Issue #9

February 7,1999
Dear Friends and Family,

I hope this email finds you all well and happy. It is going well here. This last week was a good week. We had a big event on campus. On Friday the American Ambassador came for a visit. We have a new Ambassador. He has only been in country 3 months. He wanted to come see where the largest group of Americans is. The kids were excited about it. The got all ready for it and helped clean up the campus. We had an assembly on Friday morning. The elementary choir and the high school choir sang and the band played. He spoke for a few minutes and then was given a tour around campus and a reception was held for him. He also had an entourage of people with him that work in various aspects of the Embassy. They all seemed to enjoy their visit.

The other big news on Friday was that I had an addition to my household. I had been telling my kids for a few weeks that I was going to have a surprise for them in a few weeks. Then I had been telling them for about a week that it was going to be on Friday. I surprised them with the arrival of my new puppy on Friday morning. He is a seven week old German Shepherd puppy. Of course he is very cute. His name is Leviticus (Levi). (I just named him that, no reason. Everyone keeps asking though.) He has been pretty well behaved thus far and has not driven my roommate or others in my apartment building crazy yet. It is nice to only have concrete floors when you are trying to train a puppy though.

On Tuesday, the staff women played the high school girls' basketball team. There is a shortage of teams for them to play these days. A lot of the schools in town don't seem to have basketball teams anymore, so we play them so that get to play a few more games. I'm not sure our game is what you would call competition. We started doing better toward the end when people like me figured out what they were supposed to be doing. I can't say that I have had much experience in playing basketball, but it was a lot of fun anyway.

The elementary musical is only two weeks away. There is so much to be done. I am just now realizing how many last minute details there are. I just found out this week where it was going to be held at so now it is time to start getting the stage together. I went to town yesterday to buy material to use on the set. The people at the material store that I was crazy when I ask for that much. They kept asking, "How much?" Of course with my French it is always interesting when I go out to buy things.

Being ready in season and out of season came to my mind this morning. I was sitting in church. We had finished the singing and the kindergartners - 3rd grade had been sent out for Children's Church. The preacher was about 5 minutes or so into his sermon when I get this tap on my shoulder. "Traci, there is no one doing children's church." I walk out the door and see the kids having a grand time playing on the swings. Brenda, the nurse, follows me to help. I just keep thinking what can I do with 30-some kids for 30 minutes. I ended up taking them all to my house and putting on a VeggieTales video. I was glad I had brought the video back from the States with me. The kids were very excited, and of course I told them if they were good they could play with the puppy up the end. Apparently there was some kind of communication lapse between the person who does the schedule and the person who was supposed to do children church, but the kids didn't seem to mind.

PRAYER REQUESTS:
WORKERS: We need help. There are a lot of people leaving on furlough or going home this summer. We have a lot of empty slots for next year and no idea on who might be interested in taking them. Do you know anyone who would like to come work with a wonderful group of kids and staff in Africa? We need middle school and high school teachers along with other staff positions. Pray that good will place this on people's hearts. It is a great place to be.

BORDERS: The borders of Guinea still remain closed. The only way to get out of the country is to fly. It is getting close to the time for the parents to come visit their kids. Most come for the weekend of February 19-21. This is Penny Fair and the Elementary Musical. If they have to fly, they will not be able to stay as long because of the increase in cost.

PARENTS: As I just mentioned many of the parents will be traveling in the next few weeks to come to ICA. Some of them travel on bad roads, through desolate areas, and come long distances.

PEACE: Pray for peace in African countries like Liberia and Sierra Leone where we have parents working. These can be dangerous situations.

MUSICAL: Pray that everything will go well in the next two weeks to get ready for the musical.

PENNY FAIR: Pray for all of the preparations for this. This is the big event of the year. It is a big carnival type thing. It is amazing what all the kids do to put this together. The freshman class is in charge of the food, and the sophomore class is in charge of the booths and rides. They put many hours of work into it.

HEALTH: As always continue to pray for the health and safety of the students and staff especially as everyone is extra busy preparing for Penny Fair/Musical Weekend.

Just a note on the weather, the fairly nice weather is still holding out. It is really dry though. Everything is dying off and the grass is brown. They are burning fields today so there is a constant rain of ash coming from the sky. The temperature has gotten hot but it hasn't remained there. It was 90 inside my classroom with the fan on one day this week. We still have February though to get through. February and March are usually the hot months. We almost got rain last week, which is completely out of the ordinary. It shouldn't come until April.

Thanks so much for your prayer and support.
Traci