Life after Africa.

I haven't checked in with our blog for so long now. It's so nice to look back at the memories we have made. I thought it was about time that i updated the blog with our life since Africa. Most of you know that we received the most precious memory of our lives last year!

Miss Molly Hope Grindstaff.

She was born June 24th, 2009 at 7.55pm. Just beautiful! Becoming parents is the most amazing experience. Neither Nate or i can believe how you just don't experience the true depth of love until you have a child. It's the most precious gift.

It has been such a fun time watching her grow. She is such a character and so happy. Our little Hope is almost a year old now and we can't believe how fast the time has past!! I thought i would have a baby for so long but she is already becoming independent!

When we left Africa and came back to the States, after a visit to see everyone in England, we moved back into our home in Tennessee. It was very hard settling back into the life here. We missed Africa so much and still do. Nathan continues to regular pioneer and works so hard so that i can stay home with Hope. We are attempting our first month auxiliary pioneering this month and Hope started with a bad cold!! Typical hey!

Serengeti highlights.

Our Bible Students.

We didn't manage to get photos of all our bible students in Arusha but here are a couple of photos so you can put a face to the names.

Nelson

Emanuel

Fidea

Leaving Tanzania :(

Well our time here in Arusha has come to an end! We leave in a little over an hour! Tonight we will spend the night at the branch in Nairobi and tomorrow we fly to England. The only thing we can smile about today is the thought of seeing family. We can't wait to see mum and the girls and their families. Especially our little Miriam Ruth. We have missed them all so much!!!

We cannot believe how fast the time has flown here. Our experience here has exceeded our expectations and we feel broken hearted in leaving! But it's worth the sad part to have made so many amazing memories and have met such incredible friends. We just want to take the oppertunity to thank everyone here. Especially our closest friends. You know who you are!! Thank you for making our experience here more memorable and for teaching us so much. We love you all.

Family and friends in England and the U.S, we can't wait to see you soon and share all our experiences with you. We can't say enough how valuable this experience has been to us.

Dad, Mom and Casey Visit!

We were excited to have another visit from family and friends. Casey has joined us for the rest of our time here. We are happy to have a 4th room mate for a few weeks. Dad (Alan) and Mom (Charlotte) came for 10 days. This was dads first visit to us here so the boys had lots of fun taking him out in service on their bible studies, as did i with the girls. The joy we get from service here is unbelievable. We are all so excited to share that with others when they visit, so we put in some good days together.

After a few days service then the boys, along with a few from our congregation hiked Mount Meru (The sister mountain to Kilimanjaro), while the 3 girls went for a 3 day safari to Serengeti! Personally i think we got the better half! We certainly didn't look as tired as the boys after the 3 days. Each of the events deserve their own posts so i will save the details for later!

After a couple of days back in town we went to Zanzibar for 2 days then stopped at Dar to visit the branch. Martin and Ineke were very hospitable to us. The bethel family have just moved to the new branch office so there are no tours yet arranged, but they invited us to their room for a drink and gave us a personal tour. The branch is beautiful and has ocean views!

After the branch visit we said our goodbyes for a few more weeks to dad and mom and we went our separate ways. We are now back in Arusha and half way through our circuit visit!

WHAT A LIFE!!!!

How Important Are Meetings To You!

A sister told me this experience a few weeks ago and i thought i would share it with you. Her and her husband were visiting in the South of Tanzania and attended the assembly there.

At lunch time a local sister noticed another sister sat under a tree looking ill. She approached her and asked if she was ok. The sister looked up at her and said, "I'm ok. It's just that i gave birth this morning." She pulled back her kanga (colourful wraps worn here) to reveal a tiny baby! She continued, "I could not miss the assembly today. But as soon as it is over i will go to the doctor."

It certainly makes us think twice about missing our meetings and assemblies!

Pioneer meeting and Circuit Assembly.

We made another trip to Dar Es Salaam for our annual pioneer meeting and circuit assembly. Since the English congregation from Arusha travels so far, (a 10 hour bus ride) the brothers there accommodate us. We were happy to stay with a sister from Austria who has lived in Dublin for the past 6 years, and is now spending 2 months in Africa. Judith was very welcoming and looked after us very well.


We had an interesting (!) experience on our way to the pioneer meeting on Friday! We called a sister to ask for a ride and they told us that we could jump in the back of the truck they were taking to the meeting. This is a normal mode of transportation in Africa so we were happy for the ride. The only problem being, that the minute we got into the back of the truck, the heavens opened and it down poured! Nate, Aaron and i were soaked. It rained so hard it was pouring off us! Again, we are in Africa so we must accept these things. The only problem was that I had an interview on the pioneer meeting! Needless to say we made it through and laughed about the experience afterwards!


The 3 days were so encouraging. Nate did the soliloquy about maintaining a balanced view of alcohol which went really well. The funny thing was that he was helping in security and parking and because of the rains they gave him a huge Kilimanjaro beer umbrella to carry around both days!! The D.O reassured everyone in his concluding talk that Nate was only acting in his part!


The days were all full of encouraging talks and experiences. We left feeling very encouraged and ready to start back in our assignment. One highlight was attending with many of the international servants that have been serving here and helping build the new Branch in Dar. Now that the branch is just about finished they have all received their new assignments and are leaving Tanzania. They were all interviewed and spoke about their different assignments. Many of them have served many years in many different countries. It is encouraging to see the adjustments they continue to make to fit into their new assignments.

Zone Visit.

Following our trip to Rwanda we spent a week in service in Arusha then we headed to Dar Es Salaam for the zone visit. Brother Ellison from Brooklyn gave a very encouraging talk, "What Do You Seek?" He has been travelling around Africa and Tanzania was his 4th stop. Here are the notes from his talk..........


He gave the illustration about looking in a mirror. When animals look in a mirror they don't recognise themselves. But humans do. Perhaps at times we aren't happy with what we see and we walk away and try to forget about it. Or perhaps we don't notice negative things about ourselves. We don't want to look within. It takes someone else to tell us our faults before we recognise them. So is it nesessary to to make a personnal examination? If the answer is no, it's like saying that we would be willing to live without a literal mirror! Yet, as humans, we are glad we can look at ourselves and check ourselves so that we know what others see.


Everyday this system is a rainy day for Christians. If left unchecked, we can quickly become unrecognisable as a Christian. Heb 4 v12 tells us that, 'God's word is alive and exerts power'. We must use the bibles light to reflect our spiritual image so that we can check ourselves as with a mirror. How does it shine? How do we view the light? Are we quick to make changes? It's important to makes changes quickly as small problems are easier to solve than large ones. To illustrate, a ship must take a course to get from A to B. In order to arrive the captin must use a compass and stick exactly to the course. If he allowed the ship to drift just 1 degree off course, the further he travels the further off course he becomes. What if we walked just 1 degree off Jehovah's course?


How do we make decisons? Do we think about how they affect Jehovah? Do we have to be mature to make good decisons? Consider the example of Karen a 7 year old who lived in Cuba. The custom to enroll 7 year olds in the communist army was in effect. When the official entered her classroom and announced that it was a 'happy day for the students' because they would all become members, she raised her hand and said that she could not accept. The official was stunned and took her to the principals office. The principal yelled at her saying that he wanted 100% enrollment and he would have it, and asked why she would not join. Karen explained that she meant no disrespect but that her loyalty was to Jehovah. The official told her that if she refused to join he would have her parents thrown into prison. Karen responded, 'What do my parents have to do with this. It's my decison. Put me into prison.' Impressed, the 2 men took her back to the classroom and told the class,"we want all of you to be as zelous in your convictions as Karen is." Karen was able to see how her stand affected others. She proved that she was concerned about how her decisons affect her relationship with Jehovah.


As we continue to test ourselves we become mature. Jehovah does not provide a list of 'do's and dont's'. He provides principles that make it easy to make decisons. To illustrate: If the doctor tells you that you can't eat pie and icecream due to health problems, then a friend offers you a piece of chocloate cake, how do you reason? "The doctor didn't specifically mention chocolate cake!" Just as the doctor didn't list every single thing we should not eat, so to, Jehovah does not list all the things we should avoid. But, he gives us principles and guidlines to protect ourselves. We only benefit if we listen!


Does the fact that we are elders, pioneers, missionaries mean that we are spiritual? We must understand God's way of thinking and not allow fleshly thought to control us. For example, John, a young publisher lives next door to an inactive family. Stevie, the young boy of the family, and John sometimes play together. One day Stevie invited John for dinner. He asked his mum and she said he could go as long as he came straight home afterwards. John sat at the table with the family and they all began to eat. John just sat there. After a few moments he asked, 'aren't you going to pray?' The family replied, 'we don't do that here.' To which John replied, 'But that's what my dog does!' A dog does not show appreciation for food, he just eats. What do we do naturally?


If we were to imagine our spiritual and fleshly sides on a see saw, which would be higher? We must maintain control. So the next time we look in the mirror, ask, 'how do i look?' Be quick to make corrections. Allow your spiritual person to remain in control and develop a relationship with Jehovah that will last now and forever.

Family Visit.

We are very happy to have had a visit from Nates momma and Aaron. They arrived at the end of March. Aaron has now joined us here until we leave at the end of June and we are very happy to have him here with us. We were overwhelmed with goodies sent to us from our wonderful family and friends in the States! Our Sis and Clint, Miss Casey, Al and Tara, Jake and Jen, the Nolettes and of course momma Charlotte, you are all so sweet and we thank you all for thinking of us.

We had an amazing experience together. Nate and I had to leave the country to renew our Tanzanian visas so we decided to take a trip to the neighbouring country of Rwanda to visit the mountain gorillas. What an experience! Only 700 mountain gorillas remain in the world. They can also be visited from 2 other countries, Congo and Uganda. We visited them in the Volcano's national park. There are a number of different groups to visit but we wanted to visit the largest group called ‘Susa’. It has 39 members!

Our day began very early at the park head quarters. We were divided into groups and assigned a guide. No more than 8 in a group. We drove 1 hour from there to the edge of the volcano where our group live. We were very fortunate not to have rain as it is the rainy season! We were also fortunate because it can take up to 5 or 6 hours to reach the Susa group but they decided to head down the mountain towards us making our hike a little over one and a half hours.

After hiking for a while through thick forest our guide received a radio call from the trackers to tell him that the group had changed directions. They can travel up to 40km per hour! We turned around and followed the guide along the path until we stopped and suddenly started in a direction where there was no path. The guide used a machete to clear the way for us. Before we knew it we were pulling our way through thick bamboo shoots. Then suddenly we stopped, and the guide told us to be quiet. We looked up and just a few feet away was a huge female sat eating bamboo! We were so excited we could hardly contain ourselves. I was shaking so much from excitement i couldn't hold the camera still to get a picture! The guide then began to grunt at the gorilla and she replied! Apparently it was a series of calming noises to let them know that we were no threat. He then led us right up to her! We walked just a couple of feet from her. We then were led past a mother nursing her young and then out into an opening where about 28 of the family were lazing around and playing! What a sight! It really was amazing. Mothers feeding their young, adolescents play fighting, little ones rolling down the hill over and over, silver backs beating their chests. For a whole hour we stood in awe watching these amazing creatures in their home just enjoying life! INCREDIBLE!!!