pic 3: more kids at camp

More kids at the camp. The next big obstacle to tackle is figuring out what to do with 26,000 people. They certainly can not be sent back and they can not stay where they are. The number increases all the time and a lot of good people are working hard to help out.

pic 2: translators

Here is Scott Clark (2nd from left) who leads the SIL / Wycliffe effort for translating and printing the bible into the Fulfulde language for the mostly Muslim Fulbe (Fulani) people. Some of you may recognize the dapper and sophisticated gentleman on the far right. Pete Ekstrand is the African Regional Coordinator for the Evangelical Covenant Church (our boss).

pic 1: Fulbe refugee children

This one is a group of Fulbe children, many of which are still recovering from malnutrition. The malnutrition centers have saved hundreds of lives in a very short time.

WU Refugee Letter

Here is a copy of the letter the team sent out when they got back. I spoke to Scott yesterday and he informed me that his letter is already out of date. Thanks to God for providing many of the needs he describes. The UNHCR is "so organized it's scary" and things are better. The major concern now is that some of the wells they dug are collapsing and because they only dug to the water line, they will all undoubtedly go dry when the rains stop in November. The problem is being addresses but it is still a concern.

B & B

WU 22sep07

Good Day All,

 

Not a whole lot of news this week. It has been dry the last few days after last Sunday's rain of 130 mm. That comes out to be about 5 ¼ inches in 4 hours. About 2 inches of that fell in 1 hour. Our roof started leaking like crazy and we had to sop up about 2 gallons worth of drips in various rooms. We got it fixed (supposedly) yesterday. We'll see.

 

I had planned to take a group of students to an new (to us) orphanage tomorrow but it seems as though the kids there have something else going on. The place in Soa was cool but it was an hours drive and everybody spoke French. This place is only about 15 minutes and it is all Anglophone. We are going to try to get out there one Sat a month. We are also going to try to get out to Ekoko II for some more projects if we can gather some funds.

 

I am not sure how much the US news is covering the story about the Fulbe refugees in Cameroon. I found one site that goes into the situation a little deeper.

www.unhcr.org/news/NEWS/46b855b54.html

 3 colleagues of ours went to the East Province to visit these camps and lend a hand. I have included a portion of their letter and some pictures.

 

These events affect many here in the city and hit the Fulfulde language bible translating teams especially hard. There are quite a few agencies here that are working on plans to help the relief effort. Unfortunately, it is not the only place in Africa with a refugee problem.

 

Thanks and God Bless.

 

Brian & Betsy

 

WU 15Sep07

Good Day All,

 

I had planned to write about a trip some of our colleagues took to eastern Cameroon where they visited some Fulbe refugee camps. But, I am still gathering some stories and pictures. I hope to have it ready for next week. What I can tell you is that the situation is very difficult and there are a lot of missionaries taking time off to help out at the camps and malnutrition centers. There are about 25,000 Fulbe people who have fled Central African Republic due to the lawlessness and persecution going on there. Most of them have found peace in Cameroon but still have no way to support themselves. They are living in camps and many are crippled or starving. Betsy and I have been asked to possibly accompany a Fulfulde bible translator and his family to the camps over thanksgiving to help out. I am not sure we will be able to go but we sure would like to.

 

This week has been pretty busy. Exams in both Geo classes and trips to the French Club for tennis and swimming in PE. The French Club is a "resort" sort-of on east edge of the city that the French Embassy supports and they have a big pool and nice tennis courts. It is tradition here that the 12^th grade class gets to go there to do a unit on tennis and swimming for a few weeks. Since there are only 12 seniors, the PE is combined with grade 11 in 2 sections. I teach both of them so every Wed and Fri morning for 3 weeks I take them over there. It has gone good so far. Most of them have been there before with their families. I took on the task of teaching swimming and another RFIS parent volunteered to teach the tennis. He played in college and is quite good. My only headache is getting some of the girls through the changing room in time to make it back for morning assembly. I may have to resort to bribery.

 

Betsy is having a cooking class today. A few of our Cameroonian friends wanted to learn more about American cooking and Betsy invited them over this morning. I thought there was going to be 2 maybe 3 so when I got back from a Community Service project I was surprised to see 6 women cooking away in the kitchen. They were making bread and bagels and a few cakes. Some of them have never cooked with the use of an oven or range top. There is always a demand for cooks and househelp around the missionary community and women who know how to do American style cooking and baking are usually not unemployed long. 2 women work at the school and I don't know the rest. I took a group of kids over to the quartier behind the Newland compound to clean up behind the soccer field. We cut down a bunch of overgrown brush and cleaned out the rain gutters. The rain here erodes roads so fast that if somebody doesn't keep on top of it it becomes so bad you can't drive on it. We worked for 3 hours and we had fun. I brought Alfred and Oliver with to earn some extra cash.

 

We have our first bball game today at ASOY. I think we're ready but they always play tough. It started raining about 20 minutes ago so we might have to postpone. ASOY has a covered court but the rain still blows in.

 

That's it from here.

 

Take Care and God Bless

 

Brian & Betsy

WU 08sep07

Greetings from Yaoundé!

 

This week's weekly update is going to be different then the others.  There will be no mention of basketball or any other sports game.  There will be no mention of Geo 9 or World Geo, mainly because History is so much better. (Betsy is writing this)

 

            Now, for the more important stuff.  This week we would like you to tell you about a few prayer requests we have.  First, RFIS, students and staff need your prayers.  When the campus first opened in 1991 the area behind the school was not developed at all and the designers felt like a tin fence with some barbed wire on top would be enough to keep the snakes and other animals out of the school grounds.  They were not too concerned with keeping people out of this area of the fence because it was not developed.  Well, this has changed over the last few years and the area is being cleared and we are gaining neighbors.  One of our "new" (within the last 2 years) neighbors is a man who "casts out demons".  At one point I asked the school director what was going on over there and he told me they, SIL, thought it was some type of religious ceremony.  Last year we could hear him chanting, grunting, singing, and sometimes ringing a bell.  There were times that it would be the man with a group of men or a group of women or both and other times it would be just the man with one other person.  At the end of last year the "sessions" were becoming more and more frequent and every now and again you would hear a woman cry out.  No one (students particularly) really took notice of it and the year ended without any of the student being affected by it.  This year is a different story.  This year the bell ringing occurs almost without ceasing.  This year instead of a woman crying out every now and again, a woman is constantly screaming.  SIL has found out that the man does in fact claim to cast out demons.  He uses methods such as chanting, grunting, bell ringing, and beating someone to accomplish this.  Because of the constant bell ringing and screaming students have begun to ask questions.  (They can also hear the man beating the woman.)  It is affecting their studies as well as their sense of safety.  And for some of them it is becoming very personal and scary.  There is a strong sense of spiritual warfare occurring and many of the students (and staff) have said they feel it.  There are several classrooms close to the area this is occurring in.  Our school consists of both nationals and non-nationals, so we have a lot of students who have seen or had some experience with witchcraft.  It has left some of them confused and frightened and for others it has caused them to draw closer to Christ.   Please pray that God will work in the lives of our neighbors, our students, our staff and our school.  Pray that we can be a light of Christ's love for them.  Also, pray that something can be done to make the man stop this practice; if not totally then at least during the school day.  Pray that God will close our student's ears to the noise so that they can concentrate on their studies.  Pray for the safety of the school.  And finally, pray for the safety of the people who are attending the sessions as well as the man doing the sessions. 

 

Another prayer request is for the safety of students during sporting events.  We have only been in school for one month and so far we have had one student dislocate their knee (she will need surgery either in Gabon or Germany within the next few months) and another break the knee cap (he may need surgery in the states.  We will know more in a few weeks).  Both of these injuries have occurred during noncompetitive fun games.  The kids and parents get together and play soccer, floor hockey or basketball during the weekend and this is when these injuries have occurred.  Injuries are always a concern because of the conditions of the fields and courts we play on.  So to already have these two major injuries is alarming.   

 

Finally, we would like you to pray for Brian.  He has had been sick since we got here.  He has been on medication for a sinus infection for a week now and he is not feeling better at all.  Pray that he will be able to give his body the rest it needs in order to get better and that we will be able to find out what is going on and treat it.

 

Otherwise things are great.  I have a student teacher this year so I am spending most of my time creating a new class for next semester and rewriting notes and class guidelines for other classes (curriculum guides for all the teachers who know what they are).  It has been wonderful reconnecting with students and getting to know new students.  We are so blessed to be here.  Thank you for that gift.

 

Have a wonderful week. 

In His Grip,

Betsy (and Brian)

Weekly update 01Sep

Greetings All,

 

It is a pleasure to be continuing on with these weekly updates. We have been blessed with the opportunity to serve again here in Cameroon and things are going well.

 

There have been a lot of changes here over the summer. The School Director and his wife have retired and are working in the States raising money to finish the building of the new RFIS campus. Our Assistant Director was promoted to Director and is doing well. She is very involved in daily activities and seems to like her new job. She taught Bible and 2 PE classes last year but this year she has only 1 PE and no Bible. It seems that we rarely have a shortage of Bible teachers so that was covered easily. I ended up taking on 2 PE classes and her position as Athletic Director. I do have an assistant who does most of the daily stuff like scheduling games and getting the fields ready for soccer games. The girls soccer team played the "old gals" on Wed and it went well. We have a few new young women teachers who came out to play in the mud and they scored 3 goals against our goalie who is really good but the girls scored 10 against the band teacher. No injuries reported so far.

 

Our Academic Director is back in England on Furlough which leaves a committee of sorts doing various parts of her job. We are doing well but we sure miss her. We got in a student teacher from Chicago area who will be with us until November. He is teaching in Betsy's US history class and will come over to my World Geo in October. He is a really nice guy and has been helping me get the bball team ready. He has coached a little before and the boys really like him. Our first game is against the "old guys" on Wed. He will play with my assistant coach who is on the Yaounde city traveling team and Marc the JR boys coach who is 6'5" and fast. There are a handful of other guys coming down and I might play a little. It will be tough but we hung with them last year.

 

My Geo 10 class is studying the infrastructure of cities. I am having them compete to design a city from scratch including most of the basics like a city hall and fire stations etc. They seem to be liking it and I think they will turn out well. World Geo is starting climate and weather. It's real nice to just step outside and see all the different kinds of clouds and how they develop.

 

That's about it from here. Our nagging colds seem to be disappearing slowly so we have been feeling a lot better. We hope to have a newsletter ready in the next few weeks.

 

Take care and God Bless.

 

Brian & Betsy