Back to "Slow-nectivity"

Hello everyone:

I am sitting at an Internet Cafe. The connection is bad. But the reason I am sitting here and not somewhere else where the connection would be faster, the room not hot and sticky, and the surroundings not as noisy is a different one altogether. But I am afraid I am not going there now because I don't have time and I probably wouldn't do justice to the complexity of the issues that resulted in a slight downgrade to the Internet Cafe next to the GBIM headquarters in Bangui.

Let me just say that I can't wait until tomorrow because I will be able to work from the ICDI office where the connectivity is a lot faster and smoother. I am not going to be able to upload pictures today. It would take me ages to do it here. But it's not like you haven't gotten a good share of them lately, right?

I have just come from a lovely dinner at the GBIM headquarters here. We ate some great tacos and enjoyed some good fellowship with the Brethren (Grace or not). We appreciate Heidi's tremendous hospitality in hosting us. It was a good taste of home!

I finished my classes today so it was a packed day. Needless to say, I feel completely spent now. As a matter of fact, I am aware of every movement with my typing and it's as if I could fall over the keyboard at any moment. We started rising early as usual. Pastor Tom preached at Chapel today and the students were very challenged to hear him challenge them about the meaning of the "fear of the Lord" in Joshua and Proverbs. He was his usual Central African self with lots of jokes in between lines. The students and faculty were having a good time.

At the end of my class this afternoon they had a ceremony in chapel with the faculty and the students. The President of the student body made a beautiful speech in which he thanked me for my teaching this week. Then I spoke some about how my church in Wooster is praying for the school here. I told them about the story I wrote on the blog and the responses from some of you. Then the dean spoke reminding the students that I was the first visiting professor to come to teach at the seminary in Bangui. He welcomed me back any time, and he thanked me and my family for releasing me to come. Next the dean's wife came forward with a gift. I opened it and it was a nice African type of suit that I had wanted to get. And she had eyed me perfectly as it was just the right fit. They then prayed for me and we said our good-byes.

The rest of the team continued work on the building today and they also made a couple of visits in the homes where orphans are living. As soon as they got there, they said that they were swarmed with people from everywhere. I haven't heard a full report from the team about this but Pastor Tom said that things went well.

Everybody is in good spirits. Beth is feeling better. We are all exhausted beyond measure. This was evident today as we sat for lunch and our normally talkative bunch dug the food in stoic silence for the longest time until someone remarked the fabled "either we are too hungry or too tired" aphorism. I think both were true this day. The days are getting long because we are more tired but they seem shorter because we still have so much to accomplish.

I haven't read all your comments here from yesterday. I started copying them but my connection was interrupted twice. I copy and paste them every night so the team can have them read to us during our team time every evening. What a tremendous source of encouragement your comments have been. We are humbled to be Christ's representatives here and we don't consider us to be anything special. We are just trying to be Jesus' hands and feet, as one of our team mates said today.

Thank you for your love that has been so obvious from your comments. Please, continue to pray for us fervently as we near the end of our time here.

Love from all to all,

Pastor Ivanildo C. Trindade
itrindade@woostergrace.org