'Batman' sent to recruit students

Hello everybody!

We're all alive and well. I am out around Guinea helping Pastor recruit new students for next year so we're near some internet cafes that we can e-mail from. We may be getting our internet access in Sambouya back soon too. Although with only 5 weeks left it's a little late. Better late than never though.

Not much has changed since we last wrote. The weather has grown incredibly hot. It feels like you're walking through an oven in the afternoons and at night we just lay there and sweat. Using a wet bandana cools you off a little bit, but only temporarily. The rain is starting to come though and those nights are a little bit cooler.

So far we've had one rain storm, which came a couple of weeks earlier than usual, and a couple of times when it's teased but only sprinkled or passed over. It was a real dust storm before the first rain came when the wind picked up. We felt like real Okies (or Arkies). The first rain washed the dust and dirt off of the roofs (our water collection system) so the next rain we'll get our water tanks filled!

We now officially live in the bat cave. One day last week we saw about 10 different bats in the house. Fortunately, most of them went back up into the ceiling when we tried to capture them, but 4 of them were flying around the house in the evening. Jeje and I are getting better at broombat though. I think Jeje even enjoys it (maybe a little too much).

The kids say we should just kill them so they don't come back, but none of us are killers so we just wack them and they play dead until we can throw them outside. None of us enjoy it too much, but at least it's entertaining!!! And since I'm the only guy here it also gives me the unofficial title of Bat Man:) (Though I don't recall him ever using a broom to defeat his enemies.)

The mangoes are here. We still can't figure how they grow after 5 months of no rain, but it's all just a part of God's plan I guess. It's nice to have some different fruit.

The next 4 weekends we'll be doing student selection for next year. Pastor and I will be seeing probably thousands of kids from all over Guinea and we'll have to sort through and find the 50 or so that we're looking for. A lot of prayer has gone into it here and if you could pray as well we would be grateful. If you could pray for our safety as we travel a lot (and me as I attempt to drive a manual which I haven't done since I was 16).

Also pray that God would lead us to the right students for this school. We've sent some native university students ahead of us to spread the word and do early sign ups, but still people will bring kids anywhere from toddlers to teenagers and try to pass them as 5-7 years old. For a small amount of money it's even possible for them to obtain false birth certificates, so we'll be relying mostly on appearance and teeth to judge ages. It should be a really fascinating experience. I'm very excited to see some other parts of Guinea too!

We've sent a list of items that the school will be needing over the next 3 years to most of our teacher/school contacts, but anybody who's interested can donate. TM is shipping a container of supplies to here in early August. If you want to see the list of items we're looking for and possibly donate something(s), click on this link, thanks! Also, please use this blog to coordinate if you are donating things. The space in the container is somewhat limited and don't want to get thousands of pencils and no paper to write on. :)

So that's the news from Africa. We don't have a clue about what's going on in the political scene now, but everything seems peaceful. Looking forward to being with you all again soon.


Love,
Shannon and Carol