I can go on and on and bore you with all the details about why this is the first official post from in-country.  Little things like the power being off more that it is on and when it is on the lady at the internet cafe seems to always have the same answer, “no connection” in her broken English.  She, just like so many others here know just enough English to get us around, but not enough to have a conversation of any meaning.

But we have found a way around all of that and you are finally getting to read the results!  The plan is a simple one, I write a post on my unconnected laptop here and then our American-side director calls me from Skype on his computer and hits record while I read off what I wrote, and then he plays it back and types it up on his side and posts it and voila, you have a blog post!

So without any further ado let me try my best to explain what we have learned in the past few weeks here.  First of all, it is a beautiful country and I don’t mean just a little beautiful, it’s like the set of LOST beautiful.  Huge rolling green mountains stretching out as far as you can see in every direction and animals you only read about in books making their way across the road in no particular hurry.

Then there are the people, kind, generous and just plain nice, every where you go.  We came here thinking that we would to be teaching them about hygiene and educating them, but instead they are teaching us about loving your neighbor and how to have a true community.  It’s sort of like when you meet someone you know who has a wealth of knowledge that you need, you know it will take years for you to understand.  There is just so much more that we will learn from this culture and I am sure when we get home we will feel that it was not enough.

Our first stop after landing was to visit Andi and AnnMarie in the city.  They are living in there preparing to move south to the tribe where the children that we are caring for come from.  They will be working on educating them and hopefully helping over time to show them that what they are doing to their children is wrong and it needs to stop.  They welcomed us into their home and immediately made us feel comfortable, we learned about their plans and struggles as they prepare for what will be the biggest move of their lives.  We also realized how strong a bond we will have with them in our work here as well, as we spoke it became clear that we be in constant contact with them as we strive to give these children a good home and future.  Their work is admirable and will have a positive effect on the tribe for years to come.

We also had an opportunity to meet with some of the team who was here in the beginning when Bale was picked up,  they explained to us more of the story of surrounding the inception of the children’s home, they tell an incredible story and we are excited to be carrying it on from here.

We arrived in the town where the orphanage is two weeks ago and went straight to the children’s home to see how things were.  It was a wonderful thing to see the children and get a glimpse of our new lives.  Since then we have been working on settling into our new home, and doing everything we can to learn the language here, about 5 words so far, it’s slow going!

We have been building a relationship with the staff and doing what we can to start to make the situation better, many of the kids are sick and we are doing what we can to help make the setting cleaner and safer for the kids.

Hopefully I was able to paint a picture for you of how things are going.  We are safe, and settling in to where we are, our kids are good,  missing home and family terribly but are adjusting a little more each day.

Thanks so much to everyone for your support and prayers.

Look for more posts soon,

Levi