Tuesday Market

Food is expensive in Lusaka.

Or maybe it is just expensive to feed a family of six, especially if you don't plan to just eat nshima and relish (the local staple - nshima is dish made from maize flour and water and - you know what, if you really want to know, check out the nshima wikipedia page).  Relish in this case is some green leafy vegetable (we like Chinese cabbage for ours) boiled with tomato and onion.

Anyway, we found that many locals, especially those who run restaurants, buy their produce from the Tuesday Market. The Tuesday Market is a produce market at the St. John's Anglican Church, where you will find the freshest, cheapest fruit and vegetables in town!

When I first heard about the market, I was a little bit leery, especially of bringing the little ones there. I read this blog post (which has some great pictures of the market - you should visit the blog just to see the pics, even if for no other reason).

Anyway, arriving at the Tuesday market is a little daunting. When you get near to the market, you are swarmed with boys, all wanting to "help" you park. Whether you get in the church compound or not, they will swarm the car, wanting to carry your bag or watch the car. We've found that the best situation is picking two of the boys, one to watch the car and one to carry the shopping bag. We usually look for the same two, Jonathan for the car and Douglas to carry the bag. Still, the swarm is a bit hard to handle - and once, while we were being swarmed and trying to get the little ones out of their car seats, someone got in the front of the car and swiped my iPod. :-(

But once you choose (and tell the others that you've made your choice and "maybe next time" always works nicely for this), then you're pretty much left alone to go inside and peruse the rows and rows of fresh produce. When I say fresh, I don't mean produce aisle fresh. I mean, this is the real deal. No preservatives or added color or wax or whatever they do to produce to make it look good in US stores. And piles of food.

We have started to get our bearings; we always go to one guy for apples and another woman for pineapples. Certain vendors have better products, and certain ones have better prices. You simply ask for a price, maybe haggle, and then tell them how much you want or pick what you want. They will weigh it, usually with a small hand-held scale, and tell you what you owe and you pay. Cash. And the boy you hired carries it.

The first time we went, we had Matthew in the stroller, which was a bad move, because the stroller was too wide for the tiny aisles. So now I wear him in the backpack carrier. Locals love to see him up there, and to see his Dad carrying him... that's just a bonus! We buy tomatoes, red, yellow, and green peppers (and maybe some hot peppers), lettuce, Chinese cabbage, lemons, pineapple, watermelon, apples, carrots, celery, onions, potatoes, garlic, cilantro (they call it coriander here), and even spices (we steer toward the ones in the front that are already packaged rather than from the big bags!). Pretty much anything you want is here, as long as it's in season.

Then we pay the boy who carried our bags (we usually pay k10, which is like $1.50) and the boy who watched our car (k5: less than $1), and they are happy and so are we!

So now you know what we do on Tuesday mornings!

We Have Arrived!

At times it seemed like forever. But when it came to getting everything ready, it seemed like there would never be enough time. We finally had everything together and packed and ready to go.

Our dear friends the Mohlers not only put us up in their home, but they also took us to the airport. We had so much stuff that it was definitely good to have extra hands in the airport (just as a helpful hint, if you are heading for the airport with lots of stuff and family members or friends want to come in with you, they can request a pass to come in through security).

I was dreading the flight. Really. But besides not sleeping much at all, we made it. Columbus to Washington DC. DC to Dakar, Senegal (we switched crews but not planes there). Dakar to Johannesburg, South Africa. We had to switch planes there, and it was kind of a mess. If we hadn't found two helpful airport guardian angels, I doubt we would have reached our plane before flying. But as it was, we made it. The only difficulty was that our stroller, for which I had run and walked 4+ miles in New York City, was broken. The front wheels were broken off. So we pushed Matthew in it, wheelie-style, through the airport.

Arrival in Lusaka, getting greeted and picked up, finding our place where we are staying until we get into our house... all a blur. But we have arrived, as has that whole vanload of stuff!

Already in Africa

Well, we are not actually already in Africa, but some of our experiences are certainly serving to prepare us!

On moving day, we prepared and waited. and waited. and waited. No movers. It seems that someone put a hold on the move (on Friday afternoon) without informing us, naturally, and then went home for the weekend. 

So we didn't have movers and had to be out of the house by Tuesday. Oh, did I mention that during the same time period, the main water main from the water plant had broken, so we had no running water?

After getting our stuff shipped on Tuesday, we moved to Geneva Hills Camp in Lancaster. No problems. Except we did encounter a huge bug, as big as the one we met at Kafakumba. Tara noted that she had never ever seen one that big. 

Welcome to Africa!

Then we found out hat we had to move out of the Geneva Hills cabin for a week, so we moved to our friends' house while they were on vacation. And their AC went out. And our car got dented. 

But lest you think that my "already in Africa" title only refers to hardship, we have also had unexpected drop-ins with amazing friends, wonderful times of sharing and relationship, and sharing resources and enjoying generosity and hospitality. 

So, as we wait a few more weeks until the plane flies, we prepare to head for Africa by "already being in Africa!"

Moving

If you have ever moved, you know it can be difficult. Everything you own goes into boxes and shortly, into a truck. If you are fortunate, nothing gets broken, and everything comes out of boxes in the new home. There are, of course, things that you don't move - most notably, things that won't fit in the new house, things you haven't used in forever, clothes that don't fit (or that went out of style decades ago).

We have moved every 3-4 years, so you'd think we'd be old hat at it. Except we've never really had to downsize. It was actually rather embarrassing how big a moving truck it took to move all our stuff when we moved to Wellston.

That won't be a problem in this move, that's for sure! Global Ministries will move a 5x5x5 container for each adult (plus half of one for each child). That means we have to downsize this entire (huge!) parsonage into four 125 cubic foot containers. But that's better than we thought initially; we originally thought we would only get two containers!

So the way it works with clothes, for example is this: we initially got rid of all the clothes we don't wear. Sounds simple right? So we were then left with way too much. Next came the clothes we won't need. I won't need sweaters in Zambia. I won't need my cold-weather running gear (I was actually surprised at how much of this I had accumulated) as it doesn't get much cooler than beautiful running weather. Once we gave away the clothes we won't need, we were left with the clothes we like, we wear, and that we will need. And we pared that down by about half. So now all of our clothes are in a box or two and a suitcase. The boxes will be shipped, and the suitcase will be with us until we move.

The funny thing is, it is hard to get rid of stuff. But once we get rid of it, we don't miss it. And we'll probably realize when we get there that we brought too much stuff. Which is just as well. It is easy to see why Jesus told the rich man that the one thing he lacked was to sell his stuff and give to the poor. His "stuff" was holding him back in his relationship with God.

And that's a hard word for a materialistic society.

So... enough of blogging. I have stuff to get rid of.

It's Not Official Until...

...Global Ministries says it's official. And Global Ministries has said it's official.

Along with 13 other missionaries (and family members), we attended an over-three-week training at Stony Point, New York, learning all of the ins and outs of being a Global Ministries Missionary. Everything from "how to fill out the forms" to the theology of mission to cultural intelligence to cross-cultural problem solving... we learned it.

The final result is our on-line bios and a blessing service at 475 Riverside (the home of Global Ministries) and our commissioning service, to take place at our West Ohio Annual Conference in June.

 You can access our bios here (for Brian) and here (for Tara).

Mission Training

AWe are in training in New York, preparing to go into mission; Global Ministries has pulled together an amazingly diverse group - not only are we going to unique places around the world, but we are from around the world. 

Cambodia, Korea, Zimbabwe, Vietnam, USA. 

It is an amazing group of people. 

There are ten children among us (yes, 4 of them are ours), and they are learning as well. Jonathan has especially clicked with Josiah, who will be going to Fiji. 

It is fun seeing the mission through the eyes of the children, through the eyes of fellow missionaries (some of whom are already serving in their place of assignment), and through the eyes of all kinds of trainers and staff. 

A Missionary Call

Whenever I am asked about my call into full-time ministry, I always answer that (besides coming from a good Christian home where my mother faithfully brought me to church and taught me about Jesus, a family where we had nightly devotions and read the Bible together) I really began to hear God's call on a mission trip to Russia.

Which then should bring up the question of my call into missions.

My call to mission came early. When I was little, our Children's Church offerings went to "Little David in Africa" - as far as I can remember, "Little David" was the child of missionaries we supported (I believe he was older than we were, maybe not so "little" anymore. Also interesting was that I don't remember ever seeing a picture of him, but I always pictured him being African).

But more important in my call to mission was my church camp experience at Pearson's Mill Christian Assembly, later Rainbow Christian Camp. Rod Cameron, the amazing camp director, was not only a great director of the camp and was not only a fantastic ventriloquist (how could you not love Gabby?).

He was also a missionary. Yes, he and his wife Bev had been missionaries in Africa, and I thought it was amazing that we got to meet a real missionary to Africa, but he had the heart of a missionary. He was all about sharing Jesus in culturally relevant ways. His purpose was evangelism - sharing the good news of Jesus Christ, no matter where he was, in Africa or in Converse, Indiana.

The missionary of the week was always my favorite part of church camp (well, besides the girls). I remember several of the missionaries - the Randall family from Australia  was one of my favorites (it didn't hurt that their son, Nathan, was my age), but I most remember Bob Pemberton, who ministered in Africa (and who told an amusing and gross story about something he was given to eat when he first got there - something that tasted fine but after he heard what he had just eaten, he got sick) and taught us a dance and a translation of a Christian chorus that I still remember.

As I was preparing to go to Zambia, I went and found Rod Cameron's web page. What I hadn't remembered from my childhood was exactly where he had ministered. I found out that it was Rhodesia... which is now Zimbabwe... and Zambia. In fact, the map in Rod Cameron's book "A Dummy Goes to Africa" includes Zambia... I was excited that I would get to go to the land where one of my heroes of the faith had been.

As I began to write this blog, I went again to look up Rod Cameron's web page, and then I found the sad news; while I was in Zambia to meet the people I will be working with, Rod Cameron passed away. Kind of ironic that while I was in Africa, one of the people who moved me to go (even so many years ago), got to take his final, amazing journey, this time not to Africa, but to Heaven.

The First Step of a Million Next-Steps

As this is my first post in a new blog, let me introduce this blog!

This is where I will be posting updates and information about the Vinson Family's move to Zambia. If you didn't know that we are going to Zambia, now you know!

I (Brian) have been a United Methodist pastor since 2001, and my wife (Tara) and I have served in several churches in the West Ohio Conference of the United Methodist Church: Stonybrook (Gahanna) UMC, New Knoxville UMC, Millersport UMC, and Wellston Hope UMC. But we, along with our four children, are preparing to continue our work with the United Methodist Church in Zambia through the General Board of Global Ministries.

As we set out on our journey to begin our ministry in Zambia and continue our journey once we get there, I will be periodically updating this blog with information, pictures, challenges, what we're doing, and prayer requests.

There are all kinds of things we have to do in order to get ready to go to Zambia, and there are things we have already done and that God has already done to begin to prepare us for the next step we are taking. As we move through the steps toward getting to Africa, I will post updates here.

I hope, through this blog, to help you understand who we are and what we are all about and how you can join us, perhaps not in Zambia, but definitely in spirit and in prayer.

Thank you for taking the time to visit this blog, and I hope to "see" you back here as we continue the journey together!