Safari and Dad comes to stay

So it has been a while... I'm now in the comfort of tim and ilse Gender's house whilst they are on holiday, they have a lovely swimming pool and a quite incredible back garden with their own river and waterfall feature. The weather has also decided to be awesome so thats rather nice, I hear that you are enjoying snow in England, that made me a bit homesick for a few seconds as i sipped on my icy water.

Since I last wrote, Richard and Simon have both flown back to the U.K. which has been rather sad, but at least we got to spend the time with them however short it felt.

The same projects are up and running, Mariannhill, Lamontville, Margate, The BEC, and other random things, but most recently we have just started a joint football and guitar training course for youngsters, which also sneakily tells them about God at the same time! we've been running it the last 2 days and the "pilot" trial comes to an end after todays session but not before hot dogs and certificates!

We've also been on a game drive! It was absolutely stunning, so exciting to be close to these amazing creatures, 10 metres from a cheetah is really quite something, especially hearing it breath, seeing it yawn and being completely ignored by it because we were in the safety of the car, I wanted to reach out and stroke it but was warned against such foolish behaviour. We also saw... Lions, Elephants, Rhinos (both the black variety and the white), Zebras, Giraffes, Impala, Kudu, Eagles and a man named Elson. (he has the best eyes ever. To see with I mean, not to look at)

We had a visitor of note, none other than Daddy C, it was nice to see and hear a familiar (familial) face and voice, we went for a trip up the new 2010 stadium, moses madhiba it was rather stunning, and then witnessed an amazing sunday school play with dynamic dancing then took about 30 kids to the beach and lost them then found them and got sun burnt, a packed few days for dad to witness, but that's the way it is!

It has been and still is a very fun African adventure, I do miss all you lovely people, especially miffed to have missed little Dazza's wedding :( but I've had reports that it all went well, God bless you and Kate together. (second honey moon in Africa?)

I hope you're all okay my lovelies.

xx

Dad enjoying the view across Durban from on top of the stadium

Julie on top of the Moses Madhiba stadium, rain anyone?

Excellent Dancing from the sunday school.

Cheesy Coz with kids in the background, ready for the beach!

Mummy lion with two cubs, one male, one female.

This is one big animal!

Cheetah! Only the fastest land animal there is...

Beautiful striped horse things.

Wheely good

The next part of the adventure...


My lovely musical friends.
AMAZING singing in the mariannhill choir
Tired after the race, Nozipho and me
Seyanda and his school friends
Dog Shoe
Me trying to look like i'm nice and that i havent seen the camera, in reality it was a set up



Once again we have been very busy, we said goodbye to Richard this morning he has been really great to work with and really inspiring. Thankyou Richard!

We've been to a very remote place called Candu (the c is pronounced like a tutting noise in your mouth) we were there to see the ecclesia there and to help out with manual jobs like fixing the waterbutts up to a hose to water the plants, simon and me also ploughed a field with an old school plough hauled by two bulls! very exciting and scary at the same time. We saw Nelson Mandella's house where he grew up, and also a very nice dog that put a shoe on for our entertainment! There was a dood there called seyanda, he kept us amused. You can find Candu on Google Earth apparantly, if you are bored.

I also ran in a wheel chair race! the special needs school Happy's enters it's kids into the annual KZN (Kwa zulu natal- the area of S.A. that Durban is in) wheelchari race, and one of the pupils asked me to push her! it was fantastic and quite an experience running along this 5k road with cars whizzing by only a metre or two away! we didn't win, but decided that just finishing the race was quite an achievement in itself.

We had an open air concert in Durban centre which by all accounts went down an absolute treat! We were singing christian songs and inviting people to come along to our Bible Education Centre to sort their lives out :)

Last night we had a suprise party for Kim Beeler's 39th it was fantastic, she had no idea it was happening and we'd composed a sort of funny song that was thoroughly enjoyed by the beeler family, which was the main thing. There was lovely food provided by char and jude.

We had nice meal for Richards leaving two days ago (monday) at a place called moyo's which is right on the beach front, all of us volunteers went, and then Christy and David White met us there for the beach after, we had fun making games up in the sand and playing noughts and crosses I think I won over all...

Love to everyone
Kiss to everyone
Hug to everyone
Matthew.

A New Blog Posting For You

Monkey eats off my hand! Shamo!

Cute kiddy types at Margate, one at the front tried to throttle me!

We are ringing places up getting freebies, We got 400 tires for a crecha playground, lots of shoe boxes and a box of good quality paper for crafts! What a cool blessing! (christie, simon {in a blur}, Julie, LauraG, LauraI

Hello Mes Amis,

We have been busy bunnies, we have had capers this week!

Simon peel, Laura Iredale, Jude Norcross, Laura Skinner, Julie Machachek, Christy Beyers, Richard Alleyne and myself, went to a place called Marget this weekend, it is quite a small dusty quiet town and the christadelphian meeting only has about 5 members! So we decided to do something about this, some of us advertised in the mall down the road, some of us went to a local township, and some knocked on doors near the meeting room.

The township is the poorest place that I have ever been to, pieces of cardboard are used as walls, buckets are used as toilets and there are people just hanging about because they have nothing to do, so it was ripe for getting people along to church! On the saturday about 45 people came along and on the sunday service about 60! So everyone was really pleased with what God allowed us to do!

There were also some wickedcool things we got up to, like the waffle house, the monkeys, the beach one evening, food handouts, getting to know each other a bit more and breaking the igniotion on the truck!

I don't think I've mentioned Cam Before, he is an American and a dood! He is also a fully fledged member of the gang! he does a lot of work in Durban centre which is where he lives with this family (Kim, Shiloh, Annalise and Wyatt) He also has a bald head and used to be in the Marines!

Other things that have happened, I gave 2 bible classes, Bunny Chow, Stung by a jellyfish, locked out of home jumped in window set alarm off armed guard came, climbed a tree, had roast chicken.... ooooooooooh, I have remebered something else that I have started, I am going to run the comrades marathon!! eek it is a double marathion in may, Christy Beyers was looking for a running buddy and I decided to venture forth and try it... I'm sure it will be a lot of pain but also a lot of pleasure!

I will attmept to put some pictures on, but the computer isn't liking it at the moment....


Kisses and hugsies to everyone, kisses for the masses

*edit* I Have the pictures! (they all seem to have come out a bit dark, it might be this computer because its fine on the laptops.)

Kids at Happy's disabled school being amused by us! It was too good an opportunity to miss (richard, simon, cam)

Durban Beach, it was a bit cloudy but hot, and good for swimming

Amazing mural that I saw and had to take a photo of!

Internet Caf-AY

Hello one and all,

I am now a one week veteran, and with it comes such priveleges as being able to have my window slightly undone, recognition of the mobile telephone masts that are dressed as trees and thats about it really, i can't wait for week two.

I have met some lovely people here, not least of all the the other Brits, Simon Peel (whose humor appears somewhat akin to mine much to everyone elses annoyance) And Laura Skinner, I knew the others already! I have also met Christy Beyers who is From Durban, and about our age so she has been chilling round ours quite a bit and she is Well Cool and took us to some rocks in Shongweni Nature Reserve and we jumped in to a lake, it was pretty sweet man and not in the least bit scary... Kind of a perfect sort of activity for me because I like jumping, you might have noticed.

Anyway, less of the messing about, We have also visited a school for handicapped kids called Happy's where we are teaching a basic bible course, and just generally having a right laugh with them. There is one dood there who made up some long name with lots of Zulu "clicks" in it then he made me pronounce it! Japes abound.

Marianhill is a township west of Durban which is a really poor area (though not the worst) and we've been there helping out with turfing some land for kids to play on, and doing there bible class, it was quite difficult to get a response out of them, so we are going to try different approaches! I'm about to photocopy an illustrated timeline of moses life to try tomorow!

I shan't mention the time i lost my wallet and then found it again, or the time i almost broke the car. Happy Days.

I forgot the wire for the camera so i am sorrybut no glorious photos!

Love. Kiss. Hug. Matthew. X

Wow, so I actually made it into the country, for some reason I found that suprising.

The weather is great here, very sunny and hot! We've been going about to various places around the Durban area Marianhills and Lamontville. I'm finding it quite difficult to say quite what's happened, it's only been two days but it seems like ages! Everything is a bit muddled in my head! I think it's because it's so hectic (a very south african word)

Right i'll put some photos up, that should satiate you.


Lots of lovely love from Matthew. x



Break time and the prayer
A bit gross really very big and hairy
Laura Skinner with "Gregory Manuel"
A Dood and Me.

Dear all

Seeing as I am going to South Africa for a good number of days, on Christadelphian mission work, I thought I would keep everyone informed, by starting a Blog. Hopefully I will remember the password and also remember to keep this updated, with what I'm getting up to.

I don't often get stressed, but during the visa debacle I did. There is a picture of my passport photos that I thought I needed (I didn't in the end) that proves I got a teeny bit stressed.

I am mainly petrified and excited.

Love. Kiss. Hug. X