Maybe it's the weather, but I don't think so. I've just wanted to be quiet all day. Sometimes I get tired of talking so much, you know? I get tired of laughing so loud. Which is not something I can really control, but still. Sometimes I just want to keep my jaws and tongue and voice still.
Went to the soup kitchen with Momma Judy today, and two of the aunties. (Okay, man, I forget that I can't really write things without explaining them. "Momma Judy" refers to Judy Kendall-Ball, one half of the Ken and Judy Kendall-Ball, our coordinators for our stay here in South Africa. Basically, they guide us and help us find our paths while still giving us space and freedom. They're good people. And "aunties" refers to two of the older ladies that we're introduced to, usually churchgoers, but mostly just ladies who deserve respect. It's a term of respect, "auntie.")
So anyway. Today we met Auntie Mags and Auntie Ann, two sisters who make soup for the soup kitchen. The "soup kitchen" has shrunk though, from what I understand - now they just take soup to the waiting room of a hospital and an AIDS clinic here in Port Elizabeth. A couple of AIMers help them by giving them rides and helping them hand out bread and cups of soup. I had a "good" time - it's hard to say you had a good time handing pieces of bread to sick people who were obviously hungry, some of whom didn't have teeth, one of whom didn't have an arm, all of whom were in need in some form or another. It's very difficult to say you had a great time doing that. But I do know that that's exactly what I wanted to do here - find needs, simple and clear needs, and fill them. You don't have to make it hard, you know? Helping people does not have to be difficult. Just hand bread over.
I'm also trying to prepare lessons for an upcoming VBS in East London, South Africa. Four other AIMers and I are going there a week from this next Saturday for a Monday-Friday VBS. I'll be teaching 2nd grade, using the curiculum that we help Ken and Judy print - it's called "Lessons to Live By." It teaches morals and ethics using bible stories, like obedience and patience and sharing and all of that good stuff. Lots of worksheets. I'm trying to plan crafts, but it's been a while since I was in 2nd grade, and I'm trying hard to remember what 2nd graders like to do. I'll let you know what I come up with, and how it goes. I still have about a week, which is nice.
We recently visited Seaview Lion Park, and it was a lot of fun. I have some pictures, and I'll upload them on here soon, but not now. I think dinner is coming up soon, so the pictures will have to wait. But the baby lions were a lot of fun to play with, their claws were pretty sharp and I got scratched, but it didn't really hurt. Their fur wasn't as soft as you'd think it was, but it wasn't like sand paper either. It was fun. It was neat to finally hear a big lion roar too. I don't think it was a full-fledged roar, but it was fairly close, so I was satisfied for now. The cool thing is, this place is about 30 minutes from where we live, and it cost only about 7 dollars American to get in (and about 7 dollars American to play with the baby lions), so I'm sure we'll be going back. Also, this same lion park is about 5 minutes away from the Xhosa school I went to a week ago, which is crazy. How crazy would it be if your elementary school was 5 minutes away from a lion park? That's what is so interesting to me - to us, that sounds totally cool and crazy and fun, but to those kids, it's completely normal. What's normal for this part of the world is ridiculous or absurd or even outrageous for someone who lives on another continent. What someone does in their daily life on another continent may make someone here extremely uncomfortable. Life, people, days, living, relationships, choices, differences, similarities, everything.
I forget sometimes that God made everything.
God made that woman in the hospital waiting room, and God knew her when she had teeth. She is imago dei - the image of God. She has some qualities of God in her, maybe her compassion or her patience or her forgiveness or her eagerness or something. She has something. He knows her just like he knows me, there's no difference.
How dare I think that there is?
