Some GT pics

So in the mission house there is no can opener so this is how we did it. Which is also the way we open cans in the jungle. We use a cutlass (large knife ie machete).



This is the best place to get internet at the mission house! So when you talk to me while I'm here, that is where I'm standing.


Here is Maunisa and I hanging out at the Mission house.

Making Casava bread

Picking the Cassava

This is the first thing you do once you pick cassava, peal it.

Then you have to grate it.

Then you squeeze it. Then you do some other things like shift it and then bake it. maybe some other things, i wasn't involved in those steps.

But then you bake it in the sun.

In Georgetown, Missing Parumia

After four months of living in the jungle I’m beginning to feel a little technologically ignorant. I’ve been looking at my blog and marveling how wonderful it is. I provide the words and the pictures, but it is all because of my amazing graphically inclined sister that makes it all come together and look so great. It’s a good thing I don’t have Internet in the jungle otherwise I would not have such a good looking blog! But here I am in Georgetown with Internet and since my amazing sister is still sleeping peacefully back home 4 hours behind me I’m going to see if I can figure out how to add a post to my blog all by myself (scary).

So much has happened since September. I have seen God working in so many ways. I’ve had many bad days, but so many great days that I have never had before. Coming to Georgetown where life is busy, hectic and dirty, I keep telling myself how much I love Paruima. In Paruima you can look up at the sky and see the beautiful sky, and only a couple buildings. In Paruima you can walk in the puddles because it is clean rain water mixed with dirt (unlike GT where it is trash and who knows what else in the water). In Paruima you can hear yourself think. In Paruima life is so much simpler and less complicated. I miss Paruima.

The pilot kept wanting to take me out of Paruima every time he came to take the staff out. But I kept telling him that he should take someone else instead of me. I did not want to go to GT.

Although I do not like GT, I’m enjoying talking to friends and family back home. I miss you all and wish I could see you. But I’m also missing all my girls and students back at DIIC. The house that I’m staying at in GT has Internet so I’m on a lot ( I have to make up for the last 4 months), so write me or call me on skype (kariac) I’d love to hear from you.

Some recent pictures

Christmas break coming to DIIC

December 4, 2008
I was wearing my Orange skirt that Mama made me and I found a message written on it for me! It said I love Karla!! I don’t know how long I’ve been wearing this skirt and just found it. Thanks. It was a nice surprise.

(Note from Karla's mother: I sewed this message into the skirt with my sewing machine.)

I’ve been keeping Psalms 126:5, 6 very close to me. It is very encouraging.  5 Those who sow in tears shall reap in joy. 6 He who continually goes forth weeping, Bearing seed for sowing, Shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, Bringing his sheaves with him. NKJV

Also Is 40: last five verses. 26 Lift up your eyes on high, And see who has created these things,   Who brings out their host by number;  He calls them all by name, By the greatness of His might And the strength of His power; Not one is missing. 27 Why do you say, O Jacob, And speak, O Israel: “My way is hidden from the LORD, And my just claim is passed over by my God”? 28 Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the LORD, The Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His understanding is unsearchable. 29 He gives power to the weak,And to those who have no might He increases strength. 30 Even the youths shall faint and be weary, And the young men shall utterly fall, 31 But those who wait on the LORD Shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint.

Christmas break is soon upon us. As a teacher I realize how quickly the break comes more than when I am a student. The transportation going home for Christmas break is complicated. James flies all the students here at the beginning of the year, and he can’t afford to fly them all home for Christmas so they have to find their own transportation. I’m trying to get them all home. I can at least get all but 3 home, hopefully.

We are hoping to have the motor bike fixed before Christmas so we can go around on it during the break. But we have had the parts on order since we arrived.

Well I’ve got to go to the air strip and get this off.

Love you all
Karla

Challenges

Karla, Maria and their girls

How was everyone's thanksgiving?

So I was going to send out this email on the 13th, but it obviously didn’t get sent then. We have been waiting for the last 2 weeks for the plane to be inspected. For the last 2 weeks we have been needing supplies. We are running out. On Thursday (Thanksgiving) we had to go to the village to buy supplies to last us until James came with more food. It is such a good thing we have the farm. We can eat one meal every day completely from the farm. It is such a blessing. And then the other meals are enhanced by the farm produce.

This last week has been such a growing experience for me. It started off with a lot of discipline. A lot of saying “we have had enough of this _(behavior)___ and we have warned you about it, and now we are going to do this _(Action)___ if it happens again.” I really don’t like disciplining. I don’t like being the bad guy, but I still do it. I have a much easier time doing it to the guys because we are not as close as I am with the girls.

One of my students, Rebecca has this cycle that she goes through with Maria and me. She won’t be talking to us, and ignores us, and then next thing you know she’ll come up to me and say how she misses me. Then she tries to suck up to me. It is so frustrating. I feel like, “the devil is really trying to break my courage through her.” But I have determined in my heart that she will not have the power to do that to me. I don’t want her to behave the way that she does, but I cannot let her affect my mood.

The other day Rebecca and I were weeding together on the farm (because it is the only way to get her to weed and that barely works) and she was like "why are you giving punishment to everyone? When you give kids punishment they just want to keep doing what they did wrong." I asked her what I should do instead, and she said "talk to us." Then I replied, “I have talked to everyone, including you, and nothing changes. I have given many warnings, but nothing happens. I need something to back up my word.” She didn’t like that but then we moved on.

Tonight I really felt like the devil was using her to try and tear me down. When we got back the dorm I stood on the steps and told the devil to leave this place, to leave in the name of Jesus. I felt peace after that. It was so good to be free from that heavy atmosphere.

Please pray that Rebecca’s attitude will change. Pray that the devil will not be able to use her to get to me. That she can be filled with the Holy Spirit and that she can take the knowledge that she has of the Bible and use it to glorify God.
Ok enough on Rebecca, but she is my biggest challenge.

The rising river

James taking a photo of Mr and Mrs Gates and the students on a boat ride down the river.

It has rained the last four days. Mostly just at night. All night. It flooded in the village and the river rose 60 + feet. It started to flood the airstrip. I haven’t seen it but I imagine that it went 30 feet into the airstrip. The plane can still land but not take off. James needs to make two trips when he gets his inspection over with. So hopefully it will be dry enough for him to take off the second time (if you get this then it was dry enough).

I had the best Thanksgiving in my life this year. Ok, so it had nothing to do with it being Thanksgiving but more my walk with God. I had prayed on Wednesday that God would work a miracle in getting the plane inspected in one day. I knew that this was something that only God could do, b/c Guyanese inspections take 3 + days. But I knew from the other part of the week that God had been using this time in the school year to grow us, as staff, To really rely on God for strength. Never before has the verse that says that “those who wait on the Lord ...will renew their strength” meant so much to me. It hurt but I knew that God was using these trials to grow me like never before. And I knew that if God didn’t perform this miracle that He had something better in store for me. And I felt completely at peace about whatever God decided to do. Well I didn’t get my miracle, but that was fine. I want to grow in God more and more. Running almost out of food has been quite a “growing” experience.