Gwen & Mags Update recently received into the SAMS office:
Dear Friends,
It seems that Autumn has arrived as we have had some welcome low temperatures this last week. One morning we got up to 13ºC which made a nice change. We have also put our clocks back which means it is once more still light when we get up!
School has been busy but we have been able to get down to a lot of work so far…except for today! School is closed for the day as there is a general strike. Many people feared it would be violent. Roads are also blocked off although their efforts don’t appear to have been too effective! Anyway, with staff coming from far and wide we couldn’t risk opening school with the majority of staff unable to get in. We were also concerned for the children’s safety and know many parents wouldn’t send their children anyway. Even so, we did have a number of complaints about closing. Many other schools also closed.
The lower secondary managed to get away for camp the other week. The 7th and 8th grades went to our sports ground and camped in tents…until the rain came. Mags reckons the rain came just at the right time as they had the children playing games that left them very muddy so the rain managed to wash a lot of it off before they went for a shower. It was a very good camp and Pastor Ronnie and one of the teachers, Ariel, spoke on Noah. Mags came back saying how well it had gone apart from the lack of sleep!! 9th grade went to camp and climbed a hill where they had to cook their own food once on top. This involved a walk of 25kms altogether. Pastor Donald went there and again, spoke on the theme of Noah. That too was also a very good camp.
Last week we had our school anniversary service in which we also remembered our founder, Auntie Thea, who died in January. It was a lovely service and everyone seemed touched by it. The pupils listened well. Pastor Ronnie spoke on Zephaniah 3:17 which was the verse from Auntie Thea’s funeral. Ronnie spoke well with a great visual aid which involved a few of the children. It made them all laugh but he got his point over.
It’s been hard getting the secondary pupils to settle after the holidays. Many of them are not motivated to work hard as there are no national exams to pass to get to university. There are, of course, some who do work hard. The National University requires an admittance exam but many others just require fees! Many of our pupils know they’ll go to university and they’ll have a job afterwards which doesn’t urge them to work hard now! They also have an active social life and this also affects our school routine. The Ministry of Education doesn’t have a legal requirement of how many days the pupils attend school nor fines and punishments for those who miss school. Many of ours go off travelling in term time. We’d love you to pray for our secondary pupils, that they would settle and take school seriously and that they would know the Lord’s hand on their lives.
We were missing Munchie ( the dog who died in November) and this week we welcomed the new arrival. Splash, came all the way from Uruguay, brought by friends coming from Argentina. He’s now 6 months old and still finding his place in the family. I think he hoped to be the Alpha male but Viking has put paid to that!! He’s very sweet and cuddly and loves water…hence his name!
Well, we’ve had a very profitable day. Both of us have managed to get quite a lot of school work done and were glad of the time to do it. Mags is now baking with Splash tripping her up at every turn!
Thank you to everyone for all your support and prayers. They mean a lot to us.
God Bless, Love Mags and Gwen
Beryl Baker offers medical treatment to around 18,000 Indians in the Paraguayan Chaco. She has dedicated nearly 30 years of her life to this area and describes herself as an ‘orderly, gynaecologist, midwife and dentist’, treating anything from TB to gunshot wounds and snakebite. Beryl’s vehicle which was loaded up with medical equipment, food etc ready to go to the Chaco was parked in Asunción, but it has been stolen. As you can imagine this is a stressful and complicated situation with numerous implications for the various people in the Chaco who depend on medical help from Beryl’s ministry.