Kuiphof Family Blog

Sawubona everyone! :)
["Sawubona" means "hello" in Zulu.]

I just returned last week from my mission trip to South Africa and I wanted to share a few brief things. (I'll be sending a more detailed letter soon about it in the mail.)

First of all, it was AMAZING! I love South Africa and the people we worked with. I miss them so much! I feel so blessed to have had the opportunity to meet them because my perspective will never be the same.

Throughout the week, our team went into the impoverished townships ("squatter camps") of the Gauteng province (in and around the Johannesburg area). Soweto, which stands for "SouthWest Township," is a large area full of squatter camps that comprise several villages. The first day we were there, we went into the Kliptown village and we worked at a school there (called a "creche") for children between the ages of 2 and 6. It was truly amazing! We all completely fell in love with the kids there.

Throughout the rest of the week, we went into other villages (including Finetown and Katlehong) and met with people in the community who are doing incredible things to improve their own villages and others who simply needed some basic needs met. My favorite part, always, was meeting the kids. They are absolutely beautiful and I completely fell in love with them. I truly hope that I have the chance to go back so I can work with these people again. The trip went by so quickly! I really wanted to have more time to do more. It was kind of crazy because white people generally never go into their communities so we almost felt like celebrities at times. In some parts of the villages, our race could have put us in danger, but where we were, the people were very welcoming and gracious. We were in South Africa to serve with a ministry there (founded by members of my church) called Vox United. Several missionaries from my church have been living in South Africa for the last 1 1/2 years and the relationships they've been able to establish within these impoverished communities is amazing! The people in the townships were always excited to see us coming because they knew the missionaries who went with us. It was so cool to see how Vox United has established themselves so well over there already, in such a relatively short time.

There were a few setbacks that kind of put a damper on things, but God still gave us so many reasons for joy.

First of all, on our way there, our flights were supposed to be from Detroit to NYC, and then on to Johannesburg. However, when we arrived in Detroit (by bus), we found out that our flight to New York was cancelled (for weather apparently) so they had to re-route all 12 of us. But our travel agency didn't book us as one big group so we had to split up a little. Two of the guys flew to Amsterdam and then on to Johannesburg and the rest of us flew to London. We ended up having a 12 hour layover there so we actually got to take a quick tour of the city, which was incredible! It seemed so surreal that we were there because hours before, we didn't even know we'd be in London. Anyway, long story, but our flights were messed up again so we had to split up AGAIN. Two more members of my team flew from London to Nairobi (Kenya) on to Johannesburg and the rest of us flew to Cape Town (South Africa) and then on to Johannesburg. So, by the time we all got there, we had been traveling for 50+ hours and we were a day late. :( We actually missed one whole day of doing mission work because of that, which was awful.

Secondly, the first day we actually did get to do mission work (in Kliptown at the school), I started getting a sore throat and by the end of the day, I was getting a bad cold. I had a cold the ENTIRE trip and the rest of the team caught it too! How crazy is that? There were no serious illnesses (thankfully!) but having to deal with colds in South Africa was a little weird. Because of that, I didn't feel so hot so I didn't always feel like hauling my camera with me. There was a professional photographer on my mission team and he took a ton of pictures so I will share those with you once I get them. :)

And here's the big one... at the end of the week, we were blessed with the opportunity to go to Kruger National Park (to see the wild animals and to stay overnight there in one of the camps) and I ended up breaking my foot! It was nuts. People tell me that I should just tell everyone that I was being chased by lions, but the truth is not nearly that glamorous. :) I was actually carrying a tray of food out to an outdoor table we were all eating at and I tripped over a little mini-trench that was in the walkway. (It was in a horrible place... everyone else tripped over it too.) My right foot happened to just roll wrong and to the side and I felt and heard it pop. I thought it was sprained so I didn't have it looked at out there... but I got home and went to Prime Care and found out that it was actually broken! That's not the souvinir from South Africa that I was hoping for, but it makes for an interesting story, I guess! I have an air cast and a knee walker and I can't put any weight on it for 3 weeks. Then I'll go in for more X-rays and the doctor will let me know if I can walk on it. Sheesh.

So, there you have it. A "not-so-abbreviated" synopsis of my trip. There is so much more I could say but you'd be reading forever! :) I will be adding more pictures to this post soon so keep checking back!