Mash de Clutch! Don't mash de Clutch!

This past week has been quite the adventure!  First it made my soul so happy to be out at the village at the Ed Center and to see all of the precious students out there, both the ones I already knew and the ones I was meeting for the first time, but I will get to that more a little bit later.

Traffic on the way home

            One of my big adventures for the week was that I started driving!  First, the car I have here is a manual.  Second, I had some wonderful teachers in the states that taught me how to drive manual, but really I had only driven a manual about 6 times.  Oh how I wish I could have put a camera in the car and filmed my times driving with Alphonsus.  Alphonsus works for the ministry and I wish you all could meet him because he is the sweetest.  Everything about him makes me laugh in the best way possible.  You can only imagine now how our “driving lessons” went when he made me drive through town on the second day at rush hour… You might be picturing him saying something like “Anna, why are you mashing de clutch?! Quit mashing de clutch!.... Why aren’t you mashing the clutch? Mash de clutch! Mash de clutch! Why do you want de car to stop? Uh huh?”  And me just laughing because what the heck is mashing the clutch? And then you might picture me saying “Alphonsus, am I doing a good job?” To which Alphonsus would respond “Is de car moving? Yes. Then yes, you are doing a good job.”  However, by Wednesday he told me I didn’t even need him the car anymore, but I think I will keep him around just for a little while…  So that is my driving and I must say I am quite pleased with myself.

This is a picture overlooking the village from some rocks
we hiked up.

            Now, onto the village and the Ed Center.  I just love that place and those people.  The teachers blew me away.  Esther is so much more confident than when I first worked with her a year and a half ago.  Ayuba is a new teacher since I have been here.  He is pretty young with no formal teaching training, but Theresa did a great job training him because he is like a rockstar teacher.  God has definitely given him the gift of teaching.  Stephen, who is also new since I was here and is Esther’s husband, does a great job managing things and tutoring the older students.

            The students themselves were such an encouragement and a testament to God at work in this place.  A few students in particular have gone through such a transformation it is incredible.  One of the students is Israel, who was in my class that I helped teach during the internship I did in 2011.  Israel was the trouble-maker and was not too committed to his education when I first knew him.  In fact, I am pretty sure he was getting close to getting kicked out of the program because he had had so many violations to Ed Center Policies.  When I observed his classroom on Monday that boy was so attentive and was so happy to be there and was even reading to me!  I thought he must have been acting that way to impress me, but I talked with Esther and she told me he has totally changed! So praise the Lord for that and for the work that He is doing in all the students’ lives!

          The kids are always saying funny things.  One of the new students, Mary, tells me every day “Wow Auntie, you’re head is looking veeeerrry good!”  It cracks me up every time.

            This week we have two teams here, which is really exciting, but also means it will be a really busy week for us all!

Grace, Peace, and Love,

Anna