Blog update vs. homework

Blog wins.  every time.

This is going to be short and sweet. Just something God has put on my heart.

On Sunday at North Hills Church, my South African church which holds a piece of my heart already, I went to an extra service at night called SUPER SUNDAY (it was quite super) with Megan and Francie.  It was a smaller, intimate group setting that was put on by the youth of the church, namely college-age members.  The whole night was focused on identity.  My new South African buddy Brett had Francie, Megan, and I come in front of the church and each introduce ourselves and say what our family heritages are.  (Side note: If you ask a person in South Africa where their family is from, they say that they are South African.  In America, literally nobody says they are American unless they are Native American.  We always say “I’m about three quarters German and a quarter Norwegian” or whatever yours is.  Isn’t that interesting?  Our country is so made up of immigrants from all over and THAT is what we identify with.)

Anyway, we told the congregation our family heritages and then sat down.  I didn’t understand why Brett had us do this until he related it to identity in Christ.  If I were to ask you right now “Who are you?” what would you say?  Would you define who you are based on your profession?  Your beauty?  Wealth?  Status?  I have to ask myself these questions.  Or better yet, who/what am I allowing to define me?  Society’s standards for who a woman should be/look like/say/do?  Do I dwell on negative words spoken over me by any friends or people in my life?  I realized that for me, the culprit of who I see myself as is defined by envy and comparison.  I let envy eat away at me as I compare myself to other people.  Not just physically, but spiritually.

How much do I allow myself to be defined by how God sees me?  Well, that’s difficult because I’m not sure how He sees me sometimes.  I realized on Sunday that I have been believing something different than I have been saying to other people.  I have always said that “God forgives your sins and they are as far as the east is from the west” and that “God loves you so much; more than your mind can even comprehend!” and yet, I realized that I haven’t even been believing this for myself.  He really does forgive me for all of the awful things I have done and thought?  He really does think about me all throughout the day and is excited for His plans for me?

We received a sheet of paper that is addressed as a letter to you from God.  Under each sentence, it references the verse of the Bible it is from.  I want to write out a few of these sentences.  If you want the verses, just let me know.

My child,

You may not know me, but I know everything about you.

I am familiar with all your ways.

You were made in my image.

You are my offspring.

I knew you even before you were conceived.

I chose you when I planned creation.

You were not a mistake, for all your days are written in my book.

I am not distant and angry, but am the complete expression of love.

And it is my desire to lavish my love on you.

I offer you more than your earthly father ever could.

Every good gift that you receive comes from my hand.

My plan for your future has always been filled with hope.

My thoughts toward you are countless as the sand on the seashore.

I will never stop doing good to you.

If you seek me with all your heart, you will find me.

I am your greatest encourager.

One day I will wipe away every tear from your eyes.

In Jesus, my love for you is revealed for He is the exact representation of my being.

I am for you, not against you.

And I am not counting your sins.

Love,

God

Once I learn to fully accept God’s love, I think then I will be able to define myself based on how He sees me.  I am no longer going to value myself based on the world, or whether I am being pursued by a guy or not, or whether I have a boyfriend (which hasn't really happened...ever-ish. I am learning to be more and more thankful for this everyday by the way).  I am handing all of this over into God's hands and placing my trust in Him.  I want my identity to be in Him.  I am a beloved daughter of Christ.  So awesome.

Well I guess that wasn’t as short as I thought it would be, but hopefully it was sweet.  And I hope it encourages you as much as it encouraged me.

Sending you a big fat hug from Africa!

Britt

Learning, growing, new friendsing, and other 'ings

Sorry, this post is long overdue!  I am going to attempt to update you all on the latest and greatest of this past week of my life in this wonderful place.

Let's see, ok as far as classes go, I am finally getting the hang of everything.  I am learning so much here.  My Life and Teaching of Jesus class is already rocking my world and the way that I view Jesus.  I gave a 45 minute seminar discussion with a small group today for that class regarding the controversies surrounding the birth of Jesus and his virginal conception (got an A too if I might add!) and it was just so interesting.  I love everything that I’m learning in that class.

On our biology field trip to a nature preserve last week, we had a poop spitting contest. I am not kidding.  We each put a little pellet of dried buck dropping in our mouth to see who could spit it the farthest (our teacher told us that lots of people here do this, so we didn’t feel too weird…)  I didn’t win the contest I might add. But it was an interesting experience.  And I’m not too tempted to do it again.

Saturday we went to Durban to visit an Indian marketplace (we stuck out an uncomfortable amount) but I met a few really great people.  One was a 19-year-old named Nadia who is married, has a 2-year-old child, and co-owns a shop with her husband and uncle.  It was interesting to hear about how she thinks arranged marriages are great and it was also interesting to note that most arranged marriages work out well, she says, while 50% of marriages in the US end in divorce.  This I just cannot understand.

We also spent the day at the beach, swimming in the Indian Ocean.  The water was warmer than the Pacific, but not by a lot.  Probably because winter is just ending here.  Shark Week prepared me to die of a Great White attack, but that didn’t happen.  Also, I am infamous for getting stung by jellyfish everywhere I go, but by the grace of God I didn’t step on one of the many jellyfish that had washed up on shore.  That could have put a damper on the day.

my beautiful chalet-mates

On Sunday I went to the church that our director, Reg, goes to.  It. was. phenomenal.  It was different than any church I’ve ever been to before.  I loved it because it didn’t have a set structure that they were afraid of straying away from.  I get so sick of the same structured 15 minutes of worship, then the pastor gives the message with 3 bullet points, then we all pray, then we worship a little bit more.  This was so far from that.  It really felt like they just let the Holy Spirit lead the service and addressed anything that they felt they were being called to do.  I was convicted of some things during the service as my prayer was “Less of me, more of You.”  I am trying to put this into action now.

Also on Sunday, I made new friends!  I got to know some great people from the church who are around my age and we totally hit it off. (Carrie, Lara, Brett, Gina, James, and Kay, I love you all already!)  We decided that seeing each other once a week on Sunday wasn’t going to be enough if we wanted to be “real friends” so they came and visited AE (where we are staying) on Sunday and I am waiting for them right now to come visit again.  We are having a blast learning about each other’s cultures.  First of all, their accents are BEAUTIFUL.  And surprisingly, they think that our accents are cool too (I don’t know why).  We found that we like a lot of the same music such as Muse, David Crowder Band, MuteMath, and Jon Foreman.  I am learning some of their slang and I am teaching them my abbrevs (totes presh, perf, bt dubs, etc).  And we are all friends on Facebook now so that basically makes us real friends, right?

I am on the Birthday Committee here and today is one of my favorite chalet-mate’s birthday J wonderful Janelle Yoder!  She is 21 and we surprised her by decorating the chalet with balloons and streamers, had Brett K and Calvin serenade her with guitars and bongo drums outside her window, and brought her breakfast in bed. We have more surprises coming later… I hope she doesn’t read this.  Love you Janelley!

We are continuing to visit service sites where we will be serving everyday for one month at the end of our time here.  There are five sites to choose from and we have visited three so far.  Please be praying for me as I consider which site to serve at.  I want to be able to pour my heart out into it.

I am so at peace here.  I am completely my weird self here and I have a little too much fun.  Music videos will probably be coming soon, so look out world.

I see God everywhere here.  Everything about Africa is beautiful.

Sending you love from SA,

Britt


ps. I may or may not have just thrown a live frog into a classroom through a window while they were talking about messing with animal spirits.  I mean, I had some help with this.  Be proud, Mom and Dad.

Schoolwork? meh

So.  I sort of forgot that I'm in South Africa to do school work too.  16 units worth to be exact.  Classes started on Monday and it has been quite the shift for me to get used to.


Luckily, my classes are AWESOME.  First up, Biology (Humans and the Environment).  This class is going to be great because we go on extra field trips that no one else gets to go on every Thursday from 8am - 4pm.  Holler!  Life and Teachings of Jesus course is going to be so so great.  Reg, the head director who is quite possibly the sweetest person I've ever met, is the instructor and I know this class is going to blow me away.  Intercultural Communications is going to be surprisingly interesting I think.  The prof is really engaging and I think I'll learn a lot from it.  History and Culture of South Africa has technically been going on for a while now.  Our trips around SA count as part of our coursework.  And finally, my Intro to Zulu, 0 units course is quite entertaining.  There are 3 "clicks" that they use in Zulu.  I have 2 of them down, but when I try to do one of them I sound like a dummy.  I will work on it.


Today we visited one of the service sites that we have the opportunity to work with during our service time.  It was called Gateway and was a woman's shelter and school.  I loved it!  We even got to see some of the kids for a little bit which was amazing.  They love foreigners and can hardly wrap their minds around people coming to them from an airplane.  I am going to pray about being a part of this service site!


Besides schoolwork, everything is still amazing here.  "Tea time" has become one of my favorite parts of the day.  We have tea twice a day, mid morning and mid afternoon.  I am more of a coffee person myself but am learning to love and appreciate a hot cup of red tea (which I like better than dark tea).


Also, can I just say that I have the best chalet-mates in the world? (Chalets=our "cabins")  Tonight the 6 of us stargazed, ate hazelnut chocolate from Switzerland (thanks Kristina), and LAUGHED.  Oh man I laughed tonight.  I haven't laughed that hard in a long time.  The people on this trip are so dang amazing. I am so thankful for them and that they understand my weird personality/sense of humor, or at least they do a good job of faking it.  I LOVE THEM.


Still no sign of zebras nearby, but today as I was doing homework by the waterfall, 2 impala walked by. So awesome.  If you don't know what that is, then google it baby!


OH also, some of you have asked about my ankle.  It is doing a lot better!  I don't wear a brace at all now unless I need to walk long distances.  Long distances still are pretty difficult... but I will get there!  I am keeping my ankle flexible so that it will heal quickly.  Thank you for your prayers!


On Sunday I went to a small church made up of almost all Indians (people from India).  It was an interesting dynamic and was a great experience!  The people were very welcoming. We got plenty of hugs.  Oh I learned that in Africa, people don't really have personal bubbles. I realized this when I was at church.  A lady I met shook my hand and then proceeded to stand very close to me while rubbing my hand during our whole conversation.  This didn't particularly bother me but it was a little weird until I realized that pretty much all cultures are like this except our own.  Even when I was walking out of church, people were really close behind me basically breathing down my neck and kind of pushing me out of the way.  This had nothing to do with them being rude at all!  See, most of the people here grow up in homes with one bedroom, or just one room in general, where all members of the family live.  They HAVE no personal bubbles.  I'm going to have to get used to this but I think it's kind of neat.


I pray that I keep my eyes on God's kingdom while I'm here.  In chapel on Sunday, Reg asked whose kingdom we are here for: ours our God's.  I hope and pray that I continue to seek to further God's kingdom while I'm here.


If you'd like to write a letter to me I would LOVE that!!!!!!   Even if it's just a small hello :) It's nice to get a little piece of home.  The address is...

P.O. Box 13870, Cascades 3202

Pietermaritzburg, Kwazulu-Natal 

South Africa

But don't send anything past November because I probably won't get it.  It takes a few weeks for stuff to get here.

Grace and Peace,

Britt

ps.

ps to the last post.


Mom, you wanted to see a picture of a monkey, well they are EVERYWHERE. I watched this stinker steal that apple from a poor girl as she was walking to her chalet.  Idiot.

They are kind of cute in their own way... But I will soon hate them I'm sure.

:)

Is this real life?

Hello world!!!

I have not only made it safely to South Africa, but I am officially in LOVE with it.  Like, I would consider marrying S. Africa if it were up for it.  Ok well I will attempt to fill you in on the last few days of pure glory...

The flight to Africa = LONG.  We were on planes for about 18 hours. I was worried about being comfortable with my long legs / healing ankle but somehow I got relocated to a seat that had extra leg room so I was able to stretch out and be much more comfortable.  I was separated from everyone else in the group but I was A-ok with that because I would not have been able to handle that ridiculous flight otherwise.  ps. South Africa Airlines food is incredible!  The weird man next to me ate all 3 of the meals like he hadn't eaten in 5 weeks though.  It was amusing.

Then we arrived in Johannesburg and stayed in a hotel that night, spent the next day traveling around Jo-burg and then spent one more night there.  Joburg is like the LA of South Africa.  It was very busy, crowded and did not look at all African-y.  I swear I thought I was still in Cali...

Ok so in Joburg we went to the Apartheid Museum so we could understand more about what this country has been through.  It was so powerful and such a beautiful place.  There has been so much discrimination here for so long and it wasn't until 1994 that this ended.  1994!!!  That is SO recent.  I think that's what hit me the hardest.  Blacks were treated so horribly for so long, being uprooted from their homes by force to make room for whites, and this ended so recently.  (By the way, in S. Africa, the term "black" means someone who is 100% black, "colored" refers to someone of mixed race of black and white, an "Indian" is someone from India or Asia, and "white" is white.)  It's difficult to describe all that I felt at this museum but it was an eye-opening experience to say the least.

We also visited the township of Soweto (an abbreviation for SOuthern WEstern TOwnship) and I LOVE this place.  The people are so so so welcoming.  As you drive by, they wave and smile at you as a way of saying "you are welcome here in our neighborhood."  And that's exactly what it felt like, a massively huge, closeknit neighborhood.  I felt so welcomed.  We ate lunch at a woman's house (it is a restaurant by day) and it was tastyyyyy.  Chicken and rice are pretty much at every meal, which I approve 100% of.

SO FUNNY: the kids of Soweto (who I had to do everything in my power not to steal one) will run up to you and yell "Shoot me! Shoot me!" which means "Take a picture of me!"  I'm glad our tour guide warned us about this phrase beforehand or else someone could have gotten hurt hahhaha

Also, we ran into some local South African boys and I asked them if they think our American accents are ugly and they politely replied, yes.

So then, the best part of all......... TODAY we arrived in Pietermaritzburg at our campus.  I don't even know how to describe this to you.  Let me attempt to describe this place.... Absolute Perfection.  It is without a doubt the most beautiful place I have ever been in my entire life!  OUR campus!  There are rolling green hills, flowers, MONKEYS, waterfalls, rivers, fresh white buildings, ah I could go on for hours.  Reg, the sweetest man in charge of our S. African semester, says that calls from here to Heaven are local, and he could not be more right.  This place is my Heaven.

I requested to room with Kristina, my roomie from home.  You are placed in little 4 bedroom cabins, called chalets.  However, Kristina and I were split up........ soon to find out that we both have our own rooms alone right across the hall from each other!  This is wonderful because then we won't have to worry about waking anyone up because we have our own room!  Not everyone has their own room, most have a roommate.

Oh ok and, this is the greatest, my room has the MOST beautiful view out of all of the rooms in the whole place (I am not the only one who thinks this, it's in agreement with all).  I am on the 2nd story and my window looks out over the waterfall and green valley/cliffs.  Is this place real?!?!?  I am sitting here in my room typing, listening to Jack Johnson with the sound of water rushing in the background.  Wow, thank you thank you Lord!  His Creation is so beautiful.

Ok one last funny story and then I have to go to bed.  Today we went to the mall down the street, which is just like any mall in the US, and first of all, we stick out a LOT.  From the way we dress to the way we talk, people glance at us politely out of curiosity.  Well, as we were walking through the mall, there were so many people walking towards us and we had to keep swerving to stay out of their way and we were like What's the deal?!  Well, I soon realized that we were walking on the right side of the walkway through the mall; everything in S. Africa is backwards!  They drive on the LEFT side of the road! Once we realized this we felt so stupid and then started cracking up and felt bad at how rude we must have looked.


Anyways, to say the least I am loving it here!  I will update more soon :)

So much love,
Britt