first steps!

Well, Hello there! The last few days have been days filled with joy, laughter, and just silly things.

Sunday was probably the best day of my whole life thus far. If the Lord had me fly all the way to Africa just to experience that one day, it would have been well worth it. Sunday was the day that one of "my" boys stood up and took his first steps to me on his own. This boy was severely malnourished when he came to Beautiful Gate and so he has been a bit behind developmentally. Since I have been here, I have been working with him a lot to get him to start walking. On the weekends I usually don't go to see the kids since we have church and usually other errands to run, but this Sunday I really felt like I should just go pop in my house to say hello. When I stepped in my house all the kids were sitting and playing and then my house mom came in the room and said something to the boy in Sesotho. After that, he stood up where he was and took 6 steps to me!! I couldn't believe it! The whole time he had a huge smile on his face and was so proud of himself! I stood him up again and took a few steps back and he walked to me again! I was just so happy and proud I just sat and hugged him and cried for a while. I love that he always hugs me back. :) I love that the house mom was so excited for me to see him walk. I love that I knew the Lord was smiling down at that moment. Also, this little boy is probably THE most handsome child I have every seen, seriously.

The next thing is not so much joyful but just kind of a funny experience. A couple days ago Bryan and I had to go back to the immigration office which is where I originally had gotten my visa to stay here. Bryan was explaining to me how the immigration offices didn't keep track of who they gave out visas to and realized that they should probably have done that. (good one Lesotho :) So everyone that had more than a 90 day visa had to re-register just to kind of say "Hey, I am chillin in your country!" When we got there they took us right into the back office and the lady helped up right away. She took our passports and wrote down our name and occupation and stuff on a printed out sheet of paper with lines on it that said "USA" at the top in handwriting that was hardly readable. I chuckled to myself thinking that it would be so much faster and efficient on a computer. There were 3 other ladies in the room and none of them were working. They were just chatting it up and talking on their phones. I began to wonder if they even worked there. The lady that was helping us then turned over our passports and started smearing glue on the back of our passports with the end of a spoon. At that point I was just confused and wondering why she was using the back of a spoon to smear glue. They then stuck on a piece of paper that said "Lesotho Immigration" with a stamp. That whole time I was watching her I just kept thinking that if this was America, this would not be happening. The US government would not just forget to keep the information of the people they gave visas to. I would not be coming to a shady office/storage room with 4 ladies just sitting around chatting it up. They would not glue a piece of paper to the back of my passport. It was just rather comical from my perspective and I just kept thinking...TIA (this is africa:)

I learned something about myself. I never want to be famous. Whenever I am behind my house to hang up laundry, there is always people from the community walking by outside the fence just a few feet away. Since white (especially blond) people are so rare in Lesotho people will often just stop when they see me and either just stare for a bit and move on or try and talk to me (which never gets far since my Sesotho is limited). I used to keep my curtains open most of the day but I have had it too many times where I am stuffing my face with food or dancing around the room to my music and there is people walking by outside the window just watching me. Talk about...awkward. Last week there was a group of kids walking home from school that had stopped by my house while I was out and they all took turns yelling, "Lumela!" and then hiding behind their friends when I looked over and start giggling. It gave me a little chuckle that the color of my hair and skin was really the only thing getting me this attention. Just kind of crazy to think about. :) I have also had it twice now where people have asked me for a job. Both times it was a mother who had one or two children with her. I didn't really know what to say or if they could even understand what I was saying. I was sure to let them know I would pray for them and for a job to turn up for them. Who knew you could make so many new friends while doing laundry?!

Prayer Requests:
-Please keep the funding for Beautiful Gate in your prayers as that area has been a bit of a struggle this month.
-One of the girls from my house has a really nasty wound on her thumb so just prayers that that would not bring her too much pain and would heal quickly
-Thanks for warmer weather...WOOHOO
-There was supposed to be an adoption ceremony this week but the mother never showed up. So just pray that they would be able to find a time to reschedule.
-Energy for me to be able to keep up with these crazy kids :)