So this last week was filled with all sorts of Good Braais and goodbyes. Anyways here is the brief story of the last week of school:
So the last week was a highly unproductive week for me. I was busy relaxing reading chilling, sorting myself out for traveling etc... I should have been studying more for my Biblical Studies Exam but for whatever reason I found myself not feeling any pressure for it. Anyways instead of studying hard I chilled, spent my days resting chatting with friends (thanks friends!) and sort of sorting out my room and cleaning.
Thursday I had my first braai of the week (Braai=BBQ but south African style) with the other exchange students from Denison Residence. They didn’t wait for the charcoal to get going (it took its time... I guess we north Americans don’t have braaiing in our blood?). Eventually after we used up almost an entire pack of fire starters to try to get the charcoal burning we had finished all of our cooking and had eaten our fill anyways. But it was awesome to chill and grill with friends.
Friday Night was another wonderful night this time we were celebrating Hillary and Nonto’s 21st Birthdays (Sort of Belated for Hills and very belated for Nonto). Anyways so we got together with their church friends and had a braai at the Diggs. It was a wonderful night to hangout with people and learn how to be patient with the process of braaiing and getting it started well. It was a wonderful night with lots of laughs and good times. We even sent one of the pastor’s daughters (from Church on the Ridge she was young like 5 or 6 I would say) to the hospital during the evening. She was being pulled around on a beanbag chair through the house at high speeds and clunked her head on the doorframe. And well she started bleeding from her forehead. They took her to the hospital just to be sure but all they did was give her a band-aid and sent her on her way. But still a very enjoyable night to spend with Nonto and Hillary and other friends.
Saturday was exam day: I forgot to set my alarm the night prior because it was late the night prior, but I still woke up before 7am like i was hoping. It was just really a crappy way to wake up when I wasn’t sure what time it was and if I had overslept because I had need of taking time to study that morning. I had breakfast with Kate and Mendisa at 9am and that lasted until almost 11:30am. The tail end of it they were busy swapping music and I studied during that time which was nice. It was great to be able to finally spend time with Mendisa. Mendisa is a drama student in her Masters program at the UKZN. Kate and I both know her through NCF church and Cell group in particular. The unfortunate bit about it was that Mendisa was super busy and our schedules never really clicked so her and I didn’t get much of a chance to hang out.
Anyways after breakfast I went back to my dorm grabbed the specific notes I had needed for my exam and ran to the LAN to send some emails and message some people really quick. Then I went to Kara Nichas for lunch (Biriyani Tub with Curry for 5.50R like 0.70$ just amazing! I don’t know if I have mentioned it before but yeah, AMAZING!). And with my lunch and notes I found a bench in the shade (Because it was ridiculously hot that day like 37+ degrees) and did some prep work for my exam which was about to start at 2pm.
Anyways the Exam went well 4 essays in 3 hours, but the best thing about it was that we had access to a Bible. Wow was that ever a huge help! Anyways so I finished about 30min early and was happy to be done with it so I left the exam and was finally done!
Saturday night was Braai number 3 with friends from Holy Trinity Church (The Bible Talks People). It was just amazing to be able to chill out with people braai one last time hang out, watch Jumanji, and to be able to relax after my exam. Super good and it was wonderful to meet some people from the classics department and other friend circles that were brought together by a braai.
Anyways Sunday was a day that started good byes for me. Sunday at Church on the Ridge (possibly my last time) wasn’t too bad, it made me really wish though that I had committed myself to that church a bit more throughout the semester but I still learned alot from the other churches as well. That Afternoon I did Lunch with Margaux, Hillary, and Nono after church which was cool, and then after that I chilled out with Margaux at the diggs swam, chatted, chilled it was nice. In the evening I went to Holy Trinity for one last worship service there. It was so nice to be able to worship with friends from TBT and others from that church. I said good bye to Ant and Kim Carr (the staff of TBT in PMB or ex-staff as they are moving to Durban now for ministry there), and also to Anabel and Savio, and a couple of other people from there as well.
Monday was a day where I sorted out my payments that I owed to the school, and after that I packed up my luggage. I left it in my dorm room locked up in the cupboard, because I have the dorm room at varsity until the 9th of December. Which is wonderful. That afternoon I said a handful of goodbyes to people from the varsity (exchange students mostly) and then I got a relatively early night’s sleep.
Tuesday morning I said goodbye to kate (as she was up studying for an exam early) and then I hit the road to start travelling (more on that later.).
Anyways I guess I should run through my emotions rather than just the actions. I guess part of me is still in a high degree of disbelief of the reality of saying good bye to these people. It feels like I have such a long time left in South Africa that I can’t be really saying good bye. There are probably going to be (and have been) three sorts of goodbyes that I will say to people. There will inevitably be those brief “Cheers and Safe travels” sort of goodbyes. This first type is not a heavily emotionally attached sort of goodbye. Basically it works out to being just a very easy good bye because well these are the people I know by name, might have spent a wee bit of time with, but really not too close with. The second type of goodbye is the next step up. This is the sort of good bye that has the reality of yes we have gotten to know each other more than just in passing, and has the desire to have spent much more time with them. This one so far has left me with the longing to have experienced deeper and closer relationship with them, and that will probably get a bit lost with time and distance but there was potential. Yes it is sad and tough to say goodbye like this but if I try and put in some effort with long distance friendships something may come out of these. The Last one I haven’t had to many of thus far this trip. They are the deep friendships that are going to have much more of a difficult time being distant from each other. Saying goodbye to Kate was like this. We have made and arranged to stay in touch with each other. I think for me the emotional reality of this one will set in when I am doing these goodbyes to the really close friends close to when I am heading home. Basically this will be difficult in and around the end of December when I say Goodbye to John, and Ryan, and Margaux, and Duncan. Those sort of friendships are ones which I hope to maintain (also like Kate and Minnie among others) which I will be sad about the distance, but at the same time I will learn how to use that sadness as a drive to improve long distance friendships with these people. They are the sort that I will be calling when I am doing the work of processing, or will be in conversation with over emails frequently I hope. Perhaps even road trip to visit the ones who are close enough to go to.
Basically I am going to keep on working on that long distance communication thing. I know that I will probably fail at it about a month or two in to the return to Canada, but at the same time I will be working on being persistent and patient with these friends so that I can figure out how to be in better communication.
Anyways I will be posting this blog asap and it will probably come with another post quick on its heels. Cheers!
Andrew
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Sunday, November 21, 2010
Sani Pass
Hey friends so I am going to break up the events of the last week a bit to keep the reading length down a wee bit. So right now you are getting the post about the Sani Pass. Later on (tonight or tomorrow night even) you will get a second post.
So Friday Afternoon we (Kate, Jasmine, Elizabeth and I) hopped into a taxi to head down to the taxi rank to get to the Underberg. So we arrived downtown and asked around about where we needed to go to catch a taxi to get to the Underberg. So we walked to the farthest taxi rank that any of us had been to. We got in the taxi and slowly it filled up with people. (Us being 4 made it fill up rather quickly). Anyways they started the engine and as it was idling waiting to get going it sounded a wee bit off. Sort of like it was skipping a beat of the engine as it was firing. So we got underway and slowly but surely we pulled off to the side and we had to start the engine again. Then a second time we had the same problem but it wouldn’t start up again. As we waited for them to try, they decided to call another taxi to take us to the Underberg. (Unfortunately this was after being there for a while waiting...). So we got to stand on the road side and watch a herd of cattle cross the highway, and wait around for a second taxi.
Eventually it arrived and everyone was very relieved so off we went to the Underberg. We got there and called for a lift to a number that was given to us by the lodge we were staying at that evening. And the guy didn’t have a taxi at the time but was on his way towards the lodge and offered us a lift in his pickup truck. So the four of us tossed our bags in the back and we went in the truck bed to go to the lodge. It was a beautiful drive. (see the pictures of the clouds on the mountains taken just outside of our lodge for the reason why on my flickr).
That night we planned out our next day as we discussed with the manager of the lodge about what she thought was possible. We figured that our best bet was to hike up the pass and back down in the same day having lunch at the Chalet due to the lack of available accommodation for us that evening. So with that as our plan we were working on how to get a lift to the border crossing. Luckily Krzyz (Chris), a guy in the room next to us over heard our problem and was wondering if he could accompany us for the hike during the day. Luckily he had a car that could get us to the Border.
So the next morning we got up for 6am and left around 6:30am. We arrived at the South African Border (where we had to leave the car because it is a 4-wheel drive only pass) and started hiking around 7am. It was a beautiful morning to hike up. Also since we started early enough we missed the crazy traffic on the way up the pass. It was just beautiful hiking see the photos as my words can’t quite describe it. We made it to the top by about 9:30am and we were thoroughly exhausted. We had hiked 11.2Km and the majority was uphill. But it was beautiful and worth the walk.
At the border crossing as we were stamping through they were busy off to one side working on the butchering of a lamb which made me think: ‘Hey maybe lamb for lunch would be nice’ (Just kidding friends...). Anyways so we walked over to the lodge and flopped out on a couple of picnic tables looking over the pass and just rested for about 30min. By about 10 we poked our head inside the Chalet and looked around and then chilled out on some couches for another 30min. The kitchen hadn’t opened by the point in the morning so we decided to go for a walk around the area and hiked out along the cliffs. The best way to describe the Sani Top is that it is a very flat area at the top of South Africa (Again see the photos) and the pass is basically this valley that drops down from the town of Sani Top. It was truly stunning.
As for lunch we had it around 11:30 starting off with a pint in the chalet pub. Yup the highest pub in Africa! (Finally!). It was such a pleasure as we chatted with the owner’s brother and shared some stories with him. For lunch I had their famous ‘Mountain Sausage’ which was very delicious. It came with a little salad (a piece of lettuce and two tomato slices) and a potato (half really that was boiled) but it was a delicious meaty lunch (I stole some vegetables from other people’s plates).
After lunch we hiked back down the pass which was a bit slower progress (it felt like) but with less rest stops. The problem with hiking down was that it was a loose gravel and dirt road that is pretty steep so as we were walking we would start sliding with the gravel under our feet. That was the tough and gruelling section of the hike but we were overjoyed when we arrived back at the South African border crossing. Then we found out that Chris was heading back to PMB that same evening. Such a blessing so we asked if we could get a lift with him back to PMB and he agreed. So wonderful.
Basically it was a wonderful weekend trip tiring and exhausting but so amazing. It was a good chance for me to get to know both Jasmine and Elizabeth a bit better as well as to meet an awesome guy like Chris. It was a very chill study break as well. Also I did get to do one of the ists that I had missed once upon a time during the last time I was in Lesotho. Finally the Highest pub in Africa!
Cheers eh!
So Friday Afternoon we (Kate, Jasmine, Elizabeth and I) hopped into a taxi to head down to the taxi rank to get to the Underberg. So we arrived downtown and asked around about where we needed to go to catch a taxi to get to the Underberg. So we walked to the farthest taxi rank that any of us had been to. We got in the taxi and slowly it filled up with people. (Us being 4 made it fill up rather quickly). Anyways they started the engine and as it was idling waiting to get going it sounded a wee bit off. Sort of like it was skipping a beat of the engine as it was firing. So we got underway and slowly but surely we pulled off to the side and we had to start the engine again. Then a second time we had the same problem but it wouldn’t start up again. As we waited for them to try, they decided to call another taxi to take us to the Underberg. (Unfortunately this was after being there for a while waiting...). So we got to stand on the road side and watch a herd of cattle cross the highway, and wait around for a second taxi.
Eventually it arrived and everyone was very relieved so off we went to the Underberg. We got there and called for a lift to a number that was given to us by the lodge we were staying at that evening. And the guy didn’t have a taxi at the time but was on his way towards the lodge and offered us a lift in his pickup truck. So the four of us tossed our bags in the back and we went in the truck bed to go to the lodge. It was a beautiful drive. (see the pictures of the clouds on the mountains taken just outside of our lodge for the reason why on my flickr).
That night we planned out our next day as we discussed with the manager of the lodge about what she thought was possible. We figured that our best bet was to hike up the pass and back down in the same day having lunch at the Chalet due to the lack of available accommodation for us that evening. So with that as our plan we were working on how to get a lift to the border crossing. Luckily Krzyz (Chris), a guy in the room next to us over heard our problem and was wondering if he could accompany us for the hike during the day. Luckily he had a car that could get us to the Border.
So the next morning we got up for 6am and left around 6:30am. We arrived at the South African Border (where we had to leave the car because it is a 4-wheel drive only pass) and started hiking around 7am. It was a beautiful morning to hike up. Also since we started early enough we missed the crazy traffic on the way up the pass. It was just beautiful hiking see the photos as my words can’t quite describe it. We made it to the top by about 9:30am and we were thoroughly exhausted. We had hiked 11.2Km and the majority was uphill. But it was beautiful and worth the walk.
At the border crossing as we were stamping through they were busy off to one side working on the butchering of a lamb which made me think: ‘Hey maybe lamb for lunch would be nice’ (Just kidding friends...). Anyways so we walked over to the lodge and flopped out on a couple of picnic tables looking over the pass and just rested for about 30min. By about 10 we poked our head inside the Chalet and looked around and then chilled out on some couches for another 30min. The kitchen hadn’t opened by the point in the morning so we decided to go for a walk around the area and hiked out along the cliffs. The best way to describe the Sani Top is that it is a very flat area at the top of South Africa (Again see the photos) and the pass is basically this valley that drops down from the town of Sani Top. It was truly stunning.
As for lunch we had it around 11:30 starting off with a pint in the chalet pub. Yup the highest pub in Africa! (Finally!). It was such a pleasure as we chatted with the owner’s brother and shared some stories with him. For lunch I had their famous ‘Mountain Sausage’ which was very delicious. It came with a little salad (a piece of lettuce and two tomato slices) and a potato (half really that was boiled) but it was a delicious meaty lunch (I stole some vegetables from other people’s plates).
After lunch we hiked back down the pass which was a bit slower progress (it felt like) but with less rest stops. The problem with hiking down was that it was a loose gravel and dirt road that is pretty steep so as we were walking we would start sliding with the gravel under our feet. That was the tough and gruelling section of the hike but we were overjoyed when we arrived back at the South African border crossing. Then we found out that Chris was heading back to PMB that same evening. Such a blessing so we asked if we could get a lift with him back to PMB and he agreed. So wonderful.
Basically it was a wonderful weekend trip tiring and exhausting but so amazing. It was a good chance for me to get to know both Jasmine and Elizabeth a bit better as well as to meet an awesome guy like Chris. It was a very chill study break as well. Also I did get to do one of the ists that I had missed once upon a time during the last time I was in Lesotho. Finally the Highest pub in Africa!
Cheers eh!
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Lesotho Take 2: Who would of Knew?
Sorry for the Bad Grammar for the title but it is a great play on the sounds and I couldn’t resist word play like that!
Anyways so I am sitting at almost a week and some change before I hit the road and my studies draw to a close here in PMB. So I thought it would be good to give a brief update before the weekend.
So I finished off two more courses worth of work. One Take Home exam and one Essay done this week and I totaled about 7500 words in the course of 2 days! I feel like a bit of a champ (not being cocky but probably the truth is I feel like a marathon runner, Excited about the accomplishment but exhausted by the effort).
The Take home exam fell on Tuesday this past week the same day as cell group. Take home exams here are different than those I have received at Western in this past year, they are a 24 hour marathon. So the expectation laid out for us in class was that in the 24 hours we were expected to read broadly and write clearly. I hope that I did that. So that morning I woke up to try and get myself some breakfast and have a cup of coffee to start my day off well. I go to the fridge where I was keeping my milk and I opened it up and it didn’t feel any cooler than the room outside. So I checked the milk and it was definitely sour. So I tossed it out, and had my coffee without milk that morning. I then met up with a group of students from BIST 310 and plotted out how we were going to tackle studying for the final (We got given 12 Questions that might be on the exam for our NT section of the course, so we decided to each prep 5 questions and share our prep work, over 5 people we cover each question twice giving us a huge amount of detail to study off of!). I was busy complaining about my 24 hour exam that was starting in 30 min, and how my milk went bad so I wasn’t going to have the easy drinking coffee as a fuel for the night time push. Alice decided that she would buy me milk so that I could have my coffee. We separated up the questions and I went off to start my exam.
I started off well. I looked over the question sheet, and planned out the exam, grabbed the readings I thought I might have found useful, and went off to the Library. I spent the morning working on just reading Globalization Texts, and then I went and grabbed lunch. At this point I was feeling pretty comfortable about the direction and the pace I was going. After lunch I started into theology texts, (Liberationists, Economics and Faith, Feminist Theological Economics etc...) and that was when things started going slightly sour. At first I couldn’t find a table to work at in the Library so I went down a floor and found an open space. Then I found the texts more basic than and nowhere nearly as helpful as those of the Globalization scholars. Anyways, I finished up at the Library and went back to my dorm to start writing (At about 2:30/3pm). I grabbed a shower to refresh myself and then I settled into the couch and started writing. I got done the first question (of four) and started into the second. By 6pm I had eaten dinner, and the day before I had made the decision that I was going to go to cell group. Here is where things started to pick up and get better.
At cell group we combined two cell groups to form one big group for a larger session on Worship. Which was just enjoyable! As we worshiped I was able to relax and just gain some very positive energy from God and the people there. Afterward I was dropped off near my friend’s house in the pouring rain to hopefully grab some milk. Unfortunately she didn’t answer her cell phone, so I was left standing in the rain outside of her Diggs. Luckily a guy pulled up in his Car and was waiting to be let in through their gate so I went in after him and hollered in the window of their diggs hoping to get Alice’s attention. I got the diggs mates attention instead but they gave me the bottle of milk that Alice had purchased for me. Super thankful! Anyways so I got a lift back to my Residence sort of... Denison is a large complex of blocks, and well I live about equally distant from both entrances as is possible. So I had to run through the rain and puddles back to my dorm to get back to my take home. I got back and I had a shower, and energized by having worshiped and warmed up by the shower I settled in for the evening of writing. I pushed myself and got through the final three questions of the exam on only one cup of coffee. And I got to bed at 1:30am (and got a solid 5.5hours of sleep! Especially compared to that of other people in my class...). I had written 19pages at 1.5 spacing 12pt Times New Roman including my cover page and Bibliography and I felt really good about that.
The next morning having finished all of that all that was left was to do a quick read over and then print it off. So I did that and submitted it in. As I submitted the other students of the class rolled up around 9am with all of their horror stories of staying up till midnight sleeping till 2:30 and getting back to work at 2:30, or starting the exam @ 7:30pm. I guess I felt blessed by God and my decision to actively take time to value worshiping him. It is odd that even though having pushed late into the night, and had a very roller coaster experience of the day that in spending time with God and people in worship that I could just receive rest and energy in abundance. That rest and energy (even though i was jumping and worshiping with my full self) must have come from God. I guess it is part of that dethroning the Academy that I do with choosing to prioritize rest and events where I can gather with people around God. It is helpful for me, and I find that in those times, the best thing I can do is to value those activities and hold onto them for the same reason that I do them, to be and have time set aside for God in my week. I guess I am very like Luther in the fact that I agree with him when he suggests that on a normal day he spends an hour in prayer, and on a busy day he can’t afford to spend less than three hours in prayer before the day starts. (By the way if you are reading this and think that it is ridiculous and there is no way you can be as productive, or if you read about my pace of life and you think, ‘yeah right’ then you should probably consider choosing into it... Just saying that if you believe God to be good, then you might also believe that the 10 commandments are kind of important and well this happens to be a positive command within those rules, so consider it!)
Anyways also on Wednesday I had a wonderful Chat with my friend Thomas (Fr Thomas) over coffee after we submitted our exam. It is interesting to share my story of theology and to be able to share my passion of why and what I do with him. It is also cool to hear his perspective on theology as he is a priest in the Indian Orthodox Church (Think ancient church like the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, like 4th Century split off from the Church, not like the Russian Orthodox Church (11th Century Split)). Anyways other than that on Wednesday I was exhausted and pushed my way through one last paper (Quite literally pushed my way through, I am not happy with how it turned out), but I am glad that it is finished.
I guess I need to return to the title where I might have insinuated that I am going back to Lesotho. Well this weekend some friends and I are going to try to hit up the Highest pub in Africa in addition to hiking up to the Highest Peak South of Mt. Kilimanjaro. So it is back to Lesotho with me, and Back to the Sani Top! It will give my new Backpack a good test run, (I finally downsized to a nicely sized 50L backpack) before I hit the road.
I guess I am going to end this post here and keep it shorter than 2500 words, but I would love to hear stories from anyone back at home. If you are sitting there thinking: ‘Oh surely he can’t mean me,’ I mean you in particular. If you are sitting there thinking: ‘What stories?’ Send me an e-mail about life, the universe or anything. It is really special to me to receive e-mails, stories etc... I guess since I am coming back in Early January that I will be seeing you guys and I would love to have some Idea about what is going on in your lives as well.
Cheers!
Anyways so I am sitting at almost a week and some change before I hit the road and my studies draw to a close here in PMB. So I thought it would be good to give a brief update before the weekend.
So I finished off two more courses worth of work. One Take Home exam and one Essay done this week and I totaled about 7500 words in the course of 2 days! I feel like a bit of a champ (not being cocky but probably the truth is I feel like a marathon runner, Excited about the accomplishment but exhausted by the effort).
The Take home exam fell on Tuesday this past week the same day as cell group. Take home exams here are different than those I have received at Western in this past year, they are a 24 hour marathon. So the expectation laid out for us in class was that in the 24 hours we were expected to read broadly and write clearly. I hope that I did that. So that morning I woke up to try and get myself some breakfast and have a cup of coffee to start my day off well. I go to the fridge where I was keeping my milk and I opened it up and it didn’t feel any cooler than the room outside. So I checked the milk and it was definitely sour. So I tossed it out, and had my coffee without milk that morning. I then met up with a group of students from BIST 310 and plotted out how we were going to tackle studying for the final (We got given 12 Questions that might be on the exam for our NT section of the course, so we decided to each prep 5 questions and share our prep work, over 5 people we cover each question twice giving us a huge amount of detail to study off of!). I was busy complaining about my 24 hour exam that was starting in 30 min, and how my milk went bad so I wasn’t going to have the easy drinking coffee as a fuel for the night time push. Alice decided that she would buy me milk so that I could have my coffee. We separated up the questions and I went off to start my exam.
I started off well. I looked over the question sheet, and planned out the exam, grabbed the readings I thought I might have found useful, and went off to the Library. I spent the morning working on just reading Globalization Texts, and then I went and grabbed lunch. At this point I was feeling pretty comfortable about the direction and the pace I was going. After lunch I started into theology texts, (Liberationists, Economics and Faith, Feminist Theological Economics etc...) and that was when things started going slightly sour. At first I couldn’t find a table to work at in the Library so I went down a floor and found an open space. Then I found the texts more basic than and nowhere nearly as helpful as those of the Globalization scholars. Anyways, I finished up at the Library and went back to my dorm to start writing (At about 2:30/3pm). I grabbed a shower to refresh myself and then I settled into the couch and started writing. I got done the first question (of four) and started into the second. By 6pm I had eaten dinner, and the day before I had made the decision that I was going to go to cell group. Here is where things started to pick up and get better.
At cell group we combined two cell groups to form one big group for a larger session on Worship. Which was just enjoyable! As we worshiped I was able to relax and just gain some very positive energy from God and the people there. Afterward I was dropped off near my friend’s house in the pouring rain to hopefully grab some milk. Unfortunately she didn’t answer her cell phone, so I was left standing in the rain outside of her Diggs. Luckily a guy pulled up in his Car and was waiting to be let in through their gate so I went in after him and hollered in the window of their diggs hoping to get Alice’s attention. I got the diggs mates attention instead but they gave me the bottle of milk that Alice had purchased for me. Super thankful! Anyways so I got a lift back to my Residence sort of... Denison is a large complex of blocks, and well I live about equally distant from both entrances as is possible. So I had to run through the rain and puddles back to my dorm to get back to my take home. I got back and I had a shower, and energized by having worshiped and warmed up by the shower I settled in for the evening of writing. I pushed myself and got through the final three questions of the exam on only one cup of coffee. And I got to bed at 1:30am (and got a solid 5.5hours of sleep! Especially compared to that of other people in my class...). I had written 19pages at 1.5 spacing 12pt Times New Roman including my cover page and Bibliography and I felt really good about that.
The next morning having finished all of that all that was left was to do a quick read over and then print it off. So I did that and submitted it in. As I submitted the other students of the class rolled up around 9am with all of their horror stories of staying up till midnight sleeping till 2:30 and getting back to work at 2:30, or starting the exam @ 7:30pm. I guess I felt blessed by God and my decision to actively take time to value worshiping him. It is odd that even though having pushed late into the night, and had a very roller coaster experience of the day that in spending time with God and people in worship that I could just receive rest and energy in abundance. That rest and energy (even though i was jumping and worshiping with my full self) must have come from God. I guess it is part of that dethroning the Academy that I do with choosing to prioritize rest and events where I can gather with people around God. It is helpful for me, and I find that in those times, the best thing I can do is to value those activities and hold onto them for the same reason that I do them, to be and have time set aside for God in my week. I guess I am very like Luther in the fact that I agree with him when he suggests that on a normal day he spends an hour in prayer, and on a busy day he can’t afford to spend less than three hours in prayer before the day starts. (By the way if you are reading this and think that it is ridiculous and there is no way you can be as productive, or if you read about my pace of life and you think, ‘yeah right’ then you should probably consider choosing into it... Just saying that if you believe God to be good, then you might also believe that the 10 commandments are kind of important and well this happens to be a positive command within those rules, so consider it!)
Anyways also on Wednesday I had a wonderful Chat with my friend Thomas (Fr Thomas) over coffee after we submitted our exam. It is interesting to share my story of theology and to be able to share my passion of why and what I do with him. It is also cool to hear his perspective on theology as he is a priest in the Indian Orthodox Church (Think ancient church like the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, like 4th Century split off from the Church, not like the Russian Orthodox Church (11th Century Split)). Anyways other than that on Wednesday I was exhausted and pushed my way through one last paper (Quite literally pushed my way through, I am not happy with how it turned out), but I am glad that it is finished.
I guess I need to return to the title where I might have insinuated that I am going back to Lesotho. Well this weekend some friends and I are going to try to hit up the Highest pub in Africa in addition to hiking up to the Highest Peak South of Mt. Kilimanjaro. So it is back to Lesotho with me, and Back to the Sani Top! It will give my new Backpack a good test run, (I finally downsized to a nicely sized 50L backpack) before I hit the road.
I guess I am going to end this post here and keep it shorter than 2500 words, but I would love to hear stories from anyone back at home. If you are sitting there thinking: ‘Oh surely he can’t mean me,’ I mean you in particular. If you are sitting there thinking: ‘What stories?’ Send me an e-mail about life, the universe or anything. It is really special to me to receive e-mails, stories etc... I guess since I am coming back in Early January that I will be seeing you guys and I would love to have some Idea about what is going on in your lives as well.
Cheers!
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
La Cucaracha!
La cucaracha! la cucaracha! El no puede caminar,
La cucaracha! la cucaracha! El no puede caminar!
Because I hit him with a toilet brush and flushed him down the toilet!
So I woke up and there was this big cockroach (cucaracha) about 1.25 inches long (3-4 cm long?). In the hallway, and he didn't want to leave on his own (trying to sneak past me into my room) so I took the toilet brush and Thwap! I hit him onto his back, and Thwap! Again to get him stuck on the brush, and then Flush! down the toilet he went.
Anyways in othernews I finished my first exam, 3 hours: 4 essays, 3/4 of an hour each essay! Theo of Transformation done, Onto an essay, a take home exam, and one last 3 hour exam!
Cheers!
La cucaracha! la cucaracha! El no puede caminar!
Because I hit him with a toilet brush and flushed him down the toilet!
So I woke up and there was this big cockroach (cucaracha) about 1.25 inches long (3-4 cm long?). In the hallway, and he didn't want to leave on his own (trying to sneak past me into my room) so I took the toilet brush and Thwap! I hit him onto his back, and Thwap! Again to get him stuck on the brush, and then Flush! down the toilet he went.
Anyways in othernews I finished my first exam, 3 hours: 4 essays, 3/4 of an hour each essay! Theo of Transformation done, Onto an essay, a take home exam, and one last 3 hour exam!
Cheers!
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