Greetings! Hi. Howzit. 'sup. jaI have been in the US for 11 days... It has been a great 11 days. its weird to think not long ago, I was in Durban; sitting on bronze beach with good friends and swimming in the warm, salty Indian ocean. Now I am in Michigan. With a beautiful clean saltless ocean (okay fine, its a lake) that people claim has waves, none of which reached above my shins.
Here I sit at the end of “Phase one” of my journey. Phase one is what I called my ‘holiday phase’. I spent some time in wonderful Chicago- and even though it was raining most of the time, we did some cool touristy things for the long weekend before I got on a train to Michigan where I’ve been able to spend time with family and help out at their church on the weekend!
Being a tourist has been fun. I'd say I've done some pretty cool things. I've eaten some good ‘local’ food, seen cool sights, watched a live baseball game at Wrigley field, snuck into an NFL football stadium, been up a 96 story building, took pics at 'the bean', jumped in a river and a lot of other rad things.
These things have made the past 10 or 11 days fun- but the adventure has been a lot to do with the people. Usually when I come to the states, I shadow my parents and do whatever they do. But this time I have met and hung out with people (closer to my own age) that I have a lot in common with.
Day/Morning number 1 in the US I spent giving clothes to needy people in the Chicago area. Since my body does not have the word ‘jetlag’ in its internal vocabulary, I went along with a friend and helped out at the church. It was so interesting to hear these peoples stories, and to learn that Africa does not have the only poor people in the world- and Africa is not the only place that needs Jesus to intervene, and people to share love.
Spending a weekend with my cousin and his friends in Grand Rapids, Michigan was pretty interesting. I taught them the meaning of a ‘bring-and-braai’ and tried to explain why I call girls ‘bru’-but they taught me a lot too. Not only do they have a community of young Christians living simple lives together as a family, but they have loved their neighbourhood as their friends and family and are spreading the love of Christ to their little ghetto-town! I felt like I was in the ‘blue like jazz’ book or something.
On my last day in GR we took a kid with us on our adventures to the river. 5 year old Meechie. (I have no idea how you spell his name). Meechie comes from a really tough home-life, and.... had never been swimming!! WHAT?! so we took him out for a day of fun. He was going crazy. It was so great to see a kid experience so much joy out of things we take for granted!
and yes, my cousin matt took me dumpster diving. (google it). so maybe I was petrified of getting 'caught', and we didn’t find much in the dumpsters, but it was an interesting and good bonding experience none-the-less.
So what have I learnt here in the first few weeks in the US? that people are pretty much the same everywhere. We all need love, we all need a friend, and we all need Jesus. I feel content about being here because I have realised that I can make an impact wherever I am, not just in the typical ‘missionary’ areas of the world. I miss Africa, but am excited for what I can learn and who I can be in these phases of my life.
God Speed my friends
cheers
cheers
