HERE WE ARE again, just as we promised. Only this time we really are in Zambia. Not without changes in plans, but more of that later! We are both well; a bit tired but very happy to finally arrive in the MFA project house, which will be our home during our time with MFA Zambia. For us it is a bit of a novelty to have our own place, all for ourselves! We have been a bit of a nomadic couple; I (Sharonne) have just realised that in the last five years we have had seven different addresses. Well this one (we trust in the Lord) is for a while.

Sunday 3rd March was our commissioning service at our Milford Baptist Church in Surrey, England. We are both so overwhelmed by the support and love that the people of our church have given us.

We arrived in Johannesburg, South Africa on 6^th March, and spent our first week looking for a suitable vehicle for the project. Once we’d bought the vehicle, we started to make plans to travel to Zambia. Our route was via Potgietersrus, Martin’s Drift, Francistown in Botswana, up to Kazungulu to cross the River on the pontoon there, through Livingstone (near to the Victoria Falls) up to Lusaka and on up to Ndola: a 1600 mile journey.

We set off on Wednesday March 21st at 5:30 in the morning, hoping to arrive in Ndola by Friday afternoon. We said goodbye to our very kind South African hosts, Shirley & Rey Haddad. Our first overnight stop was Francistown in Botswana. We arrived at Francistown at 4:00 o’clock in the afternoon, and after half an hour searching for accommodation, we found a suitable place to stay.

Our next morning’s journey started a bit late, due to one or two minor things that Charlie needed to do on the car. But by 9:30 we were ready to continue to Livingstone, Zambia. Most of the journey was over dry brown land. Botswana has had a drought; even the river beds were full of sand with not a drop of water!

After 180km of driving Charlie suddenly noticed that the car’s temperature gauge was on the red. He stopped straight away. We opened the bonnet and found that one of the hoses that carries water to cool the engine had a small hole in it, and water was escaping. To start with we thought that it would be a small job to repair, but as time went by we realised that in fact we would have to be towed all the way back to Francistown, for the car to be fixed. (The overheating had, as we thought and was confirmed later, caused the cylinder head to warp, and the gasket to blow.)

Well you can imagine how happy I was, let alone Charlie. But God is so wise, He wants to teach us something out of everything. Especially our frustrations!!

We found a couple of Botswanian men that, for a price (!!!) agreed to tow us back to Francistown (the full 180 km!!). By then it was getting late, and the thought of travelling in the night in a country that neither of us knew very well didn’t appeal to us, but we had no choice. We had to try and get to Zambia as soon us we could. We started our long journey back to Francistown, at 4:30 pm. But before we started I asked both men not to drink beer while they were towing us. Everything went well, but by now it was 7:00 o’clock and dark.

25km from Francistown, they stopped. We asked them what is the problem The driver said that, they had a flat tyre. We asked them “where is the spare?” Well you can guess what was their answer. They didn’t have one!!! Our spare would not fit their Toyota pick up, so what were we to do?? I was getting frantic. Here we are in the middle of nowhere, dark, stuck with two people, and by then I realised that they had both been drinking. I could smell alcohol from them. What are we to do? I could only pray and ask God to help us and to find a solution to our problem.

After changing the wheel (even that was not a straightforward job because the wheel that they had didn’t fit on the front, only the rear, so we had to do 3 changes before we got it right) we finally arrived in Francistown at about 10:30 at night. But both well, and no harm. God sent his angels to watch over us.

It took two and a half days to fix the car (remarkably good considering…) and by Sunday we were back on the road. We arrived in Ndola (with no further problems) on Tuesday 26^th, two days before Good Friday. We were so happy to be able to celebrate Jesus’ death and resurrection with our Zambian friends.

BEING BACK IN Ndola, much is familiar to us. But the truth is that things have changed. Poverty has increased. Ndola used to be an industrial city, but due to heavy government taxes on factories and industry many, except one or two, have closed down. Sometimes I just can’t imagine how life could get worse for people here. But then something like that happens and you see how people really do live on the edge. People barely survive. Their existence is for today; who needs to think about tomorrow? Tomorrow may never come.

So many people now have lost the little income that they had. You find on every street and every corner someone is trying to sell something. Just a few Kwacha, to buy maybe enough food for one meal. What really has hit the Zambian people badly was that the staple food (which is maize meal flour) has gone up in price substantially. Then people really suffer.

AIDS is still sweeping the country, and daily you hear of stories of people who's relative has died. Just yesterday I met a lady that told me that she lost both her sister and her brother in the space of three weeks.

Pray for Zambia and MFA

Thank you!

MFA is a small charity entirely dependent on the advice, enthusiasm and giving of extraordinary people like you! Thank you for all your support. To ask for a hard copy of this newsletter, or for information about getting more involved or giving, please phone our UK office on 01428 684371, or contact Charlie and Sharonne in Zambia: