About the Niamey, Niger Project

Niger is located in West Africa and 80 percent of its land is in the Sahara Desert. Most of the country is desert plains and sand dunes, droughts are frequent. The climate is one of the hottest in the world. Its estimated population of 11 million are 98% Muslim. Niger is ranked 172 out of 173 countries in the United Nations Developemnt Program's Human Development index, and only 13.6% of its population is literate (6.6% of women). The Reformed Church in America partners with the Evangelical Church of Niger. Their focus in the region is to help with community development, theological training, literacy, medicine, and agriculture. The Mission project for this winter is to build a guest house to assist the Evangelical church's programs. It will give them a facility to house people who come in from the countryside for training in evangelism, leadership and other minstry skills. Bruce and Laurie Hawley are the missionaries responsible for the project and will be working closely with Kay and Sue. More information is available on the Reformed Church website at http://www.rca.org/.

Kay and Sue will be in Niamey from January 26, 2009- February 10, 2009.

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Saturday night

There is so much to say I don't even know where to start. I am so glad to have Sue here. We are, indeed, having fun! The restaurant was an experience, food not great but so much more than most people here have.

Today we spent the morning at at Jeremy and Susan's making and frosting cookies from scratch for the school carnival this afternoon, where i did facepainting. What a blast. The best was painting a heart on the face of a baby sleeping in his mothers wrap while she knelt down and held her on my lap. Sue made balloon animals!! We made homemade pizza (the crust and the sauce) and homemade ice cream and caramel topping for dessert for lunch. who would've thought in Africa? The carnival lasted until 6:30, now we are "home" eating pancakes for supper. (I do not think I will be losing any weight after all!) Driving home we passed many small mosques where all of the men were outside kneeling in prayer, what a sight.

Tomorrow we will worship at the church Jeremy and Susan attend. It will be at least 3 hours we have been told, because there will be communion. Men will sit on one side, women on the other.

OK -- the weirdest food so far is the mutton stew, and we have had masa and fati masa (fried cakes and fried dough) off the "street" (dirt road really.) They, of course, were very good. We are in the city 700,000 people so there are no wild animals, however, we have driven behind herds of cattle, seen camels, donkeys, goats,chickens (alive and dead!) everywhere!!! The hottest temp: 113 in the afternoon. I keep saying it but it is true, the sights, sounds and smells are AMAZING.

I am really doing great. Thanks for your support and prayers. Kay
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1 comment:

  1. Anonymous2/01/2009

    Kay, Jeff's new b-day cookbook has a good recipe for Mutton Stew in it - bet you can't wait!! More snow coming our way tomorrow night (Monday) - think of us as we think of you :>)) LU, M & P

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