Meanwhile...back at Yabello

Meanwhile…back in Yabello this morning the dogs chased the goat & sheep round and round while Denise and Baharnish chased the dogs round and round. In the end all was well and the goat only had a couple scratches. The lamb’s defenses of laying flat on her belly worked well.  Yesterday was the first trip into town with the new guests and an obnoxious boy welcomed Meghan by hitting her with a rock in her back (that was a first). Thankfully she wasn’t hurt, but it did scare her. We decided to walk out of town for the rest of our walk. My life has gotten a little more exciting after a couple weeks of focusing on paperwork in the city.

 

Meghan & Jensen arrived safely last week and didn’t get their luggage until 2 days later. So they have had quite the introduction to Ethiopia, but they are doing well and pitching in with everything from paperwork to working under my house to clean out the pipes. I am trying to avoid the fact that I have to pack everything up in the next month. I will hopefully be able to give away some of my vet things on Friday. The next week will be busy with travel setting up for the evaluation, so I am enjoying my time at home this week.

 

Yesterday, I sent someone to go get 160 Borana Bibles from Negelle for the Borana people. I am so excited about this. It seems that I have been trying to get a way to get a good number of Bibles for over a year, and many have been asking for them. Pray that they arrive safely tomorrow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

UPDATE

I’m in the midst of paperwork work this week which means no fun monkey stories. The best part of writing up all of my research is seeing how much I have learned and accomplished over the past two years. So far I am on page 11 and I feel like I’m still in the boring parts and haven’t gotten to the good parts or added any cool pictures. Thankfully I have quite a bit of things already written down, but it is still more work than I thought that it would be. It feels like I am in school again except that I can’t stay up all night to finish anything because my mind seems to just stop before midnight.

 

Also this week I will be discussing with SIM the evaluation with the government for my research project that must be completed in February. It involves getting 9 different people (besides myself, my worker and my short-termers) from 4 different offices at the same place at the same time to show what I’ve been doing for the past two years. Getting this accomplished in Ethiopia is nothing short of a miracle. The last missionary who had a project in Borana didn’t even get to do his because not all of the people agreed to come. Doing the evaluation, however, is an important way to end well—so I hope to be able to show them “the works” of the Borana work as it also testifies to what God is doing in the area.

 

My new short-termers Jensen & Meghan come on Wednesday evening. I’m looking forward to their arrival and started making lists of specific things that they can do to help me.

 

Pray for a decision I need to make concerning my future: CVM and I are currently discussing my role starting June/July of this year.

 

My next update will hopefully have me going back to Yabello with my short-termers. I hope to leave for my Yabello home on or by the weekend.

Holidays and the Desert

Hi Friends,

It has been a few weeks since I’ve written an update. The holidays have gotten me off of my schedule. For those of you I didn’t have a chance to send greetings to, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! I had a wonderful Christmas in Addis Ababa with Bob & Jane & their son, a missionary family from Seattle and another girl, Marcie who is helping with an agriculture project in the southwest. It was fun with a tree and presents to unwrap, a Christmas chicken and stuffing, pie (my contribution) and a puzzle to do.

 

Shortly after Christmas SIM Ethiopia had a conference for all missionaries in a resort place called Sodere where we all got to ring in the new year. It is a sweet place with African sounds like monkeys in the middle of the night. All of the water supply comes from a hot spring so all of the water from the Olympic-sized pool (which is as hot as a hot tub on the first day) to the toilet water is quite hot. The monkeys are a big part of life there…I tried to open the door to air out my musty room and to unload things from my landcruiser and the monkeys kept sneaking in the room when I turned my back. In all they stole 4 pieces of candy and a banana (the 1^st monkey took those in the gold shiny wrapper first then the next one took the candy in the clear wrapper and the third monkey tried to take all 3 bananas in a bag, but only ended up getting away with one). After that I dug out some squirt guns (brought from the States just for this occasion) and that helped keep the monkeys at bay. I must admit that the monkeys were quite entertaining to watch—jumping through the trees and peering in through my window to see what treats they could find. OH yeah, we had the Christian author Philip Yancy come and share with us on prayer during our retreat. I was impressed that he could not only write, but was also an interesting and challenging speaker. I remember his summary of the three things Jesus taught on prayer from the first night: Keep it simple, keep it honest and keep it up. Good words to remember and to follow.

 

I am currently trying to finish paperwork for my project in the next couple weeks and then a short term couple (Jensen & Meghan) will come to help me for a month in Yabello. (They arrive Jan 13). I really need to get the paperwork done by that time so I’m hoping that I can be focused. Before I get going on the paperwork I was invited to go along to visit some desert people in the northeast. There is currently a drought in that area and I expect it to be hot, dry and barren with skinny camels.  I have never been to the real desert before so I am excited to go. It is only a short 2 day trip so I leave tomorrow & I’ll be back on Tuesday.  If you could keep me in your prayers I would appreciate it…my back is a little sore from sitting in a conference all of last week so I’m praying that the drive won’t bother it too much.

 

Blessings to you in 2010,

Dr. Denise