Crazy, yet relaxing times!

Hey all!
first of all I want to thank you for keeping up with my posts and for the comments that you leave. I love reading what you have to say.
This is the second day now that something has reminded me of our skiing vacations and given me the urge to ski (and snowboard). Yesterday I was just walking across campus...it might have been the smell of the cool air and the wind blowing against my face and creeping under my muts/beanie. Today it was just the smell of coffee in the language and literature department here at OC...for reason that coffeesmell reminded me of getting up in the morning and mom or dad setting coffee in our apt. before we go out to ski. I just cant believe its been almost 3 years now since ive skied! Man...those times have left me with really good memories! I thank God for giving our family the oppurtunity to do that!

Quick Rwanda update: We had another meeting yesterday. A young couple, Rusty and Onawa Linden, have decided to join our team for three weeks! That is such exciting news and we've been praying for this to happen for a while! Rusty was on the team with me last year and he and Onawa really wanted to go back to Rwanda....and now they can! Praise God! John Osborne came to our meeting and talked to us about how to conduct a small group sessions. It was really interesting and he had some really good things to say.
well, i tried to upload a picture of our team, but it wasnt working, so I'll need to try again later.

Ive still been sick lately....got a little sicker that I was, so Ive been staying in my appartment a lot and relaxing. Its been really nice to be able to relax....course Ive been doing my best to keep up with school work too. I have three exams this coming MOnday...In TEFL Methods, Modern Drama and African Civ.....so this weekend will be a study-filled time for me. If you could pray for my health and motivation to study well, I would greatly appreciate it! Thanks!
Also, please pray for my friend Marge. SHe is one of my sisters in club and she's been struggling a lot with her health.
ok, i have to go to chapel now.
cya!
in him,
Randa

Rwanda now!

Now that you've read what I did last summer in Rwanda and that I plan on going back this summer, I'll let you in on what's going on with our preperations for this coming summer and how much we know about what exactly we're going to do.
Our team consists of Alex Volpe, a Junior at OC, Mike King, a freshman at OC, Adam Blackerby, a Junior, me and Bryan and Holly Hixson, both are faculty members at OC and attend Quail Springs Church of Christ, and their two little girls, Alexis and Grace.
Our team has gotten together twice so far and we have discussed things like fundraising, what we'll be doing, what our lesson plan and tactics are, how and what the missionaries are doing, what the culture there is like and what our fears and motivations. Our last meeting was during OC's lectureship week, so Sam and Nancy Shewmaker, who have been missionaries in Africa, came and told us some of their story and answered some of our questions.

We aren't quite certain yet what we'll be doing. The original plan was to teach classes at KIST university, like what my LST team did last summer. But that plan seems to no longer be available to us. Now we are hoping to be able to have small group studies and independent one-to-one studies with students from KIST who are interested.

unfortunately my time is running out and i have to go to class now. I'll give more update and some pictures later.
Have a great day everyone!

Rwanda update

Well, I promised you that my next post would be an update on rwanda.....so, I'm gonna start by just posting the newsletter that I sent out before Christmas break. For those of you who didn't get this newsletter, I'm really sorry but that means I either dont have you on my address list, and if so you should give me our address. Or you are among those friends of mine in Europe to whom I must honestly say that I havent sent one yet. I was meaning to do it while I was home for the break, but I forgot that break was busier than expected at times and at other times I just had that feeling of "i'd like to just sit and do nothing" that i havent been able to have at OC and had forgotten what it felt like. Not a good excuse, I know. But I will get those letters to you before I get the second one out!
anyway, for those of you who actually check this post, here is the letter:

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,


This past summer, I spent approximately 5 weeks in Kigali, Rwanda on a Let’s Start Talking (LST) trip. If you are not familiar with LST it typically sends out teams of three to six people to many different countries in the world to provide one-to-one English conversation with people. To generate conversation, we read from an easy-to-read version of the Bible with them, in the hope that they will be led to Christ.

In Rwanda, that approach got changed up a bit. Through the missionary, Dave Jenkins, we were able to work with Kigali Institute of Science and Technology (KIST). The dean of students there required that we teach all of his students taking English classes, which would not be possible with one-on-one lessons. So we ended up teaching classes of twenty to forty students. We were split into groups of three and each group had a weekly schedule.

We would start off the class session with some activities to warm them up and to get them speaking English. We played name games, riddles, English expressions, etc. After this warm up, we handed out as many LST books as we had, and started reading from the lesson. Then we picked out 2 or 3 volunteers to read the lesson. This helped them with pronunciation, but also let the Word sink in more. We then asked them questions, had them define simple terms in their own words and let them ask us questions. When we felt like we had covered the basics to help them understand the story and they were starting to become more interested in the depth, we broke up into small groups. Each teacher sat with a group of 5-10 students and talked about the lesson in more depth. Students asked questions about the story as well as things not related to it. We encouraged them to answer each others questions in order to get a discussion going and not merely a dialogue for the others to listen to. They asked us questions not only about the story, but about the whole Bible, religion in general, America and our lives. We in turn asked them the same questions and had wonderful conversations with them, getting to know their faith, their cultures, their families and their lives.

We got to know the students pretty well during school hours, but we also enjoyed our time with them outside of school hours, in order to build up our relationships with them as much as possible. In between classes we often hung out on the school grounds to continue to chat with our students and others that we did not meet in class. We also invited those students who seemed particularly interested in our beliefs to have an individual Bible study with us. Some of us walked down the shopping street with our students and went to their homes to meet their families. We also joined some at their churches to tighten our bonds and to get to know churches in Rwanda better.

This coming summer, I will return to Kigali with a Quail Springs Church of Christ campaign group. Quail Spring sponsors David and Jana Jenkins, as well as many other missionaries world wide. They have decided to send a team to every one of their mission sites in order to help with God’s work in those places and form closer bonds with the missionaries, the church and the people who need to hear the Gospel.

Bryan and Holly Hixson are serving as the sponsors for this work. Their two daughters, Alexis and Grace, will join with the mission work as well. Our campaign will look similar to the LST project I did last summer. We will work with a university and teach English through the Bible in their classes. Additionally, we will have one-on-one tutoring sessions through the Gospels so we can more easily form bonds and share our faith with our students. We will also serve orphans one day a week and we will have a few days to travel as a group and learn more about the country and culture.

Our expense for this campaign is $3500 each. God is already showing His provision by providing the first $1500. That means I only have $2000 left to raise. I need to have half of my funds raised by February 15, and the balance by April 15. This money will go to plane tickets, on site transportation, training, housing, food, some vaccinations, work materials, and resources for our service projects. In order for me to be able to go and do this work for the Lord, I will need both spiritual and financial help. If you would like to share in this ministry, but cannot help me financially, I would appreciate prayers. If you can help financially, donations can be sent to Quail Springs Church of Christ, Attention: Rwanda GO Team-MB, 14401 N. May, Oklahoma City, OK, 73134. I have included addressed envelopes for your convenience. If you send a check, please include the following memo: Rwanda GO Team - MB. All contributions are tax deductible.

I have created a blog website where I will be posting information on how my life is going. I plan on having a Rwanda update every two weeks or so where I will give information on how things our going with my fundraising, training and other preparation. I will also add photos and videos from last summer’s campaign. I hope you check it out and add a little comment here and there. Here is the site: http://randaslife.blogspot.com/.

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and Happy New Year! Have a blessed time with friends and family.

In Him,
Imana ishimwe! (‘Praise God’ in Kinyarwandan)


Next time I'll post an update on whats been going on with Rwanda so far this semester.
I'll let ya go for now cuz I've already given ya a lot to read!

school's gettin busy

Hey everybody!
like the title says, school has already gotten really busy. And I've also been a little sick this past week. Ive been trying to stay on a schedule of going to bed early and getting up early so i can do some exercising, but the getting up early has been a problem for me this week. SInce I havent been feeling well Ive decided that I should get that extra hour of sleep instead of go running or walking and get more sick. I'm just greatful that God's given me the strength to go to class and work and everything else I've got going on. But i'm looking forward to the day that I can get up early and feel healthy enough to go run.
Also, spring sing practices have started!! For those of you who dont know, SPring SIng is a big show that the clubs put on. Each club gets about 5.30 mnts in the show, and up until the show in March, clubs practise their lyrics and 'dance moves' (i'm supposed to say choreography). Our club has been practising three times a already...we started this past Sunday. Its really fun and I especially cant wait til the actual show, but its also one of those things that is gonna really wear me out. One of our practices starts at 10:00....which means I get back in my room about 11:25 ish. Now, you would think that because i'm a collegestudent I should be able to handle that....and I will...i was just reallly excited about my new schedule and my 10:30 bedtime! Ahwell...hopefully that will just be one night out of the week. I'm not gonna complain.

Ok, Rwanda. some of you might be interested to know whats going on there. Unfortunately I have to go to class right now, so I wont be able to continue for now, but Rwanda will be my first topic on my next post.

have a great day!
God bless you!

beta Rush event and snow!!

Here's the pics of my beta rush event:

This one is the whipped cream war:

I also wanna show you how beautiful the snow looks! We've had some really weird weather here! Its gone from pretty warm, like spring weather, back to wintery snow weather. Crazy stuff!

getting back into a routine

well, school has started and I'm getting used to the new routine I've made up for myself. I'm eating and living healthier than ever before....course, it hasnt been a week yet, so we'll see how long I can keep it up ey. I'm pretty sure I can keep the healthy food up, but its the running, walking and other exercise I'm worried about. This first week isn't nearly as busy as I'm going to be getting in the future, so we'll see.
well, I'm first post a few more pictures from winterkamp for you all to see:

If you want more pics of winterkamp, let me know! I have more!
Now, I'll tell ya about my first day of school and post some pictures of that too. I went to all my classes...and work. Twas a great day. Gave me some perspective of how busy I'm gonna be! Greek at 8:00, Methods of TEFL (teaching english as a foreign language) at 10:00. Then chapel and my lunch break. Then African Civilization at 12:30. Man, that one's gonna be good! I'm excited! Then I went to work in the security office for an hour and then went to my Modern Drama class. This is a literature elective. Its gonna be really hard, but a great class! And then I went to work for Curt Niccum. I'm his greek grader, but since today was the first day of school I just did research for him. I really enjoy working in the Bible building! I enjoy my work in the security office too. Then, after work i had some time to eat and relax and get some stuff sorted out and then we had a Beta (my social service club) RUSH event. For those of you who dont know, RUSH time is the time that students who arent in club but want to be can go to different club activities to check out the clubs to see if they want to join. Our activity yesterday was with the boys club Alpha and we did "build your own sunday". We had a good turnout and we had a lot of fun! Some of my friends had fun having a whipped cream war outside. I'll post some of those pics on a next posting cuz I cant add them to this one. There must be a limit. Is there anyone who can tell me more about how this works and if there's a better way to post a lot of pictures? thanks.

the vacation ends and its back to school

After spending Christmas and New Year at home with my family, my last activity in Belgium was going to winterkamp to spend time with fellow Christians of my age (16+). Most everyone who was there were people I grew up with...whom I've grown very close to and love and miss dearly!(If you guys are reading this, I miss you a lot!)

I had a wonderful time and was really sad to have to leave a day before kamp was done to be able to prepare for our flight home.
Our flight home was rather crazy in Chicago. We got held up at two security check points. Apparantly we look like terrorists! The thing was, we only had an hour and a half to get off our plane, get our bags, go through customs and security and get to our next plane (for which we had to take a bus to another terminal). We just barely made it! We were some of the very last ones to board the plane. But GOd is good and He let us on. That flight was good...it was a small plane, so turbulance was a ton of fun! Yea, i know I'm weird.
So we got to OKlahoma on Thursday and the three of us stayed with friends and family until we could move into our dorms/appartments without having to pay $20 a night. I got settled in on Saturday and hung out with some friends. We got to have lunch with some good friends from Canada, and then I got to go see one of my friends who just had a baby (and I got to see him too....such a little cute baby boy!) Could guys please pray for them (Cassie and Erick)? He was born 13 weeks premature. He is doing really well, but at this age and size, any small problem could cause big complications.

Ok, well, its Monday morning now and I start classes today, so I should go get ready to have a great day of education!
I hope you all have a blessed day! Please let me know how your Christmas and New Year went and how you feel to be back at school and/or work.
Love you all!