Posted in Musings

Today was our last day of homeschooling with the Irwins. It was a fun day spent closing out our history/social studies unit on Africa.

My co-teacher, Nicia, is an MK from Zimbabwe, Africa. Her dad, Jacob, and his wife Jaynie, flew in yesterday for a visit. Jacob and Jaynie are currently serving as missionaries in Mozambique, Africa. We looked at pictures and listened to them as they shared about Mozambique. I just love to hear missionaries share about their lives, especially when they are from a totally different place.

I learned a lot about Mozambique that I did not know. Like that Mozambique is the third poorest country in the world. The 30 year civil war, ending in the early nineties, pretty much destroyed the country and the resources there. Janie was recently given 440 acres by the government for a project that will help people to learn about plants and trees native to the area and their inherent medicinal value.  Many people are afraid to use many of the plants because they were traditionally used by local "medicine men" or "shamas"  in putting curses on people.  Part of her task will be to show the people that these plants were created by God for our benefit.

Another project they are involved in that I enjoyed hearing about  is their cattle project. Traditionally, a family's wealth was determined by the number of cattle they owned. Most of the cattle in the whole country were destroyed during the civil war. What they have done is to buy some cattle to give away. But they don't just give away indiscriminately to anybody. They give a community six heifers and one bull. The condition they put on them is that they will then give of the first fruits to another community without cattle. The first six heifers and the first bull that are born out of the original 7 animals are given to others. Then they are free to develop their herd. It's a system that is working as the people there begin to share their wealth and begin to improve the lives of the people. Cattle are very expensive and this is a way that they can begin to turn things around for many people. It was exciting to hear about.

Afterwards they treated us to some typical African food. They prepared a cornmeal ... mush kind of thing that is eaten with a topping made of vegetables. We got to sample it eating it like the africans- with their hands. They take a scoop of the corn stuff, roll it into a ball (size is between a golf ball and a baseball), then dip it into the topping (like a thick soup). That was fun!

One of the things that we did while studying Africa was to make a lapbook of the continent. They turned out really good and I hope to post some pictures of it soon.


On another note I just want to congratulate Kristie Yamaguchi on winning Dancing with the Stars. She was fabulous all season! I'm glad she won.