April 4, 2007

This month I’m going to write about how Leslie and I live here and what we do for fun and leave out mission business entirely. All of you read about that in the mission update anyway. It’s very easy to just write about the work and leave out our personal lives, so I’m going to make a point of doing the opposite.

What do we do when we’re not working? It’s a real challenge to find entertainment options. Barb J. regularly sends us burned DVDs with movies and TV shows we like which we watch on our laptops. We always bring back a bunch of books when we go on vacation so there’s always something to read. I’m currently reading a collection of science fiction short stories and Les is reading “A Generous Orthodoxy” by Brian MacLaren. Just by that you can tell which one of us went to Bible school and which one studied technology.

There is one thing we have started to do I would never have predicted. Leslie and I spent half of last weekend gardening. Specifically, Leslie made a little raised vegetable garden out of old, cracked filters and I transplanted papaya plants around the garden. We have some new friends, David and Judy, who have the most beautiful yard, with enormous old rubber trees and a full lawn, and mango, star apple, grapefruit and other trees. They have been working on their garden for over 30 years, but it’s been kind of an inspiration for us. It’s fun gardening here because things grow so quickly and vegetation really transforms where you live. Already, we have more trees than most of our neighbors which means that our place is several degrees cooler and many degrees more pleasant than the rest of Pierre Payen. I would eventually like to plant all of the papaya/banana garden with fruit trees, but I have to wait for my seedlings to grow large enough to transplant safely. We finally have the garden goat/chicken/pig free, so it’s been much more productive in the last year or so.

Leslie’s new vegetable garden made using cracked filters.

Leslie is more creative about finding entertainment than I am. Lately she has been making furniture. I don’t have too much to say about that but one thing she made really impressed me. Our kitchen is really tiny so she made a custom countertop/cutting board which goes right on top of the little chest freezer we have.

What else do we do for entertainment? I use the Playstation 2 a lot and I’ve been playing through the games I got for Christmas.

Chris & Jabez have a special bond. She actually comes looking for this kind of attention. She’s a little strange.

Also, we sometimes just wait for people to show up and entertain us. The folks who bought the old boat have fixed it up and they come out about every two weeks. We go sailing with them when we can and it’s fun because I don’t have to worry about the boat! Our neighbors along the beach are all weekend neighbors, and we are often invited to join in activities with the Martin family. The have the best tasting Haitian meals I have ever eaten, and we sometimes use their pool. It’s true that we have an ocean right in front of us, but it’s salty and has sharks in it.

Out for an evening sail with friends. Steve, in the red shirt works with Dennis, the man behind him who now owns the boat. David, in the white shirt was here to help with the house roof.

I think you may be starting to realize why I always write about work stuff in the updates. We live in a backwater of a backwater country, so we don’t even have a movie theatre to go to. That’s why a lot of the time when work is done for the day and we can do whatever we want…. We work some more. It’s a good thing I believe in what we’re doing and enjoy it.

For those of you that pray for us here are some things that we would love for you to pray about:

* We’re still waiting for the Volkswagon papers. We bought it in October. It’s now April. Enough said.

* Leslie needs to get her residency papers done and this process can take a long time. This will include her Permis Des Sejours, Carte Identite and Haitian driver’s license.

* There are some good fundraising possibilities in the works. Pray that those will be what they’re supposed to be and that God will continue to provide for the work that he wants done here and that we’ll have the wisdom to know where to focus our energy and mission funds.

* Pray that God will send us a new night guard. We had to fire our old one for various reasons and need someone here. Pray that the right person will be brought to us and that they’ll contribute well to the work of the mission.

* We have someone to look after the mission in August/September so we can take a vacation in Canada & the US! It’s still a long way off, but we’ve been blessed by two problem free absences in the last six months and would love to see that continue. We’re just feeling really blessed that we can make definite plans for leaving because it will mean being with friends and family for two weddings and a baby birth.  

Until next month,

 

Chris & Leslie Rolling