It is with true sadness and a heavy heart that we come to the time of speaking about our return home. All good things must come to their end, or at least find themselves amongst change. Our original commitment to the work here and to our donors was to spend two years in Central Africa. We will be returning home just shy of our two years in order to be present for the ninetieth birthday of Darren's grandmother in Victoria. Thus we will be leaving Gamboula in early December and we will be spending Christmas with our families in Victoria. It is a rare treat for us to spend Christmas with our families, and as our lives take us on ever far-reaching paths we imagine being home will become ever more rare.
When we first decided to come to Gamboula it was with the expressed interest of learning as much as we could about agricultural development and missions from those who have been doing it successfully for a long period of time. We have not been disappointed. In fact we have learned more than I thought possible and have been given the opportunity to try out our own ideas, to express our opinions and to ask a lot of questions. I could not have imagined a better place to try out our wings, so to speak. Far from just sitting back and soaking in all that is around us, we have strived to really 'do something' while we have been here and as we have discovered more deeply each of our spiritual gifts, we have seen ourselves plunged into all manner of work. Darren has found a real desire to help missionaries and nationals with their technology needs which is evidenced by the time he spends giving computer lessons and fixing computers. Some days our house has looked more like the back room of an outdated Future Shop! He has managed to restore 10 year old laptops back to working order with no help from the Internet. I have seen more and more where my interests lie and where my gifts are best utilized. I still love to work with fruit trees but even more, I love to work with people working with fruit trees. My heart is for the relationships built while working with people in the area of food security. I have enjoyed getting to know each of our workers, knowing their stories, meeting their wives and children, helping them work out different things in their lives, praying with and for them and generally helping them excel in their area of service to the Lord. I can find no better satisfaction. It is true that many days I return home from work saddened by the stories told, grieved over the sin in people's lives and other days overjoyed with the victory achieved in other's lives. Without the help of my dear husband and my dear friend Clarisse, I might not be so quick to love my job, as their listening ears have helped me process a lot of what falls on my ears during the day. I enjoy managing people and projects and look forward to what happens next.
So, what does happen next? Given all that we have discovered about ourselves here, we can undeniably say that we see ourselves in a long term career of service in foreign lands. However, before this becomes reality, we both feel that a little more preparation remains. While we are both committed to life long learning, Darren has a little more left in the university realm of things. So here is the plan (subject to change, of course).
December - Return to Victoria for time with friends and family around the Christmas tree.
January - We will be returning to Fort Myers, Florida where we will debrief with our mission, NMSI, and then Darren will start an IT (Information Technology) apprenticeship at ECHO while I help manage the Tropical Fruit nursery at ECHO.
August - Darren returns to British Columbia to start classes at either UVIC or UBC towards a degree in Computer Science.
December - I return to Victoria after finishing up at ECHO and attending their annual conference. This is when I start job hunting like crazy to support my student husband!
I am also planning on doing my MA degree at Royal Roads University via distant education, starting either May 2007 or May 2008. It is a program called Human Security and Peacebuilding and is designed for those with previous work experience in insecure countries. It is a two year program and includes a six-month internship overseas, which I would like to find a placement for in Central Africa. This little plan takes us to about 2010 at which point we will be seeking opportunities to return to a career overseas.
This e-mail is for the curious. A more formal letter will be sent out to all our donors in October. The nutrition garden at the Gamboula hospital has been an incredible success and I do not want to see such an important and successful work fall apart due to lack of funding. Two or three hundred dollars a month would put the project in good shape and due to my flexible school schedule, I would like to be able to return to CAR once a year for follow-up visits and to consult on the work here in Gamboula as well as with ICDI in Berberati, possibly leading short teams from NMSI. All this is to say that we still have need of our donors and the work here will go on even in our temporary, if not elongated, absence. Our hearts have been so captured by this land that to leave without a thought of returning is nearly impossible for me.
We welcome your questions, your comments and your prayers. Even the best laid plans are doomed to fail if they are not the plans of our Father.
On a totally different subject, please put to prayer a meeting we will be having tomorrow with all of the Agroforesterie staff and the elders and pastor of our church. We will be discussing problems that have surfaced between staff following the truck accident. There is a lot of finger pointing going on to do with voodoo and such and there is no unity between the head of the program and the staff. We all need wisdom and patience going into a meeting like this, especially when it comes to accusations of voodoo which is so unreal to us and so very real to our African counterparts.
