A COUPLE OF SOUVENIRS

I’ve been back “home” in Kolda for almost 2 weeks now and I must say that my transition was not what I expected. I thought that all my African friends would give me a hard time for being gone for over three weeks but that wasn’t the case. I had not prepared myself for the shock that I would get from hanging out with English speaking believers for three weeks and then going back to Pulaar speaking non-believers. The problem wasn’t with language, it wasn’t with the people here in Kolda, it was all me. I guess you can call it culture shock, but I’m getting back into the rhythm. Before I know it, I will stop focusing on learning the language and my schedule will change again!!!

I did want to show you one of my souvenirs that I got during my time away from Kolda. It's made from the wood of an actual African tree. Perty, huh?

Today I had a real fun experience. I was hanging out with some of the guys my age and they told me to come play soccer with them. I knew that this would be a lot different than the 4 on 4 that we play in the rode in front of my house, but I was ready. We went to a big field and had real goals!!! Well kinda, they were big branches that were dug into the ground and a rope tied to the top of the branches connecting the two and it made the top bar. We get there and we start kicking the ball around a little, and when everyone shows up we start to stretch. Then they tell me we are going to go for a little jog….20 minutes later we stop and then the coach dude tells us to get in a square and we run the short sprints basically chasing each other around the square. Then we did this little sprint drill running back and forth in the shape of a star. Then we did this other drill running just like the star drill but with only one line. After that they spilt us up into teams and we finally started to play, which was fun. Before I knew it, it got dark and we went home. I can remember a bunch of people telling me that African training consists of running, running, and scrimmaging. I guess you never really believe it till you see it with you own eyes. I was told it’s the same way in every sport. You may not be the best ball handler or have the best plays, but as long as you can run, you can do anything! I’ll have to remember that later on.

As much fun as I had I thought I would show you a little souvenir from the day. I remember kicking the ball and my toe hurting for a second. When I got home and cleaned all the dirt from my feet I could see that I really had bruised my toe.

Oh well, it doesn't hurt as bad as it looks.

(Cool tan, huh?)

epieniazek@gowestafrica.org

This is my new email address. I've been having some problems with my other email address. The servers see that the email is coming from Africa and it goes to a lot of people’s junk folder, so I'm going to try something new. Would you please send an email to my new address and add it as a contact. I'm trying to get a little more organized. I'm still going to use my old email address as well but I'm going to try to use my new email address for communication between my prayer supporters and hopefuly I will start regularly sending out a short email with my prayer requests and leave my blog for the cool stories.

Oh yeah, all the build up of me trying to get home. Well, I finaly did and the process was very anti-clamatic. I'm glad to be back home. Thanks for the prayers.

And don’t be shy to tell all your friends to send an email to me. You can never have too much prayer. You can send your prayer request to that email accounts as well. I would love to pray for you.



epieniazek@gowestafrica.org

African traveling!!!

My last blog was a little short, so I’ll try to explain while I still have a limited time here on the Internet. My one problem turned into 2 problems. Then one of the problems got a lot less serious, and back to one problem. But then I was back to two problems, if you would call them that. I’m in Africa, a problem is just a normal way of life.

First would have to be a problem with travel. I was told that I might have a hard time getting back in the country of Senegal with my passport but then I was told later that it won’t be as much as big a deal as I first thought. I would have the problem in some of the other West African countries, but when in Africa you never know.

The second problem would be an airline strike!!!! That’s not something that you want to say out loud either. It was a big scare but it only lasted about 24 hours and didn’t affect but about 15 people in the region.

The third, which we are still in the middle of now, is the plane had some mechanical problems. All the people going to Senegal (around 30) waited at the airport a while then they sent us to a hotel in Cote d’Ivoire, where I am right now as I’m typing this. Don’t know when we'll finally get back to Senegal, but I hoping and praying it’s soon. My local flight that I would take to Senegal takes off in like 2 hours so I’m going to miss that one, but that doesn’t bother me. I just want to get back to Senegal.

Prayer Warriors Needed!

I need the help of some prayer warriors. I will spare you the details, but I may have some problems re-entering the country of Senegal. Please begin to pray now that my paperwork will not keep me from getting back to work in Kolda. I have had such a great experience here. I feel like I have learned new things, I have made new friends, and my spirit has been refreshed.
PRAY, PRAY, PRAY and I will update you the week of August 4th.

Sitt'n and Listen'n

I shared a little on my last post that I was leaving my home in Kolda to take some seminary classes and then attend a week long conference with missionaries from all over West Africa. The first week here in Cote d’Ivoire, I took a theology class and this past week I took a class about church history. As you can tell by my clever title, the month of July will entail more sitting and listening than I am used to.
These two seminary classes were a lot different that the undergraduate classes I took. I never thought I would have so much fun taking a seminary class, but I was wrong! I still have a couple of papers to write and I’m actually kind of looking forward to it. I’m very thankful that I had this opportunity to take these classes and learn more.
I’m also really excited about this coming week and getting to meet all the missionaries from around West Africa. Including children, there will be more than 300 of us here. The leadership has done a real good job getting all this stuff planned out but you have to remember, “We’re in Africa!!!!” and anything at anytime can go …African! Please pray for our meeting, the hotel, the places we eat, all the traveling that will take place and that we can focus on the main reason that we are here.

The test is over!!!!

I want to thank all the people that have kept me in their prayers, especially over the past few weeks regarding my language test. I had my test. It was fun; it was nice. It seems crazy that the past 6 months came down to a 45 minute test, but we all know that God’s got bigger plans than tests that people have to take…well actually it is all one big test, but we would all fail that one if it wasn’t for mercy!!!
My test consisted of sitting at a table with 3 native Pulaar speakers. They each had something that they evaluated me on: how I talked, the words that I used, and how much I understood. There’s this big system and a check list of things that I should know. One guy did the talking and the other two just made notes on the conversation. We talked about many things, about life in Kolda, about the differences between USA and here; we talked about food, I gave directions somewhere, I read out of the bible to them. It was just a bunch of small talk I would say. It was a fun test, I know that I could have done a lot better but I also think it was an accurate evaluation of the Pulaar that I know.
So what did the evaluation say? I’m a level one! They said I’m about a 10-12 year old!!! I’m not ahead and I’m not behind on my learning. I’m right in the middle of the curve on where I should be right now. One of my biggest problems that made me lose a lot of points was my accent. This language has two “B’s” two “D’s” two “Y’s” and three “N’s.” When you write them there is only a small difference with a little tail or accent and you say them the same but with your tongue in a different position. Because of my lazy self I always made the letters the same sound; I knew the people still understood what I wanted to say so I never thought it would be a big deal. But because of it, the evaluators said that my accent was a little distracting and it took points off. They also took off points on my correctness and fluency skills. I also got some points taken off on my vocabulary. I was told that I had a huge vocabulary and that they were very impressed by it, but they also told me that I used many words that were French or Wolof. When I’m here in the city, that’s no problem. People understand me fine, but when I will be out in the villages where they only speak one language, there might be a problem. This was very shocking to me because I had no idea that I did that.
So what am I going to do differently? I have already told my friends to not let me be lazy and correct me when I’m saying something wrong. I’ve also made my friends a lot more aware that I’m past the point that I just want to communicate. I want to know what words belong to what language and I want to be aware of that. Please keep these in mind when you're saying your prayers for my language acquisition.
So what’s next? I’m going to Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire. I’ll be there for about 3 weeks. The first two weeks I’ll be taking seminary classes, and the third week is a conference where the West Africa region will be able to get together. I'm really excited about the next couple of weeks.

Planting Seeds!!

I’m going to warn you that this story, even I don’t understand, but there’s been a couple of events that I really want to share with y’all. I really don’t know how to introduce this story, so I’ll get right to it.
There’s a friend of mine that I like to visit and talk to once or twice a week. I’ve written about him in the past. Patrick is his “name”. Because I spend so much time there I have started to get to know all the people that own shops next to and across from Patrick’s. There has been this one guy, still don’t know his name, that is near Patrick’s stand that I’ve had unusual dealings with. He sells radios, luggage, and other various items, but when he sees me, he would get right in my face and say…something I don’t know. He would be almost yelling at me. The first couple of times this happened it would catch me by surprise and I would just stare at him and then look to Patrick and ask what he said. After a while, I did what every normal person would have done. I started yelling back at him in English.
About a week ago the same thing happened, but for some reason I responded back to him in Pulaar. I’ve heard the Wolof language spoken a lot and I have a vocabulary of about 50 words. I had no idea what he was saying but I had a clue and would respond. This went on for about 5 minutes and everyone in the area got a big kick out of watching the two of us.
The other day the same dude comes up to me and gives me his greetings in Pulaar!!! I was totally surprised and so later that day I came and sat down next to him for a while. He knew a good amount of Pulaar too. He and about four of his friends sat down and starting asking me why I’m here. It took me a while to convince them that I’m not Peace Corp. Then the conversation moved to Jesus and he quickly asked, “Who is Jesus’ Mother?” Then he asked “Who is Mary’s Mother?” Before I could answer, someone else asked “Who is Jesus’ father?” I quickly responded “GOD!” They all gave the same reaction. I don’t know how to describe it but the noise would be a cross between the noise you make when you stub your toe and when you see a car crash. They all stared at me in disbelief from what I had said. I tried to say with my face “Bring it. It’s the truth!!” but on the inside I was saying “AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! What are they going to do to me?????” They asked me a couple more questions and then I could tell they had enough. I was told to go back and talk to Patrick.
I run into people all the time and I’m able to share a little about my faith like I did in this story. It will be fun to see if anything happens to the seed that was planted that day. I also had a big laugh yesterday when my new friend came up to me and gave his greetings and then Patrick looked at me and said, “You two are friends now?” PRAISE THE LORD!