Getting a Zambian Driver's License

When we arrived in Zambia, a well-meaning friend took us to the RTSA office to get driving licenses. There were lots of unmarked doors and tons of people standing around. When we got in where some people were taking their written tests, we were finally told that we had to have our work permits before we applied.

So I waited a long time before actually going and getting one.

Which meant any time I encountered police road blocks, it was a crap shoot as to what the officer would do. Driving on a US license is allowed... for a couple of months. Then it's considered "unlicensed driving" which incurs a fine of K450 (currently about $40). So I figured I needed to get my Zambian driving license.

So I went back to RTSA and found a manager who told me what I needed: I could start from scratch (which would take months and driving lessons and so forth), or I could convert my US driving license. I chose to convert...

To convert, I had to get proof that my US driving license was valid. That meant a trip to the US embassy. I stopped by after my visit to RTSA, and they told me I needed to make an appointment, and I had to do it online. So I went online and made an appointment. They only have a couple of slots available, so I chose one when I could do it, which wasn't for several days.

The next day I went to get my doctor's certificate. They have a certain form that a doctor needs to fill out, but not just any doctor. It has to be a doctor from a government clinic. So I went to a clinic... only to find out later that it was the wrong one (and in any case, the doctor wasn't there). So I went to another one. It was crowded and muddy. I'm not sure if I got through simply because I was white, or because the driving "check up" is so simple, but whatever the case, I sat and waited for a while and kind of pushed my way through (like everywhere else, there are not signs telling you where you should be - but I found another person doing the same thing, so I just went with him). I waited for a cashier to come, and then I paid my K50 (a little under $5) and went and waited somewhere else for the doctor to come. The doctor came and signed off on our forms (never even looking at either of us - I don't mean he didn't give us a check-up, I mean he never even glanced up at us). Then we went to another room to get the official stamp (I would not have known to do this or where to do this if the other guy wasn't there).

OK, now I had the doctor form. That process took half a day.

Next was the embassy. That was a smooth process and very easy, but it cost $50 (US) for them to certify that my license was valid. I guess they need to make money somehow, after all the US government spends.

Now I was ready to go back to RTSA. I went back to the manager I'd spoken to before... but he wasn't there. So I interrupted an employee who was very busy eating a snack, talking to a co-worker, and flipping through a pile of forms. She asked for my paperwork, which I gave her. She seemed a little put-off that a customer was asking her for help (typical civil servant from anywhere, In my personal experience). But she took my papers and stuck them in a pile. And I sat there. Then I was photographed and told to go to another room and paid someone some money (I don't even remember how much now) and talk to another manager.I went in, and he asked if I was ready to take my driving test. But it was getting late, and I didn't have time. So I told him I needed to get home to my wife and kids, and he laughed and said he knew I was going to say that. I asked if I could come back the next day, and he said that would be fine.

First thing the next day I went back and took my car into the arena which was filled with cars and with a set of bleachers filled with people waiting to take the driving test. A guard pointed me to a parking spot and asked if I had the "L" stickers for a "learner" car. I didn't. He told me he would give me temporary ones for K30. I went to the shack in front, and gave them all my paperwork and sat around for a while, until someone came and told me he would be taking me for the test.

Mind you, I had been studying the manual and memorizing the rules of the road and had even developed a mnemonic device to remember them. But he didn't ask about any of that. He directed me to drive around the block (in moderate traffic) and back into the arena, where he said I was done. I waited in the shack while I got my paperwork signed and all the official stamps. Then the guard came back and told me I needed to give him K40. I gave him 30 and called him a thief. Then I went back and waited for the manager to sign. Then I was given my temporary license (on paper) and told to go to the main RTSA office in three months to get my permanent one.

Now, you might think this is a long and crazy process. But I was pleased at how fast I was able to do it...

Christmas in Zambia

We might be so used to Christmas traditions that we couldn't tell people right off what our traditions are, but here's what I'm used to:

• Decorations: lots of houses with lots of lights.
• Christmas trees everywhere. Some of our friends go nuts with trees in every room or tons of outdoor trees and decorations. They even have cool themes for lots of the trees.
• Celebrating Advent for the four weeks leading up to Christmas
• Christmas music playing in stores (starting earlier and earlier)
• Over-consumption and materialism
• Christmas plays/musicals
• Christmas Eve services at church - with candle lighting, singing Silent Night
• Christmas music at church (of course, with the debate over "should we sing Christmas carols during Advent").
• Christmas caroling.
• Last minute shopping.

Some of these are good and some are bad, but they are cultural expectations.

Another one is that we American churches start planning WAY early for Christmas. One reason is because there are many people who will come to church for a Christmas Eve service that might not come any other time of year. We start making Christmas announcements in November, as Advent will start right after Thanksgiving.

This isn't what we experienced here.

Here are some things that were the same:

• Stores had lots of Christmas decorations and played Christmas music (it was funny to hear "Let it Snow" and even funnier (or maybe sad) to hear "Do They Know it's Christmas" - yes, Africans definitely know it's Christmas, and it doesn't have to snow for Christmas to be special).
• There were tons of toys on sale where they hadn't had many in the stores leading up to Christmas.
• The last minute thing... the week of Christmas, traffic was insane. I mean, completely nuts. It took us twice as long to get across town as it usually did. And it was explained to us that everyone shops last-minute. It's a cultural thing; people don't plan ahead. If something is going on, you'll hear about it... now!

Which leads me to some differences.

• I asked someone (the District Superintendent) what the church does for Christmas. On the Friday, less than a week before Christmas Day). He told me "Christmas Revival" - and, oh, by the way, can you preach on Sunday and Monday? Sure, no problem. When and where is it? Oh, they'll figure that out on Sunday morning.
• Christmas Revival was different. We had services every afternoon leading up to Christmas. Sunday through Wednesday (and the speaker didn't show up for any of the services, so I preached at all of them). They were held in the home of a church member, and though they were set to start at 15:00, nothing started until 16, and people would keep showing up as the afternoon went on. It was really wonderful to be in the home and to get to meet in such a close and intimate setting. That (in my opinion) is where true discipleship happens.
• Christmas Day Church Service. Well, I think it was different. We showed up on time, but the gates to the school (where the church meets) were locked. After waiting around for 1/2 hour or so, with a sick kid, we went home.

I missed the Christmas carols, so Tara and I brought instruments to the Wednesday "Revival" meeting and led the group in singing some of our favorites. They sang along as best as they could (one of them came up with an American Methodist Hymnal, which was helpful for her). They knew some of the songs, and some sang along in the vernacular.

I missed the outward focus that I've seen recently at Christmas, with a Christmas offering going to someone else (following Ginghamsburg's lead with the Christmas is not your Birthday idea, we've celebrated by giving a lot of money away) - here, the Christmas offering is supposed to be split between the pastor, the district superintendent, and the bishop... not sure how I feel about that.

But what I love is that here, Christmas doesn't just last one day and then it's done. People are still wishing each other "Happy Christmas" - and it's New Year's Day.

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).