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Day 1: Thursday 8/12/2010

Long trip to Africa. I was in Australia this past June and although going from Atlanta to South Africa was only approximately 1.5 hours longer than Australia, it felt like an eternity. God’s way of humbling me long before I even enter Africa. He has a way of doing that.

We landed in South Africa on Thursday 5p or so. Corey Bell and Gabe Soto are my travel mates and I’m very grateful they are here with me. Our bags didn’t show up on the conveyer so a big “?” was evident to which the official told us they were delivered straight to Maputo. I sure hope they are there when we arrive. I’m glad I packed a change of clothes on my carry on. No luck for Corey tho. He was forced to check his carry on back in the states.

Met up w/ Pastor Mel at the airport under a huge Soccer Ball in the airport lobby. The people here are very proud of their team. Soccer stuff everywhere! Our driver Noah got us situated and soon we left for the hotel. On the way we picked up a lady for Botswana named Helen. Sweet lady and has a huge crush on Bill Clinton. I told her we were from Texas to which she replied “I hear bad things about Texas. Black people die there.” We laughed and I replied “Well you are misinformed and my experience is that black people are CEOs of companies in Texas (looking at Corey).” We all had a good laugh and she said if Texans are like us then she wants to come check it out. She isn’t a Christian but hopefully our short conversation about Church, Life and the Xai Xai kids can be a seed. Pray for her if you get a chance.

From there we got to the hotel. Realized our heater doesn’t work in the room. Wouldn’t be a big deal if it wasn’t 46 degrees outside and the door to the room was a glass door! No biggie. Just glad to be off the plane.

We had a fantastic dinner w/ Pastor Mel. Chicken was superb! Mel got us up to speed on the situation in Xai Xai and the other care points we will hit in Mozambique. I asked about the kids. Mel began to talk about them and the atrocities that the kids have experienced to which he began to weep at the dinner table. His compassion for the kids is more than evident and I can’t wait to meet them myself.

We fly out at the crack of dawn to get to Maputo. From there we will meet up w/ the team from Healing Place Church’s African campus and begin hitting care points. The work for us begins Friday. The people so far in south Africa are very sweet and welcoming. Pray that our bags are in Maputo as we have valuable supplies for the kids in those bags. Internet will be spotty the next few days so I hope to update as often as possible but I may not be able to as much as I’d like.

Love yall! – Pastor Daniel