Exploring and Experiencing the rest of the World. (26.08.08)
Since leaving South Africa on the 30th of July we have visited Switzerland, Scotland, London and are now in Vancouver. We have visited family and friends in most of the countries we have visited which has made the trip very special. We are looking forward to a couple of weeks relaxing in Canada before heading on to Japan, China and Singapore. We are both well and are looking forward to seeing everyone back in Australia when we return to Perth on the 18th of September. So we will see you all soon and Thank You once again for all the support and love you have offered us during our travels.
It has been my pleasure to share our journey with you all. Thank you for sharing Africa with us.
If you would like to contact us directly please feel free to do so via our e-mail detalis in the Contact Us section of this website.
Andrew
Reflections on our Final Day (07.07.08)
Today is the final day of the Volunteering segment of our trip. Am sitting in the warm Lesotho sun which is a good thing because it is very cold out there, about 2C at the moment. In about 4 hours time my parents, little brother Malcolm and his girlfriend Megan will arrive at the Lesotho border. They flew into Jo'Burg on Friday and will be seeing a little bit of Lesotho and QwaQwa with us before taking us back.
I sit here with mixed emotions. I'm not really sure which ones I'm feeling at the moment but I know that there is no sadness, no regret or fear. I am happy for the gift of time and ability to undertake what we have and so very grateful for the support we have received from family, friends and strangers along the way. In the next couple of days we will reflect on the last six months and share our feelings and observations with.
At the moment we are comfortable that it is time to go, we have enjoyed this experience so much and learned a great deal about ourselves and the world we live in. For this we will be forever thankful. So thank you for sharing this journey with us, your company has meant a lot to us. I hope you have enjoyed the journey. I don't know about the rest of you but we are ready for a holiday. So bye for now but please feel free to continue to contact us via e-mail. (jodandrew@gmail.com)
Less than one Month remaining. (13.06.08)
As the volunteering component of our trip begins to draw to a close it is hard to describe what we feel. There is a sense of sadness that we will soon be saying goodbye to the friends we have made and the children that we have loved and worked with for the past few months. There is also a building sense of anticipation about the coming holiday component of our trip, of seeing and experiencing new things and new countries. I think we are both at peace with what has happened and what we have achieved in the past six months. We are probably in need of and ready for a change of pace.
The volunteering has been a wonderful, fulfilling experience that we will never forget and have learned a great deal from. It has been an eye opening, confronting, loving and ultimately precious time. We have felt every emotion, seen both horror and beauty, experienced so much love and so much pain. Personally this trip has probably posed more questions than answers for us and our understanding of this world, however, the answers we have found have been priceless and will continue to shape and influence our lives for many years to come. We are looking forward to the round-the-world trip, seeing family and friends all over the world and the eventual recovery time back in Perth from late September till our next adventure begins.
New Photo's in Slideshow Section. (18.05.08)
I have uploaded some new photo's for the Slideshow, so take a quick look at what we have been up to in the past few weeks.
There is also a new story or two in the Picture News section.
Some new ways of contacting us in the Contact Us section and plenty of new Thank You's in the Thank You section.
So enjoy and hope to talk to you all soon....
(Not sure how to talk to us?... see the Contact Us section for all the different ways to say Lumela (Hello in Sesotho).
A look around our new home. (10.05.08)
I've just finished making a short presentation for Beautiful Gate. It is mainly designed to thank all of the people and organisations that have donated towards the recent building projects. Ray, the director, is just about to head to America for a few months to meet with many of the churches and individuals who have financed the building you will see in the presentation. It will also give you a good look at where we are working and some of the beautiful children and people we are working with.
Click here to go to the video page.
The Joy of the Children (30.04.08)
I couldn't resist sharing this photo with you. It sums up, better than words ever could, what an absolute privilege and joy it is to work with these children. These children need love more than anything else in life and to be numbered amongst the lucky few who are here providing that love is something that we treasure and thank everyone of you back in Australia who have made this experience a reality.
January - April 2008
Changing Tomorrow Children's Foundation
It was my task to develop a short promotional video for Changing Tomorrow Children's Foundation. This task became a bit rushed when we decided to leave for Lesotho a few days earlier than planned, however a couple of late nights and early mornings saw the task completed.
I hope you enjoy the finished product.
Watch the Changing Tomorrow Children's Foundation Video
Sliding down a Mountain Stream.
A short video to share some of the fun of our African Experience. We love the mountains and enjoy exploring them when we have the chance. We found a nearby stream that we couldn't resist sliding down. Lots of fun and laughs. Please share them with us. Enjoy.
Watch the Video
Next Destination.... Lesotho. (03.04.08)
After meeting with the beautiful people at Beautiful Gate Ministries (no pun intended), we have decided to join their beautiful team (ok, that one was on purpose). Within a couple of hours of meeting Ray and his staff we had already decided to join, and already been accepted into, their organisation (more like a large multicultral family; A few South Africans, a few Australians, a couple of Canadians, and lots of local Besotho).
Ray, an ex-military pilot from Zimbabwe, and his wife Sue have developed Beautiful Gate Ministries Lesotho into an amazing place. B'Gate (takes to long to write it out in full; still shorter than Changing Tomorrow Children's Foundation, though) have recently purchased, developed and now just moved into their own property and it is wonderfully designed and run. The property consist of 3 large babies houses; complete with sleeping areas, playing areas, bathrooms and carers quarters that can accommodate up to 20 babies each. There is alos a clinic building, administration, preschool and church on the premises. The children that come into the center have either been abandoned, orphaned and/or are HIV+. The aim of B'Gate is to care for and love these babies back to good health and then find families either in the local community or abroad that wish to adopt them.
We were very moved and challenged by our visit to B'Gate and feel that we have a definite and positive role to play as part of their team. We look forward with mixed emotions to this new opportunity and feel it is a positive step forward even though it will be very sad to leave the children of Leratong Village and our friends at CTCF behind they will always occupy a special place in our heart.
We will be moving to Maseru, the capital of Lesotho, to work with Beautiful Gate from the 15th of April. We will spend the next ten days finishing our work with CTCF and playing with these beautiful kids that we have come to know so well over the past few months as much as possible.
New Photo's in SlideShow. (29.03.08)
We are down in Harrismith for the night so I've taken the opportunity to use a faster internet connection and upload a some new photos. Enjoy.
Go to Slideshow
Lesotho Trip planned. (21.03.08)
Picture: Watching a sea of clouds roll in and break against the mountain. The beauty of this place is beyond description and pictures, it has to be seen to be believed....and even then it is unbelievable.
We have planned a trip into Lesotho at the end of this month to meet with the director of Beautiful Gate Ministries. We hope to learn about the work that his organisation does in Maseru, the Lesotho capital, and see if there are any opportunities for us to work with them. We are excited about the prospect of getting away for a few days break and seeing a bit more of South Africa and Lesotho.
Lesotho is a very exciting place. It is known as 'The Roof of Africa' and is a small mountainous Kingdom completely landlocked by South Africa. The entire country is above 2000m in elevation, a statistic that not even Tibet, Nepal or Switzerland can match. It is also one of the poorest nations, has one of the lowest life expectancies and one of the highest HIV rates in the world. Over a quarter of all the children in the country are orphans, so the need is great.
Jodanne and I are both excited at the prospect of working with and learning from a new organisation and new people. We are beginning to feel that we have completed all that we need to and have learnt what can with Changing Tomorrow Children's Foundation. It has been a wonderful time and we are looking forward to the last few weeks with Chris and Mary and the children of Leratong Village, however we can feel momentum building and carrying us forward towards new challenges and opportunities; either in Lesotho or Kenya.
Decided to change things again. (13.03.08)
I just can't seem to sit still at the moment so decided to restructure the website again. It turns out that I may have been too quick to judge our internet connection; seems to have no problem accessing and updating the website so will revert back to our previous form of updating with pictures and stories. Will also keep the 'blog' alive though because this is a nice way to communicate with everyone and easy and simple for those quick 'Hello' or 'Guess what I did today...' type updates. The 'Picture News' as the name suggests will feature the latest news with some corroborating pictures. Otherwise all will remain the same except for everything I might decided to change tomorrow....just taking it one day at a time at the moment.
New 'Blog' page (04.03.08)
Our super slow internet connection on top of the mountain restricts us to only small updates and e-mails, so the easiest way to keep in touch is for us to keep updating a Blog (See the Blog page) and this saves us doing the more bandwidth intensive updates and messages....like this one. However from time to time I'm able to get a connection that allows me to do more so hopefully we can still upload photo's etc. Please feel free to comment on our comments in the blog and let us know what is happening in your lives as well.
Picture: Jodanne waiting her turn to use the natural spring near the village to do some washing. We were actually there first but bulls don't understand the concept of waiting in line.
Lots on new photo's in the Pictures section so take a look.
(And feel free to leave a comment in the Messages section if you like what you see... or if you have any photo requests, i.e. Jodanne carrying a water bucket on her head.)
Moving into the village. (21.02.08)
From the end of next week we will be living in the Care Center 24/7. This is exciting for us as we will be able to have a much greater interaction with the local community, much more access and time to teach and play with the children and really be getting down to the real work that we want to do here. It has been wonderful and very, very comfortable living in Harrismith, however commuting back and forth to the village (over two hours of driving per day) really cuts down on our time teaching and working with the villages. So we will be without a lot of mod cons such as running water, reliable electricity and fast internet but I'm sure we will survive and be better for the experience. In truth we are really, really looking forward to the new challenges and opportunities this will present.
Change of Plans - Kenya Trip Postponed (Jan 2008)
We have decided that at the moment we can best serve by continuing to work in QwaQwa, in South Africa, instead of heading to Nakuru, in Kenya. The situation in Kenya is still extremely volatile especially in the Rift Valley region around Nakuru where sadly dozens of people were killed as recently as last night. Our prays and thoughts are with the East African Mission Orphanage who are in the middle of this turmoil. Our decision was a difficult one to make because the need in Kenya is greater than ever however out of consideration for our loved ones who would worry themselves sick and out of love for the people we are working with at the moment we couldn't bring ourselves to leave QwaQwa just yet. We are planning on staying in South Africa for at least another two months and work intensively with a couple of the schools in this region.
We are excited about what the next two months will hold but are also saddened by the problems in Kenya, previously one of Africa's most exciting and stable nations, now slipping more and more into civil war and ethnic cleansing. It is unnerving and deeply depressing to see neighbours turn on each other because of something as unavoidable and unchosen as ethnicity. Why can't we all just get along?
Anyway, the situation in QwaQwa is a little bit more pleasing but we are still faced with daily reminders of how difficult life can be and how fortunate we are. Jodanne and I are both well and enjoying this experience immensely, it continues to be a steep and challenging learning curve beyond our expectations.
I have never felt so torn in so many different directions; the need is so great, our ability to help so limited, our hearts so fragile, our minds so very full.
(Picture courtesy of BBC news, the caption sadly reads "The town of Nakuru has seen some of the worst violence").
We are in South Africa. (Jan 2008)
We are currently in South Africa and working with Changing Tomorrow Children's Foundation. We are both very excited to be here again and it is wonderful to see how much the Care Center has grown and how big some of the kids are getting. For the latest news check the 'Latest News' link. We have also uploaded some new photos so take a look.
Sorry for the update delays. (Jan 2008)
I have had some issues convincing my laptop to talk to this website but seem to have now solved the problem so I hope to update this site weekly from now on. Thank you for your ongoing love and support.... and your patience.
Next Trip Planned (July 2007)
We will be travelling to South Africa on the 2nd of January 2008. We will spend a few weeks working with Changing Tomorrow Childrens Foundation, in Qwa Qwa. We look forward to visiting the kids again and seeing the progress being made. We will then fly up to Kenya to begin work with East African Mission Orphange, in Nakuru, Kenya. We will initially be staying at the Orphange for six months before returning to Australia for a friends wedding and a bit of a break. We hope to then return to Kenya for a longer stay of a couple of years.
8 December '06 till 22 January '07
We travelled to South Africa to provide assistance to local charities and discover for ourselves the depth of Africa's social and economic problems. The trip allowed us to provide direct financial support to selected charities. We witnessed firsthand their invaluable work in some of South Africa's poorest townships.
Working with 'Changing Tomorrow Childrens Foundation' to help establish their Care Center in Qwa Qwa, South Africa.