The Elder’s have landed and did it with style. After a long journey we arrived into Cape Town on the 4th and Olivia introduced the Elder’s to the South African customs inspectors by promptly throwing up while waiting in their line. Hi, nice to meet y’all, we’re from Tennessee.
She rallied though and we all have recovered. So we are here and absorbing all that is new and all that is foreign. We have gotten such a head start thanks to the unbelievable network of support that is in place here through our friends with Living Hope. So in the past week we have been able to do a lot. We are getting settled in our new house, have gotten our basic communication setup (no internet yet), have been able to feed ourselves, have re-learned how to drive a manual transmission and learned how to do it on the other side of the road, have been able to get ourselves around as needed and of course have found the beaches.
What hasn’t happened though is the full reality of what we have done. There is still a very surreal feeling to the fact that our family is now living at the bottom of the African continent with so many friends and family so far away. It is different yet there is such a level of peace and comfort here. The natural surroundings are some of the most beautiful in the world and you can’t help but feel like you are living in a paradise. Yet, the occasional visitor at your gate asking for food and money, the hundreds of people you pass while driving who are walking to and from who knows where, the township of thousands just across the street dealing with poverty, disease and drugs and the people at intersections looking for a handout all beckon you back to a reality that is very present. I am keenly aware of it all now because it is not like the bubble world I just came from, but I can’t help and wonder if I will ever let it just become another part of the background. Will I stop seeing the individual with the dreads, the tattoo, the blue shirt and brown shorts and just start seeing a generic human form at the corner? There is so much need in the midst of so much excess and I am sure that it will happen on certain days and at certain times, but my hope and prayer is that God will always allow me to see beyond the shadow to the beauty and worth that resides in us all.
So with each new day new experiences are following. The girls will start school next week on the 16th and there is excitement and nervousness building with that. We are working to buy a car and quickly learning a new reality from the oversized gas guzzling behemoths that are so common to us in the States. We are walking through the processes of banking, establishing needed services and new cultural norms that are uniquely South African. So much to learn and so much to be excited about!
But we couldn’t do all this without your continued prayers, words of encouragement and support and we thank you from the bottom of our hearts. We are so blessed by the immense network of people who are on this journey with us both locally here in SA and all across the globe. While we may be far away we do not feel alone.
Tate
Here are a few pictures so far and many more to come.
She rallied though and we all have recovered. So we are here and absorbing all that is new and all that is foreign. We have gotten such a head start thanks to the unbelievable network of support that is in place here through our friends with Living Hope. So in the past week we have been able to do a lot. We are getting settled in our new house, have gotten our basic communication setup (no internet yet), have been able to feed ourselves, have re-learned how to drive a manual transmission and learned how to do it on the other side of the road, have been able to get ourselves around as needed and of course have found the beaches.
What hasn’t happened though is the full reality of what we have done. There is still a very surreal feeling to the fact that our family is now living at the bottom of the African continent with so many friends and family so far away. It is different yet there is such a level of peace and comfort here. The natural surroundings are some of the most beautiful in the world and you can’t help but feel like you are living in a paradise. Yet, the occasional visitor at your gate asking for food and money, the hundreds of people you pass while driving who are walking to and from who knows where, the township of thousands just across the street dealing with poverty, disease and drugs and the people at intersections looking for a handout all beckon you back to a reality that is very present. I am keenly aware of it all now because it is not like the bubble world I just came from, but I can’t help and wonder if I will ever let it just become another part of the background. Will I stop seeing the individual with the dreads, the tattoo, the blue shirt and brown shorts and just start seeing a generic human form at the corner? There is so much need in the midst of so much excess and I am sure that it will happen on certain days and at certain times, but my hope and prayer is that God will always allow me to see beyond the shadow to the beauty and worth that resides in us all.
So with each new day new experiences are following. The girls will start school next week on the 16th and there is excitement and nervousness building with that. We are working to buy a car and quickly learning a new reality from the oversized gas guzzling behemoths that are so common to us in the States. We are walking through the processes of banking, establishing needed services and new cultural norms that are uniquely South African. So much to learn and so much to be excited about!
But we couldn’t do all this without your continued prayers, words of encouragement and support and we thank you from the bottom of our hearts. We are so blessed by the immense network of people who are on this journey with us both locally here in SA and all across the globe. While we may be far away we do not feel alone.
Tate
Here are a few pictures so far and many more to come.
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