seals and rugby

these past few weeks nothing too terribly exciting has happened... just homework and papers and reading and papers and more papers, ugh! but hey, life is still good and i'm loving it here at cornerstone! let's see if i can try and update you on what has gone on so far: 2 weekends ago me, naomi and laine went shopping ALL day long. seriously, after that day, i dont think i ever want to go shopping again. we spent close to 6 hours at the mall because that was the only times we could get rides and none of us are big shoppers... lol i'm pretty sure we were dead by the time chez came to pick us up. but it was a blast hanging out with them, they are 2 of the greatest girls and i feel so blessed to know them! afterwards chez and i got some supper and then just hung out and talked. oh, i forgot to mention, on friday night we went to a rugby game! ok, so honestly, i really wasn't that excited about it because i am bored to death by football and heard that rugby is very similar to it but my expectations were totally blown out of the water!! we went with two of the guys from cornerstone and had such a fun time! if i can get pics from someone i will put them up here... its quite an intense game! sunday was church day as we went both in the morning and the evening (i must admit, the evening service is way better than the morning service but they're both still fun). on monday (which is our free day) Basil, pronounced baaa (like the sheep) -zil, our driver took us all around the cape point where we stopped at camps bay, hout bay, seal island, and cape point (plus many other places that i cant remember). when we got to seal island we hopped on a boat and went for about a 1/2 hour boat ride until we reached an island completely covered in seals! there had to have been at least 300 or so seals on this tiny little island, sunbathing and swimming all day long. while i was hanging off the boat admiring the seals i whipped out my camera hoping to catch a few action shots of the seals jumping into the water. sadly, as i was doing this i accidentally threw my sunglasses into the water! lol it was actually kinda funny but i was a little sad cuz they were real cute sunglasses and i bought them at such a bargain (only $4!!)! so after taking about 50 pictures of seals we headed back and finished up our tour of the cape point. the scenery was absolutely breath-taking. wow, God has done some amazing work out here! i would love to write more but i have been sitting here procrastinating for quite some time and realized i only have 2 hours left to finish my paper, ahhhhh!!

Going back to my first love

last night i was laying in bed, moping and being somewhat bitter about not having a date or even a cute guy around for today, a.k.a. valentine's day. i turned off the lights, though not even that tired, and put on my mp3 player, hoping it would help me fall asleep. as i do many nights of the week before going to bed, i turn on one of my favorite songs, "first love" by kirk franklin. laying there, it dawned on me just how selfish and absolutely mad (sorry, south african term, it means crazy) i was being. so often we look to physical, worldly things and humans to satisfy us, yet can they ever REALLY satisfy us as Jesus can?! Can they really solve our problems and make us feel truly loved? i would contest not. After coming out of a year and a half relationship that wasn't anything close to being Godly, part of the lyrics hit me like a brick wall:

You didn’t make it
You thought your love would last forever
Ain’t it funny how a chapter can make a story change
Cold and lonely, you never knew hurt could feel this way
Understand there’s a plan if you’re patient
Hear the savior say

God is able to heal if you listen
And He’ll show you His will if you listen
But you gotta be still and just listen, listen

Come back to your first love
Come back home, back where you belong
Come to your first love

though it's been almost 2 years since that relationship ended, i still am constantly learning from it. we need to come back to our FIRST love, the love of Jesus Christ, the REAL love because that is the only love that will truly satisfy our souls. Listening to that song led me to pray that God would teach me not to lean on the love of other human and other things but to lean on His love alone. i prayed that God would give me joy and happiness in being with him and in love with HIM on valentines day and that i would be totally content without having a guy on the side. He is so faithful! as Uncle Desmond constantly tells me, and he has been so good to me today on valentine's day. so i encourage everyone who reads this... don't get discouraged if you dont have a date for valentines day, because your first love is your valentine's date for the rest of your life!

new pics!

me and sharoneze!!

aunti sandra!

uncle desmond!

the view from the mountaintop... this is what naomi and i saw on our hike up this mountain/hill... absolutely beautiful!

an INCREDIBLE sunset at sea point (where we ate some INCREDIBLE ice cream as well!! :) )

my neighbor sinai, isn't she just adorable?!!

this was posted right before we entered the prison at robben island

me and chez at langabon

life is HECTIC!

i'm on my second week of school and i cannot believe how much work has already piled up. the work here is INTENSE. i have class tuesday through friday, one class on each day lasting from 9-3 (though most classes only go til 12 or 1, thankfully). We have packets upon packets of reading to do in each class (no books cuz its too expensive, so we just copy all the pages from the books and pretend its not illegal, hehe!) along with papers to write, exams to study for and presentations to prepare. and i thought bethel was hard! however, one person told me to look at it this way: we are here for 8 weeks of our life (for some students a bit longer but i think it still applies to me). in this 8 weeks the work will be hard and life will get crazy but in that time not only are you educating yourself on things of the world, you are intensly studying the word of God. you are here, immersing yourself in a world with other christians to go out and apply yourself to your society with a Christian worldview. is it not worth it to spend these 8 weeks getting the very best out of it that you can? these words were very encouraging to me and have helped to prepare me in the work ahead. i'm kinda bummed cuz i wont get to do the ministry that i was hoping to do (not only because of the work load but also because of transportation) but i know that i still have ministry within the household i'm living in and God can do a lot right where i'm at. please please please pray for my relationship with sharoneze and that i will be able to work in her life to bring her to a point where she wants to LIVE her life as a born again Christian and DESIRES to know God more. none of her friends are strong christians (that i know of) which makes it difficult for her to want that relationship with Christ. pray that i can be a light in her world and that she will listen and take in all that i can give her.
this past weekend for me was quite interesting. friday night i went to a 21st birthday party which HUGE!! no joke, 21st birthday parties here are like weddings... it is one of the biggest celebrations in south africa. me, uncle dez and auntie sandra drove about 45 minutes to this decked out hall with beautiful decorations, a massive amount of food, and a DJ. When they announced for Azalia to come in, she wore a beautiful white dress with a train (can you see how it reminded me of a wedding?!) and walked in with her cousin. the family all spoke and gave toasts to her, congratulating her on becoming a woman. unfortunately i really had no idea what they were saying cuz everyone spoke in afrikaans. but, all in all, it was still a pretty good night. on saturday, i hung out and talked with my brother and sister for most of the afternoon and then left to go spend the night at naomi and laines house. that night was great fun! we watched MADEA (ohhh i just love those movies!!) and laughed like no tomorrow, played a few board games and then took andre (their host brother) outside to jump in the rain puddles! (that was by far the best part!). later on, around midnight or so the power went off so we lit a bunch of candles and just sat around and talked in the candlelight. me, jill and mike went to bed about 4:30 whereas laine, naomi and andre didnt go to bed til 7!! needless to say, we had planned on hiking up table mountain that morning but weren't able to make it. fortunately, the guy who was going to bring us up never called us back anyway so it probably wouldn't have happened. sunday we had a huge lunch which was super good. i worked on homework, well, tried to work on homework, the rest of the day. not much else to say, pretty much just been consumed by work :( tomorrow is valentine's day so tonight i'm gonna help sharoneze get ready by blowing out her hair and straightening it so that should be fun! i just found out that if we dont wear red at school tomorrow they are gonna charge us 2 rand! lol, thats pretty clever if you ask me. i'll let you know if i get a date :D haha! love, melissa

uncle desmond

my host dad is freaking hilarious, oh my gosh. here's a few entertaining stories for you:

#1: the night of auntie sandra's birthday, after everyone had left, a man came up to our door begging for money. auntie sandra was there and telling him to leave. when he wouldn't leave, uncle desmond started shouting, "what is that man doing begging at 12 o clock at night? tell him to leave sandra or else i'll make him leave!" when he wouldn't leave uncle desmond ran to the back of the house and came out with a HUGE machete! he ran up to the gated door, waving the machete at the man, saying "you need to leave now! get out of here!" i was trying so hard not to laugh but it was quite a funny sight to behold.

#2: on saturday night after our day at the beach, i was walking out of the shower and into the kitchen when uncle desmond walked in, looked at me and said, "whats up my nigger?!" lol, i dont think i have ever laughed so hard in my life, which caused him and and auntie sandra to start laughing too. here is this 60 year old man saying something that, in america is almost taboo, while to him it's no big deal. he asked me, "hasn't anyone ever called you a nigger before?" i told him no and that made him laugh even more. so now he jokes with me all the time about calling me a nigger and saying that i'm no longer a whitey. lol, i absolutely love this guy.

the best weekend EVER!

this weekend has seriously rocked. on friday i went to orientation for, well, about 1/2 hour and then skipped out on the rest...ooops, my bad. but it was SO boring and all they were doing was teaching you how to write a research paper and i've definitely done that before so i just went to the computers instead :) afterwards, me, naomi and sarah met up with joelle, who is a student at Cornerstone and went over to her house for lunch. Joelle is SUCH a cool lady. She came over from england about 4 years ago to be a missionary in south africa. she has started up an amazing soccer ministry for girls but has decided to take a year off for school. however, she is still coaching one soccer team, which is something she is very passionate about. she has a foster daughter named Odi who really wants to come to America to study and play soccer... and marry an African American man, lol. personally i think the african men here are way cuter but that's another story... so anyways, joelle took me and the other girls to The Arc, which is a homeless shelter run completely by the homeless. it is a HUGE complex with around 2000 people living there. There is a range of all types of people, young and old, families, single parents, teenagers, young children and babies. Sadly, for the kids who are here with no parents, no one can adopt them because somewhere, they have parents that are living. this means that these kids are living completely on their own with no loving parents to take care of them on a day to day basis. however, everything that is needed is provided at the Arc. There is a school, cafeteria, beds, showers, etc. but none of it can compare to a nice home. i would highly doubt anyone there gets any real privacy. despite all this, the kids were extremely happy and greeted us with open arms. so many of the kids just craved for attention, jumping into our arms at every opportune moment. we also got to me some of the older girls who joelle has recruited for soccer. oh, i should also mention that the arc is in kyalietsha, which is a poor township about 45 minutes outside of cape town. i really hope to come back and continue volunteering with joelle as much as i can! after leaving the arc we headed deeper into kyalietsha to visit one of the girls on joelle's soccer team who had just had a baby. this girl was probably about 16 years old. we pulled up on a sandy road and walked a few feet up to her house. the homes in the townships are very much like mexico's poor areas: small shacks made of tin, usually with only 2-3 rooms inside. walking in we were greeted with a hug and kiss by the mother who was so sweet! we met the 16 year old and her baby as well, who was absolutely beautiful. there was also another girl living with them who had just moved in recently. the mother of the house found her alongside the road all alone with no family anywhere in sight. the amazing woman that she is, she took her in as one of her own and the young girl (about 8-9 years old) has now been living with them for several months. i tried talking with her but i dont think she spoke any english, only xhosa. but that didn't matter, i just smiled at her and she stretched out her arms and i held her for the entire time we were there. it reminded me so much of mexico and how love has no barriers. you dont need to speak the same language or enjoy the same things in life to love someone, it just comes from your heart. this young girl was also an awesome dancer! the mother of the house told her to show us some of her dances and WHOA, the girl jumped from my arms and brought down the house!! it was so cute cuz as soon as she finished her dance we all clapped and she got so embarrassed that she would run over to me and hide her fance in my legs and then reach up with her arms, asking to be held again. out of the entire day, she is the thing i will remember the most. her beautiful smile and laugh and her loving heart. i've gotta make it back there too. once the day was done with joelle, she brought me back home just in time to help prepare for my host mom's BIG 55th birthday party. and i thought the day was almost over... there was food everywhere and i helped to set up the tables and things. people started coming over around 6:30pm and didn't leave til around midnight!! they sure know how to party here! i met auntie dottie here who i will talk about later in the blog. we talked about her job (she works at the HIV/AIDS ward in the Red cross Hospital) and her foster daughter (who is 2 years old... auntie dottie is probably close to 70!). i didn't get to talk with her long but she definitely sounded like an amazing woman. she, along with the rest of the folks (there was probably close to 40 people there) were almost all from our church, Athlone Baptist. the rest of the night i helped auntie luverne (who is our neighbor and was hired by auntie sandra, my host mom, to clean the house and stay during the party and clean) wash dishes and clean up. chez, my host brother hung out with me the whole night as well, talking and helping to clean up (with a little push from me of course... but thats how all men are, hehe).

the next morning, saturday, we woke up at 7:30 to go to Langabon, which is a lagoon about 1 1/2 hours away. me, chez and uncle desmond drove together which was a lot of fun. on our way in we saw a baby tortise so of course, i had to jump out of the car, run to the turtle and touch it and take pictures of it, haha :) we got to the beach about 10 in the morning, had a little breakfast and then hung out. i met beth, a girl from oregon, who just got to south africa a week ago! it was so great to talk with her and we exchanged numbers so we will definitely hang out again soon. someone brought this kayak/surf board looking thing that i attempted to try and use. it is shaped just like a surf board but has a little dent for your butt and two littler dents for your feet and you have to balance and use a paddle to get yourself around. me and chez got a good laugh out of trying to use it... i think i fell out about 7 or 8 times before i finally got the hang of it! there were also quite a few house boats in the distance and so we snuck up on one that no one was in and dove off of the dock which was super fun! i layed on the beach for awhile more after that and then me and chez went for a walk on the beach... ok, so i know what you all are thinking... "hmmm, melissa sure is spending a lot of time with this chez boy"... NO! he is just a friend people, JUST a friend... but he is kinda cute ;) but for real, he's just a cool guy/brother to hang out with so dont worry, there is no future here! when we were taking our walk we saw sand sharks because the tide had risen and so they were swimming all around our feet, which kinda freaked me out a lil bit! the rest of the day we just ate, talked, swam some more and relaxed. unfortunately, i forgot about the power of the sun out here and didnt think to put sunblock on my back or my upper thighs... boy was i hurting that night!!! my back looked as red as a tomato! luckily, chez has connections to a pharmacist and so i got free stuff for my sunburn, woo hoo! on sunday we went to church, did homework and were just luming (afrikaans for hanging out/chilling). today, monday, i headed over to the red cross and got a grand tour from auntie dottie. if all works out, i will hopefully begin volunteering there next week! i hope you all are doing well back at home, i hear it's a little cold out there, shame :( lol. love you to bits! melissa

and the sickness finally kicked in...

my gosh it has been FOREVER since i've written on here! i hope i can remember everything we've done. i don't think tuesday was too eventful cuz i can't remember a thing from that day... i'll ask around and try to figure out what we did. wednesday we went to robben island! we took a 1/2 hour boat ride over to the island which gave us an incredible view of the ocean and city. about half way there a bird came up behind the boat where the motors were spewing out water at a high velocity (it would've been SO awesome to tube behind this boat, holy crap!), and tried to race us! however, it wasn't a very smart bird because it was going back and forth from one side of the boat to the other, barely missing the high waves that were just waiting to suck it in. sadly, the second time the bird tried to cross over he went too low and tumbled into the waves... lol, ok it may not sound funny but you really had to be there... it was quite a sight! anyways, onto the good stuff. arriving at robben island it was EXTREMELY HOT. i mean for real, it was probably in the 100's that day, whoo! we jumped onto a bus and took a tour of the island. we saw the limestone quarries where men had to work every day, monday through friday, no matter what the weather was like. there were no bathrooms and no shade except for one cave, which is where they would have their meals. it was brutal. inside the prison things weren't much better. there were absolutely no whites on this island, only coloureds, indians and blacks. no matter how bad a crime, whites were never put on the island. there was also a lot of discrimination on the island between the races. the lighter your skin, the better food and treatment you got. meaning indians were treated the best and black africans the worst. you were given a bucket with fresh water in the morning to use all day for washing your self and going to bathroom. this would sit in your cell overnight and then be washed in the morning. mandela used the same bucket for over 10 years. they could only get one visitor every 6 months and they had to be older than 16. english and afrikaans were the only languages that could be spoken so if you were a prisoner or visitor and didn't know those languages, you would sit across from each other... and not speak a word. all of the tour guides at robben island had, at one point in their lives, been prisoners on the island. our tour guide told us about his experience at the end. he was a political prisoner, thrown into jail for being a part of the ANC and trying end the injustices blacks and coloured faced every day in apartheid. for 5 months he was put in a holding cell, tortured and abused by the government who was trying to get information out of him. the last three months he was held in the cell completely naked. in order to get information out of him they would sit him on a chair and strap electrodes to his privates, shocking him over and over. this kind of abuse happened every day at any hour. when he told us about this, i was in complete shock. how could someone treat another human being like this... like an animal?! after those 5 excrutiating months he was brought to robben island where he was sentenced to a life prison. luckily, after 6 years he was released due to the end of apartheid. that was in 1992. now, 14 years later he as come back. not because he wanted to but because he had to. he was out of a job and out of money and needed to support his new family. please pray for his healing because we could tell that he still has a long way to go in the healing process. it was so heartbreaking to hear his story and the pain that he went through because i will never understand what it felt like to be in his position, or anyone else at robben island for that matter. it was a difficult place to go but also a place i will never forget. that day, unfortunately, was also the day that i started to get sick. so, for the next week i was stuck in bed and the toliets. it was not a pleasant experience though i have to say i felt a little guilty because i seemed to be such a wus compared to all the guys who suffered at robben island. but, eventually i started to get better and on saturday i took the taxis all by myself to the shopping center (which was quite the experience)! winding my way through the markets, i just inconspicuously (or so i thought) tried to follow people who looked like they were going shopping and finally found my destination. that night my family took me out to sea point and we watched the sunset on the beach and ate ice cream. it was so beautiful! i came prepared and whipped out two ziploc baggies and dragged sharoneze down onto the beach to look for shells in the dark... we found some pretty cool looking shells and even a few small sponges!! sunday was church and chilling with the family and feeling sick again :(. from monday to wednesday we had camp for the first year students which was a little scary but lots of fun. i had some great conversations on tuesday with a guy from Umtata and another guy from limpopo. it is such a blessing to have people at this college who are so fired up for Christ! it is definitely a totally different experience from what Bethel is like (and i'm loving it a whole lot more!). nothing else too exciting has been happening, just still working on a lot of homework that is due from our history on south africa course. today i'm going to an orphanage in kyalietsha with one of the ladies i met at camp so that should be tons of fun! last night was my host mom's birthday so they're throwing a huge party tonight, woo hooo! tomorrow me and my family and people from church are going to some lagoons to swim so it should be a hoppin' weekend! i hope you all are doing well. i miss you all so much!! continue to let God work in your life and please keep me in your prayers. love you all, melissa