Lang Lingo

Langlingo.org

2009-04-23T12:53:00.000-07:00

Hi FOLKS! We're live!

www.langlingo.org

bye Blogger. thanks.

A new day, A new Address.

2009-04-21T05:59:00.000-07:00

Hi Friends!

You're probably wondering why we didn't do our semi-usual monthly post or two since Annabelle turned 3 in Feb. Well, we decided it was time to turn a new 'page' in our blogging. So I have been redeveloping Lang Lingo on a friends site. And now I think its ready for viewing.

Please have a look and see what you think, comments on the bew look and feel are quite welcome. langs.rowbory.co.uk THIS IS NOT THE FINAL address for the blog however. It will shortly be at www.langlingo.org. But I'll don't worry I'll let you know. Thanks for listening!

Annabelle's Birthday

2009-02-26T10:53:00.002-08:00

Annabelle turned 3 today!! Here are pics of her birthday party! All she wanted was a cake, lollipops, sprite, and lots of friends. I think she got all that and more. What fun!!

2009-02-26T10:39:00.000-08:00

Hi friends, Things are going well. Just thought we would post these pics. One is of Annabelle with Gladwell's youngest daughter, Virginia. Their favorite thing lately is to come home from school and ask for 5 shillings, then they go and buy bananas from the fruit and veg. lady and eat them together. Then there is the pic of Jer's eye when he had such a bad infection, it was swelled shut. It is probably a good thing that we didn't take a pic of it on the inside cause it was hemorrhaging. Then there is a pic of Junio in a play at school. It was a modern day version of the good samaritan. He was a kid who beat up another kid on the playground and took his ball. He had a little too much fun with that role :). Then there is one of him with his friends at school. And then there is big girl Lily being so proud of herself sitting up. She is generally really happy. I love when she smiles, her tongue pops out!

Trip to Marallel

2009-02-16T09:54:00.000-08:00

We went on an exciting adventure during mid-term break. We went up to a little town up country called Marallel. We went to see some friends named Jim and Sue who have been working with the Daasanach people up north on a Bible Translation for many years. We thought that we would visit them and see how the translation of the book of John was going. It was very exciting because it was the first time for Jeremy to sit in and see a taste of what he will be doing next year.

We borrowed a friends bright yellow Pajero for the trip. It apparently used to be an ambulance and even had a switch on it to make the siren go off which is good to avoid boredom on long trips. We left Thursday after Jer got done with classes and drove 3 1/2 hours to Nyahururu and stayed at a lodge there at Thomson Falls. The lodge was a little run-down with beds a bit more like car seats than mattresses but a nice atmosphere, no bugs, and great food. The waterfall was absolutely gorgeous!! It was cool so in the evening they came and lit a fire in the fireplace in our room which was so nice.

The next day was 4 1/2 hours going only 110 KM on a dirt road. Some of the dirt was ok and some was challenging to say the least. I was just about to the limit (ok, maybe over the limit) of my patience with the road, the kids, my husband and the flies when we arrived. But we had such a great time, it turned out to be worth it. Part of the patience testing was when Annabelle asked to go pee about every 15-20 minutes. By the time we got there though, I realized she had a fever and therefore a urinary tract infection. We called our doc who talked to a local pharmacist, got her some medicine and she was feeling much better in 24 hours :)

We had fun going on walks around Marallel, and just experiencing the day to day life of Jim and Sue. I think one of the most fun things for Junio and Annabelle was doing dishes in a bucket on the floor. When they ran out of dishes, they wanted to do more, so in went the toys. They were soaked and happy and had clean toys. What more can you ask for?

The second half

2009-01-08T22:08:00.000-08:00

Dear Friends,

Its been several weeks since the last time we posted on our blog becuase We have had family visiting us since the 22nd of Nov. Jamie's Dad and step-mother were here two weeks and then the following day my parents came (Dec 7th). My folks left last friday. Its been a lovely time. Its been restful and fun to see our family again, but it was also quite hard to say goodbye again.

I finished last term just as Ted and Linda arrived and now I have started school again this past monday. ONly two terms to go, thats really only 24 weeks of responsibilities for schooling left (basically 10 weeks or class and 2 weeks of studying and exams per term). It is quite exciting to see the end and to be in the year in which I will graduate. And then...on we will move for more transition, this time, Lord willing we will be, at long last, in Tanzania, doing what God had called us several year ago to do, finally. We are not yet certain where in Tanzania we will be yet, we will discussing this with some of our friends and counselors in our organization in the coming weeks, and we should know hopefully soon.

We are looking forward to getting to Tz, but it is not without stress and a bit of apprehension. Jamie, as you know has been sick, quite alot this past year with Lily and then even following with mastitis and other things, so we are taking things slowly and tentatively realizing that for us to go certian places in Tanzania will require her to be stronger and healthier more consistently than she is. She is not unwell at the moment, but being that she has not had a stretch of health longer than 25 days since this time last year, we are praying and asking the Lord for health and wise councel in making our decisions.

We are now over the half way point of our first term here in East Africa. It has been marked, interestingly, by a reunion with our families for the holdays. This has been great, and it is interesting to reflect for a moment on our last 18 or 19mos here. We have seen alot, transitioned alot, learned alot... in some ways life is now fast becoming normal. I only notice this when we have company here as things are really quite abnormal, strange and potentially quite stressful for them and not for us. This is good, i mean us feeling adjusted we love living here and working here. We are in the right spot.

At any rate, we praise God for his provision, protection and love that is so visible in our lives (even as difficult as they are from time to time). I do hope you can do the same.

THis term should prove to be slightly different from the others, it seems to be more focused on Biblical studies than on translation studies. I have basically finished my lingusitics courses now and am moving, basically, to the application of my linguistics knowledge and translation theory towards the task of making God's word clear to those who don't speak the same langauge. It is an interesting and important process, translation, and one that takes a great deal of thought and seriousness. I recognize that my God given passion is nothing to take lightly and is something which apart from God's grace and my willingness to humble myself, is quite dangerous. I suppose the same fear exists in the hearts of many faithful preachers and teachers of Gods word. But my task is somewhat more basic than theirs, my responcibility is faithfulness to God by delivering his Word as untainted and unhindered by my sinfulness and incapabilities as well as clear and quite understandable to a quite distinct language and worldview from my own, so that preachers and teachers may use it. One cannot simply assume that if we take a word for word approach to translation it will somehow make sense those who wish to read it, hear it, use it. So much cultural understanding and Biblical exegesis and linguistic informedness and many other things goes into Bible translation that, In summary, I simply feel the weight of the God-given task before and look forward, eagerly, to the working of his spirit in my life, to help me accomplish His goals. Pray with me for these things and the health and provision for my family. Thanks for listening.

Pictures: the trouble with these pictures is I took so many, that the five i post here don't do justice to our time with our family or all the wonderful things we did with them. so I guess you'll just have to wait until we post more. The pictures are, in some order -

Linda and Annabelle at home
GraMitz, Annabelle, and Jer at Amboselli game park
The kids at Christmas
Sunset in Amboselli
THe top of Mt. Kenya

Whew!

2008-11-26T04:04:00.000-08:00

Dear Friends,

well...I'm done, or mostly. This has been a long intense and crazy term of school, certainly the hardest, but its finished (except for final revisions on my big paper). In addition to school work, we have been getting used to being a family of 5 (no more room in the back seat). Annabelle potty trained herself several weeks ago. Junio is doing quite well in 1st grade and got the obedience award for the 1st grade class. But now that classes are finished until Jan. for me, we have family here. Jamie's Dad and Step-mom arrived last sunday for two weeks. As soon as they go, my folks come for the rest of Dec. We are very excited to welcome them to our world. Thanks for watching. Enjoy the pictures. I hope to get Jamie to post a more detailed post here soon...this is all I can think to say right now. Thanks for your prayers.

Pics:

Lily- Let's go Shopping

Junio and Annabelle at Gladwell's house (where her and her husband are building)

David, Gladwell's husband, and Lily

Lily playing with her bugs

David, Gladwell and Lily

Jeremy

A new normal

2008-10-01T22:43:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone. We have been quite busy as we get into the middle of my school term. Classes and assignments are busy but I are managing to keep my head above water (or maybe just my nose). Anyway, I wanted to share some more pictures with you. Lily will be 1 month on Sunday, the time has flown. She seems to be doing well, and slowly figuring out how to sleep at night and not all day.Crystal, Jamie's mom, was with us for about two weeks just after the hospital, which was a huge help. Junio and Annabelle are doing well. I think they had chicken pox the past couple weeks, but now that's over and we are slowly finding a new normal.

Little Lily...or Lillian Ginger Lang

2008-09-11T06:14:00.001-07:00

Hey Everyone!

I have the pleasure of Announcing Lillian Ginger Lang was born a week ago 4/9/08 here in Nairobi. She was 3.75kg (8lbs 4oz.), and 50cm (19in) long. Momma and Lily are doing alright. I finally got to bring them back home monday, just in time for me to jump back into school. Jamie had some complications with blood loss after delivery but is recovering quite nicely. Lily had troubles with her blood sugar as a result of Jamie gestational diabetes, but that too seems to be doing ok now. Anyway...the best thing about this post is the pictures so enjoy!

JEremy

Waiting

2008-09-01T10:56:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

So where were we? We are now one week from starting classes again. My second and final year, part of me is really looking forward to getting back to work and another part is really not (I'll miss the time with my family). It should be a fairly difficult term, with 17 hrs in Translation a bit of linguistics, cultural anthropology and greek (for the first time). Junio has been in school now for 2 weeks and is enjoying 1st grade. He has a great teacher, and seems to be doing quite well. Annabelle went back to baby class today at the school here on campus, she also loves it and was scooped up by one of her favorite teachers at the door, and whisked away without any trouble. I am glad she has a good time and can be social too.

Jamie is doing ok. As many of you know, she broke her foot, but it is mending quite well. We are still waiting for the little one ot come out, we've had a couple of close calls, been to the hospital a couple of times but still no baby. Last week we went in, after she had contractions all night, and it appeared she was in pre-term labor (35 weeks), so the doctor tried to stop it, but that didn't really work. So the doc decided ok, lets just let the baby come, but she wouldn't and the contractions left on their own eventually. We had discussed an induction, but in the end decided the best thing to do was to wait. So wait we did and waiting we are still. I keep telling Jamie it will be sooner rather than later, but still it's difficult with a big belly, on crutches, having mini-contractions all the time. Pray for her.

We have had our friends, Ian and April, here all week which has been so much fun. They were able to do some work for Pistis School, the little Kenyan school here on campus that Junio used to go to and we also did some fun things with them like the giraffe center and the elephant orphanage. They are also friends with Don and he was able to take them camping and on safari at Nakuru National Park. Attached is a picture of all of us at a BBQ at Don's house.

We'll attach some fun pictures. Thanks for watching. Keepin you posted.

Jeremy

my Cute Kids

2008-07-28T04:42:00.000-07:00

Hi Everyone,
Well we finished, a couple weeks ago (with school i mean), and then it was off the the coast. Our organization had its annual conference, always a good time to reconnect with colleagues and friends, and also hang out on the beach a little and relax. So that's what we did. The conference was a week and then a holiday for a few days. We returned to cool cloudy Nairobi last Tuesday. Now its been time to catchup on things which got pushed aside during school and Jamie's sicknesses and stuff. But we are well, and happy. Jamie did very well on the coast with all that humid air, and even now is pretty well though she gets tired often up here at 6500ft. SHe is about 32 weeks now, so certainly on the homestretch. In fact she may be induced early because of her gestational diabetes (things to pray about). So we may be 5 at the end of next month, certainly around the time school starts for me.
We are house-sitting for one of my profs while he and his family are on furlough in the UK. Its nice, the house is large with a big yard, and a trampoline for the kids. One of the best things for Jamie and I is that it is actually quiet. School will start the 7th of Sept for me and the 15th of Aug for Junio. I hope everyone is well, and I am glad I have the chance to actually post a blog again to y'all. please email us or something soon. We will be sending a newsletter out pretty quick i think (its on Jamie's todo list). Enjoy the pictures of my cute kids.
Jer

Finishing Well

2008-06-21T04:18:00.000-07:00

Jer ran in his first race. It was a fundraiser for the Bibleless people of Kenya. It was supposed to be a 10K but the route ended up being only an 8.7K disappointingly. He ran with his friend David who had been training with him. And their friend Esayas did the 4K walk. Mommy and Annabelle and Junio got up at 6AM to watch Daddy. There were tears when Junio realized that Daddy didn’t win the race and get a trophy. I tried to explain that he was competing against former gold medalists in the Olympics and that Daddy was very happy with finishing in 47 minutes but I don’t think he quite understood!

Jer is also busy finishing the race to complete this school term. He is slowly working away at all the presentations and papers. Almost there and then it will be break! Ahhh!

Junio just finished a week of Vacation Bible School. He has come home beating his chest like Tarzan and singing silly songs all week. But then, what else is new!

Annabelle is finally back to normal after a whole month of one sickness after another. She is happy and soooooo talkative!! She went back to baby class two days this last week and always comes home with lots of stories about her friends. She is now working on counting in Swahili, which has been fun!

I am feeling better now after a couple of trying weeks with blood pressure problems. It turns out that I have gestational diabetes and even though the two things aren’t supposed to be related, when I went on this special diabetes diet, I have had hardly any problems with my blood pressure and I feel so much better. Praise Jesus!! Another praise is that a German friend of ours happened to have an extra glucometer so I can test my blood sugar. We were dreading having to buy one here because they are so expensive but he said that I can use his extra one until I have the baby and don’t have to worry about it anymore!! Yeah!

Mid-Term

2008-05-19T04:45:00.000-07:00

Jer and I are both mid-term right now, him in his 3rd term at school and me in my pregnancy!

Jeremy is very busy with school and trying to press on with all his papers and books.

Annabelle got pink eye last week which would have been fine but we forgot to tell the doc that she was allergic penicillin and so her first eye drops made her look like she just lost a fist fight. She is fine now though with different medicine.

We are having a little girl! Yeah. Junio's response was "Dad... that means we have 3 girls to take care of now instead of just 2." The responsibility of a 6 year old!! He has proved his responsibility well this weekend though when he got Annabelle up on Saturday and made her breakfast all by himself. We were not only impressed, Jer was also actually able to sleep in on his day off. Wow!!

And now for something different

2008-04-16T01:43:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends, greetings from Nairobi. I am done with school (and on my last week of a two week break before they begin again), and Jamie's family has left but we had a great time. When they were here we did a one day safari in Nairobi national Park, we went to the coast and spent 4 days on the beach and snorkeled a bit and ate alot and did a number of other fun things ( I also took 3 exams and submitted a couple papers). In the mean time Jamie has been regaining her strength and starting to feel better little by little. Thanks for your prayers, we are so grateful that God is blessing her with strength and energy and not as sick of a stomach! Indeed, Jamie also told me this morning she felt the Baby kick last night for the first time.
This week is my week to catch-up on all the loose ends which I did not have time to do during the term, and try to rest a bit. Its funny I was worried a bit about driving my car to the coast and back so I prayed "dear Lord may we get safely to the coast and back, and then anything can happen to my car, just keep us safe." SO the car did great, and on Sunday ( we got back last week) on the way to church it overheated and burned out the valve seals and a head gasket. But I got in touch with a highly recommended mechanic from the church we attend here and he picked the car up Monday and dropped it off last night (Tues) at about 4pm, not only that but it was only about 200USD for the whole thing! Anyway, I think the whole situation is ironic because God answered my prayer to the letter. anyway...Thats a quick update enjoy the pics.

A quick Hi

2008-03-23T12:14:00.000-07:00

A quick Update:
Hi friends, here is another quick update.
We'll as most of you can figure out by now, we are still in Kenya,

which means the country did not degenerate into civil war, for

which we are grateful. As things have calmed done here politically,

our academic lives have also returned to normal. I have finished my

classes, but now i have to finish projects and take exams. Jamie's

family flew in for a couple weeks on friday, which we are very

excited about. Jamie has been sick as you know, but she started to

get a bit better last week before her family came, but then got a

nasty bug from somewhere, and now is on antibiotics and sick, if

its not one thing its another...but God is taking care of us one

day at a time. Thanks everyone for watching, sorry the post has

taken so long. we'll be in touch soon.

Jer

Typos

2008-02-20T11:53:00.000-08:00

In the last post of pictures I had intended to write. 'smiley girl' not simply girl. and its supposed to say anna and friends. thats what you get from a near exhausted father doing work in the library till it closes, and getting up with the kids early in the morning. Please pray for us and my term papers. THanks.

Mr T and others

2008-02-20T11:44:00.000-08:00

Hi friends, here is the long awaited pictures of Mr. T and others.
-Mr. T 1
-Mr. T2
-Poor sick Mommy
-simply girl
- anna a friends. notice the difference in skin tone, hair color, and facial structure. An indian, an Ethiopian, and our little squeaky (or talky now!) see ya.

A quick Update

2008-02-11T03:48:00.000-08:00

Hi friends, here is a quick update.
We had mid-term break this past weekend (which is really only a Friday and Monday off), so a long weekend, but its been good to have a bit of break. It appears as though things in Kenya, are actually getting better. The violence is subsiding, and the negotiators have reportedly begun to workout something that will work as a settlement for the political situation. Thanks for praying, keep praying though, because, well, I for one will believe it only when we see it. Its been a tense couple of months. Interestingly, the violence of the last two months has really had little to do with politics. The political disagreement only gave an excuse for tribal tensions to flare. But anyway... so we had a good mid term break, which for me was spent trying to get started on term papers and things. I have had some success and also some rest, which is great.
Jamie is sick. Not as a bad as last time,but none the less. So really the only thing she does is rest. Right now this is best. Her rest is somewhat imposed, by me, to try to ensure we don't repeat what happened last time. She has only thrown-up a handful of times. So please keep praying for her. And pray for me as i try to fill in some of the gaps, for a while. Gladwell has been great and is learning to cook lots of cool stuff.
The kids are doing well. Junio is enjoying his school. His school is situated on this side of town and in a safe and secure "out of the way" location so he has had no trouble going to school these past weeks. They had crazy hair last friday, for which, we cut Junio's hair to look like Mr. T. I'll post a picture as soon as I can. But he now likes to come up to me and tell me, "I pity the fool..." Annabelle is generally happy, and doing well. She has had a bit of an adjustment with not being the center of Mommy attention. This, of course, is inevitable and it will continue this way. But she enjoys going to the store with Daddy and taking walks with Gladwell and our good friend "aunt" Julie. She has gotten a number of bug bits recently, but they are not bad and are under control (in fact, this time she seems to be reacting to them much better than usual). Praise God for this.
Well, i guess thats about it. Thanks for praying, thanks for watching.

Jer

Lots of News

2008-01-27T11:04:00.000-08:00

Lots of News:
Hi everyone...greeting from Kenya. We are well, thanks for your prayers. As most of you know the violence in Kenya continues, but we remain safe and secure. Classes have started, and seem to be going well. For the moment we are finding things a bit easier than last term, but it is still early. Its also a bit more technical linguistically....which is fun.
In other exciting news, we have decided to put Junio is a different school. There is an American School very close to here, which also gives us a discount as its a missionary school and was started by our organization. We really think this is going to work out great. Junio was having some issues with understanding different words because of the Kenyan accent. As a result his reading in the long term, was going to be hindered so we decided, we needed to do something now to ensure he doesn't have to catchup later. And so far, he loves it. He has one of the best teachers there and is really enjoying things. They have a fantastic library, and he still has a multinational class with classmates from around the world.
Also in other wonderful news! We found out last week that Jamie is pregnant again!! WE are very excited, but also a bit apprehensive, because as some of you know Jamie was very sick for 7/9 months last time and had to be hospitalized during that time. SHe started to get sick about 5.5 weeks along last time. Now she is 6 weeks along, and so far so good, only slight nausea which has been remedied by a quick snack. Please pray for her, that it is not like it was last time. Everyone keeps telling us you just can't compare pregnancys, they are different each time, I do hope they are right, but we'll see. As I said so far so good. If we are right the next "Langlette", as one of our friends called it, will be here just in time for the next academic year in September.
So thats the skinny. thanks for watching.
Jeremy

Pictures:
Annabelle feeding her new baby doll
Junio and his friend Johnny on a bouncy castle before school started
my new haircut courteousy of Jamie.
Jamie hard at work with Morphosyntax
a fun pic of the kids

A Reflection from Jamie

2008-01-16T09:29:00.000-08:00

15.01.08
So, many people have asked us how we are doing here with all the political upheaval. It is hard to describe how much we feel like newbies at all this missionary stuff. We have colleagues in war torn countries all over the world who deal with the kind of thing that we have dealt with here on a daily basis. So, I suppose, after awhile you just get used to it.
Today there is supposed to be some crazy parliamentary stuff so we are not allowed to go near the city. This last week was pretty calm with the only riot being when we finally decided to venture out and go to a restaurant, a riot broke out about ten blocks down and we got a text about it and left. Thankfully we had finished our food! But that is basically the situation. There is just this constant tension, should we go out. No, not today. Is it ever going to feel safe again? We are not the only ones to feel it. The Kenyans here have never feared for their lives before like they have in the last month. There are many people who are bitter and angry and feel extremely disappointed and scared all at the same time. All we can do is constantly lift our worry, anger and bitterness to the Lord or we would all go crazy.

Our Dear Friend Victor

2008-01-08T05:30:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone, Thanks soo much for your comments and posts on our blog, its really great to see who is "watching". If you haven't posted a comment please do. As the violence and political upheaval in Kenya slows down and, we hope and pray fades away, our attention turns again to preparing for school. Term was delayed by our administration a week, so that people might have a chance to travel safely and perhaps recollect their lives a bit before we are hit with work.
Below is a letter from a very dear friend of ours, he is a pastor from Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) (another country that has been torn apart in the past by war and political violence). He is a student here with us at NEGST. We got to know him while doing a project with him last term (which we got an A on by the way). He is trying to find avenues of sponsorship for his studies at NEGST. We asked him to write a short testimony, and we told him we'd give him a bit of "publicity" on our blog. If this is a direction the LORD might move you, please contact us, We have more financial specifics. If you don't know our email adress give us yours via a comment to this post, and we'll contact you. Think of it this way, in supporting people like Victor and others, you are building and strengthening the church in Africa. One of the worst problems the church faces in Africa, is not necessarily hunger and lack of provision (though this is a deadly African reality), but lack of a substantial Biblical and Orthodox theology (perhaps a even more "deadly" reality). There is a severe famine in sound Biblical teaching on this continent, and NEGST is one of only a handful of institutions the LORD has blessed Africa with that seek to remedy this need.

I am Victor Lonu Budha, from the North-East of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). I am married to Carine Dheve Lonu and God had blessed us with six children: 4 daughters and 2 boys. They are between 12 years and 9 months. With them, I have one orphan, a boy who is 13 old, in my charge. My home church is Communauté Evangélique au Centre de l’Afrique (CECA-20) and especially Eglise Locale CECA-20 Sukisa/Bunia.

I accepted Jesus as my Saviour and Lord when I was very young, during an evangelization campaign. But it was in 1988 that I committed to serve God. I began as singer in a choir and a Sunday school teacher. After my secondary school, I taught in a primary school for 3 years. Then I worked as secretary in my church denomination for 5 years and I went to theological studies for 3 years. After this period I served as headmaster in a bible school from 1996 to 1998 and I went again back for 2 other years for theological studies. When I finished in 2000, I went, as a teacher, in another bible school from 2001 to February 2005. From April 2005 to August 2007 I was pastoring in a local church.

My journey to attend NEGST began in 2001 but I only got my admission in June, last year , 2006. But I could not come to begin the academic year 2006-2007 in September, because I did not have money to pay school fees and my church was unable and still the same to help me in this matter. As the admission was valid only for 2 years, I finally decided, even without sponsorship or any promise, but by faith, to come at NEGST, because I was convinced that God’s time has come for me to be at NEGST and I did not want to lose my admission that I got after many years.

According to the financial difficulty, which has not changed even now, my wife and children remain in my country and I have come alone. I had just enough money for my travel from Bunia (which is my home town) to Nairobi. My wife is dealing with many issues to help the children (school fees, daily life) while she is jobless. To be without scholarship, separated with my family and the fact that my country has not a stable peace, especially my area (Ituri District), gives me great sadness much of the time and sometimes I am unable to concentrate for my academic tasks.

According to the deterioration of the country with the effects of wars, the church there has became very weak. It is true that the church is economically poor, but also it needs help in teaching of biblical principles and appropriate strategies for its growing. That is the main aim for why I am at NEGST and I will go back, when I finish, to my country to serve God in the church of Jesus Christ.

Therefore, considering all these facts, I am looking for the financial support. Any assistance of this kind will be your great contribution for the establishment of the Kingdom of God in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

May God bless you.

Victor Lonu Budha.

one more Picture

2008-01-01T23:06:00.001-08:00

One more picture of Junio and Micaiah with their new bikes.

Christmas in Kenya...more pics

2008-01-01T22:59:00.001-08:00

Pictures are:
-Us on Christmas
-Tim and Jeana
- Don
-The girls
- Annabelle wanted to go out... (don't worry we let her and it is completely safe)

Christmas in Kenya

2008-01-01T22:44:00.000-08:00

So our first Christmas away was full of fun and friends. We had our friends, the Roths (Tim, Jeana and Micaiah) up with us from Tanzania and a friend named Don who works here in Nairobi at the Embassy. Don provided and cooked a delicious 16 pound turkey, Jeana made her famous peppermint fudge with ingredients sent from the states and I settled in on the green bean casserole, and the birthday cake for Jesus. Junio's favorite presents were his bike, a sling shot (not from his mother, I'd just like to point out!) and new superman shoes that light up when he walks. Annabelle loved opening the presents and saying "Krisamasi, Krisamasi!" over and over again. Micaiah also got a new bike which was very exciting!
Tim and Jeana have had to extend their stay with us because of violence from the elections here in Kenya. It is long and complicated but if you would like to know more about it you can look on the NY Times or Washington Post websites. They are planning to leave tomorrow morning to head back to Tanzania since we have had one day of relative peacefulness and there is a big demonstration planned for Thursday where it could be much worse for awhile. I have been really encouraged by a couple of verses in Lamentations 3:21-26, "Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning;great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, 'The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.' The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord." Please pray for the Roth's and for us. We have seen the Lord provide and we have seen his protection over us and his friends but we have been stretched to not constantly fear. We are constantly waiting for the Lord to do something to end the violence.

Pictures: - our friends the Roths
- opening gifts
- Don and his amazing turkey (which we are still eating, who knew it would become so valuable now that food is a bit scarce)
- Annabelle and a new Christmas doll
- Junio and his new bike

two more

2007-12-11T07:21:00.001-08:00

A picture of our Christmas tree and annabelle and her friend showing each other their bellys.

Pictures of Christmas Tree

2007-12-11T06:59:00.001-08:00

Friends here are some pictures of our Christmas setup which also happened to be Momma Jamie's birthday. Happy Christmas. Thanks for watching.

A Bit of Rest

2007-12-11T03:09:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone. Its break time and that means rest. And rest is, in fact, what we've been doing. As well as getting a newsletter ready, and getting some gifts for our family back in the states and things. This week we are house sitting for one of our professors. They went on "holiday" as the British call it, to the coast, and so they graciously let us spend a week at their house. It is bigger than ours, nicer, has internet, a washing machine and a really big yard/garden around it so the kids can play. Its been nice and quiet because its on the other side of campus from where we live.
In other news, Jamie's Birthday was last week, Junio and Jeremy went out and bought her a fake Christmas tree for her birthday. We also went out to lunch, to Jamie's favorite place, Java House (www.nairobijavahouse.com), for American style food, she had a burrito, lemonade and a mocha frappucino for dessert. We took Gladwell with us. She loved it. It was her second time ever having a hamburger (the first time we found out was earlier this term when we all had to eat lunch at the cafeteria here).
In kids news, Annabelle has been loving the sand box in the back yard here and Junio has really enjoyed playing with a few of his closest friends instead being bombarded with tons of kids all the time. We were able to babysit Lilo and her older brother and sister,Jonathan and Abigail, while their parents went all the way to the other side of Nairobi for the day. They played so well all day. And Annabelle, of course, loved having her best friend Lilo over.
Jeremy was able to go and shadow with a colleague last week. The fellow is a translation consultant working with some languages in Tanzania and is based out of Nairobi. Jer absolutely loved the work. They had a great time checking the translation the native speakers had done and making comments. thats it for now, thanks for watching.

Its Over for now

2007-11-29T00:24:00.000-08:00

Hi Everyone... we are done! we finished out First term out of 6 this week. Its nice to have a break. We go back to school on January 7th. IN the mean time we will be resting, spending much needed family time relaxing. Junio will finish school today (Thursday 29th). We had plans to go to Tanzania to visit some friends working in Northern Tz for Christmas, however.. it became a better option to have our friends come up to us. SO they are coming in a couple weeks. We also have the opportunity to house-sit for some friends (actually one of our profs). SO we'll do that, and have a bit more room for about 10 days or so. So thats the quick skinny. We are beginning our next newsletter, so y'all should get that sometime before too long. If you don't get it and you want. Post a comment here and tell me, and how to get it to you, and I'd be happy to put you on. Also if there is a particular question you have about our life and studies here, post that and maybe we can address it in a post or in the newsletter. thanks for watching -Jer et al

Pictures attached this time:
- Junio in his school Christmas program ( i dont know why the tall kids were is the front)
- Lilo helping Annabelle take a bath
- outside our house at night
-Annabelle deep in philosophical conversation ( takes after her Dad!)
- Junio's fantastic smile

its been along time

2007-11-06T03:29:00.000-08:00

Hi, everyone...I do hope you are well. many people have mentioned to us via email that they really appreciate viewing our blog. So frist, let me apologize to y'all for not updating it as regularly as we'd like. Things have continued to be very busy for us, and they will only get busier for the next couple of weeks. We are now in our last month of our first term at school. We find ourselves deep in the middle of research projects (thankfully we've chosen good interesting topics), and various other things. In three weeks time we will be studying for exams. We end on the 28th of this month, and then praise the LOrd, we can rest until the 7th of Jan. when term 2 starts. It, truly, has not been bad at all. We have really enjoyed our classes (despite the work load) and have learned a ton that will be useful in the future ministry God has called us to.
We have remained mostly well this term. Really the only one who has been sick has been me (Jeremy). I have had a cold on and off for about 6 or 7 weeks now. I finally have access to vitamin C so, that is starting to go away again,(I hope this time permanently).
Annabelle is doing very well. She has decided to start her terrible twos a bit early, and so now she thinks she can do many things by herself. Luckily for us, we taught her to ask for help if she couldn't do something, and she still does ask every once in a while. She is at the point of constructing two word sentences now. her usual repetroire is "mow nease" - more please, "down now" "nakk pease" - snack please, "ain uu" - thank you, "santi" - thank you (swahili asante), and "dizi" - banana (swahili ndizi). Yes she is doing pretty well at swahili...as is Junio. However, Junio is a bit embarrassed to speak swahili to his parents. We also have to remind him to speak American English when at home so I can understand him.
Both the kids have good friends. Junio has a good friend next door, named emmanuel (manu for short). They love to hang out together and play soccer with all the other kids. In fact, we don't see Junio very much during the day (you'd think he was 16), he's off kicking the ball with Manu or somebody else and having a grand old time (with the occasional disagreement in the middle, you know they yell at each other, maybe one throws the other on the ground, victory is declared, and then back to soccer). Annabelle also has a couple of little friends her age. One is the daughter of an Ethiopian family here. They love to play together and in fact share toys and food together quite often. Her name is Lydia, though everyone calls her Lilo, except for Annabelle who says "wiwo." Her other little friend is a little boy a little younger than her (Lilo is a bit older). His name is "wiam" I mean Liam. He is the son of another American family here, doing a PhD.
We have over the past month been attacked by swarms of ants coming from the trash bins behind our house. The first time they came they came in our room at about 4:30am, we had our bed next to the window and Jamie woke up with them on her head and all in her hair. She was combing dead ants (or alive ones) out of her hair for a couple days. Several times they came in the kids room, very scary in light of Annabelles allergies to bug bites, and once they visited the kitchen. We have things mostly in control now, but it was really stressful for a while there. We kill them with boiling water, and kerosene, and bug spray. I check behind the house every night before I go to bed to make sure we are safe. They have not come for about a week now, perhaps its the coffee grounds we put on the window sill (a friend of ours said that works, so we tried it, and it really seems to -something to store away for the next time you are in Africa.)

Long time

2007-10-06T07:32:00.000-07:00

Hi Friends, I am very sorry I didn't realize its been a month since last we posted. We suddenly got very busy with papers and readings. We are in the middle of our first term. We are both enjoying our classes allot. Jamie has about half the work that I do, which is great so she still has time for the kids and taking care of some of the house work. However, our house help Gladwell has been fantastic, we are really getting along well with her.
The Kids are doing well, except that Junio is getting over an ear-infection. He also lost one of his front teeth now and the other one is loose. Hes doing well is school as well, and is really beginning to read. Annabelle is happy and health and decided to explore on her own for the first time today. She walked all the way to Junio's school and tryed to climb the ladder to the slide she didn't get very far up it thankfully, before Jamie got her.

news for the 4th of September

2007-09-04T10:57:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone...I hope you are well. This week we have been involved in orientation for our school. Next week classes start. We are excited to be here and settled and we are looking forward to starting classes though everyone tells us classes are alot of work and we will be very busy, they may be right, but we'll see. Jamie is probably only going to take 3 classes and I will take a full load of 16 or 17 credits (5 or 6 classes).
We will both be taking some linguistic courses including phonetics, sociology of language and something about vernacular media (non-print). But I will additionally be taking Greek (probably) and something else I forget at the moment.
I am excited, but I don't want to lose our family life for the sake of our schooling. I want to have a good a balance.
In other news, we are in the process of buying a car. its a 88 Toyota Corolla Station Wagon, something to get us around nothing fancy. We are buying it from a missionary who flys planes for an organization here in Nairobi. I will post pictures as soon at I take them. I think its a good setup.
Thats it for now, thanks for staying posted. see ya.

Jer

PS. more pictures. The flower I took the other day and I thought they came out pretty neat. The others are self-explanatory.

Pictures

2007-08-28T11:41:00.000-07:00

Hi friends...I have some pictures for you. without further ado... acouple are of the kids and two are of the school we are at, one of the area near the classrooms and the our our house (bottom floor, on the left). these were all taken on our new camera, its fantastic.

It's late now so I'm going to bed

Another long awaited Post

2007-08-24T05:31:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends....please forgive me for taking so long for new posts. However here is another:

WE are now done with Tanzania for the forseeable future, we have arrived in Kenya and gone to the school were we are studing for the next two years. www.negst.edu . We are in the process of finding things, setting up house, finding house help and that sort of thing. Its been a very busy past couple of days and a bit overwhelming...but we are doing well and very very glad to be in one place. Jamie can set up our little appt the way she wants.
Also other good news, we have gotten our new camera and finally are able to document what has been going on. unfortunately no pictures of Tz now for a while, but I'll do my best to post pics of our life here in Nairobi. I'll put one here, but i need to resize some others and will post them next time. Thanks for keeping posted. see ya,

Jer

Junio's Bday, conference and Annabelles sick

2007-07-30T02:38:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone...its been far to long since the last post. I'll add more pictures in a second, but to update you. We finished Language school, spent a week in Dar es Salaam and then drove up the coast to Malindi Kenya for our annual branch conference with our organization. We had a great week, and Junio had a great birthday during conference. However Annabelle continues to remain sick with rashes and a cold, and so instead of returning to Dar es Salaam Friday, we flew to Nairobi yesterday to see doctors about Annabelle's health. This is the best place for it. God is providing for a place to stay and access to a car and great new friends to help us learn where to go and how to go there. Below I intend on putting pictures on Junio's birthday, and Annabelle and anything else I can find. Our camera really has "died" now so the pictures are very limited...I am excited to get a new one form the states very soon. thanks for you prayers and for keeping posted.

Jeremy

Annabelle's Walking, Junio's cooking!

2007-07-06T06:18:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone,
here are some more pictures taken this week. Thanks for watching.

For those interested: the verb "angalia" is to watch. to say "I am watching" you can say ni (I) na (am) angalia(watching)....ninaangalia! thanks

Jamie went to the house of one of the workers at the camp on wednesday when i went into town. She made Mandazis which are like little african donuts minus the holes and less sugar. The lady who is holding Annabelle in the picture is Mama Zaina. We were inside her house with dirt walls and floor but her house is a little fancier because it has a tin roof as opposed to the grass ones. The thing she is cooking over is called a jiko and it is a little coal stove. Junio helped cook the mandazi's by rolling out the dough and cutting it into triangles. We took them back to share with everyone after dinner for dessert and he was so proud of himself telling everyone that he made them.

Annabelle has started walking all the time now although she reverts back to crawling on uneven ground. She is so proud of herself. Junio and his friends, Brennan and Luke caught a lizard the other day and put him in a jar and spent the day catching bugs for him to eat. We let him go at night though!

We have been trying to cram all that we can into learning Swahili since we only have a week left of class. Pray that we will keep going with it and won't get discouraged!!

More pictures..

2007-06-29T13:13:00.001-07:00

The real thing

2007-06-29T13:01:00.000-07:00

Hey Everyone!

Yeah..the last post...oops, I'm still figuring out how this all works.

Only two weeks to go, and the we are done with Swahili school. I for one am truly amazed at how far I've come. Jamie is once again very confortable with her swahili. Its great that we both know it now, and can communicate with one another. Just wait till we come back to the states in a couple years and we can have a personal conversation right in front of y'all and no one will know what we are saying.

The kids are doing well. Annabelle, has tripled her vocabulary this week. She trys to say everything Mom or dad say. I talked to her on the phone tonight and she said "hi" "i love you too" and "bye" and something else I can't remember, with prompting from Mom, but tis wonderful. Jamie said she said "diaper" today which of course is a very important word for a little girl o know. I'm in Dar es Salaam this weekend helping pick up a vehicle and friend of mine and his wife are buying. Its a nice 98 Toyota Land Cruiser, big tires rugged off road suspension, a nice car. We'll drive about 7 hours back to Iringa tomorrow. WE go through a game pack, which when we came through coming to Dar, we say gazelle, giraffe, Elephant, warthog and Junio's favorite Zebra. I'll try to take some video for him on the way back tomorrow.

In other news, we've had rats in our banda recently, the night before I came to Dar, we had set traps, and ended up catching two coming into our house, however, they still were running around knocking things over on our night tables, and making noises under the bed. Certainly an unnerving experience for Jamie. But last night she didn't have any trouble( which is great because I wasn't there to protect her :o) ). Anyway...such is life in Africa. Thank for listening. Peace.

Jer

Onward...through small streets.

2007-06-29T12:53:00.000-07:00

Sorry...here are the pictures...yes one is here twice.

2007-06-15T06:33:00.000-07:00

This week

2007-06-15T06:11:00.000-07:00

Here are some pics of our place: One is a pic of the house we have mostly been living in. Another is a picture of the girl, Jiliani that takes care of Annabelle and Junio while we are in class, and the last is a picture of Junio and his friend Mikayla outside the tent we lived in while they were putting a bathroom on our stone house. We just moved back to the stone banda with a bathroom and it has been so wonderful.
Today both Jeremy and I got to come into to town to run errands. There are only vehicles that come into town every so often and usually there is not enough room for the whole family. So, we celebrated when we found a shop with Ice cream cones. Yeah!! Some of you have asked about our access to e-mail. We only have e-mail when we come into town and use the internet cafe. Sometimes it is slower than mud and we never know when we will for sure be able to come into town. So, thank you all for your patience in our slow returns to e-mail and things.
Swahili school is going well. My class is doing a play of the story of Joseph in Kiswahili. We are writing it and performing it ourselves. I am playing the part of Jacob, Joseph's father and the baker who has the bad dream and gets his head cut off. We have to memorize all our lines in Swahili so it is a little nerve-wrecking. Jeremy is getting prepared to teach a lesson in Swahili to his class on how to play a song on the guitar. He has to completely explain it in Swahili. This should be challenging but fun.
Annabelle is doing well, for those of you who didn't know, she did take her first steps but hasn't really started walking. She prefers to crawl or swim in the dirt. She is always covered from head to toe in dirt when we pick her up from childcare.
Junio is doing well. There is another American family coming tomorrow with 5 and 10 year old boys. Junio will start taking Swahili lessons with the other 5 year old boy on Monday for an hour a day. This is very fortunate because his friend Mikayla is leaving to go back to New Zealand next week and they probably won't see each other again for awhile.
God Bless you all and thank you for your prayers!!

Welcome to Africa!!

2007-05-30T05:29:00.000-07:00

HI everyone, sorry this is the first post I've had in a very long time. With internet connections being so slow and all, its been difficult. We have, as you know, moved to Tanzania, and we are now is Language school, learning Swahili. Jamie already nows it and its been great for her to get reacquainted with it, but as for me its new, exciting, and a lot of work.
We've been here now for almost a month. The campsite we are staying at is a fantastic place, great for Junio to play in and everything. The food is great, the staff are really helpful, and will speak swahili to you if you want to, but also know at least some English. It seems to be a really good introduction in the culture. We study in the morning, and then have the afternoon to go into town or whatever. Town is about 12 km away.
One bummer, is our camera has broken. So the pictures will be scarse for awhile until we find something here or in the states ( and someone coming over). A friend of mine got it to work barely, with a bit of sauder and a piece of a pop can, but this is really a temporary solution. So much to say, Annabelle was sick with Malaria, she got the prize for being the first one. though, unfortunately the price was sleepless nights which Mom, Dad and Annabelle enjoyed together. But is all better now, and back to her happy healthy self, which is a huge blessing.
One of the most intersting things is that, here the stars are different, or at least certainly in different places. I'm no astronomer, you'll have to ask someone who knows ( like my dad), but they are really bright and different. just FYI.
I don't know what else to say, I hope to update this when I get into town every week, that way you all can stay more connected, eventually we might even have pictures we can post too. thanks for praying. see ya.

I'm back

2007-03-07T08:57:00.000-08:00

After almost a year of no posts, i am now posting...nothing once again.

What happens when you have nothing to say.

2006-05-21T14:00:00.000-07:00

I think when you have nothing to say nothing happens. The trouble is that either people have nothing to say or too much to say. this is the case with Bloggs. It is important to me to spell Blogg with two "g"'s thanks.

Time for a new post

2006-05-15T16:57:00.000-07:00

WEll now its time fora new post. ITs been about 1.5 years since my last. I am married to my lovely wife Jamie and have a 5 year old Junio and a 3 month old Annabelle. The Lord has been very good to us. WE are plasnning on going to Africa next year to study linguistics and Bible translation.

There are about 2600 languages which do not yet have the scriptures in their language. Why is this important, you ask. Well... It'd be like an american trying to read their most favorite book in the world, in Old-english. They may recognize one or two words, maybe more but they certainly couldn't understand the majority of it, let alone let the world really sink in to enjoy them.

Question

2004-12-21T09:55:00.000-08:00

Why is it so difficilt for us American to desire balance in our lives?

I don't think this a value in our society. It certainly was in other societys in the past, particularly some of the greek people (well maybe not their society, but certainly in the writings of Aristotle and Plato). But it seems as so though balance is the "forgotten virtue." Well, shoot, the word Virtue and its various connotations and denotations, have largely been lost in our post-modern western world. Virtue implys something of intrinsic value, but in our PM world what has value apart from the value assigned by the individual?
I was talking to a friend the other day, and I realized that the issue really comes down to nature of truth. Is truth apart from the individual? Or maybe better put, is truth bigger than the individual. I think so. But I digress.
Balance is no longer a virtue. Why?
And to add as a side note, where did Honor go??

2004-12-08T16:08:00.000-08:00

a picture of my soon-to-be-son Junio and myself.

2004-12-08T15:43:00.000-08:00

A picture of me and my Jamie

A frustration

2004-12-08T14:58:00.000-08:00

WHy is it that we always assume that whatever is new is better? THis is something common in the culture in which we live. But as I live in a life of Christian ministry, I find that we so easily get sucked into the same mentality in the church, at the great expence. We are called to right living and cultural relevance, but the newness of the latest and greatest often begins to erode away our conviction and solidarity on Othrodoxy more than we realize.
It happens all to often, that someone will come up with a new idea (which in itself may not be new, simply a repackaged one), and claim that they have finally found "the way", "this must be it!", they shout, and then we must to start a revolution in order to change things. "Throw it all out, start again" they say. The truth is often, that they simply do not know their history and do not understand scripture. Solomon very clearly says, " there is nothing new under the sun." But Further, since when has the Biblical concept of redemption involved through out the old and starting again? That was never God's plan. His plan has always been working for the inside to change, to redeem, life for his people. This is why Jesus came and was incarnate. He did not one day say, "oh Shoot, everyone is horribly sinful, hey Dad lets just start again." He came to earth, drew us, sinful people, to himself and transformed us, through his spirit and his grace.
My point, I suppose, is simply to say, there is nothing new in the realm of Christian thought and practice, just repackaging (this does have value, but more about that later). Be very sceptical of anyone who tells you that everything that came before is crap, and we have to start over because they have finally got it!

The Now

2004-12-01T10:09:00.000-08:00

This the now. At the urging of a good friend and the gentle nugging of my will, i decided it may be profitable to provide a forum for myself to discuss the now of life and truth. OF course, often, the then is the same as the now.
IN short my hope is that this would be a place to the discuss my current ideas and thoughts with myself, in the hope of someone else reading them, and benefiting from them. Perhaps this is to much to ask, i pray not.