Week Two

Sorry for waiting so long to create another post, Internet is kind of slow here depending on how many people in the building are trying to use it at once.  I may have a lot to update you with.  So the week I arrived I got right back into some more training but this time the focus was on training us for living in Madagascar specifically.  For the first three days we did this program called L-A-M-P which is basically this language training program.  We learned how to make lesson plans and do different activities doing our sessions with our language helpers.  My language helper is Florentine, this Malagasy woman who has been teaching missionaries English for years now.  She is very patient with me, which I am grateful for.

The second week which is the one I am currently working through has new challenges but at the same time they have been rewarding.  I moved in  my flat on Sunday with my new Roomate Heidi.  It is pretty nice in my mind, I never pictured a missionary living is such a nice place.  It is not fancy or anything but the everything works great and I have not seen any bugs yet.  We get a full kitchen with a stove and everything.  Now Heidi and I both confessed to each other that we cannot cook, which in turn has made things very interesting.  Thankfully the main meal that people cook in Madagascar is rice (although I have not perfected it yet) so we have a great excuse to cook the same meal over again and do not have to be too creative.

Well besides eating rice and listening to Adventures In Odyssey you may want to know what I have been doing during the day.  Well I may have explained to some of you that the main reason I am here is to be trained to become a full time missionary for after I graduate.  Basically that is what this journey is about; learning from other missionaries but also creating a new and different path for myself. This is a time where I figure out what full time ministry will look like for me in the future.  Every missionary has to make important choices that will affect the themselves and the people they are ministering to.  Every missionary has to decide what is most important to them.  Well right now I feel language is most important to me.  It is so draining and well humbling but I know that I cannot communicate the Gospel to these people without words.  To every culture words are important; they communicate love that actions cannot always express. Not when you are one of few white people on the entire island.

So as part of my training I have Language Studies, Cultural Studies, and Volunteer ministry.  The ministry I am doing is working at this Christian English speaking school known as MCA (Madagascar Christian Acadamy)  That is only in the afternoons, at least for now as I have language studies in the morning with Florentine.  I am working with the grade one classroom with their reading, teaching a little of Drama, and maybe helping with art class with the uper level grades.  I have been doing a little teaching which has been different for me as I have never done that before but I enjoy being around the kids very much so.

Well as much as I would like to go into more detail it is time for me to go to bed.  I go to bed around 9:30pm during the week but that is because I have to get up early to go and walk to school.  I will try to write again soon.