Untukmu Para Pengunjung

Monday morning already? The weekend flew by. Friday evening on the way home from work we heard about the tragic case of a five year old girl from our church being killed in a car accident. She had accompanied the family maid to the store to buy bread. They were walking and holding hands when the girl forced herself free and ran into traffic. It's so sad! Here, children are buried even faster than adults, so by the time we got to the church, the service was already ending. There was a lot of weeping - obviously. For stress relief, we decided to go for a run. I don't like running in the evenings as much as the mornings. The ratio of drunk/offensive men out on the streets is much higher at 5pm than 5am - at least in our neighbourhood.

Saturday John spent the day in Karoi with a team of people doing strategic planning for The Salvation Army. They left at 6am and didn't arrive home til about 8pm. I was supposed to go to a wedding in town, but I didn't feel like going into the city centre by myself and to a wedding dateless. (A friend told me later that day that she saw police beating people on their way to church that day - they were suspected of being supporters of the opposition party). Anyway, I had the day and the house to myself so I did laundry, made some nice pasta, read Time magazine (fascinating controversy over Oscar Pistorius, eh?), visited friends and spent 7 hours watching t.v. This is not typically Rochelle. I did have some moments where I was like, "maybe I should read Dostoevsky or start learning Mandarin or something." But nope. I just watched 24. There's something to the whole "day of rest" idea of God's. Besides, I had to take advantage of having electricity ALL DAY on Saturday. Upcoming elections have some advantages!

Yesterday we travelled to KweKwe for the installation of our new Territorial Commander (big boss of Salvation Army in Zimbabwe & Botswana). It was a five hour service which seemed much longer because we were sitting on these little, tiny chairs (you know, the kind that kindergarten and grade 1 children use...) But the music was good, and I got to sit with my friend Kim and another Captain who are hilarious - so it helped pass the time. The territory gave the new T.C. many gifts, which is "cultural" but always amazes me seeing as my HIV/AIDS budget is constantly at $0 because we have no money.... Priorities, I guess. And now it's Monday morning, and we have another welcome for the T.C. in a few moments. Have a great day!