Dave Guiles, Mike Yoder, and Tom Avey are in Bangui Africa for two weeks for networking with leaders and training. Frank Puhl (GBIM associate Africa director) is in Bangui this week and Bill Katip (provost at Grace College and Seminary) will join them next week.
From Tom Avey, Bangui, Central African Republic
We made it to Bangui! The flight was pretty good although I only slept a couple of hours. I’ve seen parts of “August Rush” around five times!
The BIG plane lands in a little airport and then you wait in a couple of lines, then in a big crowd and finally we gathered all our stuff. Staff from the missions guest center and Dr. Ngoumape picked us up in a couple of trucks. We slept a couple of hours this morning, ate a good lunch, then had some good time to relax and talk about our plans. Mike and I helped helped Heidi Sisson with her advanced English class then Heidi she took Mike and me to a nearby arts bazaar. Very interesting.
So far this is very third world. Dirty, difficult, very hot and humid. Bugs are not as bad as Florida (yet) but the people are very friendly. They are a delight. One student in the English class is one of three female police commissioners in all of C.A.R. Very impressive.
Tomorrow we visit the orphan care center and some potential sites for the seminary in Bangui. Sunday we preach in various churches and then we leave for Boali for ACT training. It sounds like that is going to be difficult; cots, not toilets, interesting food, etc.
I will teach two segments at the CIDEL training for government leaders next week, One on Nehemiah and one on Joshua. I’m looking forward to it.
This is a real adventure. So far, so good. I think it will be good even though difficult. Internet access is very limited so don’t expect much from me. I’ll update this blog when I can.
Keep praying.
Tom