Wow, I can’t believe I’ve already been here a month!  The time has flown by so fast! I’m already feeling at home here and I feel blessed that I get to experience life and the people of Africa. The work I’m doing teaching English  in the townships is keeping me so busy that by the time Friday comes i’m exhausted.

I'm really enjoying the work i'm doing. Going into the townships at first was scary. I didn't know the people or the area.  Now I feel at home and comfortable, but of course, can never be alone. Nobody bothers us
(except for the occasional cat call)  because they know we are here to help. They respect us and  enjoy it when we come to help out.  Lately I have been going with Mama Julia to a township called Tavern Becky to hang out with HIV/AIDS patients.   Happy, one of the ladies we work with who has Aids was about to die when Julia found her.  Julia gave her ARV"S ( medication to help manage Aids)  and now she is so much healthier and stronger. Happy now helps Julia out in the communities and comes along to translate for us. She is such a great lady who is filled with so much joy and compassion for the people in her community. The stories of many of these people’s lives are so sad and filled with so much pain. Julia has seen people go into deep depression and alcoholism after discovering they are sick with Aids. She does free testing for them, and the news is not always good.  Since Julia has been going to Tavern Becky, many people have turned their lives to Christ, and this has given their life so much meaning. Instead of clinging to drinking and depression they decide to cling to Jesus for their comfort.  Julia has witnessed first hand the changes God has made in the lives of those that accept him. They stop drinking and they start helping others, which it empowers them because they are no longer victims of their circumstances.  What I love about Refilwe is that they teach people how to thrive on their own. They don’t continually pass out food or give them things because that will teach them to rely on others to give them what they need. Refilwe teaches them how to do things for themselves so they can become self sufficient. They teach them skills such as gardening, sowing and other crafts

"If you give a man a fish he will be fed for the day, but the next day he will be hungry. If you teach a man to fish he will never go hungry and hopefully he will teach his brother to fish as well" 

Africa is filled with so many problems with no easy solutions.  One thing I have noticed is that drunk driving is not taken seriously.  I have been here a month and have already come across a couple drunk drivers. The cops are so busy dealing with violence it seems that drunk driving is left on the back burner. The cops are also so corrupt that you can bribe your way out of a DUI.
  One evening, I was sitting outside on my porch with a friend and I noticed a lady driving by on the lawn with her trunk open. She was driving slow but jerky. A few second later she crashed into my neighbors clothes line, shattering her car window. She then backed up and ran into a tree, and then kept going! Eventually she stopped the car. A few of us ran out there, and sure enough, she was drunk.  We didn’t let her drive, but nobody called the cops because apparently police officers don’t come out to Refilwe at night. Kind of sketch if you ask me! The next day we found out how she made it past the gates. The security guard let her in because she said she was here to see Jaco. Jaco is the name of the director at Refilwe, but she wasn't here to see him, Jaco, is also the name of  her boyfriend. She thought she was driving up to his apartment.  She was too drunk to notice she wasn't at his place.  There are no houses around or near Refilwe, it's empty farmland, and she ended up here.  She only got through security and wasn't turned awa, because there was someone here with the same name as her boyfriend. The way she was driving I can’t believe she even made it to Refilwe alive. If she got turned away at the gate she would have kept driving and who knows what would have happened. Killed someone? Killed herself?  Hmm a coincidence? I think not. 

A couple days after this incident, my buddy Abel was kindly walking with me to a nearby pool.  I came across another drunk lady that had been driving.  On our walk  we saw a lady stuck in a ditch on the side of the road. When we went to help her out I first noticed she seemed  very frazzled, I then noticed the smell of alcohol.  She also had bloody scratches on her body. Inside her car was open beer and a blood soaked napkin. I asked her if she was alright, and she told me she was running away from an abusive x-boyfriend, which explained all the blood. She didn’t need or want anything other than to get her car out of the ditch as quickly as she could.  A nearby worker was driving a fork lift, so he came and pulled her out of the ditch. Ghetto style!  Well at that point we had to let her drive drunk. I could not keep her against her will, and if I did i'd feel terrible if her ass boyfriend found her.  She gave me a  hug and said she would be on her way.
 Oh Africa, what to do with you?. In the states it's so much easier. If you see a drunk driver you call 911, simple as that. Here they will just ask for a bribe and let her drive off the road into a ditch.

The worker in the forklift gave us a ride to the pool after that. I can't say i've ever been in a forklift before. I never know what to expect next!  

On a lighter note, I’ve been learning to speak a few Soto words. My goal is to try to be able to speak conversational Soto before I leave, but it’s very difficult and I don’t think I will meet that goal.  I can now say Hi, How are you, how was you’re day, I’m fine, No, Thank You, good night and you too.  There are 7 languages that are spoken here but many people can understand a little of each. The worker guys here have been teaching me how to speak it, but it's hard! My mouth does not move that way.  

Here are pictures at Refilwe with a few of the kids on site