There once was a man from Van Buren...

Thanks for praying. Right now you could pray for us three men who cannot find anything without our wives! Currently, we are looking for a sim card we bought today so that we can program the cell phone. We have figured out the pin number by guessing and now have found the phone is programmed in German. We have not found how to put the 10,000 units in to the phone so we can call out. Tommy is going to be multi-lingual by the time he leaves Senegal!!!! He did get to talk to home before the few units in the phone expired.

We purchased several items today ... as in Africa you do not purchase but an item or two in a store unless it is all in one catagory. Here is our list:

• 2 electric kettles for heating water for tea or coffee (or caffe here)
• Placed an order for a water filter (found out they are home made here) from a man who used to work for Jane (a missionary from Michigan who helped us find the kettles) but now works for New Tribes Mission
• Picked up several maps for some members of the medical team as well as for Tom and Robert
• Regulator with a transformer to work his microwave (we got three items here... an extension cord and an adapter for US plugs)
• A SIM card for the phone
• The phone

We found the water filter had been delivered and the man came at 8 p.m. to pick up his money. We could nt buy more than one item at any one place.

When working our way back to the business office at 2 p.m., we found a place that offered "fast food". We stopped and had a hamburger. This was somewhat different than Hardee's... we ordered the "Simple" burger which had cheese (grated), a tomato, dressing of some sort and french fries (not with but ON) the burger! But hey at 2 p.m. after a hetic time of shopping, we were not going to complain.

Renting a van and driver is expensive. We even took Joseph Silva with us so he could translate since Musa the driver does not speak English. We are thankful that we had a driver because there is no way we could have accomplished this without him.

We are not sure that are any rules in driving here. Boldness and courage help. Size does have its advantages but limitations as well. When buying the kettles, a semi loaded with what looked like sacks of potatos, turned down that street. He was having difficulty making the turn on what would be a one way street in the states with a taxi and other vehicles facing him. I keep forgetting that driving in Africa is always more fun and less boring than the States. Probably if there are laws or codes, they are unwritten. [Editors note: Ummm... Writing them down doesn't always help in Missouri, either!]

This plus major highway construction that is putting in new roads and overpasses around the city. When you come to one of those overpasses, you go right or left across the new road bed to the other side and then back across to where you started. These are not marked by the way and all are different.

Included in all of this is a vast number of cars of various descriptions, conditions and serviceability. The taxi that Tommy and I rode in yesterday ... Robert got to ride in a nice air conditioned Toyota van ... was a moving machine. My window would not roll up, Tommy tried his door and it would not open so he crawled through from the other side. Later we found out that both doors had to be opened from the inside. But it got us there and back. We even went to Pizza Inn to get pizzas for lunch.

We are to leave at 5:30 in the morning for Sedhiou. I understand the road is not that good so it will take us 12 hours. We could have flown but it would have cost us $450 while going by road will cost us a visa and the price of riding the ferry across the Gambia River. We could not justify the costs. It will just add a few more miles to our old bods.

Prayer items:

1. Thank God for His leadership and blessing. When we got to the business office this morning, we had just missed Bert from whom we needed to get funds for this project. My immediate thought was we are going to have to delay another day to get all of this shopping done. With the money I had left from the medical team, we were able to purchase every thing that we felt was necessary.
2. Ask God to guide and bless during the 12 hour trip that starts at 5:30 in the morning.
3. Ask that He will open the doors to an effective and effectual ministry for Bro. Tom.
4. Pray that Tom and Pastor Ngom will be an effective teacher, translator, and learner of Training for Trainers (T4T).
5. Pray that God will raise up men (and women) of peace to whom Tom may teach the material.
   

Bro. Sam