Saturday, May 28, 2011
Bula Bula!
As of a couple of hours ago, it has officially been 1 week since we arrived in Suva and it has been an adventure of a week. Ministry at USP has been going extremely well and after finishing the first week I was very encouraged and excited to continue.
I updated last time right before heading back to USP for their weekly meeting of Student Life (which is what Crusade is called at USP). Everyone says that the meeting starts at 6, but we soon realized that this was not really the case. Fijians often operate on “Fijian Time” (just like Zambians operate on “Zambian Time”). Often we will plan to meet students at a certain time on campus, and they will arrive an hour or so late, and it’s not really a big deal or rude at all to them. I encountered similar trends in Zambia so I have experienced this before, but it has taken a little getting used since it is not at all like this in the USA. The weekly meeting didn’t really end up starting until much closer to 7. But despite the late start, it was a very encouraging night. There were around 80 people in attendance. The meeting started with some worship songs, and that was what really got my spirits up. I was moved by how pure their worship was and how lucky I was to be a part of it with them. Later, one of the Miami Crusade Staff, Joe Kleibscheidel, spoke about God and his Eternality. We also played some fun Fijian games that everybody to really into. At the end of the night there was some food and drinks that we enjoyed while getting to know some of the students who are regularly involved with Student Life. The Fijian students were very friendly and eager to get to know us. I can’t wait for this week’s meeting!
Saturday we had the day off and one of the Stinters, Rob, took a few of us to Wailoku (I think that’s how it’s spelled) for an adventure! 2 Fijians also joined us as we hiked on land, then arrived at a stream that we got into and started hiking up (against the current!). Along the way we came to a waterfall that was probably 15 feet high or so. Many of us climbed around the side and then jumped/dove from the top into a deep pool of water at the bottom. A couple of us even climbed up to a higher point up the rocks along the side of the water fall to jump from. It was soooo scary but a ton of fun! We then continued on upstream until we came to another waterfall that was probably between 40 -50 feet high with a deep pool at the bottom to jump into. This was an absolutely horrifying height to jump from but most of the people, including me, mustered up the courage to make the jump! I will admit I was up there for about 25 minutes before I finally jumped. Once again it was so much fun and I hope to get to do it again. The best part of this whole adventure was that it only cost us $2.30 Fijian, which was the cost of the bus ride their and back!
Today we went to church. The team had the option of going to 3 different churches with different members of the Stint team. A few of us chose to go with Dave, Jenny, and Kori to a Baptist church. Several USP students go there. It was a nice service, especially the worship. Most of the songs we recognized and they were very passionate. The service lasted 2 hours, which was a little longer than I am used to, but it was good overall. I think we will be checking out different churches each week.
Tonight will be the first time we meet in our impact groups, which are co-ed small groups. We will be sharing our life stories with the rest of our group over the next few weeks. This week will also be the first time we meet for Bible study. We are studying Philippians over the entire trip. This first week we have been studying the entire book and its context, which has been a challenge for me, but I can see that doing in depth study will be very beneficial. I’m excited to improve my bible study skills through this project.
That's all for now, I'll update by next Sunday.
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