It's still Africa...kinda

Just some random thoughts from the past week...

The power has been going out a lot lately, about every two or three days for about four hours at a time, we've been going through a lot of candles...not only is it really inconvenient but its also really bad for businesses all over the city who can't operate without power, its one of the many problems of the government and it makes you remember that you're still in Africa

Its been getting colder here the past couple of days, 50s and 60s during the day and down into the 40s at night, supposedly this is earlier than normal for it to be this cold, so I hope it warms up a little bit before I leave instead of turning into winter because I didn't bring many winter clothes

We visited Sandton the other day, this is essentially the upper class part of town, its the financial district and the part of the city where all the businesses are starting to locate...we went to a huge mall there called Sandton City, which is basically two skyscrapers connected together with an outdoor square and this statue of nelson mandela in the middle...



...it was definitely the biggest, most upper class mall I have ever been to, I'd say almost twice as big as the Mall of Georgia

We went to Joburg Hospital the other day with Pastor Cheryl from Troyeville in order to visit a little girl from church that was in there and pray for her...I had heard a lot about the hospital, its pretty much the premier hospital in Africa and where anyone on the continent comes that has to have some kind operation done, so I guess I was expecting an extremely nice, modern hospital that might belong in Sandton, instead it was really big, but very run down, dirty and old looking...again a reminder that its Africa and not the U.S.

Finally, it was my roommate Jon's birthday the other day and we went to the Lion Park and the restaurant Carnivore to celebrate...the Lion Park is essentially a small zoo but you get to drive around inside the area where the lions are as they come right up to your car, and you get to play with lion cubs, here's some pictures...





We ate at Carnivore, an all you can eat place where they serve all kinds of African game meats, we had impala, kudu, crocodile, and ostrich...they bring it on skewers right to your table and slice it off onto your plate.

That's all I can think of for now.

Cape Town!! and Joburg update

Well I went on vacation to Cape Town last weekend, we stayed with some of the other Hands On missionaries stationed there. Its one of the coolest cities I've ever been in, it felt a lot safer and a lot more American than Joburg, it was nice to get a break from not being able to go out at night...here's a few pictures...

These are from the top of Table Mountain







Most of the group that was there...me, Kelsey and Mercedes from Joburg, Jay and Chris from Port Elizabeth and Brittany and Robyn from Cape Town



These are all from Capepoint, an hour or so outside of the city...
This is known as the Cape of Good Hope


Capepoint is behind me...the southern most tip of Africa


This is where the Atlantic Ocean meets the Indian Ocean


A baboon, they're suppose to be all over capepoint but we only saw this one...they supposedly steal your bags and search for food if you're not careful


At the waterfront with Table Mountain behind me as wait to take a ferry over to Robben Island, a former political prison where they held Nelson Mandela for years.


Seals at the waterfront


Table Mountain from the ferry to Robben Island


Penguins on Robben Island


Baby Penguins


Well I think I've posted enough for now...everything back in Joburg is going really well, we're doing a series in youth right now about Biblical heroes so I spoke last Friday night about the stoning of Stephen and I think a lot of them got something out of it...we're having about 15-20 show up consistently on Friday nights which is encouraging. These guys all continue to struggle with understanding why God allows innocent people to suffer so much...most of them have family members that have died of AIDS or live with single mothers or other family members, some are immigrants from the Congo or somewhere else nearby and left their family behind and live with friends or something...its been a really hard message to get across to them...anyway, I'll try to post some pictures of youth and other stuff at Troyeville sometime soon.