Photos from Zimbabwe!

I've been sorting through my photos from our trip to Zimbabwe in April and here are a few I think you'll like!

 

These ones are of me with the orphans in Muzarabani. We help these children be able to go to school and I heard about all the things they do in school!

I was singing with the children in these photos. It's just as well you can't hear me singing because it was a bit noisy! The children are much better singers than I am.

Here I was sharing ice creams with Norma and Pastor Silent.

These two boys are Pastor Silent's two youngest sons. We had lots of fun together!

It was Easter while we were there and I found this little Easter bunny. I tried to talk to it but it didn't have much to say!

I met some children at the Easter Conference. They all wanted to hold me!

Here I am with Norma and two of the Pastor's wives, Joyce and Chipo.

Finally, this is me with the two senior Pastors, Simon and Silent.

 

I had a lot of fun on the trip! Would you like to see more photos? Norma has some she'll be showing on Sunday morning after the service and everyone is welcome to stay and see them! She's going to be talking to everyone about a trip from Link Church to Zimbabwe next year. I'm going!! I hope lots of other people from church go too as that would be so much fun!

Ice cream - my favourite!

We had a lovely outing the other day. We went to Borrowdale where there is a shopping centre which Iain, Norma and Angela like very much. I'm not sure why humans like shopping so much, but I was happy they took me because we got some ice cream!

Norma was very generous and shared her ice cream with me! Yummy!

 

Here is Pastor Silent. He visited us at the Link last September. I managed to sneak a lick of his ice cream when he wasn't looking...

 

We had some excitement the night before this because there was a HUGE thunderstorm! It set off the fire alarms twice! There is no hot water because of the power cuts so we are having to take cold showers. Brrrr!

 

Pastor Silent's wife has malaria and is very ill just now. Please pray for her!

 

 

Some photos from Mzarebani

Here I am with the children we help. We were able to speak to each one of the children we help to go to school and they have all drawn us pictures. They are very good pictures and we will show you when we get home!

I told you last time that there was no electricity in Mzarebani and that I didn't mind much, since I'm a sheep. Iain, Norma and Angela found it quite hard though, especially as there were times when no water came out of the taps too! But it's much harder for people who live there as the power lines have been down for months, and only the people who have machines called generators - which make electricity - can use anything that needs electricity. Can you imagine what that would be like? What would YOU miss if you didn't have electricity for months and months?

A Fun Weekend!

"I lift up my eyes to the mountains - where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the maker of Heaven and Earth."

Psalm 121: 1-2

 

We had a great weekend in Mzurabani! We met up with the orphans who get to go to school because of the money we send them. They sang us a song and then told us what they do at school. It was very interesting - some things are the same about going to school here, but some things are different too. We'll tell you more about it when we get home. Iain, Norma and Angela spoke at meetings for the church leaders and we went to the Sunday services too.

It was VERY hot - I had to take my scarf off! There was no electricity either but that didn't bother me so much because, of course, sheep don't use electricity.

We are back in Harare now and having a couple of days to put our feet up before it all gets busy again with the Easter Convention.

We arrived!

We arrived safe and well in Zimbabwe! Today we are going to Muzarabani where we will get to spend some time with the orphans we know. It'll be good to catch up and find out how they are getting on at school! Later we have a meeting with some church leaders and Iain, Norma and Angela will be talking to them. Tomorrow we will be going to church. Please keep praying for us!

A new adventure!

"We say with confidence, 'The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid.' Hebrews 13: 6

 

It's been a while since I went on an adventure, but I'm off on a new one today! I am on my way to Zimbabwe with Pastor Iain, Norma and Angela. I'm so excited!

We are going to stay the weekend in Muzarabani and Iain, Norma and Angela will be speaking to some leaders there and we'll be at the Sunday services. I'm most looking forward to meeting up with some of the orphans that get to go to school because we send them money to help with that. I can't wait to hear how they are getting on at school and some of the things they have learned!

After that we will go back to Harare for the Easter Convention. People come from lots of different places in Zimbabwe for that so it will be great to see so many people and make some new friends!

I'll be back to let you know what we're doing. Please pray for us!

Some photos from Tanzania...

Hello everyone! We're back from Tanzania now and I've just been sorting through all the photos. Here are some of my favourites!

Having a little look round outside in between the showers of rain

 

 You can see it had rained a LOT!

 

 And then it started to rain again...

 

 If you look hard you might spot the monkey outside...

 

 I loved watching everyone dancing at the conference

 

 In fact, I even joined in!

 

 Here are some of my friends, they enjoyed dancing too!

 

 Here's that centipede I told you about. He was HUGE! His feet are orange - mine are green..

 

 I was listening carefully while Pastor Iain was preaching.

 

 Just to show you I cleared my plate. While sheep prefer grass, I am a missionary sheep and so will try just about anything while I am away.

 

 Celebrating 75 years of the AOG in Tanzania

 

 I can't remember what was funny here, but we laughed a lot!!

 

 These children live at the orphanage we visited.

 

 This is where their water comes from.

 

 Angela gave them all balloons and sweeties

 

 They were very happy!

 

 We had lunch together too...

 

 Chilling with Iain and Norma in Zanzibar. This is the life!

 

Iain and Norma relaxing on the beach. The little boats in the background are called dhows.

This is the life!

We are now in Zanzibar having a couple of days to relax before we come home. Zanzibar is part of Tanzania but it is made up of islands. I like it here! We are staying in a lovely hotel and today I am writing my blog while I'm lying in a hammock beside the Indian Ocean which is a lovely turquoise shade.. Of course, Angela, Iain and Norma are relaxing too! They say thank you for praying. They had a great week last week and Angela and Norma (who weren't well) are both feeling better.

Moving on...

Yesterday was the last day of the Easter Convention - what a week we had! When we get back we will tell you about all the amazing things God has been doing.

We went to a friend's house for lunch after church yesterday. It was lots of fun because she has 14 children who live with her! They don't have mums or dads so it is really good they have someone to look after them and love them. Angela gave them all balloons and sweets so they were very happy! She took a photo of me with them too. We have lots of great photos and I will put some of them on my blog when we get back because I know you will like seeing them.

Today we are travelling again. We have a three hour car journey and a 2 hour sea crossing. I think I will catch up on some sleep during that journey so I can be ready for whatever is going to happen next!

Easter in Tanzania

We've had a really interesting Easter weekend here. When it was Good Friday a lot of the church donated blood to the blood transfusion service. That's what the people here like to do to remember how Jesus shed His blood on the cross for us.

Today we had a three hour celebration service because it is 75 years since the Assemblies of God came to Tanzania. It was great fun! There was lots of dancing and Norma did some great African dancing all around the church. I haven't seen her do that at church at home but I think it would be very good if she did. I joined in a bit too, I can throw a few shapes myself you know! The children sang for us too, that was lovely. They sang really well and everyone really enjoyed it.

My friend Angela hasn't been feeling too well the past few days. Please keep praying for her!

1...2...3... 99...100!!

We had a very busy day yesterday - Iain, Norma and Angela were speaking at four services, and the first one started at 7 am! We had to get up at 5 am and I could hardly get my eyes to open I was so tired! Imagine my surprise when I did finally wake up enough to look round the room and found we had a visitor! It was a HUGE centipede - Angela said it was at least 6 inches long and 1/2 inch wide (I checked on a ruler as I'm not very good with inches - that's about 15 cm long and 1 cm wide!!). I watched it for quite a long time because it was very interesting to see how it walked with 100 legs. I did try to count them to make sure that's how many it has but it didn't keep very still so I gave up.

It finally stopped raining. Norma and Angela said that was typical as they had just gone out and got some wellies! I didn't mind because there were no wellies small enough to fit me. I'm not sure if I would look very good in wellies anyway, even though it's not nice walking in mud all the time.

Monkeys!

Well, we finally got here at 2.30 am! What a journey we had but it was so good to arrive at last.. It was raining when we went to bed and still raining when we got up again. It almost felt like Scotland with all that rain! But we had a good sleep and a lovely breakfast. Of course, I had grass for breakfast, just like I always do, but it was still very tasty.

Eventually it stopped raining so we went outside for a walk round the grounds. It felt great to stretch our legs after all the time we spent on the aeroplane and in the car yesterday. And guess what! I saw some monkeys on the ground outside our rooms! I'm going outside to see if they want to play with me.. I'll write more later!

I'm in Tanzania!

We have just arrived in Tanzania. I am with Pastor Iain, Norma and Angela. As we are stuck in traffic I Dar es Salaam at the moment I thought I'd let you all know about our long and adventurous trip to get here!

Our flight from Dubai to Dar es Salaam was 3 hours late because another plane had skidded when it landed at Dar es Salaam airport. (I am very glad our plane didn't do that, it must have been scary!) We were diverted to Mombasa to refuel first. The first time our pilot tried to land at Dar es Salaam he had to abort because the fog was so bad, but he managed it ok the second time. We were very glad to finally be on the ground again!

But now we are stuck in traffic and it is raining so much the roads are flooded. We are all very tired and it will take at least another two hours to get to where we're going. We will all be glad to get there and find our beds!

Once I've had some beauty sleep I'll write more about what we are doing on this trip...

I'm home again!  What a trip.  I met so many people that I'm still a bit dizzy!  But now I have had a nice bath and a bit of a fluff-up, I am ready to tell you more about Pakistan.  Heather says "Sorry that the photos didn't load" when she tried to send them from Pakistan, but she is able to show you some now and I will tell you what is happening.

  Heather and I had a makeover done by some of the girls learning to be beauticians.  This is so that they can have a good job and earn their own money.  Mind you, they couldn't really improve me, I think I am meant to have untidy hair!  In the evening we went to a church meeting where there was a birthday cake for a very little boy that was bigger than him!

The next day I went to a new school in a very poor village where the families work so hard to make bricks all day,.  These children are now being given a chance to learn in English which may help them to get better jobs when they grow up.

I went to a lot of meetings, some in church buildings, and some in tents.  The biggest tent was a bit frightening as there were SO many people - Heather says there were more than 15000, but I lost count after 4 as I am only a small sheep and don't have as many fingers and toes as you have. In fact I only have four legs! But I was quite safe as Heather kept tight hold of me. 

There was one special little boy I was most impressed with.  He is a great drummer, but he was so little he had to stand on the platform while his drums were put on the floor below him so he could reach!

I will finish with a picture of the youngest person I met.  Next time I go, I expect this small person will be trying to take me home with them - that's what usually happens! But I make sure that I always come back to see all my friends at Link.  I take your love to all sorts of people all round the world, but I like to come home and bring their blessings back to you too.