SOME THINGS ARE CULTURE and SOME ARE COMPLETE ACCIDENTS!

The other day I’m in language class and my teacher is introducing me to some new verbs. We get to the verb, “saltaade”, which means “to refuse”. My teacher says the word, and then I look it up in my dictionary, and say, “to refuse”. My teacher then repeats what I said and flaps one of his arms like a chicken. I’ve never seen that before so I try my hardest to figure out what it means. My teacher would make the motion and then say “to refuse,” then do it again and say “saltaade”. He did that like twice and in the middle of one of the times, he turned his head to the side and blew a snot rocket (snot rocket - to blow your nose without a tissue). In my mind I just thought that blowing a snot rocket was another African way of saying, “I don’t want it” I’d never seen the flapping one arm thingy so I didn’t think the snot rocket would be that different. Anyways, I figured out what I wanted and we went on forward to some more verbs, or should I say “dandols”. About 30 minutes later my teacher blew another snot rocket and thinking about his earlier lesson I said, “saltaade”. My teacher then says “I’m sorry” and gets up and walks about 10 ft away while continuing to blow his nose. Now I can tell he thinks that I don’t like it when he does that. If you know me, then you know that blowing a snot rocket does not bother me at all. It’s actually on my top ten list of things to do when I’m board.
Some people say you learn something new every day, and I’m also finding out that you learn something wrong every day. So….yeah, if you’re ever coming to West Africa, remember, blowing a snot rocket doesn’t mean that you refuse, it just means that you got buggers in your nose!
Quick side note, my teacher’s best friend, just became a believer. So over the next few months he will be in close contact with two Christians. Pray not only for the witness of the new believer, but for the witness that I will be on my teacher.

KNOWING THE TRUTH

One thing that’s hard to believe is that I’ve been living in Africa for 2 months. If I ever wonder if it’s true, all I have to do is take a look out my window and … I’m in Africa!! Almost every time I’m watching a movie, right in the middle of it I will hear the call to prayer, a donkey braying, or any other random African noises and I tell myself, “Oh yeah, I’m in Africa!!”
I want to give you an update on my friend Bob, and thank you for your prayers for him. He is just one of the many over here that are blind to the truth. If you haven’t been keeping up with my blogs, I gave him a bible about 3 weeks ago. I try to hang out with this family at least once a week and the last time I was there Bob told me, “I read the whole bible and I didn’t see where it says that God is three.” My response was, “OK, that’s fine, so do you believe that the bible is true?” …. “Yes” … “So do you believe what is says about Jesus is true?”…. “What???”… “Do you believe that all those miracles? Do you believe Jesus died on the cross and came back to life three days later?” By his response and the look on his face I don’t think he ever read the Bible, but I don’t go there. We talked a little more about some of the miracles that Jesus did, and then he asked me, “Who killed Jesus?” Bob has asked me some good questions so I know he is searching for the truth, but it also seems that he wants to stay where he is.
We all know that you can’t change the truth. Some people here flat out reject it. Some of the people know the truth, but don’t want to believe because it means that they will have to change. Some people, like my friend Bob, have the truth within their reach but can’t take that first step and take hold of it. Sadly, there are many people here in Senegal that have never and might never get the chance to hear the truth. Pray for the truth and pray that the word of God and the word alone will convict these people. Pray that I remember that my job is not to make them believe; my only job is to present the truth and leave the rest up to Holy Spirit. Pray that the Fulakunda, West Africa, and the world will quit hiding from truth. Like I said earlier, you can’t hide from the truth for too long!
Hey, if you haven’t gone to www.gowestafrica.org you need to. You can find info on the Fulakunda, or about the many other people groups in West Africa. April 4th and 5th, there will be a big convention in South Carolina that tries to connect the many people in America with the many opportunities to serve the Lord over here in West Africa. Many times missions start because of events like this. Please keep it in your prayers.

The Language of PULAR

As I’m spending my time here in Kolda my biggest prayer request is still my language. There’s a parable here in West Africa that “Slowly, Slowly, you catch a monkey in the bush.” When I say it they seem to get a big kick out of it. I hope they’re laughing at the parable and not at me, but it wouldn’t be the first time. And that’s just what is happening…I’m slowly getting this language. Now that I’m here I have been told that Pulaar is probably the toughest language of West Africa , so yeah, I do mean slowly. There’s only one way to eat an elephant, one bite at a time!!!!! I really do appreciate the prayers for my language and I thought that I would spend this time and just tell you some cool things about this language that make it so “fun” to learn.
NOUNS: A lot of times the singular and plural words are completely different. For example, Man – gorko Men – worbe
ARTICLES: If you look up the translation for the word “the” in the Pulaar-English dictionary you won’t find one – not because they don’t have a word for it, but because they have 23!!!!! Each noun has its own article and you basically have to just remember the article along with the word. And yes, it’s different for singular and plural nouns.
VERBS: In Pulaar, verbs aren’t necessarily conjugated for the subject. Instead, it depends more on when the action occurred. To conjugate, you get the stem of the verb and if it is present tense you add –ii; if it is present negative you add –aani. There is also a past tense and 2 future tenses that both have different negative forms (One of the future tenses is for when you know what will happen and the other is for when you aren’t sure what will happen).
MULTIPLE MEANINGS: There are a lot words in this language that are hard to translate and/or have two meanings. You just have to know the context of what they’re talking about. For example to read and to learn are the same word in Pulaar. Another example is the word Nande which means to hear and/ or understand (because many people in Africa can understand a language but they can’t speak it). The word that I gave you earlier, gorko¸ doesn’t just mean man it also can mean husband if it has a possessor after the word. One of my favorite things about this language is the many words for wash. There’s a different word for washing clothes, washing yourself, washing your hands, and washing your feet. I don’t know why, but I think that’s awesome!!!
As I said before I don’t expect to learn this language over night and I plan to still be taking language classes 6 months from now! As you can see, I almost have to totally re-wire my brain to be able to get this language. So please continue to pray for my language learning. Pray for my teacher. As I start learning more language I will start to bring out my Pulaar New Testament and translating them and using the bible as my lesson plan for learning Pulaar. That’s perty deep…lesson plans of life…I can go on for hours. I will not only share with my teacher but please pray that I will be able to “practice” these stories on my friends and eventually for the many villages and people that I will visit.

GOOD NEWS - BAD NEWS!

I’ll start off with the bad news first cause if I don’t, it kinda ruins my point.
Bad News: There is only one Cyber Café in Kolda that has wireless Internet where I’m able to connect with my computer. I go there every ten days or so to send my blog and/or receive other documents that I need. Well, a few days ago I went there to spend a good 2 hours, but I got there and the place was under construction. It’s all good though, I’ve been getting by. I’ve been using my thumb drive a lot and I’ve been using these “frenchy keyboards.” I just have to remember where to click and/or guess the French word that looks close to the American word that I want.
Good News: Yesterday I got a bill from the phone company!!!!!! I couldn’t read it because it was all in French, but I called one of my colleges in the capital city and he is going to try and get it all figured out. I don’t know what it all means but I know that I’m one step closer to getting Internet in my house. I think the next step will be the actual installation of the phone line. Please pray that this whole process will go smoothly and that I will soon get Internet at my place. I’ve really been itch’n to get on the Internet and not have a time limit. And if Africa isn’t cooperating, which is probably most likely going to happen, pray for my patience and my time at the Cyber Café.

How Do You Handle a Hungry Journeyman?

I wanted to share these pictures with you. What happens when you get a hungry journeyman, a can of ravioli, and no can opener?

It took me about 5 minutes to get this can open and as I looked at the can I thought to myself, “If I spent this much energy getting the can open, I’m going all out!!!” And then I turned the stove on and placed the can on top.

That was some of the best ravioli I have ever had. Except for yours, Mom ;)

And if you’re wondering, I have a can opener now!

I'M ALMOST THREE YEARS OLD NOW!!

I have lived here in Kolda a little over six weeks now and I was thinking of all the things that I have learned. I have found a lot of new friends that are teaching me a things, but as you can tell by the title, I still have a lot that I need to learn. Everything that I’m learning can fit into two categories; language or culture. I was told when I first arrived that my only job here in Kolda for now is to learn the culture and the language.
When thinking about culture, the first thing that comes to mind is this whole thing about which hand to use. I can think of many times where someone hands me something and I reach out with my left hand to grab it and I realize what I’m doing and switch hands. When that happens, I always get that little half smile; don’t know what it means but at least they aren’t yelling at me!! There are also many things about the culture that I don’t understand but that I have to remember out of respect. My favorite was the other day - after sitting a while I was stretching and I left my hands to rest on top of my head. My friend calls out my name, puts his hands on his head and says “Moit yannie” (translation: not good). In this culture there are somethings that I know I won’t be able to understand completely but I just have to remember what I can and can’t do.
As I knew before I got here my biggest struggle is the language. I knew it would be hard, but I had no idea that it would be this hard! A lot of people speak some English. I love it when a random African sees me and they say the one thing they know in English, “Good Morning”, and its 3:00 in the afternoon!!! A small percentage of people speak enough English that I’m able to understand it, so right now when I communicate it consists of a lot of facial expressions and movements of the hands. My biggest prayer request right now is my language. Every night when I go to bed I’m exhausted, not from the sun, not from walking or playing soccer, but from my brain working so hard trying to communicate. I wish y’all could see my language classes. My teacher, Lamin, knows very little English and I know very little Pulaar. It’s a 2 hour class and I have to take a break after class just so I can continue with the day. To tell the truth I don’t know how we still like each other after class. Both of us get pretty frustrated when we still don’t get each other after trying to explain something for 14th time. Most of the time it doesn’t click until I’m able to talk to one my friends that speak English later that day or week. The Sheriff and Patrick have both been super big helps and I would probably still be a 2 year old without them. I keep telling myself that I just need to be patient and over time it will get easier and easier. I can’t wait for the day that I will be able to communicate with these people. Oh, I pray that day will come soon!!!

Erik Pieniazek
BP 352
Kolda, Senegal

Here is my address. I know that a lot of ya’ll have been asking for it, so I thought that I would finally give it to you. I will get the mail if you send it to this address. Let me also give ya’ll some guidelines if you want to send something. It takes over a month for it to arrive. My team members have never had problems, but the African mail carriers are well known for opening mail and taking something if they want it. If I get a box in the mail, I will have to pay customs on it. Don’t let that stop you, but if you’re able to fit things in one of those padded envelopes then I don’t have to pay customs and envelopes don’t get opened and checked and all that good stuff. One thing that you can send me is pictures. Africans love pictures and I really didn’t bring as much as I would have liked. It doesn’t matter what the picture are of; pictures of your dog, pictures of us together, baby pictures, or just a pictures of the great state of Texas, the locals will still love them and it will be a great way to practice my language and build relationships. I, as of now, don’t need anything that won’t fit into an envelope. Please contact me if you want to send anything bigger than an envelope because there might be an easier way of me getting it to me. Teams come from the US throughout the year. Don’t hesitate if you do want to send something, have anyone questions. We all know that everybody loves mail! I would love to hear more about what’s going on in your life and how I can be praying for you.