Africans Helping Africans
The fan spins back toward
Jess’ bed. I lay awake on mine, sitting in the blissful silence. In a few hours
kids will flood the center, coming to the care point to get some soy enriched rice
before they go back to school. I think about the day to come. What does it
hold?
Right now we are without a
Kombi, completely dependent on public or the blessings of friends to even be
able to go shopping to get food and to get to internet. The next few weeks we
are supposed to be concentrating on going to two certain care points but really
we can’t do that until we get a new vehicle. In some ways this situation is
incredibly frustrating, in others it gives us a new understanding of what life
here is actually like…to a degree. The colour of our skin often prevents
us from experiencing life as a Swazi.
Most people don’t have
their own cars. Most don’t have friends that have their own cars. Yesterday we
took “public” to the Nsoko Spar to get food for the next week. Our friend Mac
spotted us and told us to come to his office after we were done with our
shopping so that he could give us a ride home. Mac is South African and his
family owns the Spar. On more than one occasion we’ve been invited to go
swimming at his family’s pool and on one particularly hot day we took him up on
his offer.
Mac got to Swaziland about
the same time we did. His cousin owns the Spar and he came to help him work in it.
Mac also has a heart for the community. He just finished clearing away a few
fields to plant sugar beans and maize in order to start a soup kitchen for
Nsoko. He has a meeting with Pastor Gift this week to talk about it. He also
just agreed for the Spar to sponsor the local soccer team that Bryan has been playing with.
Meeting Mac and getting to
know his heart for the community and people in general give us renewed hope
that things will change here. People will be fed. Christ’s love will abound.
It’s a beautiful thing:
Africans helping Africans.
Awesome! We’ll be praying you guys inspire him to love the people of Swazi the way you have grown to. Great news about sponsoring the soccer team!