Conference Pitfalls

Sending photo updates to Tom while he was away

We don’t go to many conferences.  They are expensive and time consuming.  They are hard on the family.  Finally, going to conferences can set a bad example.  I don’t know if other occupations suffer from this problem but it is certainly a danger of the international worker.  There always seems to be a conference somewhere and it is entirely possible to spend your time going from one to another.  Unfortunately, we have seen island brothers fall prey to this temptation—and it is understandable.  Some of these conferences are eager to have a representative from the islands and offer to pay their plane ticket, pay for their hotel, pay for their food.  Imagine being someone from a poor country who has never had much chance to travel and then being offered opportunities to travel the world for free.  Would you say no?  We have seen some unable to resist and spend months and months each year traveling from one conference to another, far away from their family, far away from their work, far away from those they are supposed to be serving.  So for this reason especially, I try to avoid going to many conferences, but last week I (Tom) went to a conference in Kenya.  To be honest, as I left I wasn’t very enthusiastic about it, but I had never attended this biannual conference (despite being invited the last 2-3 times). I was overdue.  And so with a bit of foot dragging, I agreed to go.

Kids welcome Tom home

While I was away, our youngest got sick with vomiting and fever, followed by a serious ear infection.  There was a problem with the electricity and an electrician had to be called.  They went two days without power.  A neighbor had a special family event requiring a trip to a village (see last week’s blog).  Not to mention a full week of team responsibilities and homeschool to boot.  While we are blessed to have a great team working with us, who is willing to help out with homeschool and watching kids, it remains true that conferences are hard on families.

But for all my misgivings and the hardships, I did enjoy myself at the conference.  It was great to meet so many wonderful people, to hear about their work and experiences and to compare notes.  There was excellent teaching on strategy and leadership that I certainly benefited from, as well as some excellent times of prayer and singing.  I was challenged, encouraged and inspired. It was a good week and I was glad I went.

But there is still one more thing that bugs me about conferences.  Often it doesn’t go beyond the one person who went.  People go away to conferences and learn and grow but then fail to share anything they’ve learned with the people around them.  I don’t want islanders to do that, so I didn’t want to fall into the same trap.  So on my return I shared with some of the brothers and others who work here some of the principles we talked about.  It was great to see my island brothers interact with some of the ideas I had brought back.  It blessed me as much as it blessed them because it reinforced the things I had learned and helped me understand it better as I was forced to present it to them. If you’re interested in what I learned send me an email and perhaps this conference’s impact can keep growing and it can keep encouraging, challenging and inspiring.

Tom back home and at English Club

So I’ll have to admit, maybe conferences aren’t so bad...once in awhile...

PRAYERS ANSWERED
We had an encouraging weekend without our colleagues from the different islands. It was great to reconnect and gain a deeper understanding of how the work is progressing on the other islands. Our downstairs neighbors were seen at the hospital on the French Island and may have to travel further away still to get all the answers that they need but we encouraged that they are at least on the right track. Continue to pray for healing.

PRAYERS REQUESTED
Tom’s good friend Bwe Who he’s been studying with for so long had a break-in.  The thieves stole everything from his home (which was not much to begin with). Bwe  traveled to the small island immediately following the theft. Tom does not know why and does not know when Bwe will come back. He has not been able to be in contact with him since Bwe’s phone was stolen.  Pray for Bwe and for the situation and how Tom might best support him through this hard time.
Pray for Tom and an island friend who have been having some strong debates over WhatsApp.  Pray that debates might lead to discussion, study, and openness.  A short-termer (who is serving for 6 months on the big island) will be visiting with us this week, pray that he could have a good visit and that this exposure to another island could enrich his experience and that he could be a light while he is here. One of our colleagues on the small island is going off-island for medical testing after months of unexplained illness, pray that he would find answers and more importantly, healing! We want to see big things happen on these islands— keep praying for whole families, communities and islands to be transformed by truth and light! Let’s keep our prayers big!

Wedding Negotiations

After negotiations- all smiles

Ma Riziki came to visit. She shared about all the illness going around and commiserated with me on our youngest getting sick. There was a lull in the conversation and she leaned forward and lowered her voice and said with a sly grin, “We are marrying someone.” (A active phrase that says you are marrying off a child or grandchild.) I know her family well and there were several possibilities, so I asked the obvious follow-up question. “Tsanu!” she told me.

Tsanu is one of her sons, probably in his 20’s but responsible and with a steady job. He has always been a friend to us with a quick genuine smile and wave whenever we see him. I was happy to hear that he had found someone.

“You will come with us on Friday to the village of the bride!” Ma Riziki continued to explain. I expressed my surprise that he was getting married so quickly, but then she explained, “No, the wedding will come after. This Friday is just the discussions.” She went on to list a handful of family members that would be going to the village. It didn’t sound like a big group. Then I realized, this wasn’t a wedding event, this was the negotiations for the wedding and I would be helping to represent the groom’s family. I was honored. This wasn’t anything I had ever been asked to participate in. This was for close family. So even though the timing wasn’t ideal, I agreed.

Father of groom addresses group

Weddings on the islands can be complex. At the base a wedding might be two individuals coming together, but it is also two families coming together. Perhaps “coming together” gives the wrong impression, it is actually rather transactional. There is a give and take at weddings. There is an event where the bride’s family sends a parade of gifts to the groom’s family. The groom’s family provides an answering event where they parade the gold jewelry for the bride. Many of the wedding events are hosted by the bride’s side and the groom’s family is loaded with flower necklaces and honor. All of this is very public and easily observable by even a beginner visitor to the islands. But there is one transaction that I’ve never seen take place— the bride price. In fact if you had asked me some years ago, I probably would have told you that it doesn’t exist on the islands, but in fact one of the first transactions to be negotiated for a wedding is how much the groom’s family will pay for the bride.

Not that this was Ma Riziki’s primary concern going into the negotiations. Her concern was that she wanted Tsanu married before the month of fasting. She was excited to not have another mouth to feed during the month when big dinners are expected every night. Fasting begins in April, so she wanted him married off as soon as possible.

By the time we arrived at the village, we were escorted into a small square room, with almost no furniture and no mat on the ground. These were not rich families. But the floor was well swept and a few chairs were brought out. The rest sat on the floor. Ultimately there were about 20 people in the room, over 2/3 were men. Neither the bride nor groom were present. The groom hadn’t even come to the village with us. A quick prayer was followed by an opening speech by the groom’s father, declaring his son’s desire to marry their daughter. The bride’s representative then gave a speech, honoring and thanking everyone and asking for equivalent of $650. Various men from the groom’s side responded with thoughts about what type of wedding should be done, quietly accepting the demanded price without discussion. (Later on in the crowded ride home, I heard several declare that it was a very reasonable price.) It was all very calm. Points were generally made passively or indirectly, and everyone stayed friendly. When there was disagreement, more people spoke and brought about consensus. Less than 20 minutes after the negotiations began, we were honored with flower necklaces, given the customary goodie-bag of a soda and snacks, and led outside to take pictures with the future bride. It was over and everyone was smiles and congratulations!

Future bride (in green) exits for pictures with future in-laws

At least most of the people were happy…towards the beginning Ma Riziki had made her request. She talked about how good it is for a man to be settled into his new home and with his new bride for the month of fasting. Unfortunately her request was quickly pushed aside as the bride’s family admitted that there was no room ready for the new couple to live in and it was just too fast to get everything ready. Other members of the groom’s family quickly sided with the bride’s family and Ma Riziki was left disappointed. They will get married this summer, so I guess Ma Riziki will still have an extra mouth to feed for awhile.

PRAYERS ANSWERED
Both our youngest and our teammate are feeling better after their bouts with the fever virus plaguing so many here. Thankfully no one else in the family or team has gotten sick with it. Our downstairs neighbors successfully navigated the bureaucracy to legally travel to the French Island for medical treatment. They arrived this morning! We survived our week without Tom, though we were hit with several unusual difficulties (electricity issues, illnesses, accidents and surprise events). Tom made it safely back this morning! He has come back from his conference with lots of new ideas to ponder and potentially implement and new connections to build on.

PRAYERS REQUESTED
Our downstairs neighbor will take her daughter to the hospital on the French Island tomorrow. Pray that she could get answers about the respiratory problems that have plagued her daughter and for healing. Pray for our youngest’s full recovery— after fevers passed he was hit with a nasty ear infection.Pray for the continued distribution of the proverb calendars, that they would have a good impact. This upcoming weekend all the island workers will gather on the big island— pray that it would be a fruitful time of mutual encouragement and strategizing together. We only have a month left on the island before heading to the States for six months— pray for us as we try to hand off our responsibilities and make all the necessary preparations. Pray for us as we discuss and pray about some of the ideas Tom encountered at the conference, including our role in mobilizing Africans to reach other Africans.

No Island is an Island?

Our island home

To be an island is to be isolated, cut-off. The well-known quote “no man is an island” is used as a warning against isolating yourself.

Now Donne wasn’t talking about physical islands, but we live on a real, live isolated tropical island. On a clear day we might be able to see another island in the distance but generally all you see around us is water.

Sometimes we feel the isolation. We feel it when someone comes to visit (or wants to visit) and we have to explain how expensive and time-consuming it is to get to us. We feel it when rough seas and delayed boats mean that there are shortages on the island. (We just had a flour-shortage that temporarily closed down the bakeries and eliminated bread and baked goods from our diet.) We feel our isolation when we ask our classes how many people have ever been on a plane or traveled beyond the islands and most don’t raise their hands. We feel it in the mono-cultural milieu of the islands- almost everyone on the island has the same language, culture and beliefs.

Tom & Megan after friend's "secret" wedding

All these help drive home the fact that we are easily cut off from the bigger world, but that doesn’t mean the islands or islanders survive in isolation. They couldn’t survive that way in fact! We had a new visitor this past week and they marveled that although the islands are ranked as one of the poorest countries in the world, it doesn’t usually feel as poor as all that. Granted there is almost no economy and almost no GDP. But it survives with the aid and help of others. The most valuable export from the islands is its people. They go out from the islands, get educated and find jobs and then they send money back. There are so many islanders living abroad that send money back that almost every family’s income is bolstered by money from afar.

Families are not isolated nuclear families either, island families are big and extended. Resources are supposed to be shared, so money given to one person in the extended family helps support everyone. This past few weeks there have been a number of examples of how we have been drawn into these extended families.

One friend asked for a loan of a considerable amount of money so she could send it to her son for his overseas tuition. Others come to our house regularly for help with food— enough that we keep a whole supply of canned foods just to give-away. We were called upon to contribute to help friends travel or get medicine. 

But the interconnectedness isn’t only financial. This week our downstairs neighbor asked me to be her official spokesperson (giving a speech and officially receiving charity money on her behalf so she can get medical treatment for her daughter). This would normally an extended family member. Our old neighbor Ma Riziki came and asked me to be part of the family delegation to go and negotiate the terms for her son’s wedding with the future-in-laws. Another island friend confided a big life-change that I know only a small handful of people know about. Yesterday I left in the evening for a date with our older son, knowing the downstairs neighbors would help the kids left behind if anything happened.

Another lost tooth for our youngest!

It took time and we aren’t naturally the most outgoing, but we’ve found ourselves in the midst of a web of island connections. And that isn’t including all the interconnectedness we naturally find with our team! A

So all that’s to say that our island may be an island, but we aren’t!

PRAYERS ANSWERED
Tom made it safely to Kenya and has been enjoying connecting with some old friends and leaders there. Our newest teammate arrived and she has been transitioning well so far, jumping into relationships and community events. We successfully renewed our visas for another year! Our visitor from the US office had a nice visit and we enjoyed sharing our vision and values for our work here (which should help her get others excited about joining us!).

PRAYERS REQUESTED
Pray for our interconnectedness with islanders that it would grow and give us opportunities to be lights into families and community. Fevers have been plaguing the islands! They tend to knock people out for days and our youngest is the most recent victim. Pray for his recovery, he has had a hard time keeping anything down. Pray that no one else gets sick (we just got a text that a teammate is spiking a fever too). Pray for our week without Tom on the islands, that Megan and kids would survive and thrive and lean on islanders and teammates and that Tom would make lots of good connections and be inspired at the leadership meetings. Our downstairs neighbors are doing the paperwork to travel (legally!) to the French island for medical treatment for their daughter. Pray for them as they wade through the bureaucracy.

The Faces of Rain

For our kids- rain means porch slip n' slide

What do you think of when you think of rain? What image or feeling do you associate it with it? Is it refreshing or is it gloomy? Do you first think of light sprinklings of rain or of powerful downpours?  Are your first thoughts of rain of it bringing rejuvenation and new life or of it bringing dangerous destruction?

Rains mark the seasons here on the islands. The lack of rain is what distinguishes the cool, dry months of July and August. So when the rains finally come around September or October, you see the whole island transform. What was yellowing and dry suddenly bursts with green. The whole landscapes changes seemingly with just a single shower. It’s like the islands were just waiting, thirsty for that first drink.

Goats find a ledge to get out of the coming rain

Then comes the hot, wet months of November, December and January, where the humidity climbs and climbs and you long for a rain to come and break the heat, but when the rain does come in those months it is usually disappointing. They aren’t usually overly long rains and the relief they bring is temporary, sometimes only seeming to add to the moisture hanging in the humid air. Finally though, there are the rains that come around February— the true rainy season rains. These are downpours. These are crushing rains that are so loud that we have to yell to be heard over them. These are rains that can last entire days or weeks.

This year these heavy rains first came in January. The air cools and the wind whips in preparation for a downpour. There a sense of anticipation…rain is coming. We can hear the wall of rain hitting tin roofs far away, quickly getting closer and louder until the sky buckets over our heads are tipped and it pours.

Dirt and trash collect by road

That’s what I think of when I think of a rainy season rain. It is cool and cleansing! The air has a fresh quality that it doesn’t have at other times! I love it.

But despite rain’s refreshing nature, there is another side… It’s dirty and destructive.

The torrents turn streets and paths in rivers and streams and they carry downhill with them the trash and rocks and soil from further up. The drainage gutters (that when dug out are 2-3 feet deep) become completely filled until you can almost forget that there was supposed to be a ditch there in the first place. The dirt collects on lower roadways, turning paved streets into bumpy dirt roads.  Rocks run down along with the dirt which damages the pavement forming holes. The holes fill with swirling water and erosion happens fast turning a small pothole into a significant roadblock. Before rainy season is over, many roads will be completely ruined. 

The rush of dirty water also floods the pipes so the water from our taps turns cloudy and unappealing. Our water filters work overtime and we have to let the water in our buckets settle if we don’t want to bathe in a chocolate-colored solution at night. Plus, the sun doesn’t shine as much so there is more mold and mildew.

Then there is the damage to business and life. Islanders don’t go out in downpours. Heavy rain means canceled meetings, classes with few or no students, shipments delayed by weeks.

Weekend workers pile scraped dirt from road

So understandably, islanders have mixed feelings about the rain. Rain is life-giving and needed. It feeds their crops and fills their rivers, but it comes with a host of problems too.  It seems like lots of things are that way in this broken world of ours.  But we hold onto the hope that the blessings will outweigh the hardship.

PRAYERS ANSWERED

Megan’s online course finished up last week with good connectivity and good content.  We hope she will be able to put the practical tools of coaching to good use.  Our island friends on the Big island who have been struggling with some serious demonic problems have seen significant healing.  We praise God for freedom and new life in the Spirit.  We pray that the evil spirit that was living in the house has also been banished and we thank God for all the people that united together to pray for the situation.  Tom brought a bridge person along to his men’s group last week.  It went pretty well.  We hope he will return again this week.  We are thankful that our computer screen continues to work and we have some alternatives in case it should break completely.  Everyone is doing well health wise this week.  Finally, we are ecstatic that the calendars are finally finished and look great.  It took 2 months!  But we are happy to have them and share them with others.

PRAYERS REQUESTED
Tom will travel to Kenya at the end of this week for a conference, leaving Megan and the kids behind.  Pray that the conference will go well and that Megan and the kids will have a good week.  Our newest teammate arrives on Wednesday.  Pray for her transition to Clove Island and to this new team (she had previously lived and served on the little island).  We are hoping to renew our service visas this week.  Everything appears to be going smoothly.  Pray that the process would go easily.  We have a visitor from the States with us this week.  Pray that her visit would go very well and that she would be blessed by her time here.  Pray for her and Tom’s travels at the end of the week. Our good friend “Ma Nadjma” got married in a “secret” wedding this weekend. She let us know if was coming the day before (though we couldn’t attend). Pray that she and her new husband would develop good habits of communication as they start their life together and for the complicated extended family circumstances that led to the secret-nature of their wedding.