It is so easy to forget how amazing our Father is and to take Him, His power, and even His creation of granted. Dad has been doing such amazing things through the Fulani People of West Africa and I am so glad to be a small part of the work He is doing here. It was the Fulani who spread Is.lam across most of Northern and West Africa, so it is my yarper that they will do the same with the J.C. way.
It is interesting to see how the stories in the Word apply more directly to the Fulani and that they understand them better than we often do because their culture is MUCH closer to the way it was back then than ours is. I told the parable of the lost sheep and they were nodding their heads soaking it all in, the parable had a more direct application to their lives than it ever could to mine. I saw a lady pouring grain from one bowl to another so that the wind would catch the chaff and blow it away...it just amazed me to think how directly applicable the Word is to the daily lives of the Fulani. I never had really thought about the passage that talks about sorting the goats from the sheep before...I was picturing fat fluffy white sheep and skinny goats, but here they look almost the same. Having grown up on a farm I was so embarrassed when I was talking about a goat and was corrected, it was a sheep! The only way I have figured out how to tell the difference is to look at the tail, a goat tail goes up and a sheep tail goes down.
One day Cheryl and I were visiting a village with another M. and we were going from courtyard to courtyard talking to people having a good old time. Anyway the last compound that we went to there was a young woman who was deaf. We were asking cultural questions like what does a woman find to be good looking in a man and visa versa (apparently big foreheads and small noses are all the rage here). Somehow, I have no idea how it came up, but one of the women suggested that I should marry the deaf woman and take her back to America with me. Cheryl immediately cocked her hip and started wagging her finger in a “I don’t even think so” fashion that apparently got the point across that she was not too keen on the idea. The lady sounded shocked and said “you two are married?” in an oh-so innocent manner...but what followed was the shocker... “well, she could be your second wife”. Cheryl, who had still not regained composure, let her know that this was not an acceptable idea. It was really quite amusing to see Cheryl in defense mode, all bristled up, I think she might have actually bared her teeth! We then explained that followers of the J.C. way believe that a man is to only have one wife, so it ended up being a good opportunity to talk about The Man. Meanwhile another women who could somehow communicate with the deaf girl relayed what was going on and the deaf girl replied with “I would take him”. I was really embarrassed, but it makes a good story right?
I was invited to go to a farm party recently, I knew that if I was invited that I was either obligated to come or to give money. I decided that my work was worth more than my money and that they probably just asked me thinking I would give money, so I wanted to surprise them. I woke up early, really early, got dressed and went to the farm. Most of the men were already there working away. I was given a tool and I started working the soil (luckily a couple of days before a friend showed me how to use the contraption). Everyone cracked up at me working in the field, they thought that it was so funny to see a white person doing manual labor. I think it was the first time that they had seen such a thing. The kept coming to check on my progress and I think were surprised to see that I was working just as fast as they were. I worked for about three hours and then I was completely exhausted. I went and told the owner of the farm that I was tired and that I was going to leave. The men all checked my hands to make sure that I did not have any blisters then I was on my way back. I heard a shout from behind me and saw the owner of the farm hustling to catch up with me. He wanted to walk me back, I had no idea why until we reached his house and he had me to sit down. When he had me sit I realized that he was going to feed me since I had helped him out. I was hoping that there was some way to avoid this, but it was inevitable. Eating here is a weird thing. Shyness is a trait that is highly desirable here, so typically you do not eat in front of other people because that is rude, but parties are the exception. The food here is not exactly tasty. That day it turned out that we were going to have a dish that was crushed up millet that was cooked down until it became a rubbery yet grainey/gritty consistency and a soup. Well, eating is done with your right hand only, no utensils. The millet paste was to be dipped into the soup and then shoveled into the mouth. I made my ball of millet paste by rolling it in my hand and then dipped it into the sticky yet slimy soup and crammed it into my mouth. I had never had this particular kind before, but the soup is made from the leaves of the Boabab tree (the one that the baboon Rafiki lived in in the movie Lion King) and a hot pepper. To say the least I did not care for the food, but so as not to be rude I swallowed with a smile on my face and went for another round. My friend asked me why I was taking such small bites... I explained that I was not really used to eating with my hands. After my third ball I was hoping that I had eaten enough to satisfy my friend, but nope, he insisted I eat more. By this time my body was trying to reject this slimy rubbery food and I was yarping for grace. I choked down a couple more balls, still smiling, even though there were tears forming in the corners of my eyes. I then said that I was full, he looked very surprised. He then got up and brought me the second course, I was dreading this until I saw that it was Rogo. I like Rogo, it is a root that they cook over open coals. It taste kind of like a baked potato, so I ate a little bit of the rogo and then he encouraged me to eat a little more and then something else, I do not even remember what it was that he offered. Finally we finished eating, I was happy! I then went back to where we were staying, exhausted. A few hours later people were over visiting and I was trying to relate my experience in Fulfulde. I was in the middle of telling the story when everyone there cracked up laughing and I was so confused. The M then related to me that I had conjugated my verb incorrectly and said that I was giving birth instead of saying that was working on a farm. I just laughed with everyone else and decided to phrase it differently in the future.
Cheryl has already discussed the baby naming ceremony, but I just wanted to add my perspective since I was outside with the men and the ladies were inside. We basically just sat around and talked until they sacrificed the goat then everyone took their piece of the goat and went home.
We recently decided that we need a teindere (A porch like shaded area in front of the house)...all of our neighbors have one and it is so much cooler to sleep outside. So we started building one. First we went to the lumber yard...a woodsy area where you select what trees you want and they cut them for you. Then we purchased grass mats, wire, and rope. Then we hired a man to build it and I helped him out. All in all it was a very long drawn out process, but the end product is very worth our while because we can sleep outside in privacy and have shade and a breeze at the same time. It also gives us a place to hang our laundry and to keep our “fridge” (a huge clay pot filled with water that is about 70º F instead of 90-100ºF...the the water evaporates through the clay cooling the contents a little) Our neighbors said that it was a very nice tiendere and that it is very Fulani of us to have one.
(This picture is of grain storage units. This time of the year is a really hard time for the Fulani. Their grain supply is depleted, and their new crops are not yet ready to harvest. Yarp for them as they are experiencing hunger and have no money to buy food until they can sell their crops.)
There was a conference in our town that was to help encourage our brothers and sisters. A group came from Texas to lead the training and translators worked with them to keep communication up and going. It was incredible! The point of the whole conference was to encourage our brothers and sisters to be more willing to share their beliefs with their people. Yarp that this conference will help our brothers and sisters to be bold and that it might be the start of a C.P.M.
We also ask that you Yarp for our ESL classes. We are yarping that this will be a great opportunity to share the love of our Father. One of our students is a Fulani woman who just walked up to us one day and started talking to us. She invited us to come over to her house, so we did. We told her that we were going to teach English and she was very interested, She went into her house and came back out with two very worn books. One book was a book that taught French speakers how to speak English and the other was a French Bible. We were quite excited to see that! We asked if she was a follower and she said that she was not, but that she believed that the Good Book is truth. We believe that she is a woman of peace and we yarp that God might make her to be a Lydia (from the Good Book, not from SBU).
