This month we have reached another milestone! We have now lived in Zimbabwe in every calendar month! We got very excited, and celebrated with a cup of tea! (it’s the simple things in life!) As we look to a second year here, there have been some developments lately that we would like to fill you in on.
Firstly, the school extension. As you will have read from previous posts, we have been in conversation with the Pastors of the church, to discuss the possibility of opening a second set of classrooms, and expanding our outdoor area, to grow the capacity of the school from 60 to 90/120. The proposed plan would have been to open a new class in January. As positive as the initial discussions seemed to be, the Pastors have decided that at this time, they do not wish for the extension to go ahead. The church itself is in some financial difficulty and the school will for the near future, be supporting them. Naturally, we are slightly disappointed at the decision as we were fondly looking forward to expanding, however we are now able to focus on continuing the adult education of the staff members we work with to ensure the current school is sustainable and enabling the children taught here to receive the best education possible.
We are hoping that as we are now not working towards an expansion project, we are going to be looking into converting a space into a self contained flat, which Mission Teachers from England, would be able to come and work in Zimbabwe for a year, living and working with One Way Pre School and travelling the country also. So please do pray for this project to have a clear focus and wisdom in how to achieve such a thing!
Secondly, and excitingly, we have mentioned in previous letters, that we wanted to meet with Sean, another local church pastor, who runs various projects within different communities working with orphans, schools, unemployed, homeless and people with difficult circumstances. We were fortunate to be able to discuss last night, a few options for how both of us can become involved in these projects also.
On the 17th July, Greg and I will be spending the day with Sean, in a community called Hatcliffe. This is the most deprived area within the city of Harare, the background of which we will update you on once we have visited and can detail a broad picture for you. We will be visiting the schools, churches, homes and hospital areas in this community, with our main focus being on how we can support the pre-schools with daily routine, planning and using their environment and everyday objects as resources!
We are very excited to be taking this next step in our mission here and are blessed to have the opportunity to expand the communities with which we are working. Please do pray for us on this day, as we will be seeking wisdom as to how we can best serve the Hatcliffe community as a couple.
Finally, its 4 weeks until the end of our second term!! We cannot believe how quickly time flies and we have so much to do before then! We will then be returning to England for a month to visit friends and family and hopefully spread more information about the work we are undertaking here in Zim. So please do try and meet up with us, we would love to see and speak to as many people as possible, as without your support, we would not be able to achieve anything!
God Bless xx
For point of reference, here is an example of the school classrooms in the Hatcliffe community we will be working alongside.
