Greetings from Sandland!

It has been quite an adventure getting here, but I finally made it. I had a delay on one of my connecting flights then once I got to the capital city, there was a sand storm up north and I had two days of sitting at the airport waiting on canceled flights that couldn’t leave because of all the dust in the air. We finally just drove down to where I will be living which gave me a chance to see a bit of the country and it was actually a beautiful drive! Here are some things I’ve learned so far in the short time I’ve been here:

People here drive crazier than you could ever imagine! Basically you just beep your horn all the time to keep people from hitting you and to let them know you are coming, you make lanes wherever you want, and you don’t pay much attention to any "rules" that we ever learned for driving! It is always really busy and crowded in the streets here!
Sometimes I wake up at night to the call to pr**er which comes at 3:45 am and 5:30 am. Other times I wake up because the power has gone out and our fans have stopped working and it is too hot to sleep! We have 3-4 power cuts a day that last for several hours (actually the power is out as I'm typing). This can be frustrating since you never know when it's coming and can't really plan around it, but life goes on. I was at a little store when the power went out yesterday and the man at the counter added up my total with a calculator and told me just to come back some time when the power was on and pay him!
Water is a precious resource and it must be used very sparingly-we catch the water from the washing machine or shower and use it to flush the toilet, etc. You never drink the tap water--you carry clean water up three flights of stairs if you want drinking water. Shopping takes much more time here. You have to go to one shop to buy meat, one to buy fruits and vegetables, one for spices, and another for everything else you need! There are so many things we take for granted in the states! The people here are very welcoming and friendly. They treat you as a guest and are excited to talk to you and have you in their homes. We have a wonderful landlord who lives across the hall from us and she and her family look after my roommate and I and help us with our language and anything else that comes up. They are really a blessing!

On my second day here, I was able to go out to one of the villages and see several kids with disabilities. One girl in particular had never walked on her own and there is little access to devices like walkers, wheelchairs, and crutches here--especially for children (I had the grand idea today that I would learn to make walkers from pvc pipe so I'll let you know how that goes!). We took a pair of arm crutches out to her house and showed her how to use them. She was so excited and eager to practice with them. As she tried them out, you could see the joy and pride on her face as she showed off her new accomplishment. She would yell and all for all the other children to come watch her and each time she made it across the room to me, she would just give me a big hug. It was so amazing to see something so simple change a life! This put all the little annoyances we deal with here into perspective and was a wonderful reminder of the reason I'm here--to show these people real hope that comes from the Father!

Although the people here are very welcoming, there is a real darkness that you can feel here. Men stop what they are doing five times a day to complete their ritualistic pr**ers. They are longing so much to please a G*d that they don't really know. Ask that the light would shine into the darkness here and that people would come to know the real truth that we have in the Son.