Well for those of you who haven't realised I'm back home in the UK now - been back a week and already crazy busy with catching up with people, wedding plans, finding a flat and a job! The list of things to do is endless!!! I had a great last couple of weeks in Botswana with my parents. I finished working for Kings on 23rd January and then went down to meet Mum and Dad in South Africa where we travelled down the Garden Route from Port Elizabeth to Cape Town for a week. It was so nice to see them and to spend time together after a whole year apart!
After some holiday time in SA we returned to Botswana where we spent a week in Gaborone. Some very close friends, Farai and Princess, got married which was an awesome time, and i was also able to show my parents round various places and project I'd been working with over the year and introduce them to friends. We then spent the last 10 days or so travelling around Botswana, doing the safari thing. We spent a really relaxing 4 days on the far east border of Botswana by the Limpopo river in the Tuli Block - we were camping in a very luxury bush camp and spent the days sleeping, eating, reading and going out on game drives. I think we all really needed the rest after our manic week in Gabs! We then travelled up north, stopping for one night at the Nata Bird Sanctuary on our way up to Kasane and the Chobe River. After about 2 hours of solid pot holes and 2 hours of ok road we finally made it to Chobe Safari Lodge, where we stayed for our last 4 nights. Again we had a fantastic time - game drives, a boat cruise, a scenic flight in a small plane, a trip to Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe. We saw so many animals over our time there but the best had to be on our car journey up to Kasane, coming across a leopard walking along the main road!
After a 13 hour journey back down to Gabs we had a couple of days packing and saying final goodbyes, before we flew out last Tuesday. So far i haven't been missing Botswana too much as i haven't really had time to sit down or think but please pray for me to settle back into UK smoothly, and also for wedding plans to get organised as we're getting married on 31st May and have so so much to do! We haven't even finalised the guest list yet!! Other prayer points would be that we'd find a flat that we can afford and that i would be able to find the right job in Maidenhead, where we'll be living after the wedding. Thank you all so much for you prayer and support over this year, it's much appreciated. Please keep in touch and hopefully i'll see some of you soon now that i'm back home! My mobile no is 07519 119047 and I'm living at home so land line is still 01372 810954
Thanks again,
Ruth xxx
Tuesday, 26 February 2008
Wednesday, 23 January 2008
January Training Tour
Thought I would just write a quick update to let you know how well the tour went. 8 of us, Farai, Darius and myself and 5 volunteers all jammed into the Condor with luggage, equipment and camping gear in the trailer at the back and went in a big circle around Botswana. We first visited a friend called Glow in Mabutsane and ran a sports program with her there. She is a Kings volunteers who used to live in Gabs and moved as she got a job in Mabutsane, a small village about 3 hours from Gabs. She’s now planning to start a regular Saturday morning sports outreach program at one of the local primary schools and already has 5 volunteers lined up ready to help her.
After one night in Mabutsane, which is about the hottest place I’ve ever been, we moved onto Ghanzi, the second hottest place I’ve ever been! We were 5 nights in Ghanzi as we ran a 3 day sports ministry training time for local churches and NGOs. Because of the heat we had to run the training from 8 – 11am then take a break over lunch and the sports camp ran from 4 – 7pm and even that was hot and hard work coaching! Ghanzi was good fun, we had 17 delegates mostly from True Love Waits, an abstinence programme and Windows of Hope, who work with orphans and street children. We built up good relationships with the delegates and the training time went well, in spite of a few difficulties with the venue.
By the 9th Jan we were moving on to Maun, up in the north west of Botswana, a renown tourist spot as it’s right on the Okavanga Delta, the worlds largest inland delta. Unfortunately there wasn’t time for a visit to the delta, although we did get to walk with some giraffes, be chased by an angry warthog and the local guys on team got to see an elephant for the first time ever in the wild, which was cool.
Maun was excellent. Great food, great accommodation, really welcoming hosts, a fantastic training time and we build some really key relationships with both Love Botswana and One Way Sports, the only other sports ministry organization in Botswana. I was so so pleased with how well the training and sports camps went. The team really learnt from small mistakes made in Ghanzi and improved so much, and the training we delivered in Maun was as professional and well run as we could have possibly done. It was great for me to be behind the scenes and see Darius and Farai and the volunteers do such a great job of facilitating and running a training time. My work here is done!
We were all shattered by the time we left Maun. We moved onto a small village called Gweta for 2 nights to rest and relax a little. We were hoping to do a sports camp there but the sports field was flooded along with the rest of the surrounding area, including the lodge we were staying at. We had to walk around everywhere in huge Wellington boots with tiny tadpoles swimming all around us! Then from Gweta we passed briefly through Dukwi refugee camp to connect with contacts there, on our way to drop half of the team in Francistown and then get home to Gabs.
It was a great tour, really beneficial for our work here in Botswana. We made lots of friends and built good relationships with various other Christian organizations working around the country. The team got on brilliantly and was so full of energy and fire that they inspired pretty much everyone they came into contact with and it was great to be a part of passionate and vigorous praise and worship times in various different African languages! I had an awesome time. It was a great finish to my time here in Botswana and a great start of the year for Kings 2008. Thank you for your prayers,
Loads of love to everyone, Ruth
Prayer Points
For Farai and Princess who are getting married on the 3rd February. For God’s blessings on them as a couple, for finances to come into place for their wedding and for a wonderful day and great honeymoon! I’m going to really miss these guys when I come home!
For a great time with my parents when they’re out here – for safe journeys and quality times together. I’m leaving to meet them in South Africa tomorrow.
For me and Mark cos we’re really missing each other at the moment and actually finding it harder to be apart now the end is in sight!
After one night in Mabutsane, which is about the hottest place I’ve ever been, we moved onto Ghanzi, the second hottest place I’ve ever been! We were 5 nights in Ghanzi as we ran a 3 day sports ministry training time for local churches and NGOs. Because of the heat we had to run the training from 8 – 11am then take a break over lunch and the sports camp ran from 4 – 7pm and even that was hot and hard work coaching! Ghanzi was good fun, we had 17 delegates mostly from True Love Waits, an abstinence programme and Windows of Hope, who work with orphans and street children. We built up good relationships with the delegates and the training time went well, in spite of a few difficulties with the venue.
By the 9th Jan we were moving on to Maun, up in the north west of Botswana, a renown tourist spot as it’s right on the Okavanga Delta, the worlds largest inland delta. Unfortunately there wasn’t time for a visit to the delta, although we did get to walk with some giraffes, be chased by an angry warthog and the local guys on team got to see an elephant for the first time ever in the wild, which was cool.
Maun was excellent. Great food, great accommodation, really welcoming hosts, a fantastic training time and we build some really key relationships with both Love Botswana and One Way Sports, the only other sports ministry organization in Botswana. I was so so pleased with how well the training and sports camps went. The team really learnt from small mistakes made in Ghanzi and improved so much, and the training we delivered in Maun was as professional and well run as we could have possibly done. It was great for me to be behind the scenes and see Darius and Farai and the volunteers do such a great job of facilitating and running a training time. My work here is done!
We were all shattered by the time we left Maun. We moved onto a small village called Gweta for 2 nights to rest and relax a little. We were hoping to do a sports camp there but the sports field was flooded along with the rest of the surrounding area, including the lodge we were staying at. We had to walk around everywhere in huge Wellington boots with tiny tadpoles swimming all around us! Then from Gweta we passed briefly through Dukwi refugee camp to connect with contacts there, on our way to drop half of the team in Francistown and then get home to Gabs.
It was a great tour, really beneficial for our work here in Botswana. We made lots of friends and built good relationships with various other Christian organizations working around the country. The team got on brilliantly and was so full of energy and fire that they inspired pretty much everyone they came into contact with and it was great to be a part of passionate and vigorous praise and worship times in various different African languages! I had an awesome time. It was a great finish to my time here in Botswana and a great start of the year for Kings 2008. Thank you for your prayers,
Loads of love to everyone, Ruth
Prayer Points
For Farai and Princess who are getting married on the 3rd February. For God’s blessings on them as a couple, for finances to come into place for their wedding and for a wonderful day and great honeymoon! I’m going to really miss these guys when I come home!
For a great time with my parents when they’re out here – for safe journeys and quality times together. I’m leaving to meet them in South Africa tomorrow.
For me and Mark cos we’re really missing each other at the moment and actually finding it harder to be apart now the end is in sight!
Thursday, 27 December 2007
November / December news
MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Hope you all had a lovely time over Christmas with friends and family. Christmas was very different for me this year as you can imagine! My first Christmas away from home and family and all the usual traditions. Christmas here is a bit different – they still put up decorations and play Christmas tunes but it’s slightly strange to see Santa and snow in a place where most people have never seen the real thing and Christmas is in the middle of summer! In Botswana most people travel back to their home village over Christmas and New Year and so Gabs is very quiet at the moment. Christmas here seems to be more about family getting together and remembering the birth of Christ, as well as lots of food (rice and fried chicken and some sort of traditional ginger punch) and new clothes. I went to church and then was invited to spend the rest of the day with my cell group leaders family and some friends. We prepared food together, ate too much, played with the kids and watched cheesy movies. Then in the evening a friend who I haven’t seen in ages came to stay the night. It was fun, but didn’t really feel like Christmas and I did really miss family and home!
I’m really counting down the days now – I can’t believe I’ve got less than a month left working for Kings and less than two months in Botswana! I’m on holiday at the moment til the 1st and really enjoying the time off, then we’ll be going on tour around Botswana for 2 weeks with a team of volunteers. We’ll be visiting 4 different places around the country, running outreach programmes and sports ministry training times. I’m really looking forward to seeing some places around the country that I’ve never been before and to a really fun team time as we have some quality guys coming with us to help with the tour. Farai and Darius and the volunteers will actually be running most of the training times with me there to help everything run smoothly. I’m really excited to see them heading up the training and camps on their own. They’ve learnt so much over this year and are totally ready to do all this without me around which is a cool place to be leaving things. Farai (my replacement) has been taking on more and more responsibility for programmes over the last couple of months and I’m confident that he’ll do a great job once I leave.
The last two months have been busy as usual. Regular programmes in November with things beginning to pack up for Christmas towards the end of the month. The last day at I Am Special was awesome! I asked the kids what they’d learnt from looking at Psalm 139 over the past term and Maatla, a really lovely gentle boy, put up his hand and said that he’d woken up in the night and had been lying awake thinking about God and the verses we’d learnt from the psalm. It reminded me of that verse in the psalms about lying awake through the watches of the night and meditating on God and was so cool to see how God’s word has been impacting these special young people.
At the beginning of December we ran a cricket camp with the Botswana Cricket Association for World Aids Day. The camp went well but the most exciting thing was the impact that our volunteers energy and enthusiasm and the way Kings does things has on anyone we come into contact with. The BTA coaches and director were really impressed and are now excited to be partnering with us in the coming year. One of our volunteers, Taurai, runs a cricket camp every Saturday at the National Youth Centre and about 20 more kids signed up to come along and the BCA have promised him help in developing his knowledge of cricket and coaching skills so that’s great, just the sort of thing we want to be helping happen around Gabs.
Then we had a couple of guys come over from UK to manage our KCI camps in Gabs and Francistown. I was up in Francistown for about 10 days helping run a 2 day sports leadership training time and then the camp the following week. It was such a busy time! I was mainly doing admin for the camp and staying with a camp manager made me realize how much preparation work there is to do each night before camp the next day – crazy! It was such hard work but great fun. Can’t believe that was my last KCI camp in Botswana. I keep realizing all the things that are my lasts and feeling sad! It’s a funny feeling because on one hand I really miss home and can’t wait to see everyone and get on with organizing the wedding (which has now definitely been set for 31st May!) but on the other hand I know there are so many things I’ll miss about working for Kings and living out in Botswana.
One thing I’m really looking forward to before I go home is my parents visit. They are coming out for my last few weeks here and it will be such a treat to show them around and introduce them to everyone and show them what I’ve been up to before I come home. Also just the idea of my parents in Africa is awesome – they’re going to love it! Anyways goodbye from me, I’ll write again for the final time once I’m home on 20th Feb! Crazy!!
Loads of love to everyone, Ruth
Prayer Points
January tour
- I’m responsible for all the planning and logistics as well as making sure everything generally runs smoothly on the trip etc. Kind of a big job and I don’t want to forget anything important!
- For Eddie, one of the volunteers coming on tour – he’s quite a young Christian and I feel like this trip will be significant in grounding him in God and moving him on in his journey.
- For Darius, Farai and Victor who will be doing significant amounts of teaching at the training times, more than they’ve done before. For Victor this is his first time teaching theory sessions at a training event.
- That we’d be a blessing and a challenge to all those we meet and work with during our time on tour.
For Farai and Princess who are getting married on the 3rd February. For God’s blessings on them as a couple, for finances to come into place for their wedding and for a wonderful day and great honeymoon! I’m going to really miss these guys when I come home!
That I’d be able to spend time with the people I need to over the last couple of months before coming home.
For a great time with my parents when they’re out here – for safe journeys and quality times together.
For me and Mark cos we’re really missing each other at the moment and actually finding it harder to be apart now the end is in sight!
Hope you all had a lovely time over Christmas with friends and family. Christmas was very different for me this year as you can imagine! My first Christmas away from home and family and all the usual traditions. Christmas here is a bit different – they still put up decorations and play Christmas tunes but it’s slightly strange to see Santa and snow in a place where most people have never seen the real thing and Christmas is in the middle of summer! In Botswana most people travel back to their home village over Christmas and New Year and so Gabs is very quiet at the moment. Christmas here seems to be more about family getting together and remembering the birth of Christ, as well as lots of food (rice and fried chicken and some sort of traditional ginger punch) and new clothes. I went to church and then was invited to spend the rest of the day with my cell group leaders family and some friends. We prepared food together, ate too much, played with the kids and watched cheesy movies. Then in the evening a friend who I haven’t seen in ages came to stay the night. It was fun, but didn’t really feel like Christmas and I did really miss family and home!
I’m really counting down the days now – I can’t believe I’ve got less than a month left working for Kings and less than two months in Botswana! I’m on holiday at the moment til the 1st and really enjoying the time off, then we’ll be going on tour around Botswana for 2 weeks with a team of volunteers. We’ll be visiting 4 different places around the country, running outreach programmes and sports ministry training times. I’m really looking forward to seeing some places around the country that I’ve never been before and to a really fun team time as we have some quality guys coming with us to help with the tour. Farai and Darius and the volunteers will actually be running most of the training times with me there to help everything run smoothly. I’m really excited to see them heading up the training and camps on their own. They’ve learnt so much over this year and are totally ready to do all this without me around which is a cool place to be leaving things. Farai (my replacement) has been taking on more and more responsibility for programmes over the last couple of months and I’m confident that he’ll do a great job once I leave.
The last two months have been busy as usual. Regular programmes in November with things beginning to pack up for Christmas towards the end of the month. The last day at I Am Special was awesome! I asked the kids what they’d learnt from looking at Psalm 139 over the past term and Maatla, a really lovely gentle boy, put up his hand and said that he’d woken up in the night and had been lying awake thinking about God and the verses we’d learnt from the psalm. It reminded me of that verse in the psalms about lying awake through the watches of the night and meditating on God and was so cool to see how God’s word has been impacting these special young people.
At the beginning of December we ran a cricket camp with the Botswana Cricket Association for World Aids Day. The camp went well but the most exciting thing was the impact that our volunteers energy and enthusiasm and the way Kings does things has on anyone we come into contact with. The BTA coaches and director were really impressed and are now excited to be partnering with us in the coming year. One of our volunteers, Taurai, runs a cricket camp every Saturday at the National Youth Centre and about 20 more kids signed up to come along and the BCA have promised him help in developing his knowledge of cricket and coaching skills so that’s great, just the sort of thing we want to be helping happen around Gabs.
Then we had a couple of guys come over from UK to manage our KCI camps in Gabs and Francistown. I was up in Francistown for about 10 days helping run a 2 day sports leadership training time and then the camp the following week. It was such a busy time! I was mainly doing admin for the camp and staying with a camp manager made me realize how much preparation work there is to do each night before camp the next day – crazy! It was such hard work but great fun. Can’t believe that was my last KCI camp in Botswana. I keep realizing all the things that are my lasts and feeling sad! It’s a funny feeling because on one hand I really miss home and can’t wait to see everyone and get on with organizing the wedding (which has now definitely been set for 31st May!) but on the other hand I know there are so many things I’ll miss about working for Kings and living out in Botswana.
One thing I’m really looking forward to before I go home is my parents visit. They are coming out for my last few weeks here and it will be such a treat to show them around and introduce them to everyone and show them what I’ve been up to before I come home. Also just the idea of my parents in Africa is awesome – they’re going to love it! Anyways goodbye from me, I’ll write again for the final time once I’m home on 20th Feb! Crazy!!
Loads of love to everyone, Ruth
Prayer Points
January tour
- I’m responsible for all the planning and logistics as well as making sure everything generally runs smoothly on the trip etc. Kind of a big job and I don’t want to forget anything important!
- For Eddie, one of the volunteers coming on tour – he’s quite a young Christian and I feel like this trip will be significant in grounding him in God and moving him on in his journey.
- For Darius, Farai and Victor who will be doing significant amounts of teaching at the training times, more than they’ve done before. For Victor this is his first time teaching theory sessions at a training event.
- That we’d be a blessing and a challenge to all those we meet and work with during our time on tour.
For Farai and Princess who are getting married on the 3rd February. For God’s blessings on them as a couple, for finances to come into place for their wedding and for a wonderful day and great honeymoon! I’m going to really miss these guys when I come home!
That I’d be able to spend time with the people I need to over the last couple of months before coming home.
For a great time with my parents when they’re out here – for safe journeys and quality times together.
For me and Mark cos we’re really missing each other at the moment and actually finding it harder to be apart now the end is in sight!
Wednesday, 26 September 2007
Engaged : D
For anyone who doesn't know yet, or who would like to know more details Mark and I got engaged on Thursday last week. We were staying up north at Kasane, visiting the Chobe National Park and drove over the boarder to Zimbabwe for the day, to see Vic Falls. I had my suspicions that Mark may pop the question while he was out in Botswana and that this would make a good place to propose so was at least a little prepared when he got down on one knee.
We were up at the view by the Livingstone statue and had just been looking at the Falls and taking photos of a lovely rainbow but Mark was taking ages fiddling with his camera, getting the photo just right. I didn't realise until afterwards that he was just waiting for the other tourists to move on and for us to be alone together! It was very romantic (or cheesy however you want to look at it ; p), with the whole overwhelming down on one knee thing and all. Even though I knew it might happen I was still a bit in shock when it was actually happening, but fortunately remembered that I wanted to say yes!! We spent the rest of our time walking round the Falls National Park, holding hands and grinning like idiots, kissing at all the viewpoints....you can imagine I'm sure!
We were up at the view by the Livingstone statue and had just been looking at the Falls and taking photos of a lovely rainbow but Mark was taking ages fiddling with his camera, getting the photo just right. I didn't realise until afterwards that he was just waiting for the other tourists to move on and for us to be alone together! It was very romantic (or cheesy however you want to look at it ; p), with the whole overwhelming down on one knee thing and all. Even though I knew it might happen I was still a bit in shock when it was actually happening, but fortunately remembered that I wanted to say yes!! We spent the rest of our time walking round the Falls National Park, holding hands and grinning like idiots, kissing at all the viewpoints....you can imagine I'm sure!So all in all it was a great trip : ) We had such a great time 
together the whole 2 weeks. It was so nice for him to meet all my friends out here and come to various projects I work on and to church with me and just generally see what my life is like out here in Bots. We finished the trip by ring shopping and he bought me the most amazing white gold ring with a genuine Botswana diamond. All in all I'm one very happy girl!!
together the whole 2 weeks. It was so nice for him to meet all my friends out here and come to various projects I work on and to church with me and just generally see what my life is like out here in Bots. We finished the trip by ring shopping and he bought me the most amazing white gold ring with a genuine Botswana diamond. All in all I'm one very happy girl!!
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