Wait Til It's Painted!

Slow internet, plus no electricity, plus a very low battery equals:  a very short blog post! I took this photo while we were in Kenya. There were construction projects everywhere, each surrounded by these corrugated tin fences and I thought it was hilarious! I couldn't capture the entire thing from a moving taxi with my camera, but it says "It doesn't look like much now, but wait til it's painted!" 

That's how we feel about our new home. There is not one square corner. Emily's room is a full foot shorter on one end than the other. We are working on plumbing and wiring and window latches and light fixtures. Every single room was yellow, and most had water damage on the walls. 

But, I am very please to have my bedroom almost completely finished! We've painted, and hung curtains. I just need to scrub the door and scrape up my paint splatters. This room is bigger than our old one so I think I will try to find a pot and get a plant.

The color is supposed to be grey with a hint of blue, but over the yellow paint it dried kind of a green-grey but I like it. 

I love my crooked house!

I'm getting the yellow warning that my battery is about to die. Yikes, I still have so much to talk about!  It will have to wait. I did write an article for the MAF blog that will be posted next week so I'll let y'all know when that's up. 

Our Sentinels

Jacques with our boys

As a security measure, we have two sentinels who alternate 24 hour shifts. Jacques and Leopold have been with us since we arrived here two years ago and I affectionately refer to them as "my guys." In addition to keeping watch over the house, sentinels also answer the gate, run errands to purchase items or pay bills for us, do the yard work, help David work on the house and car, do cleaning, etc. They are a lot of help to me and I sure don't take them for granted. In this culture, the job of sentinel is a low paying, low status job because it does not require an education or special skills. Unfortunately, many people treat their sentinels badly. In our culture, if your boss screamed in your face or berated you in front of others, you would not stand for it. You’d go over his/her head and demand justice, or you would find another job. Here, jobs are scarce and there are few options. MAF families and other missionary families tend to pay above the average for our sentinels, and we have a reputation for being desirable employers. 

Jaques and Josh in front of the old house

Jacques is originally from the village of Semendua. I asked him once how far Semendua is from Kinshasa and he said not long at all by MAF plane but several days by boat. He is married and has five children ranging from 18 years of age to 1 ½ years. His youngest was born several months after our arrival and is named David, after my husband. Depending on the village you hail from, naming your child after someone can signify one of two things: either you are supposed to give a gift to that person and ask them to pray a blessing over your baby, or you expect that person to be a type of “godparent,” a life long benefactor for your child. It is also common practice to name a baby after someone or something significant in your life at the time of your baby’s birth. 

Leopold with two of his sons, Eric and Christian.

Leopold is from Kinshasa. He is also married and has five children, all of them boys. The youngest was born about six weeks after we first arrived here, and is also named David. Leopold is a unique sentinel because he has a trade. He is a mason and does concrete work, lays tiles, etc. Leopold took a sentinel job because he was not finding enough work as a mason to support his family and still does mason work on the side, including some jobs for MAF. He made the foundation for our water reservoir, repaired the wall for one family when a tree fell on it, and built our IT building.  

This week, Leopold’s wife fell from a porch and broke both bones in her forearm. Leopold took her to a hospital and was told that the doctors would not examine her until he paid $150 cash up front. To put that in perspective, many people don’t earn that much in a month or even two months, a pound of ground beef here costs over $5, and the average family here does not have a checking or savings account because they live payday to payday. Leopold moved her to another hospital that only demanded $70 and then came to us for help. He came by again the next night and showed us the x-rays. The doctors had only just seen them, because the power was out the day before at the hospital. So it was over 24 hours before x-rays were even available for her, and 48 hours before she finally had her arm set and in a cast. All Leopold could do during that waiting period was pay for an IV drip with pain medication. She is home and doing better now, but please keep Suzanne in your prayers as she recuperates and tries to work and care for her family. 

Unknown Variables

source: www.openclipart.org

People here joke about "the Congo factor" or the "Congo variable (an ever changing factor or set of factors)." When you have a project to complete in the states, you determine what supplies you need, the amount it should cost, the amount of time it ought to take to complete, and then you get to work. Adding in the Congo variable, means that you probably won't be able to find all the supplies you need, you are likely to discover after you've begun your project that there is more work to be done than previously thought and more supplies are needed, the parts you purchased are of a quality that renders them likely to break during or shortly after installation, and the entire project from start to finish is likely to take MUCH longer than originally estimated. We've done a fair share of dealing with Congo variables this week.

Variable 1: cheapo parts. A lot of new plumbing has been installed in the last couple of weeks. We also spent the better part of our first two days in our new home fixing leaks in the new plumbing and mopping floors. High quality parts and fixtures are impossible to come by here. We still have some leaks to deal with but not as many.

Variable 2: humid climate. Some walls in the house were damaged by water due to leaky plumbing but the climate here is also hard on things. A good deal of the paint was bubbled up and falling off the walls so we have been scraping, spackling, and sanding.

Variable 3: Just because it fits, doesn't mean it belongs there. As I lay in bed our first night in the new house, I heard numerous loud noises like something popping or snapping. Most of the noise was coming from directly over our bed, which did NOT help me relax and fall asleep. The next day we discovered the source. The landlord had replaced several light bulbs and added covers to the fixtures. The bulbs fit the sockets and the covers fit over the bulbs, but obviously they weren't meant to go together. The plastic fixtures were melting from the heat of the light bulbs, and making loud noises as they cooled after we turned off the lights. This is the one above our bed, and the light bulb has burned its
 way through the plastic.

This one from the hall is my favorite! That thing you see hanging down is not a spider web but melted plastic about to fall. Light fixtures are coming down ASAP.

Variable 4: Just because it's new, doesn't guarantee it will work. We finally got our new water pump installed. It did not work. The inside parts were messed up, so even though it is nice looking on the outside, the pump can't fulfill its purpose, and actually caused a good deal of wasted time and frustration. I guess people are the same way. What others see on the outside may look really attractive and "together" but sometimes we are a mess on the inside. Instead of fulfilling our purpose to minister to and love people, we become a negative variable in the lives of others. "People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." (1 Sam 16:7b)

We had a friend help us yesterday with a temporary fix, allowing us to borrow a pump from him so that we could get water into the house. Last night I enjoyed my first hot shower in a week, and it was superb! This past Wednesday marked our two year "Congoversary." Someone remarked that we've been here two years and lived in two houses. I like this house, but it's going to take a long time and a lot of work to get it in good shape, so that is a trend I really don't have a desire to continue, thank you very much!

One last little note. A friend recently sent me this link to Jon Bloom's blog post "Don't Give Up."  If you are dealing with lots of variables lately, I think you'll find it as encouraging as I did.

Life in a Construction Zone

I am writing this in our new home! Our friends who so graciously loaned us their home while we worked on ours returned yesterday, so we had to move our family. Since our house still needs a lot of work, we were given the option of moving to another temporary residence, but the entire family was tired of the moving and just wanted to be in our place, even if it meant living in a construction zone. So last night we spent our first night here. I thought I would post some "before" photos, and then later once we've made this place more homey, some "after" photos.

This is the back porch, off the kitchen and dining area.

Living room. As you can see, I have lots of curtains to sew. The awnings are nice because they help keep out some of the heat from the sun.

Dining area. We can't eat in it yet, but that's ok because I can't find my forks anyway.

This house has a lot of bathrooms. Nearly every fixture has to be repaired or replaced. This one is waiting for a new shower but the sink and toilet are finished.

Kitchen. I am very happy to be able to reach my cabinets! The guys hung them the way all cabinets should be hung, with the height of the person who will actually be using them in mind. It's so cool beans! No more dragging a stool all over the kitchen. Well, okay, I need a stool for the top shelves. To give you some perspective, David is taller than our refrigerator.
Our priorities are so obvious in this photo. I can't find pots and pans or silverware, but I know exactly where the Cokes and the coffee maker are. Now to get an outlet for that coffee maker.....

One of the kids' rooms. Both of their rooms are just waiting for paint and curtains.

Master bedroom. Also waiting for paint. All that wire is going to become our back up light source for when the power is out: solar panels will charge a battery pack and the batteries will provide power for the lights. The batteries are already running our internet antenna!

This will eventually be the office/sewing room/storage room. We no longer have a garage to store stuff or work in so for now it is where the guys are keeping their tools and supplies they need to fix the house.

This may not look like much, but it's beautiful to me! This is a new concrete foundation that will hold our water tower and reservoirs!

We have a lot that we are thankful for. We are in our own place, sleeping in our own beds. We had power and water last night. Good friends came yesterday and helped us clean our friend's home for her and another friend helped David get some work done on the new home.

There have been a lot of unforeseen obstacles causing our progress on the house to go slower than we anticipated. When I looked around yesterday at the broken, ruined things that need to be redone, I was reminded of Isaiah 58:11-12: "The Lord will guide you always; He will satisfy your needs in a sun scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations; You will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings." A lot of things are being rebuilt and restored in our home to make it not only functional, but a sanctuary and a source of blessing for our family and friends. I think it's a perfect picture of what God does in our hearts.

Moving Day: Take Two!

Coffeemaker (Photo credit: Daniel Panev)

Cool Beans! We have moved out of our old home. But! - We are not yet into our new home. We are sort of in limbo, staying in a friend's home, until the new one is repaired enough for us to move in. So for a short time, home is not where our furniture and other stuff is, but where our coffee pot is. We have to be out of this temporary home by Friday so I really, really, really hope we can go straight into the new home and not into another temporary one. It would be nice to be able to put things away, rotate our three day's worth of clothing out for something  different, have access to all of the school books, stay in one place, etc.

Matthew Lind securing our water tower.

One reason we can't settle in yet is because in Congo, home is where the water is. We do not yet have a fully functioning bathroom or a way to store reserve water for times when the city water is off.

Almost everyone has "moving day" photos, but in all the times I've moved, I have never moved a steel water tower like this one, along with two big water reservoirs. Once the tower, tanks, and water pump are installed at the new house, we will have a much better water situation. Right now we have to get a concrete footing made to hold that tower.

photo credit: Jocelyn Frey

Another unusual item we moved this time: the chicken. The cats are with us, but the chicken and the parrot are both already there and being taken care of by our guards for us. We transported her in a little box to keep her calm and our friend Jocelyn snapped a photo of her leaping out of the box at her new home. Yep, that's our new gate back there. And it's my favorite color! That's Emmanuel in the photo. He and several other members of our team helped us move all our stuff before the big deadline. We are so grateful for the friends God has given us here! Because of their help, everything was out of the old house within a few hours, using just vans and a pickup truck.

Do I miss the old house? Nope. It had some nice features but I brought all the best stuff with me: my family, the things that made our house feel like home, my pets and flowers, and my coffeemaker.