A quiet Saturday

Today we have taken a good hike. A few are golfing and there is a choir practice for church tomorrow. It is Jim Blessman's birthday today. That must mean a party later. We will see.

Yesterday the first load left at 7:00 am. The Capitol cityofPolokwane is over an hour away. We went to a large gift store to do some souvenir shopping. The vehicle went to the dealer for some service. After the next two groups shopped we squeezed into two vehicles and drove to Northern Academy. There we setup a vision clinic and saw 60-75 of the staff. This school has 3900 students of which half are housed there. It is a k-12 private school. We did the vision screening and were able to interact--visit and pray--with each person. We quickly learned of the hardships, crime and other issues that are part of their daily lives.

Our meal for the day was at Mall of the North in Polokwane. Just like home, sort of like home. There was a LTD store and a Sunglass Hut. We did see all the brand name merchandise. We had our meal and the stroll through some of the mall, then loaded into three vehicles and went back to the Academy. At 6 on Friday evenings a local pastor holds a youth group on the campus. It is limited to high schoolers that live on campus, but over a thousand were in attendance. They rocked the house with praise and worship. Dr. Blessman spoke and so did Mona Butters, one of Blessman's board members from Iowa. We are certainly having some wonderful experiences.

It was past 9:30 when we returned. It was too late to post so it is nice to have time today.

I still can't post pictures here. I keep trying so my pics are flying in cyber space.