Keys, Keys, and more Keys!

 Every day is a step closer to feeling more at home. We already LOVE it here. We are feeling: blessed, called, loved and very welcomed.

 

 The last days have been filled with unpacking, unpacking, and more unpacking, but we are making good headway and have had so many wonderful helpers!  The house we are living in is a real gift from God. 3 bedrooms, a big kitchen, a dinning room and a beautiful veranda with an amazing view. We feel so blessed.

 In the midst of unpacking, setting up a bank count, and finding a car, the there are the ongoing online meetings, and staying on top of our roles which is the reason we are now based in Africa. Take a look at the amazing view God has blessed us when we have meetings out on our new veranda.

 Something I didn't quite anticipate in my role as Africa Regional Director is dealing with country crisis. These past weeks I have been very involved with the evacuation of our TeachBeyond members in Ethiopia. Getting members to evacuated from a place they love and feel called to serve is not easy. Many experience anxiety, fear, anger and "leaver's guilt. My leadership role is to guide to them, listen and make  recommendations that we feel wisest for everyone. I do not do this alone, TeachBeyond has a capable crisis teams who helps advise me with these decisions. 

 

                                                                        One of the silver lining in this is that our Ethiopia Team Lead, Lindsey, decided to spend a couple of weeks in South Africa where she has been a blessing to us all here! 

 Yesterday Lindsey helped us celebrate Thanksgiving in our new home! We invited our TeachBeyond team and our neighbors, which I will introduce you to some other time, because that is a another story to tell.

Keys, keys and more keys......Something totally new for us here in South Africa is the whole emphasis on safety and security. It is somewhat overwhelming!!  We have never had so many keys to lock up rooms, doors, gates, basically everything that you could put a lock on, you do. There is no rushing out the door. We basically have to plan 15 minutes to lock everything up before going anywhere. Crazy!

I have been receiving messages from some of you wondering how the new  variant restrictions on South Africa will affect us. The way it might affect us personally is that this could mean that our kids , who have already booked tickets to come spend Christmas in South Africa, might not be able to do so.  This of course make my Mama and Mimi heart very sad.  Who would not want to see the cutest grand baby ever!

 

My more reasonable side, just says: "stay safe", but remember the virus was discovered here because of good scientific research, not because S.A is the "hot spot" of it.

We definitely live close to nature here. Despite all the locking up, we seem to have uninvited guests  show up. ( Duchess, our neighbors dog that used to live in our house, obviously still feels at home here, and Mr. Giant Centipede, he just wandered in :)

We received a most practical housewarming gift, by our TeachBeyond team here; an electric mosquito zappers that we fortunately have not yet had to use in our little" into Africa" house by the Harties lake.