It was a long but happy day, starting with the 8am parish eucharist here and ending after an evening one which meant home at 9pm! Tom described the pattern in his last blog -now for some impressions.
Here at St Thomas' it was a good full church with nearly 200 present, nearly half of them children, with some toddlers wandering as they will, all shades of the rainbow though very few white. The singing was lusty but with fewer part singers than in the more African churches later in the day. No book drumming either here. A&M Revised and Mission Praise are used and we wish we had brought copies as one has to provide for oneself. We have bought the SA Prayer Book quite reasonably and an A&M revised is on order for us but we think how many copies of these might be lying at home unused. If anyone would like to send out a copy we could give them to some of the poorest-looking who share or have very tatty copies. (Address is PO Box 113, De Aar, S Africa 7000 – a printed paper rate still exists I think).
This shows the empty church when we first arrived.
The service was quite long as all the readings and a psalm are included, but by 9.30 people were spilling out and rushing off home. No coffee/drinks has beenserved at any churches we have yet experienced. A few of the ladies asked to look in our house. They had helped prepare it but not seen the furniture. I had spent the time before church getting online, as the evening before we got no signal, so our bed was unmade and plenty of mess left around! Still it was nice to share it with them as they have been so generous. Never did I imagine we would be given brand new furniture and a completely redecorated house. More about our home later.
Father Joseph drove us with Hildegaard, another churchwarden, to Philipstown where a dilapidated simple church was some way off the tarmac road. Our route through the dry Karoo had been a virtually empty straight road, accompanied by power and phone lines, kopjes or steep-sided hills, occasional green trees where water is pumped up by wind for the few sheep. They say their meat is the best but how sheep survive is a mystery!
Everyone here seems to speak Afrikaans as a matter of course. At St Thomas' many speak good English and their service is in English by their choice, with the gospel and sermon usually in Afrikaans. Y'day it was in Eng, as it was done by Tom. Fr Joseph hopes Tom will learn Afr; I have my doubts!!
At Philipstown however Fr J took the service in Afr and one of the lay ministers translated while Tom preached; ditto at Britstown in the evening where it was Fr J's brother translating. His mother was in the row behind for that service and sang lustily- we later discovered she is 95!
After the 11am service communion was taken to a lady who had turned 103! She was sitting bolt upright with her tiny legs straight in front of her, a position I could never achieve! She was blind and pretty deaf, cared for by a daughter or grand-daughter with toddlers playing in the room and children outside their very simple house.
Then came lunch at a smarter home, a delicious meal of chicken, sweet potato, coooked grated carrots and rice, followed by much better tinned peaches than we ever see these days and hot custard in a jug taken out of the freezer cabinet – presumably used for storage and not switched on!
The day was pretty sweltering, mid 30s I think so when we returned at 2 or so we were ready for a read/snooze before setting out again at 5pm.
Monday is to be Tom's day-off and we were glad to be able to sleep till 7.15, an hour later than usual. We have had a leisurely day here, waiting for the satellite dish to be installed. Tom is now happy as Larry infront of a sports channel! While watching Sky News I was shocked to realise that at our 7pm it was dark for you at 5pm, and obviously cold. We will now be well able to keep abreast of national news and sports results worldwide.
It has been so lovely receiving emails from friends. Forgive us if we do not always reply and please do keep your news coming.
