Sunday, November 16, 2008

Tim Arrived in Berberati

Hello from the second largest city in the CAR. I arrived yesterday evening to the ICDI compound in Berberti. I cannot tell you how nice it was to see a house with a bed and a toilet!!! Electricity is a nice improvement as well. The generator gets shut off but a least I know when.

Saturday morning we left Pama, Tom and Rick headed for Bangui and I along with my driver, Gerrard, and Tekundo, who is ICDI's agricultural trainer, headed for Berberti. It was an all day trip covering some of CAR's finest roads. The added challenge for me was my fellow travelers did not speak English. This made for a quiet trip. Tekundo spoke limited English to match my limited Sango but he rode on the back of the truck because there was only room for two in the cab.

I did have one interesting situation sitting at a check point while Gerrard went to get some food. A military guy started speaking to me and I obviously did not understand him so he called another guy over who could speak some English. He asked me questions that did not make much sense but I answered no each time and then that satisfied them and they left me alone. I figured playing dumb was my best option which isn't too hard (laugh). I will try to get caught up on emails and pictures now that I have Internet.

Today I went to church with the Hockings and Doug Murtoff. We went to church with one of Jim Hocking (ICDI executive director)'s employees so it was different than previous experiences but good. Tomorrow I start training some ICDI guys about equipment . Talk to you soon. Keep praying.

Tim

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