Secunda

A lot happens in a week on holiday in Africa. Hannah began calling the children on the farm 'my children'! I have managed to get them mto perform 'sleeping bunnies' together with Hannah and they gave us a little gum-boot dancing show. The facilities here are fairly good, but a lot of prayer is needed for Natalie's mum who cannot do all the work on her own, for the children to get the right kind of supervision, comfort and attention. One day a strike took place by the transport union. The children came back from school early. One little girl, Phamela (7), told us that the strikers wanted to burn all the buses and that they had had stones thrown at them. Then one young chap, Patrick, about 15, told me that the bus driver had hit one of the children in the face with a fanbelt and cut his face badly. The same driver often attacks Patrick too. I said that the next time it happens he must try to record it on a mobile phone and go to the police station, he said that nobody has a phone with a camera. We have so many small previliges in the UK, like a legal system that (while being a little weak) still seems to be adhered by society. There's so much corruption here and with it so much fear and finger pointing. Inevitably it ends up becoming racial. I pray for Jesus to come to South Africa. The children here seem to be coping quite well, and they get together every evening and have fellowship. They also learn a little bit of farming and do the daily milking of the cow, Hannah also got the chance to milk a cow with the help of her 'Oupa'. We moved on from Secunda to Parys for the weekend and stayed at Oom Lukas' holiday home.

'My children' - Hannah

Siyabonga milks a cow