Some of you have asked about a typical day in our lives right now. After being here a full month, I am happy to say that there is SOME sense of routine for our family. Our main “job” currently is to be trained — in French and in the Dorm day-to-day operations. I’ve read many interesting missionary books and this part is not in them!  If you are adverse to the mundane details of other people’s lives then happily move on without reading this (seriously, no pressure…I am fulfilling request here!), but if you have curiosity — and time to boot! – then this is your lucky day!

Monday: Breakfast at 6:15 a.m. consisting of pb toast, pancakes, or cereal. Significant detail here is that the kids have to choke down their cup of milk. It is always a trial, but the kids have been champs! Family Bible time at 6:35. Brush teeth, comb hair, and backpacks loaded by 7:05. Driving through Niamey by 7:15 at the latest. Arrive Sahel Academy (across the river) by 7:25 for school starts at 7:30. (pictured here, crossing the bridge on our way back from school…normal traffic!)

Kids are in school until 2:30. Andy and Nik hit the market and shop for food and essentials with the Phillips – current dorm parents. They are training us to “do the market” and not die. Seriously! And the fact that we are not French speakers (yet) makes it a steep learning curve! This takes all morning. We go home to unload the stuff and then head back to the school to spend the day in the dorm…learning, hanging out with the kids, having dinner there, and being with them for their evening devotions. We try to be home by 8:00 and get our own kids to bed! We are not far behind – although we have French homework so that will need to be finished before we sleep. 

Tuesday: Same breakfast routine. Same Family Bible time routine. Kids to school. Nikki attends a Bible Study with five other women – right now a Beth Moore Study called Believing God – from 9-11. Andy does something constructive during this time, I’m sure! Then we head to the school for the rest of the day again. Back home by 8:00 for bedtime. And that French homework! (pictured here – the kids in their nets for night — all three are in this little room! Jon’s bed is to the left of Ruth.)

Wednesday: Breakfast…Bible time…to school…Dorm staff meeting at 8:30 with the school director, current dorm parents, and dorm assistant. Andy and I hurry back home to have our French lesson with Hamani (pronounced hah-mah-nee), our tutor, from 11 – 1. Pick up kids at 2:30 and head home right away…we spend Wednesdays as a family at our house in the city. Bedtime and French homework.

(Sorry…I know this is probably getting boring now…I’d spice it up if I could do it without lying!)

Thursday: Breakfast…Bible time…school…French 12-2…pick up kids…home for the night. French! Hamani will quiz us!

Friday: Breakfast…Bible time…school…French 11-1….pick up kids….home for the night or spend time with another family.

Saturday: We don’t have a Saturday routine here yet. So far we have enjoyed having meals with families here to get to know them. The campus of Sahel Academy has so much room for playing – the kids run for hours exploring and getting incredibly dirty. One Saturday Ruth and I went to a local tailor to have our African dresses made, and today there is a campout on campus – tents, hotdogs, (& bug spray).The folks here wanted to camp out before the hot season comes…did I mention that it is 97 degrees today? Ha!

(pictured here is Ruth being measured for her new African outfit — this incredible woman supports her family by being a tailor. She’ll make both of our dresses and two skirts for me for less than $15!)

Sunday: We plan to attend Nigerien church once a month and on Sunday nights we’ll attend the worship service that is in English on Sahel Academy campus. Oh! And I almost forgot that sometimes Andy leaves around 8 p.m. to go to the US embassy here to watch NFL football with a few committed sports fans. He rolls in well after midnight, having had his fill of American life. It hardly seems fair to me, though, since there is no “fill” for my part? Does the Embassy have Starbucks? No. Does the Embassy have Fred Meyer or Target? No. So my “fast” from American life-stuff continues! (and I’m doing just fine! I mean, look at these delicious potato chip options for me?)

Other tid-bits about our life here:

• Nathaniel and I are the mosquitos’ favorites. He counted 21 on one arm! I joke that my new perfume is actually bug spray! Oh la la!
• Every day, five times a day there is the m*sl*m call to prayer – broadcast all through the city. The men wash their feet and hands and arms thoroughly to make sure they are “clean” before commencing with pr*ay*r, always facing East toward M*cca. It is a sobering reminder of the deep religious roots of this culture. Our hearts long to share the Love of Christ, so that motivates us in our language drudgery.
• Okay – the French is great. It is just quite challenging! Our tutor is perfect, a Nigerien who speaks several languages and works primarily with the Peace Corps who come to Niger to serve. He is teaching us in a ten week blitz (my term) of critical “topics”. The key to our success will be PRACTICE. And that takes time with any Nigeriens willing to stumble along with us…
• We drink only filtered water.
• We have a lovely woman, Hadeza (Huh-dee-zuh), who is our “house-help” three days/week. And we have a day guard & night guard, Salefou (sal-ee-foo) and John, for our house since we are on such a busy road in the city. Of course we will only be here for five more months before moving into the dorm, but Hadeza actually works for the dorm too on her other three days of work! At first it felt awkward having someone else help me with cooking and cleaning, but now I see that we are helping her family and it is part of the economy here to have westerners employ house-help. Not to mention the fact that this country makes things A LOT more dirty too! So it is a joy to have her with us and learn from her.
• There are so many normal conveniences that we are doing without that I fail to remember them now? Besides, by Nigerien standards we are rich. Just having cement floors puts us in an elite group here! Most Nigerien homes are mud-brick with no plumbing. They are square, two-rooms, tin roof or grass roof, a community “spigot” for water that several families share, and holes in the ground outside for bathrooms. No ovens, just a “cookfire” and no refrigerators – they eat all their food each day. It is amazingly simple for such a big city and so many people. Andy made the comment that most people here live like we would go camping back home. Can you imagine about a million-person campsite? Yet somehow this is how it works.

Last Sunday we spent the day alongside the Niger River at a campsite that several families rent together year-round. It is about 30 minutes outside the city, crossing vast expanses of desert wasteland, garbage-laden bushes and trees, dust-covered roads, and primitive mud-hut houses and ramshackle settlements. It is sobering, the reality of this poverty-stricken country in plain view. The Mango camp, so named for the many mango trees providing shade, is riverside and lovely. Not exactly Lake Chelan or the mighty Columbia river, mind you, but who’s comparing? There was a grill for lunch and the kids could climb the trees easily, while the adults visited or simply enjoyed the peace.

"mango camp" -- on the Niger River

Hippos are really really really really really BIG. Let me tell you how we found out. We took a little boat trip to find the hippos – something they do often around here. Apparently they haven’t seen the same episodes on Animal Planet depicting these creatures as unpredictable man-killers? Anyway, we went along with it….for the adventure. After tooling around the somewhat shallow waters for about 30 minutes and not finding the beasts, (although I have to mention that we did find an entire herd of cattle grazing in the shallow waters) our driver suggested going further south, although he didn’t know those waters as well…but he thought they might find the family of hippos there. (I was getting slightly uncomfortable, but not wanting to appear the wimpy mom, didn’t say anything). We saw beautiful African birds everywhere, remote villages along the shores, families bathing and washing, men working the fields, or simply resting in pumpkin boats…it was a slice of African life I never would have seen had we not ventured this way!

Still the hippos eluded us. (All this time I wondered if they were right underneath us, ready to pop up! I seriously have watched those crazy animal shows!) We were almost ready to turn back when we spotted them – ON LAND – on an island about 125 yards away from us! Glory! This was what we were waiting for! Two “smaller” ones were in the water, and two large ones were on land, standing and moving around. It was incredible! We slowly drifted a wee bit closer, boat driver being cautious, I’m internally freaking out while taking pictures, and the hippos not noticing us. Then “BIG GUY” stands up on land near the now-medium-sized ones standing on the water’s edge. Seriously, I thought that it was a huge rocky part of the landscape until HE stood up! They all seemed to notice our presence and wimpy mom starts to sweat…uh, what are they going to do? Boat driver says (with a touch of nervousness, I might add) that it was time to go. Uh, ya. We reverse and the hippos stealthily slip into the water. Oh great – now we don’t know where they are! I’ve seen this on Animal Planet, people! They run like horses on the river bottoms! I am pretty sure we all were thinking the same thing – LET’S GET OUT OF HERE!!!

Our boat driver skillfully maneuvered his way through the shallow waters, only grounding us once, retreating to a safe distance from the dreaded man-killers of African rivers! And I have some pretty cool photos to prove I am adventurous-mom, not wimpy mom!

We made it to Niger!

Since internet has been fluctuating lately I wrote this up – kinda lengthy but it gives our first impressions of Niamey. I hope to post pictures too — we’ll see if it goes through!

Traveling: December 31^st we boarded AirFrance to Paris, connecting to Niamey. Everything was smooth, no trouble with customs, and every one of our ten Rubbermaid boxes made it all the way to Niamey with us. Hooray! We all enjoyed our personal movie screens for the long flight, which took us over Canada & Greenland on our way to France.

Our SIM friends (whom we’ve never met until now) met us at the airport, fed us dinner and promptly showed us to our temporary home…where the power was out and we got our home tour using flashlights! We were so tired and really didn’t care what the house was like at that point – just ready to try out the beds!

Jetlag: it took us almost a full week to get on the right time schedule with our sleeping. We all seemed to wake around 1:00 am. – so we played scrabble, skyped some dear friends one night in South America, read books and watched movies until 4:00 – then went to bed again. One funny thing is that the house we are in has a waterbed for the master bed – and it is so hard for me (Nikki) to get used to! I never imagined this would be one “hurdle” in my culture adjustment!

First Impressions….

Dirt. Everywhere. It is a fine-reddish-colored dirt, and it is literally everywhere you go. Most side roads are unpaved and so this dirt floats up to meet you every step. I don’t mind it (yet) and it is a very obvious reminder that we are on the edge of the Sahara Desert and in a country without the infrastructure to build fancy sidewalks and roads.

On our way to the Mango Camp

Driving. This topic has it’s own category since the roads here rival my most terrifying memories of driving in Italy with my family in the 80’s. It appears that there are no rules, but upon further education there ARE rules but they vary from traffic circle to traffic circle. On a two lane road (going both ways) you will compete to hold your space with motorcycles (everywhere), bicycles, people on foot, donkeys pulling wagons, people pulling wagons, camels, goats, small taxis, and of course other cars.  At night many of the bicycles and motorbikes do not have lights so you have to really stay focused.  At first it seems like complete chaos but after a time or two of driving, it can actually be a fun challenge.  If you are going a bit slow, you will get passed but no one seems angry or frustrated – it’s just part of the flow.

One big deal (which I think is funny) is the importance of using your blinker properly – the police will ticket you for NOT blinking on a turn, and even ticket you for blinking the wrong way! I find this comical mostly because the real “crime” seems to be the hazardous lane changes, passing, and many types of animals crowding the roads! Andy has done most of the driving so far, but I took my first turn today – pray for us!

Food. Many of you asked about the types of food we were going to eat, and we really weren’t sure. Well I’m happy to report that this country has Top Ramen! And so far it is our children’s favorite food! (I am not proud of this) We are still getting to know the markets and stores so we’ve been piecing together our meals here when we haven’t been invited to dinner with someone. Some low points would be that all milk here is powdered milk and our kids REALLY don’t like it — even with chocolate stirred in. They also claim that the bread here has a “funny” aftertaste, even though Andy and I feel that it tastes like dinner rolls, just in a different shape. I’ve enjoyed the curry rice dishes, and recently we had dinner with a missionary family and they had fried chicken, and other delicious food. Our kids loved it – Nathaniel was gnawing on the bones. I asked them how they did it…you know, fried the chicken? They said they bought it like that – deep fried – from a little restaurant on the side of the road. Yikes! (That was a couple of days ago and we are all still fine. J)

People. We’ve met lots of SIM missionaries and heard about their work. What a diverse bunch of Christ-followers! So many gifts to offer, and creative ways to serve the people of Niger! It has been inspiring in many ways and we are so grateful to be here and learn about this little-known country (to man) but very-known country to God. The Nigeriens (people from Niger have the “iens”, and people from Nigeria have the “ians”…FYI) are precious, gentle-natured, and our contact with them has been always good. They have a generally positive view of Americans (we are told) and this has been our experience. Very few speak English so we are reduced to sign language and gesturing to communicate. This is the most frustrating part! Clearly our contact with Nigeriens will be more profitable when we can actually speak French!

Atmosphere. Or ambience? We observe that this country has a peaceful easy feeling and there is an absence of hostility. Our kids even remarked that “most kids in America would probably think that Africa is so dangerous and the people even more dangerous, but in reality it isn’t true!” Even on really busy streets near the market, when people are literally pushing their way up to our car, begging for food or money…it doesn’t feel unsafe. One other observation about life here – there are people everywhere, at all times of the day and night, just walking or riding bikes or selling things…it is a place full of activity all of the time. Always buzzing. We think this is because they don’t have big fancy homes to hang out in, and their communities are where all of the action is – so they simply walk around and visit with each other? We hope to find out more… so stay tuned.

On our way to school from the city -- a common sight!

Miscellaneous notable experiences:

–       Lizards: We see them everywhere, but they are lightening fast and Nathaniel has yet to catch one. (Not for lack of enthusiasm and effort!)

–       Internet: for us it has been basically non-existent since somewhere off the West coast of Africa an anchor fell on the ONLY CABLE connecting the worldwide web to Niger! (or so they say….)

–       Goats: roaming the streets of Niger are little packs of wild goats!

–       Mosquito nets: the kids have mosquito netting over their beds now (it took a little rigging to get them set up) and after their first night I proudly asked if everyone was mosquito-bite free? Nathaniel announced that he got some new bites….hmmm…well, tonight we discovered the culprits safely hiding INSIDE near the top of his mosquito net! Whoops! Probably a good idea to make sure the mosquitos are OUT of the net before sealing up for the night!

–       Thankful for flashlights: power outages are common here.

–       Nigerien Christian Church: two hours of French translated to Housa (one people group language here). The five of us enjoyed our first church service in Niger! We didn’t understand a single word of it – but recognized some of the worship songs by their tune. It was a true blessing to be among the precious Christians of Niger, as they worshipped God and preached His Word! “Sweet sweet spirit in that place” we all agreed.

Ruth & I ready for our first church service in Niger

“There is no growth in Christ without some difficulty and fumbling. If we are going to keep on growing, we must keep on risking failure throughout our lives.” (Brennan Manning, from Ragamuffin Gospel, pg. 169)

Lying in bed recently, striving for sleep…in vain. I’m envisioning the dorm kitchen at Sahel Academy, Niger, where we are headed in less than a month.

It is hot in there.

Sticky from the many teenagers who don’t wipe counters as well as I would like.

Trying to speak French to my beautiful Nigerien house-helper.

Straining to figure out the measurement conversions — cups to liters? Or is it teaspoons to grams? I am wondering how they do it there?

Now what am I supposed to do when faced with a scorpion? Kill it? Or run? No wait, run from cobras and kill scorpions. Catch grasshoppers. Wave to parrots. Chase lizards. Do not swim in the river.

Long skirts. Cover my shoulders. Scarf creatively (and appropriately) tied to cover my head.

Man approaches – look down. Woman approaches – smile. (I think?) (Note to self: check on that!)

Yeah. I think I got it.

But I don’t have sleep. Not now, anyway, while I aimlessly ponder these imaginary scenes.

My dear friend recently reminded me that “there is no grace for the imagination!” So true! Time for me to take some authority over my thoughts so I can get some sleep!

I must accept it. Failure, hardship, hurdles, stumbles, and fumbles ARE INEVITABLE. Especially when a person as flawed as I am steps out to try something so daring as moving to Africa!

Just as long as I am fumbling forward. Seeking to know God more, serve others wholeheartedly, giving my all to the task before me!

Twenty-seven days until lift-off! The excitement and fear and anxiety regarding the “unknowns” has been the battleground for me lately. But I can see the Lord teaching me new treasures, bringing me to a place of peace, a depth of trust I haven’t known before.

And now that I think about it, my hard times in life have been graciously mingled with victories, blessings, priceless lessons, maturity, wisdom and relationships. I’ve noticed that these things pretty much go together — these fumbles and trophies –when you are risking…oh, I mean… living life to the full.

So here’s to some more fumbling!

“Even if we could live a life with no conflict, suffering, or mistakes, it would be a shallow existence. The Christian with depth is the person who has failed and who has learned to live with it.” (Brennan Manning, Ragamuffin Gospel, pg. 170)

Walking across the Narrows Bridge -- two miles of curiosity-satisfying exercise!

I thought it was time to share a little more detail regarding our “job” in Niger. Technically we will be called “Dorm Parents”, yet we’ve been told we will wear many hats. Primarily, though, we have been assigned this role of dorm parenting. Quite honestly we had never heard of this missionary job before, and it didn’t sound exciting to us at first. We truly wanted to be useful on the mission field, and we just hadn’t read too many powerful success stories from dorm parent missionaries! (Probably because dorm parent missionaries are too busy to write books…hmmm??)

Here is the simplest way I can think of to describe our role at Sahel Academy:

• Sahel Academy (SA) exists to serve missionary families who are serving the Nigerien community. About 150 students K-12th grade attend the whole school. Most are missionary kids, plus 30% Nigerien and diplomat kids (non-missionary).
• SA built one dorm for the children of missionaries serving in Niger or nearby countries. There is room for 20 teens, 10 boys and 10 girls, plus an apartment for the dorm parents and dorm assistant.
• The boarding students must be 12-18 years old to live in the dorm.
• Our job with the teens in the dorm is to mentor, tutor, nurse, pray-with, lead, discipline, hang-out, wrestle (Andy & the boys), cook, clean, cry, play ping-pong with, laugh, cheer-on, celebrate birthdays, eat meals with, and anything else life presents for us as a “dorm family”.
• Our job with the parents of the these teens is to communicate communicate communicate! We will help the parents stay as connected as possible with their children, despite the distance.

Current teenagers who live in the dorm!

As you can see, we will be pretty busy! We are thrilled to be able to practice discipleship in the truest form — what I like to call “life on life” ministry. Our own children will instantly have lots of older brothers and sisters! We are excited for them to have such a diverse and quality group of teens to look up to and learn from.

When I consider the golden opportunity before us I am just so honored to be trusted with these precious lives. Simply put, our job description is like that of any Christian who has a sphere of influence (however large or small): LOVE.

Love God.

So I can love others.

So they can love God.

So they can love others.

May the marvelous love of our God be evident in all that we do!

For those who are praying for us and curious how our fundraising is going…

here is the latest breakdown, as of 10/28/2011:

One-time needs $31,000   = 100%

Monthly Support $5,400/month  = 77%Praise the Lord!

We will buy our plane tickets soon —keep praying for the final $1,027/month to come in! Thank you!

Andrew's Hometown Event at Christ the King Lutheran Church!

Ruth's prompt card for when we speak about going to Niger

(Okay, I know the photography is terrible.)Lame photographer aside, What is that?

We’ve spent a lot of time lately speaking to groups of people about Niger, and we really wanted to get our kids involved. We asked them to be ready to share what is going on in their hearts regarding this huge life change! To help them prepare, we made “prompt cards” so they could remember what they wanted to say.

Both Ruth and Jonathan drew pictures — (and I’d post Jon’s card but I can’t locate it…his picture is really cool!) — while Nathaniel wrote out his main points.

Take a guess at what Ruth is communicating on her “prompt card”….

Oh — that was close! Did you say something about a lobster? I know. Me too, but that is not what she was aiming for! Just in case we don’t get to share our presentation with you face-to-face, I’ve listed here THEIR recent thoughts about our trip:

Ruth: “I am not looking forward to the creatures like scorpions that will get in my shoe and sting me! I am looking forward to going to my new school and making new friends!”

Jonathan: “I am excited to pounce on lizards and catch them to make them my pet. But I am not excited to be so so so so so hot. And the snakes, I do not want to meet a black cobra!”

Nathaniel: “I am excited to see lots of wild animals that I don’t get to see here, like giraffes, and hippos and different insects too. I am also excited to be hot…like about 100 degrees is good, but not 130 degrees. I am not looking forward to being in a different country where there will be misunderstandings because they do things differently than we do and the language is different.”  

It is wonderful to watch our kids embrace this calling along with us. It was never meant for just mom & dad — we ALL will grow and change through this journey!

(left to right: Jonathan, Nathaniel, Ruth)

I woke up before my alarm and you know something is up when that happens!

Andy and I celebrated our 15 years of marriage yesterday! Woohoo! That is not what woke me up…it was the movie we saw last night — “Courageous”. Wow! There is so much I could say about it but I really just want everyone to see it! This film stirred our hearts so much. Our passion for family, children, the Truth of God’s love and grace, and ultimately the courage it takes to live a life of integrity before God and man! Just go see the movie!

And bring kleenex.

I just really like this picture - my boys at Mt. Rainier, braving the glacier waters! They are courageous! (keeping with the theme)

Target carries mostly Sterilite brand plastic storage boxes. Fred Meyer has the best selection of all the brands. Haven’t checked WalMart yet. And Costco sells nifty flip-top boxes, not the kind I’m looking for. So why is this even remotely important for a missionary-to-be?

Packing. And not for the storage unit, either. Packing for the plane! Yep — we’ll be putting all of our stuff into Rubbermaid boxes (Rubbermaid are most flexible and resist cracking) and weighing them to be sure they are under 50#. That is the way you move to Africa, I’ve been told. Why? (Good question) Because everything you bring should be useful, including the gear you pack stuff in. So, these “box-suitcases” will do a better job of storing things than normal suitcases would. And I hear they keep the scorpions out too! You don’t have to tell me twice!

That is one of the many little, but actually big, things I’ve been thinking about these days.

And isn’t that just the way it is in life, with God, and in serving Him? We sometimes get funny looks when we say we are going to be dorm parents in Africa. After all, who ever heard of being dorm parents? Is it even a significant work? Will we make a difference for the Kingdom of God? We really can’t make a great defense. All we know is it will be a big deal to a number of faithful Christians serving in Niamey, Niger. That is enough for us Grays — we wanted to find a way to serve the community there, and this was the need! Simple as that.

The trap for every one of us is to think we have to create a significant work in order to be significant. What is significant, I ask? Henry Nouwen wrote “There are a number of people who have become famous or widely known for their ministries, but much of God’s saving activity in our history could remain completely unknown. That is a mystery difficult to grasp in an age that attaches so much importance to publicity. We tend to think that the more people know and talk about something, the more important it must be.”

Andy and I spent a good portion of our 30’s trying to be significant. Searching for it. Striving for it. People-pleasing for it. We fell into the trap!

God rescued us out of that pit, and now we have a chance to live freely and serve freely, in obedience to His call! Hooray for being dorm parents!

And hooray for packing in Rubbermaid boxes, because it is the little things that matter as much as the big. (smile)