Post Accident Gratitude

Hello from the warm heart of Africa,

I will start by following up on some of the happenings at the school since I lasted posted.

First and foremost I must give gratitude where I feel it is due. The Lord has blessed the students in what could be explained through physical science as amazing. When I left last week only two students remained in the hospital and they were reported to be improving. The student that I had recently come to agreements with returned to the village and was walking on his own, laughing, talking, eating, and joking, with a small amount of reasoning difficulty but even that was improving.

The most amazing thing for me was the harmonious way that the students responded to the whole situation. One of the students with extensive surface wounds came to my house and scolded me for not visiting him, no anger towards anyone else. I explained that I had gone to Lilongwe to ask for some prayers from family and he laughed and said that was better than a visit from me. I punished myself.

The punishment from the government was swift and three of the teachers at our school have been transferred to more remote schools. Two of the teachers were my favorite, one was my counterpart neighbor and best friend. They took it suprisingly well, though we did confront the Ministry people about whether they were punishing the teachers or the school. We went from 10 teachers for 170 kids to 5 teachers in less than a month. We lost all management personnel. The school is being run by a teacher who has been there five months.

The lack of teachers will require that we are going to be teaching a large number of topics and the students will end up missing a large amount of classes. Most likely the clubs and extra activities will slow down or stop. I may have to cut out some naps and afternoon TV shows. Little by little. The teachers that are remaining are really good people and there are some rumors that we may get one or two more teachers.

Tomorrow I head out to South Africa for a two week vacation. 24 hours by bus, 14 hours by rental car, to arrive in cape town, then we drive up the ocean coast and back for the return bus ride home. More later. Bye Matt