Day Five

We've been here in Choma for five days now, and the staff here at the Guest House has really been wonderful to us. There is a guest house manager, a couple cooks, and a couple more employees who do cleaning, laundry, and odds and end jobs around all day. The work very hard and are making our stay very comfortable.
These first days have been learning, learning, and more learning! We have had many cultural orientation meetings to get us informed on the things we will later be experiencing. We also have been learning about all of the programs World Hope International Zambia (WHI-Z) has to offer. We heard from the director of the Hope for Children programm, which gets children in poverty connected with a sponsor. We also heard from the Home Based Care program, which connects volunteers with people who are living with a disease. Today, we learned about the AB (Abstinence and Be Faithful) and Reach for Life programs. The AB program goes into the villages and sets up a several month long program that teaches abstinence to unmarried singles and faithfulness to one partner to married couples. The Reach for Life program is an astinence program taught in urban schools to students in grades 10-12.
On Monday we were able to go into town, which is a 30 minute walk, and see the market. We bought fabric for a chitenge, which is what we are wearing in the third picture. The Zambian women wear these to carry children on their backs, to lay down if they need to sit, and to pad their head if they need to carry something heavy like a water jug.
We've been realizing recently how cautious we need to be about creatures in and around the house! We knew, of course, to stay away from any dogs in town and to keep our mosquito nets on the bed, but we had a wake up call this morning. Alissa, one of the girls on the team, stepped outside early this morning to go for a walk. When she stepped onto a mat, it made her slip and fall. As she was sitting on the ground, she saw that a small black snake had been curled up under the mat. She called over a staff member and they quickly threw the mat over it, threw a large rock on top of that, and then jumped on the rock. After all of this, we found out it was a black mamba, the world's deadliest snake. God was for sure with us on that one! Thanks for all of your prayers, guys!

Picture 1 - our view of the sunset from the front door
Picture 2 - The compound. Guesthouse on the left; offices and classroom on the right
Picture 3 - Some of us in our new chitenges
Picture 4 - Eating the staple food, nshima. It is made from mealy meal, which is ground corn