise

R eveling raindrop

A uspiciously sparkle in the aurora and

I nspire a rim of radiant colors

N estled in a nook on Table Mountain above UCT--

B right, buoyant, beyond the blackness of the rainclouds

O nly those who are awake and looking can observe it, and

W e smile at the promise for the day

ps I am not sure if my photos are uploading correctly onto my blog.  At the top of this post you should see a beautiful view of Table Mountain with the rainbow I saw this morning... if you don't, please comment on this post and I will try to fix it!  Thank you :)

Things you learn...

- To cure mumps, place a pumpkin in your garden and pee on it every day for a week (I heard this when a patient came in with mumps to the Jubilee Health Centre)
- If a bird poops on you, you will have good luck (a young friend of mine shared this wisdom with me)
- Apparently the South African flower, the protea, is named after the Greek god, Proteus.  This flower comes in many varieties, similar to the multiple shapes this god could assume (from a tourist guide book.  Either this is true, or they were just having fun with gullible tourists :) )
- Always double check the exchange rate... especially if the deal seems to good to be true.  During my layover in Johannesburg on my way over from Abu Dhabi to Cape Town, I stopped at an airport store to buy some candy.  Thinking the exchange rate was $1 to R 100 (that was the exchange rate for Thai Baht!), I bought four rolls of mentos for R 99.   One dollar for four rolls sounded like a good deal to me... $10 for four rolls is a rip-off!!!!  Live and learn...  (this was obviously South Africans having fun with gullible tourists :) )
- Pratley Putty, invented by a South African, was used on board the Apollo 11 on its moon journey in 1969 as well as on the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco to halt some cracks on one of the main supports..
- Don't let a bit of cold keep you from jumping in the pool!  Yesterday was 'Fun Day' at Jubilee, which means a picnic lunch with everyone at Westerford highschool where they set up a pool, a bubble run for the little kids, a soccer field, a volleyball net, and three big blow-up water slides.  At first I didn't want to get my swim-suit on because the day was fresh and a bit cloudy.  But I am so glad that I did!  It was a great day.  And... I STILL haven't experienced a South African sunburn yet!  Jec has had at least three during my time here :)

Encounters: two diabetics... two different worlds

     I met a poor woman by the beach in Muizenberg.  She did not look well, with a shaved head covered by a hat and some blush brightening the tops of her pale cheeks.  She carried a large, plastic handbag on her back like a backpack, and stopped me to ask if I would buy something off of her.  She was desperate, and so tired.  She is a diabetic and had nothing to eat all day.  She didn't want to just beg, so she was trying to sell some things to help provide for her, for her daughter, and for her two grandchildren, ages 10 and 1.  She had some government money, but that all went to paying for a place to live.  I told her I didn't really need anything, but she could show me what she had if she wanted to.  I sat down and she began to pull things out of her bag:  an old book from 1953 with a little bit of everything in it--recipes, a dictionary, pet-care, etc..  Another old book of anecdotes that smelled like cigarette smoke.  A recipe book.  A Silhouette romance novel--with two pages missing, she informed me, but it was still very good.  A video game.  A small frilly skirt, also smelling strongly of cigarette smoke.  In between, I asked her how her diabetes was and told her I am also a diabetic.  I asked about her family, but apparently it is only her, her daughter, and the two children living together.  She showed me a picture of the one-year-old.  I gave her my time because I had little else to give her, except for 20 rand in my pocket.  I asked her what she would be willing to part with for 20 rand.  Well, she told me that 20 rand was only a start, and you can't get much for that (true), though she wouldn't mind me blessing her with it.
     I never know what to say to that!  I don't know how to respond to the increasing amounts of homeless people I see.  And what is a couple rand here and there?  Still, none of her stuff was worth more than that (in my opinion... I am still trying to gauge the value of currency here in terms of what people earn and spend!).  I could just give it to her, too, since I had just spent more than that on ice cream!  Yet I can't handle giving hand-outs, because it doesn't really address any of the root issues.  Sure, they need food today, but in the long run hand-outs can dehumanize, create dependency, and not actually help.  I know I have never been on the street and hungry, either, though.  What to do?  ... Though as I have been thinking about this in relation to how one friend of mine would give money to poor people on the street, I have concluded that I would rather give the hand-outs to organizations in the country who help people like that than to give it directly.  They can hopefully create a longer-term solution for these people.  But what does that mean for me RIGHT NOW?
     Anyways, I sat there thinking about this, not sure what to do next since I didn't have enough to buy something from her and it felt dumb to say 'sorry, I'll just pray for you and you can go away' since she knew I had the 20 rand now, and yet I didn't feel right about just giving it to her (especially since she herself had already said that she hated asking for money and that is why she was trying to sell a few things)...  Then she pulled a DVD out of her bag:  "Hope for Cities Johannesburg with Mark Finley:  16. Revelation's Last Appeal" and said I could have it for 20 rand.  I gratefully performed the exchange, and asked her if I could pray with her before we parted ways, and what would she like me to pray for?  She gladly agreed, and asked me to pray for safety in getting back home, and I feel bad that I can't remember the rest...  I prayed for safety, for health for her family and herself as a diabetic, for community and people to walk alongside them and help them, and that they would know God's hope and grace.  Somehow it came out that she lived around Rondebosch, so I told her she should find Jubilee Community Church and they had programs where they could probably help her.  I hope she takes me up on that and checks it out.
     And hopefully she will find more than she bargains for!  As I see the poverty and need, my prayer is increasingly that God will give these people a vision of something bigger than the moment.  It must be so hard to see what life could be when one is surrounded by images and cycles of need, poor choices, and abuse.  I pray that they would catch a glimpse of how God intended life to be, and that He would lead them into new paths.

WEEK 1: Should I cut my internship short?

     I haven't okayed this with my professor yet, but I think I can cut my internship short :)  I mean, already, within the first week I have knocked two big things off of my "Things to do in South Africa" list:  surfing and climbing Table Mountain.
     This past Thursday I surfed for the first time at Muizenburg with friends I met through the Jubilee Health Centre.  The day was beautiful, with small waves good for beginners and a strong warm sun to offset the chill of the ocean.  I like to think that you can't keep a good woman down, but I admit sometimes it can be hard to keep her up too!  I managed to stand on my board, but I think I will need a round 2 in order to stay up.  What a thrill it is when the wave surges underneath and carries you forward!
     On Saturday, I climbed Table Mountain with some new friends.  We started at 9 am and arrived back at 3 in the afternoon--sweating profusely on the ascent, freezing in the wind and encroaching fog at the top, and pleasantly cool on the way down.  The final stretch near the top was particularly steep with mainly stairs, some ladders, and a section of free-styling over the rocks.  The view is spectacular!
     In between, I volunteered Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday at the Jubilee Health Centre (JHC).  So far I have prayed with patients, served them tea and coffee as they wait, tried out some of my string figures with the little kids, and had the opportunity to talk with a diabetic lady and hopefully encourage her from my own experience as a diabetic.  I haven't really DONE a lot there, but I have been so blessed to just be there and see God at work in and through the staff there.
     In the end, I really don't want to cut my internship short :)  I am excited to see the beginning of what this time will be like here, and look forward to wonderful things.  My time here is about more than surfing and climbing Table Mountain and doing things (though I wouldn't mind doing either of those things again!), and I am excited to see what will happen over time as I do life here.    Not to mention, one learns things here that they wouldn't learn otherwise.  Just the other day, two of my new friends were arguing over what was the 'language of God.'  The one was sure it was Afrikaans, but the other countered that it was Xhosa until people messed it up!
     Also, it is strange and yet good to remain in one place for more than a couple days.  I don't know if I can quite describe what it felt like to unpack my bags and put away my suitcases for the time being.  I am starting to feel the limitations of my wardrobe, though, when the same people see me for more than a two or three days at a time (fellow GlobeTREKkers don't count :) ).

So am I ready to go home?  Not yet!
Week 2--bring it on!