It’s been a roller coaster of a month.
We’ve experienced the good and the bad these past few weeks and I thought I would share some of it with you. First the bad:

1. Student Protest

A student protest (turned riot) happened right across the street from our house on the 14th. Apparently the University students protest every year, so our local friends weren’t surprised at all. Thankfully we weren’t in any danger, and from what we have heard, only one person was seriously injured. Of course the bus was a total casualty.
Actual quote from our 5 year old daughter: (While watching a protester throw rocks at a police vehicle) “Wow that guy is a good thrower!”
Another conversation the next morning:
Justin: “Why is our bedroom window closed?”
Rachel: “Oops I must have forgotten to open our window last night. I know I opened it after all the tear gas cleared, but I had to shut it again when they started burning the bus.”

 

2. First Thunderstorm to kick off the rainy season

The first rain storm came rolling in around midnight just a few days after the protest took place. The storm was a bit unexpected, and ended up being a big thunderstorm. The dry ground soaked up the rain, but unfortunately the high winds caused damage to a number of homes. It also caused a water outage throughout the city for 2 solid days. We are expecting the rain to become more and more frequent and by August, we are told it could rain everyday.

 

3. Termites

Can I just say, termites are amazing, but I really don’t like them!
A month after storing about 200 boxes of precious ministry supplies under the stairs in our home, we found that termites had started chowing down on the boxes. Thankfully it was caught early and none of our resources were ruined, but it did cause us a lot of extra work to clean out all the damaged boxes, move them to a safer place, and get rid of the perpetrators.

 

And some of the good:

1. School’s out

   We are finally finished with our homeschool year. Little man helped me make some cupcakes to celebrate. Next school year we will have a 2nd grader, 1st grader, and a preschooler. For the next couple months though, we are going to enjoy a little extra play time.

 

2. Mangoes are in

Mangoes are in season and you can get some BIG ones here! We have been busy cutting and freezing mangoes to last us until next mango season. All the kids are huge mango fans now. Homemade mango pops anyone?

 

3. Ministry is going well

Although we are still working on our french, Justin has enjoyed becoming more and more active in the ministry here. Our mentors will soon be phasing out of full time work with us, and we will continue the work that they started: to train and encourage the national church in a reproducible model of discipleship. We knowingly choose not to go into a lot of ministry detail on this blog, but instead share more details with our committed prayer partners. If you would like to become a prayer partner and subscribe to our monthly prayer newsletter please click here to sign up.

 

Thanks for checking in and please keep praying for us!