Here is what is happening and going on in our corner of the world!
We arrived at our ministry host’s home in Jeffreys Bay last week on Monday evening after 72 hours of traveling with three flights, a nine-hour layover in Istanbul, Turkey, and an hour bus ride. We were all tired but so excited to be there and settle in! Our longest flights were overnight so it made adjusting to the time change a little bit easier. We unloaded our luggage, ate a great dinner, had a quick orientation, and then hopped into our bunk beds to rest for ministry the next day! 
We started on Tuesday at each of our ministry spots. Our squad is broken into three smaller teams, so we went to our separate ministry locations. My team,
The Pykkewyne [Pik-a-vine-a] (penguins in Afrikaans) is the only all-girl group on our squad with 7 of us who do most things together. We were trying to come up with a team name the other night during our team time and came up with that name for a couple of different reasons. After being at our ministry spot for a couple of days and working with kids we all took some time to think about what we would like our team name to be. What came to mind was a flock of geese and how they all stick together and if one gets tired while flying, they don’t go down by themselves but one will go with them. The words that came to our minds were loving, nurturing, and joy. So with the bird theme, we ended up with penguins because they are very loving, nurturing, and joyful birds, and those were the words that we felt like our team as a whole resembled. So we looked up what a penguin is in Afrikaans and that is what became our team name! Now the thing we have to do is learn how to say it in Afrikaans the right way but we are learning:) 
So our team started ministry this past week and we have the opportunity to be at an orphanage. We get to help with what is needed, take care of, and connect with the kids who have been through unimaginable circumstances. Even with the things that they have been through they still have the brightest smiles on their faces. In the beginning, I felt like we weren’t doing that much that was “life-changing” but as we kept coming back day after day I realized that we can make their day different just by giving a hand to hold or being someone to dance with. I started focusing on the little things like giving them hugs, pushing them on the swings, reading a bible story, or walking around with one of the babies until they fell asleep. I was reminded to just sit with them, love them, and soak up all of the time we have just like Jesus wants us to do with Him.
During one of our ministry days this week, we got to hear an amazing story about one of the kids that the orphanage owner took in. It was his birthday and he kindly shared his birthday cake with us and they made us tea to drink while we sat and got to be with them. The story goes like this… 17 years ago there was a knock at the door. The orphanage owner, we’ll call her Sarah, opened the door to find a woman, a baby, and the police. The woman asked if Sarah would take her child because of certain circumstances she couldn’t keep him. Sarah gladly took him in and went inside to change him. When she went to change him she was shocked to see that there was no loose skin and only bones. She thought that he for sure wouldn’t live through the night but she fed him and put him to sleep. The next morning she got all the other kids ready for Church and sent them all off before she went to get him because she didn’t want them to see a baby that didn’t make it through the night. So she went in to check on him and was surprised to see that he was still alive. She quickly rushed him to the hospital to make sure he survived. Over time he slowly became healthy and grew up to be this 17-year-old boy that we were sharing a birthday cake with. During this story, he was standing there listening and after a couple of minutes we noticed he was crying while listening to the story of how Sarah saved his life. It was such a sweet moment to be a part of to see how his life became what it is. Now that he is older he works in the orphanage and helps take care of other kids that went through the same or similar things that he did. I was so glad to be able to be there for this and see that even the simplest act of showing the love and kindness of Jesus can change someone’s life. That inspired me to do the same even if it means just smiling at the kids from across the room:)
We ended our week with an adventure day and Sabbath! For our adventure about half of the group went bungee jumping off Africa’s highest bungee jump which is a total of 708ft. I did not jump but was there to take all the photos and see some beautiful spots of South Africa. We then ended our week and started the next one with our Sabbath where we got to go to church and have a great day of rest to get ready for the next week!
