4th of October 2017
Riaan and Saretha Terblanche visit us on Chandame. They bring us more coffee beans than we expected and eventually 5 variants were planted in our nursery. We eagerly await the first harvest.
5th to the 19th of October 2017
Our daily chores continue as per usual at Chandame.
20th to the 22nd of October 2017
We host an Evangelism weekend at Namanweja where one of our prayer houses is situated. We transport some members of the congregation with our tractor and trailer. Jannie drove the tractor with all the congregation members on the trailer and I drove the bakkie with their entire luggage. We start at Chandame and pick up people who want to attend the evangelism weekend along the way. These folks are met on the main road as we do not pass each prayer house individually. The tar road to Namanweja is good, but it takes the tractor 3 hours to drive 10 km on the dirt road. At Namanweja, there were many speakers and there is virtually no time for the attendees to rest. The schedule includes praise and worship, speakers and sharing meals amongst attendees. The schedule is jam packed and there is almost no time to sleep. 300 people attended the weekend and the prayer house also received many new members.
28th to 31st of October 2017
We head over the border to Nkhoma and on the 29th, Jannie and Hennie head to Salima, Malawi. Jannie collects the windmill that he wants to use in Chandame to help create electricity. On the 31st of October, we buy supplies for Chandame clinic at Lilongwe. From a statistical point of view, I’ve counted the patients attending my clinic reaches 500 in a week.
1st of November 2017
Jannie puts in the gearbox into the Toyota Land Cruiser. This Toyota is used as an ambulance that belongs to Nkohoma’s hospital. Praise the Lord, it works! This job then forms part of our duty as mission support as we assist those in needs across the border. Jannie also finds time to fix Hennie Smit’s bakkie.
2nd to 4th of November 2017
We head back to Chandame. Wynand, Beualah and Arno arrive and spend a few days with us. On the 3rd , Jannie and our guests head to Mwala Madzi (our farm of 900ha) for the day. They walked through a big section of the farm and analyzed how to best use the piece of land, for things like building a house, coffee plantations etc. Jaco van der Westhuizen from Tete brings a 200 meter cable for Kwaai babatjie, our truck tractor for recovery. This donation will be used in the best possible and again, a big thanks to Jaco! On the 4th, Wynand, Beualah and Arno drive back to Tete.
5th of November 2017
We head to Chiputione prayer house for the day. We take Chandame’s pastor and his wife. We attend the service and share a meal with the locals.
6th of November 2017
I start with my school, focusing on children from 2 to 6 years old. I do vision therapy sessions and the goal is to improve hand-eye coordination.
7th of November 2017
The coffee beans we planted have sprouted into 12,000 plants in our nursery. We plan to take the plants directly from the nursery to Mwala Madzi and plant them there. We have also decided exactly where we want to plant them on the farm.
9th of November 2017
Riaan Terreblanche (Veritas College) arrives for a meeting at Chandame with Pastor Antonio (Chandame), Pastor Joshua (Nkodedzi) and the elders of the congregation. For a while now, there has been internal problems with the church folk and it had to be sorted out to keep focus on what the main goal is. Riaan and his Portuguese linguistic skills assisted the matter and the problems were sorted out. Riaan reads Philippians 2 that serves as a stark reminder to why we do what we do for the church and God.
15th of November 2017
Vasco and our builders finish a ramp building project that they started a few days earlier. The ramp will help to load anything on big lorries and greatly improve Chandame’s position as a place of assistance to all. Foreign folk will also be able to use the ramp, but will be asked a small fee that will go into the Chandame’s church fund.
16th to 18th of November 2017
Riaan and Saretha Terrebalnce visit us on Chandame. They came to check up on the coffee plants and to just encourage us in our mission. Few people realize how tough it is spending day in and out away from what you are familiar with. The coffee plantation is their project that they are doing with us and they are very excited about how the project is moving forward. After they left on the Saturday, Piet and Estelle du Plessis from Nkhoma move into our guest room at Chandame. They had taken their Mitsubishi Pajero over the border for legal reasons and spent the Saturday night with us. Estelle helped me with wounds and being a professional nurse, I learnt a lot from watching her when treating burn wounds.
21st to 25th of November 2017
Wynand and Beualah Theron visit us again to go and work on the farm to prepare the land to sow corn. Jannie is sick and can’t go along. Wynand and Beualah spend a lot of time on the farm and eventually, the corn is planted. They used 4 of their workers, 3 of ours and some local s that live close to the farm. One hectare of corn is planted.
26th to 30th of November 2017
We head to Malawi Lake (Monkey bay). Wynand and Beauhlah recently bought a boat. Wynand wants Jannie to help him build an engine for the boat. If the boat is eventually ready to use, they want to use it for tourism on Lake Malawi. That evening, we head to Nkhoma. On the 27th, Jannie services the generator. On the 28th, Jannie and Hennie Smit go to Lilogwe. Jannie again fills up our medication for the clinic ion Chandame.