My trip to Bobete -- by Thomas

I woke up at 6:00 in the morning. We were flying in the plane and I got to sit in front. I got to fly the plane and I did the wrong thing and made it go up to high. We got to Bobete. Then we built the VSAT. I gave my dad and the people who helped us build it the nuts and bolts. We had lunch that was chicken and rice and papa and it was good. Then we finished building the satellite. I played and then I had supper. Which was mutton, and papa and it was really good. We looked at the stars and we saw Orion, the Southern Cross and the Milky Way. Then I went to bed on a bunch of wooden boards with a mattress. It was warm but not really comfortable. Friday we did some stuff on the satellite, had breakfast, and waited for the plane to come get us. Two planes landed there because one plane came to get my friend Gus's dad and the Ambassador to the European Union. They were there looking at my dad's satellite and talking. We loaded the plane and they put a sheep in the bottom of the plane. The sheep went to Maseru for people to eat. Then we flew back home. It was a fun trip. My favorite part was eating the sheep for supper.

- Thomas

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Thomas joined me for the second VSAT installation in the village of Bobete this past week. It was great having him with me and I hope it is something he will never forget - even if his favorite part was eating mutton. It is pretty rare for two of our planes to land at the same mountain strip at the same time, so it was an extra treat to see both planes parked at Bobete.

- Traig

1 down… 9 to go!

It has been an exciting past few days for me personally as I have completed the installation of the first VSAT dish! For the first time ever the medical teams working in the mountain village of Nohana have communication with the rest of the world.

On Tuesday, April 15, I flew to Nohana along with Jeremy Keeton – IT Specialist for Partners In Health. (A few “Flat Stanley’s” also joined me – something the teachers in our families will appreciate…!) Flight delays kept us from getting to the site until after 2:00 PM and we were planning to commission the dish at 8:00 PM that evening (this is scheduled in advanced with the Network Operation Center at Constellation Network Corporation, our satellite provider.) Less than 6 hours to construct, wire, configure, and point the dish – a little more pressure than I had hoped for on the first attempt! Thankfully we had plenty of help as several local Basotho men pitched in. They were eager to build something so unique in the mountains.

All things considered the installation went great. By 9:30 we were online and making test calls to the United States. Dr. Jonas Rigodon, who has been the physician at this remote clinic for 18 months, was very excited to email his colleagues and his wife (a little quicker than sending letters back and forth on the airplane!).

This VSAT system will bring much needed Internet access, email, and telephone capabilities to help meet the healthcare needs of the Basotho people in and around Nohana. This is a small village of maybe 1000 people, but the clinic serves a much wider area of at least 8000 people. To give you an idea of how bad the health situation is here, this clinic has been tracking all the patients who test positive for HIV/AIDS. In the last 18 months the number has grown to over 2,500. And of course not everyone in the Nohana area has come to the clinic or been tested.

Another troubling statistic: Catholic Relief Services (CRS) has joined the effort in Nohana by distributing food packets, blankets, and teaching new farming techniques (the AIDS treatments here are much more effective with a proper diet). CRS also started an initiative to profile all of the orphans and “at risk” children in the Nohana area. So far they have also exceeded 2,500 and have not reached the outer areas of the village population.

2,500 AIDS patients and climbing. 2,500 orphans and climbing. Just one small village.

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This week I will continue the VSAT project by installing a second dish in the village of Bobete. I was in Bobete on Friday to set the mounting pole. It is a tiny clinic grounds and like Nohana serves a large rural area. It is not uncommon for the clinic here to see up to 300 people a day. The flight schedule should allow Thomas to fly with me and stay the night in Bobete while I install the dish. It should be an interesting experience for both of us as Bobete has no electricity and just this morning had a couple inches of snow!! I am curious to hear what he thinks about the experience.

As always thanks for your prayers and emails. Please continue to pray for the Basotho people as winter sets in here. It was very cold this morning and snow kept us from flying to several mountain airstrips. Please pray for a mild winter in the mountains and good weather to keep our planes flying.

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And finally a special CONGRATULATIONS!! to Megan and Tony who are expecting their first baby in October. We love you and are very happy for you!

Have a great week everyone and God Bless you and your families,

Traig

The Poles are Here!!

FINALLY the long wait is over – the mounting poles have arrived! It has been six long weeks since we ordered these poles and until receiving them I have been unable to install the satellite equipment for the mountain clinics. This is the primary reason we are here so it has been a frustrating wait! I am learning the hype is right - things really do take longer here...

The dishes I will be installing are 2.4 meters in diameter (about 8 feet), quite heavy, and require a very sturdy mount using 6” steel pipe we cannot get in Lesotho. (Wait, I take that back… there was ONE pipe big enough in Lesotho, and we bought that one and welded it between two shipping containers to use for our training dish. It’s not going anywhere now…) So we special ordered galvanized poles from a steel plant in South Africa, which have to be made in two sections short enough to fit into the airplanes. They have been held up due to considerable issues in the steel industry in South Africa, which I understand is the result of rolling electrical blackouts in that country. Steel prices are surging here – poles for just the first 5 sites cost us over $3,500 U.S.

On Wednesday morning I met with the supplier at 8:00 AM to pick up the poles, and by 9:00 AM was on the MAF plane to the village of Nohana to get the first mount set in concrete. It was great to be back in the mountains! This week I will return to Nohana to install and commission the first dish, then fly to the village of Bobete on Friday to set the next pole. By the end of April we should have two clinics online (Nohana and Bobete) and a pole set in the village of Nkau. Everyone is anxious to get these clinics online and improve the processes and care provided by the medical workers in the mountains.

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As I prepare for the start of this VSAT project, I want to share something that has been on my heart recently. Since the completion of the VSAT training course in late February I have been thinking a lot about two people. Pastor Joséph Thontwa and Emmanuel Swebolo are Congolese men who traveled from their home in the Democratic Republic of the Congo to Lesotho to participate in the VSAT training. They represent CEUM – a large, growing Christian church in the Congo and Central African Republic.

These are incredibly strong Christian men. Pastor Joséph is the head Pastor of a church of 1070 members with two weekly worship services, in French and Lingala (the local language). He primarily gives the French sermon, although he speaks both languages fluently. In fact he reads, writes, and speaks FIVE languages fluently. Pastor Thontwa is married with four children.

Emmanuel Swebolo is a Deacon in the church, and the head of the Missions Board. He speaks four languages, and is also married and has five children. Together with Pastor Thontwa he will travel into the jungles of the Congo for up to a month at a time, ministering to the Pygmy people. They take whatever transportation is required including car, boat, motorcycles, horses, even walking for days into the forests to reach these isolated people.

The dedication these men have to advancing God’s Kingdom within their home nation of the Congo is astounding. Currently they desire to expand their ministry by adding distance education for college level Bible courses. This will require installing VSAT satellite technology at four locations in the Congo. When the opportunity came for them to receive VSAT training in Africa they eagerly registered for the course, despite knowing the great lengths they would have to take to get to Lesotho.

I have learned it is difficult to get into or out of the Congo. The Congolese government is very restrictive when it comes to issuing passports and visas to leave the country. Prior to travel, these men were required to apply in person for visas 10 DAYS in advance. This meant a trip of 1000 km from their home in Gemena to the capital city of Kinshasa. Their first application was delayed (resulting in missed flights) but thankfully they were approved two days later. At this point they had already been away from home and family for two weeks and the VSAT course had not even started.

Arrival in Lesotho brought another challenge. Congolese people are not trusted by most governments in Africa, and cannot enter a country without a pre-issued visa. When I went to the airport to pick them up I was met by huge smiles from Pastor Joséph and Emmanuel and very angry words from the customs officer who felt their paperwork was not in order. He was not at all happy about letting these men into Lesotho without proper visas. Ultimately they were released into the country with a 72-hour permit and we had to purchase them an extension for R 400 (about $50 U.S.).

I want you to understand that Pastor Joséph and Emmanuel are intelligent, educated, dedicated individuals. Unfortunately, they do not understand English very well (their sixth and fifth languages, respectively) and this resulted in frustration and confusion during the VSAT course. Ultimately these men left Lesotho without achieving the full requirements for VSAT certification and will have to take an exam in the Congo the end of May. To add further defeat, travel hassles kept them from getting home until a full week after the training course had ended, the airline lost one of their bags, and they had money stolen in the market during a layover in the Congo. They were away from jobs and family for a full month and endured some pretty frustrating experiences and STILL cannot install the VSAT technology they so desperately want to implement in their home country.

Laura and I were so impressed by the dedication these men have. We had them to our home for lunch one afternoon during their stay and despite language barriers were able to talk about families and the work they are doing for God in their country – which has been ravaged by wars and poverty. It was again humbling to think of how easy our life is (even here!) and how much we still take for granted. These guys have such limited resources yet do whatever it takes to spread the Gospel and reach the lost people.

I have stayed in contact with Pastor Joséph and Emmanuel. Tomorrow morning (Monday, April 14) Pastor is riding a motorcycle 200km on “bad roads” to another town to teach bible courses for a week. Please join me in praying for these men, for their families, their growing Christian church, and that God would bless their work and use them as powerful tools in a country that is in pretty bad shape and needs the Hope and Love of Christ more than we can imagine. And specifically that He would grant them travel mercies as they go about their ministry and that He would enable them to complete the VSAT training so they can further spread the Gospel through technology.

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I know this was a very long post, thanks for reading if you stuck with me. Also thanks so much for your prayers and support of our family and now our friends in the Congo. If you want more information on these men or how you can send them words of encouragement please let me know.

Traig

Trunks

I just finished sorting through some of the kid’s clothing. Our housekeeper always puts the laundry away despite me telling her it is a great chore for the kids, and often times we find that the clothing is mixed up. I was thinking about how when we set out on this journey, I spent hours going through clothing determining what would go and what would stay. We had 15 trunks and I needed to be very deliberate in what I packed. Countless times I though, “How will I ever get 6 people’s things into these trunks?” , packing and repacking, we did it! Toys, some food, and clothing, 14 trunks ready for Africa-one was filled with computer parts that Traig needed to bring.

Now I am ashamed of the amount we brought here, even more ashamed to admit we brought clothes that we have not even worn. I have been in my housekeeper’s home-very nice compared to those around hers-two rooms. Everything she owns would fit into less than 15 trunks. Over the weekend, Traig visited the home of a man he has befriended. Daniel is his name and he has a wife who 6 days a week, works a 10 hour shifts in the Gap clothing factory here in town making about 29 rand a day (about 4 dollars). A loaf of bread is 4.50 rand, a half gallon of milk 15 rand, and a kg of bananas 8 rand. So that is what a day’s labor would get their family at the store. He has been without steady employment for about a year and he washes cars to make money. They have a beautiful son, Emmanuel, who is 2.

Daniel’s home was smaller than our kitchen, and we do not have a large kitchen. There was one shelf with a few blankets, a small closet that held all their clothing-2 shirts for Daniel and a dress and shirt for his wife. A make shift table in one corner and a bed, her kitchen was a hotplate on the table. I have struggled with not having water on and off since our arrival, they had no sink to have water run to. No toys, except a small stuffed dog that Noah gave Emmanuel shortly after we met them. I was getting a bag of tomatoes from our garden to send home with Daniel and Noah said he didn’t think that Emmanuel would like tomatoes, he though he would like a toy. He then went to his room and returned with one of his stuffed dogs. A real sacrifice for Noah as he only brought Cry Dog’s best friends to Africa, (Cry dog is Noah’s favorite toy).

Everything they owned would not have filled one of our trunks. I struggle justifying how I have lived my life for the past 31 years and how I have raised my children. I hope they remember what they are seeing all around them and that they can some how grow up in America without succumbing to materialism there. May they know now and always that happiness, joy and peace come from God, not all the things that we try to fill our lives with.

Grace and Peace to All, Laura

“Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you shall be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.”

Luke 6:20-22