Watch a Tornado One Day, Go To The Beach The Next!

On Saturday morning there was a huge storm!! It definitely feels more like the rainy season now because the weather is cooler, it is overcast a lot more often, and we have had a few rain storms in the last week. Yes, overcast here is still like 30°C but it actually does feel cooler. This morning the wind was extra strong so we were standing by the front door and watching it. So many things were being blown up and down the street!! And then it started pouring rain and when it rains here – it rains!!! The rain comes down in a sheet and the raindrops are huge!! As we were watching all this happen, Jamie said that it looked like a tornado. And it really did!! We didn’t actually see a tunnel but they way things were being blown around, it definitely looked like a tornado. And then we were talking about this storm a few days later with the DRIME Benin leaders and they said it really was a legit tornado!!! So we were actually in a tornado!!!! Crazy, eh?!!

On Sunday we had our last practice with the drama team at our church. We are taking a break before the official DRIME team starts in June so we can do some recruiting and spend more time training the leaders. We wanted to thank them for their interest in DRIME and for keeping a team going over the last 10 months so we planned a little party. We went through the dramas that they know and then we played a game. We taught them Four On A Couch and they really enjoyed it!! Some of them were very intense with their strategizing! :) And then we showed them a slideshow of pictures that we had put together – pictures from the last 3 months and from the time the DRIME team was here in May. They so enjoyed seeing all those pictures!! It was so fun to watch them watch the slideshow! So it was a really great way to end our time with that church’s drama team and hopefully they will all join the official DRIME team in June!!

Thursday was Beach Day!!! Janna and I went to Obama Beach with some of our friends – Olivier, Martin and Calixte. We built a sandcastle (and our friends had to call it the DRIME castle), we swam in the waves (which were actually pretty strong that day), and a couple of us spent time just lying on the beach reading (yes, I was definitely one of these people). :) It was a funny feeling because there were moments when I felt like I was just at any beach, but then there were moments when it really hit me that I was swimming at a beach in Africa!! I wasn’t in the Pacific Ocean like I would normally be in at a beach back home....I was in the Atlantic Ocean!! I was on African sand!! I always like it when these realizations hit me because it reminds me how blessed I am to be here and how I need to soak it all up now while I can!! Especially since I leave in 2 weeks!!!

That is one thing that is only starting to sink in now – that I go home in 2 weeks! It is definitely bittersweet! I am soooo excited to see everyone back home and get back to “normal” life (not that life is ever really normal). :) I really miss my family, my friends, my small group girls, my church, my work and everything else so it will be great to come home!! But I am definitely gonna miss being here! I’m gonna miss Benin, the African culture and pace, my new friends, and Jamie and Janna!! I guess I’m just lucky to have 2 places that I love so much!! :)

Praise Items and Prayer Requests
o Praise God for the good health that we have been having! Please pray that that would continue!!
o We have 3 recruiting appointments this weekend – pray that everything goes smoothly and that there is a lot of interest in DRIME
o Pray for me as I start to think about leaving here, going home and adjusting back to “normal” life
o Michele and Abby (from DRIME) leave for Benin on Monday – pray that they finish everything they need to get done in these last few days and pray that they have safe travels

Today’s Top Story: Canadian Tourists Face Incredible Danger!

Thursday was our first official touristy day!!! It was sooooo much fun!!! We asked a couple of friends to come with us, so it was good to have some extra company and to have people who know their way around and who know how to barter! :) We went to a town called Ouidah where there are a number of museums and historical sites.

We went to the Museum of Ouidah’s History. It was pretty interesting – there was a lot of history and artifacts on slavery and voodoo. It was sooo crazy to think about everything these slaves had to go through!! And then we bought our first souvenirs of the trip at this museum!! It is really exciting to finally own a piece of Benin that I can take home with me! Our friends that came with us also bought each of us a picture of one of the symbols of Benin, so that was soooo nice of them!!!

Then we went to a place called the Temple of Python. It was a little creepy because some people think the python is a god and this temple is a place of worship to them. We thought it was just going to be a museum. But we got to do something soooo cool....can you guess?....we got to HOLD A SNAKE!!!!!!!!!!!! I had heard about this place before coming here so for the last 2 months I’ve been telling Jamie and Janna that we have to visit the python place because I really wanted to hold a snake!! I think they thought I was crazy and Janna even said that she would never hold a snake. So when we got to this temple, I was the most excited of all and was the first one to hold a snake!! And then our guide started to wrap the snake around my neck...okay...when I was picturing holding a snake, I did think about having it around my neck but I didn’t think it would be wrapped around my neck...so when he started wrapping this snake around my neck I thought, You know that this is how pythons kill people, right? But it didn’t squeeze my neck at all and it was actually a really cool feeling to have a snake around my neck! Now, I know that my Dad is probably having a heart attack as he’s reading this, but rest assured that I am still alive and well!!! :) And even Jamie and Janna held a snake and allowed one to be wrapped around their necks! We were actually really funny to watch when we had a snake around us because there was definitely a mixture of fear and excitement on our faces! :)

Then our friends wanted to take us to the beach in Ouidah. They said that it wasn’t that far and they gave us an estimate of the distance but I am horrible at judging distances and knowing how far they actually are. I was looking for a time estimate instead of a distance estimate. It’s funny because here they really do measure things by distance, whereas in Canada we measure things by time. Interesting, eh? Anyways, we ended up having a second death walk to a beach!! Fortunately, it wasn’t as bad as the first one we had at the beginning of the trip because we were wearing shoes instead of flip flops and we are more used to the heat. But we definitely came home with a few sunburns!! But it is always amazing to sit on the beach and look out at the never-ending water (and in this case, the water we were looking at really doesn’t end until Antarctica!!) and just marvel at God’s incredible creation and the blessing that it is to share in it!

So that’s why our blog entries are a little late this week – Thursday was spent being tourists!! But it definitely gave us more interesting things to write about!! :) No, we didn’t face incredible danger but our heart rates definitely increased!

Prayer Requests and Praise Items:
o Continued health and safety (we are doing much much better after our sickness last week!!)
o We have our first info meeting about DRIME in a church on Sunday. Please pray that people will be interested in joining the team and supporting us!
o Pray for me as I start to think about leaving here, going home and adjusting back to “normal” life

Come On Family, Let’s Go Get Our Visas!!

On Monday, we went to renew our visas. It was sooo much less of a hassle than we thought it was going to be! We were totally expecting to wait in a long line all day waiting for someone to help us! But we just walked right up to the desk, they took our forms and money, and we were done!! Praise the Lord that it was so simple!! And then we went to a restaurant for lunch. It definitely wasn’t the same one that gave us food poisoning last week but we were still a little nervous since it was our first time going to another restaurant after “the incident.” We have been to this restaurant before: it was Festival de glace – my favourite restaurant here in Cotonou because they serve very French food! Anyways, our food was very yummy and we had no problems later!! Yay!!!!! We’ve recovered physically and mentally!! Well...maybe not completely – it is still very hard to even think about pizza! :)

On Wednesday, our landlady called us down to her apartment to talk to us. I was the only person who was ready for the day so I went, and when I got to her door, she asked me where the “chief of family” was. I asked who she was talking about and she said “The chief of family. Jamie.” ... hahahahahahahhaha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And she kept calling him that while she was talking to me! When I came back upstairs we all had a good laugh about it!

Leaders Unite!!

This last weekend we had a Leader Retreat with the new DRIME Benin leadership team! We met with them on Friday night and all day Saturday. We had so much fun together!!! Here are a couple of highlights:
o We started the retreat by teaching them how to play Charades and Pictionary and they LOVED them!!! They got sooo into both games!! Our cheering and shouting was so loud that our landlady came up to see if someone was having a fight!! Oops!!! :) But it was very fun to play with them and watch them get so excited!
o On Friday night, we made them Sloppy Joes for dinner! Of course they had never had them before so the 3 of us watched in anticipation as they took the first couple of bites. And....they LOVED them!! It’s a good thing we made a lot because they ate a lot!! We had to use baguettes instead of hamburger buns so they were a little different but I must admit...we are excellent chefs!! :) And then we made them crêpes on Saturday and they loved those too!
o We started some in depth drama training with them. Training does take a little longer with them and it is hard to get them to show expression, but when they do show expression it is sooo cool!!! One of the leaders in particular has one of the biggest smiles I have ever seen! When he smiles in a drama, I can’t help but think that everyone should have such pure joy when they see “the man in white!”
o We started deciding some DRIME Benin specifics with them this weekend (ie. The dates and times when they would do ministry and practices, and when the DRIME Benin year would start and end). It was really exciting to see the ministry really start to take form here!!! And it is sooo crazy that I get to be a part of it!!! What a blessing!!
o I led a session on leadership! I was kinda nervous about it because I had to try and do it in French! I felt confident about the material and I have led sessions and talks on leadership before but this time I had to do it in FRENCH!!!! But it went well – we had some really good discussions! I definitely didn’t use perfect French but they understood everything I said so I’d say it was a success! :)

It was the Best of Days...It was the Worst of Days...

Tuesday was sooo much fun!! One of our friends on the drama team that we’ve been working with owns a rabbit farm and he invited us to come see it! It was so fun to see all his rabbits and we even got to hold a couple of them! One of the rabbits had just had babies so we were able to see bunnies that were only 5 days old!! They kinda looked like rats with longer ears because they had no fur yet...but they were still sooo cute!!



And then this friend took us somewhere for dinner and the little restaurant that he took us to had....PIZZA!!! The 3 of us had just been talking about foods that we missed and pizza definitely made the list! So we ate some pizza and had ice cream for dessert!! Yeah – pizza and ice cream in one day!!! We were sooo lucky...


...or so we thought...


That night as we were writing our blog updates, Janna and I started to feel a little nauseated. We tried to shake it off but it just kept getting worse and worse. And then Jamie started to feel sick too!! Before we could figure out what was wrong, all 3 of us were rushing for the bathroom! It was literally one of the worst nights of my life!! I haven’t been sick like that in over 10 years but that night it kept me up for about 4 hours! Needless to say, we did not get much sleep that night and the next day was spent lounging, sleeping and not eating! We did eventually work up the courage to try some bread and water but that’s it. We are pretty sure we got food poisoning from the pizza so we definitely will not be going back to that restaurant every again!!! And I doubt we will even be able to have pizza in Benin ever again!!

The Kingdom is Growing!!! :)

This weekend was soooo busy!!! On Friday and Saturday we did ministry in a couple of villages with GAiN (another ministry of Power to Change that is very active here in Benin – in fact, they were the ones who invited DRIME to come to Benin!). We went to perform dramas and share testimonies in the morning and early afternoon, and then a Jesus Film team from GAiN would go to the same village in the evening to show the Jesus Film and do some follow-up. We rented a couple of vehicles and took about 10 people from the drama team that we’ve been working with.

Friday

Today we went to a village called Gbegbessa. The drive there and back home was very interesting!! Once we got out of the city of Cotonou, the roads were clearly not made for vehicles! They were dirt paths with bush on both sides and they were barely wide enough for our Jeep and SUV – branches were definitely hitting the vehicles on both sides. And the paths were anything but even – they had huge holes and sometimes the left side of the path was higher than the right side so our vehicle was driving on an angle! We were totally off-roading!! And it was extreme off-roading!! :)
The ministry time went really well!! We had a big group of people come and watch us and everything went really smoothly! After our drama set, about 30 people came up to receive Christ!!! I KNOW – it was soooo exciting!!! PRAISE GOD!!!

The people of this village were so kind and welcoming! When we finished our program, they gave us some pineapples to take home and a meal to eat! I felt bad eating their food because they don’t really have very much, which makes the gift extra generous! But of course it would have been so rude to not accept their gift! And there was sooo much food! It was very very kind of them!! We had also brought some bread and drinks for the team to have a snack and whenever we had garbage or finished a can of pop, a group of kids would rush and try to grab it! It was crazy! It was kinda sad to see them fight over garbage but I just tried to be glad that we gave them pop cans to play with!

Saturday

The village we visited today is called Fanto and when we arrived, our GAiN contact told us that it has a strong voodoo presence. He pointed out some women who were voodoo witches – they wore white wraps on their heads and had big necklaces and bracelets. It made us a little nervous to be in the middle of such an obvious voodoo presence because we didn’t want to be chased out of the village – we wanted to share the Gospel! But I wasn’t as nervous as I thought I would be. I wasn’t at all worried about them throwing curses at us because their curses can’t do anything to us – we have a Power that is much greater than what they have!!

Again, ministry time went really, really well!! And after our drama sets, about 30 people came up to accept Christ!! So it was another incredible and encouraging day!! One thing I was worried about was how these new believers would be treated after we left. Christians in Benin receive a lot of both physical and spiritual persecution from voodoo leaders. And the voodoo witches in this village looked very upset when so many people came forward to receive Christ so I will definitely be sending lots of prayer their way!! And GAiN will do a lot of follow up in that village as well, so hopefully that will provide protection and hope for these new believers!

After our program, we played some games with the children in the village. We taught them Duck, Duck, Goose and they loved it!! Even the adults gathered around to watch and got really into it!! They would cheer and scream and clap soooo loud every time two people would race – it was like we were in the Stanley Cup of Duck, Duck, Goose!!! :) And yes, I definitely got tagged as the goose a couple of times! Then they taught us one of their games! The person in the middle had to sing this song in French and then choose someone else in the circle to sing the song and do the actions with and then that person went in the middle. And guess what....I eventually got chosen as the person in the middle!!! I was trying to hide in the circle but the person in the middle came right towards me and everyone around me pushed me forward! Jamie and Janna were just staring at me and laughing! I had no idea what to do!!! I didn’t know the song at all!!!! So when I had to go in the middle by myself, I said “Tout le monde chante avec moi!” (Everyone sing with me!), so then I was off the hook for singing the song!! I know...I am very tricky!! :) But it was all a lot of fun and it was fun to see the kids really enjoying themselves!!

Praise Items and Prayer Requests
o Health and safety (as you will read in my next blog entry, all 3 of us have been sick this week)
o Praise God that ministry went so well this weekend and that many people heard about him for the first time and accepted him as their Saviour!
o Pray for the new believers in Gbegbessa and Fanto! That they would be encouraged and followed up with, and protected from any persecution!
o We are having a Leader Retreat with the DRIME Benin Leadership team this weekend so pray that all goes well! Pray that God will give us the words to share and that we would have great discussions!

Celebrating in Cotonou...and One More Quirk! :)

“Il est ressuscité! Il est vraiment ressuscité!!” or..... “He is risen! He is risen indeed!!”
HAPPY EASTER EVERYONE!! I hope you had an awesome and relaxing long weekend! Easter was a little different for me this year because I wasn’t with my family, but it was fun to celebrate it in a different culture! The Easter Sunday church service was soooo full of joy!! There was lots of dancing and shouting out to praise God! The service went extra long but I hardly noticed because it was so inspiring to see our church so alive and joyful in proclaiming the news that our Saviour lives!! They don’t celebrate too differently than we do but they seem to put more of an emphasis on Easter church activities than Easter family time.

Guess what we found at the supermarket....crêpe mix!!! I was soooo excited!!! We decided a while ago that it wouldn’t be worth it to buy ingredients like flour or baking soda because we aren’t able to bake enough to use it all. So we haven’t been able to make pancakes or things like that. But Tuesday morning I was able to make crêpes!!! Thanks to Aunt Patty who would always make crêpes for us and who taught me how to make them!! :) THEY WERE SOOOO GOOD!!!! I definitely ate too much that morning but I know if I had stopped earlier, I would have regretted it!!

On the list of things that we are learning to never take for granted, we can add electricity! The power goes out at least once a day...sometimes for an hour, sometimes for the whole day. Last Thursday, for example, we were out of power for the whole day. For most of the day our whole neighbourhood had no power but then everyone’s power came on except for ours...including the apartment right beside us! So we guessed that there might be something wrong... :) Turns out our electricity actually wasn’t working and our landlady had to call an electrician to fix it. The power still goes out every day but we are learning to live with it! We don’t mind having no lights but it is EXTREMELY hard to live without our fan!!!!

I'm still loving it out here!! And I really appreciate all your thoughts and prayers!!! I can definitely feel them even across the ocean! :)

Challenge Accepted and Completed!!!

This last Saturday and Sunday were the hardest days we’ve had here so far!! Last week we had interviews with all the potential DRIME Benin leaders and then the weekend was spent actually making the final decision. It was a very difficult and challenging decision to make!! All 6 people who applied are amazing people and would have been great to have on the leadership team but we had to pick the best combination of people. We spent all of Saturday in prayer and discussion over who the best people for this team would be. Each of us spent the morning on our own to have personal prayer and devotions time with God, and then we got together in the afternoon to discuss all our thoughts and what God has been revealing to us about these people. Our discussion lasted for about 6 hours (I KNOW – SOOO LONG!!) with a few breaks so we didn’t make our final decision until 10:30pm!! But we made a unanimous decision!!!! That’s right...it’s done and we have a leadership team!!! On Sunday, we told the 6 people our decision. It was very hard for me to tell the 2 people who we didn’t choose to be on the team. I’m glad we told them as a team because I think I would have fallen apart otherwise. They seemed to be okay with our decision and expressed interest to still be on the team so that’s good! And it was great to tell the people who are on the team – they were so excited!!
So here is the DRIME Leadership Team on the left!! Even though the process was soooo hard, it feels so good to finally have a team and start training them to lead this ministry! On Wednesday, we had our very first meeting with the DRIME Benin leadership team!!! Wooooot!!!! It was sooo fun!! We gave them little Canada gift bags and everything!! (you can see them in the picture) And they all get along so well and work really well together, so it just confirmed that we have the right team!

Prayer Requests and Praise Items:
o Continued health and safety (the burn on my leg is doing much much better so thanks for your prayers!!)
o Praise God that we finally have an amazing leadership team!! Pray for us as we start training them this week and prepare for a leader retreat next weekend
o We are doing ministry with GAiN on Friday and Saturday in a village. Pray that we will be able to share Christ with lots of people and that many hearts and lives will be changed
o Pray for Michele and Abby (from DRIME) who are coming in May and that all the details would come together perfectly

A Cancellation, A Game, A Loss, and A Challenge

If you read my last blog entry, you probably remember me mentioning a ministry opportunity we were going to have in one of the villages this last Saturday. Well, late Friday night we got a phone call saying that the person who had invited us to do ministry had cancelled on us! So we were super sad to not be able to do ministry – obviously it is the part that we are most passionate about! And we also felt bad about calling the team the night before we were supposed to go to tell them that we were no longer going! Of course, that wasn’t our fault but we still felt bad that it was so last minute! But don’t worry...we found another way to occupy our time...

As you can probably guess, we drink A LOT of water here!! It is very hot so, I’m not gonna lie, a lot of sweating happens and we need more water than usual. There is no recycling here so we have been keeping our empty water bottles in a closet. We have literally about 200 empty water bottles in that closet!!! The 3 of us have been trying to figure out what to do with them and over the weekend we came up with a brilliant idea....BOWLING!!!!!!!!!!!! Yep, we set up a 10 pin bowling lane in our apartment and had ourselves a rousing game! It was lots of fun!!! We heard that our church collects water bottles so we will give our bottles to them. I don’t know if they’ll want 200 at once but....oh well!!

This last weekend, we lost 50% of the appliances in our kitchen!! True, we only ever had 2 appliances but losing one is still a huge loss!! On Saturday, we noticed that our fridge wasn’t as cold as it used to be. By Sunday, it was actually warmer in our fridge than in the rest of our kitchen. Yeah...gross!!! So Jamie and I went downstairs to attempt to talk to our landlady (she has a very thick accent and is really hard to understand). She called a repairman right away and invited us to put some things in her fridge, which was a lifesaver because we had frozen meat, eggs, and milk in the fridge! But it was sooo nasty going into that fridge – it reeked!!!! Some of our food went bad and we’ve been eating more than usual these last couple of days to try and get rid of stuff. The repairman came on Sunday afternoon and then on Monday they came back to take away our fridge. Our fridge was completely broken!!! Our landlady did buy us a new fridge and we received it on Tuesday. So luckily we only went 2 days without a fridge but that is actually a long time to go without something so essential to everyday life! We are definitely learning to not take anything for granted!!

We received all the applications for the DRIME Benin leadership team on Sunday so this week has been spent looking over them and having interviews with all the potential leaders. It is a fun process because we have been able to get to know these people more and it is fun to hear their passion and vision for DRIME in Benin. But it is also a very stressful process because we have to say no to some people! I definitely want the best people possible for this team but I can also be a bit of a people pleaser and I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings. We are just praying that God makes who he wants on this leadership team super clear to everyone involved – to us 3 who have to execute the decision (because really it is God’s decision) and also to all the people who have applied so that they can feel confirmed in whether God is calling them to DRIME leadership or maybe something else.

Prayer Requests
o Health and safety – we have each been affected in different ways these last 2 weeks. My teammates have allergies and bug bites and I have had a bit of nausea this week. The burn on my leg seems to be getting better but the part that was burnt the most hasn’t changed at all.
o We are deciding on the leaders this weekend! Pray that we would be sensitive to God’s guidance and that all the applicants would be very accepting of the decision.
o Praise God that our fridge problem was fixed! Please pray against any other major problems with our apartment.
o Pray that many contacts and connections would continue to come out of meetings that we’ve had with other churches and Christian organizations