I will miss...

Yovodoku - Ata + Tevi - FAN MILK - Giant leaves - Palm trees - The beach, the sight of forever – Motorcycles - How you can get whatever whenever because people sell everything possible on the streets - Rooster in the morning - The Yovo song - Smell of the bakery by our house every time we drive by on our motorbikes - View from our roof, seeing the downtown from across the plains - Being able to barter on basically anything, anywhere - Lizards and Geckos – Storms! - If you are late NO PROBLEM - Chill Culture - Always shoving as many people as possible in a car - Showers that just like clean the whole bathroom - Shoving everything in the fridge (Gum, Bread, everything!) – I will miss Benin! See you all soon :D!

Fong Lesson

So at the village, during our lunch break, Calixte and Martin taught me some Fong (the local language). Prepare yourself, because I have no idea to spell these words, but I will spell them like they are pronounced for you all!

Ahfonkangia – Hello

Sobedo – Is everything good? Response = Dolso – Yes everything is good!

Nonni – My name is _____

Affo – Foot

Chaussuafokpa –Shoe

Cloacko – Chicken

Cloacklovi – Baby Chicken

Choockoo – Dog

Bo – Goat

Bovi – Baby Goat

Chichi – Sunglasses

Add ne to the end of anything to say like “that’s a ___”, or “this is ___” etc.

Crazy Stuff in the past few weeks

We went to the zoo, we finally got to see some African animals (even though they were in captivity)...We saw some baboons and monkeys, alligators, crazy giant snakes, tortoises and much more (Including a random house cat)! Tortoises are amazingly strong, you can stand on it, and he will be still walking around, woah!

For Canada Day we created Jon-Eh (John A. Macdonald get it, get it? Haha), out giant beaver friend to celebrate the day! Created out of some cereal boxes we have been collecting in the corner of our kitchen haha!

Martin and I went out one day and he took me to this market called Tokpa...WOW! Imagine the most people EVER + the most little shops/stands EVER + shoved into the tiniest amount of space possible, and there you have Tokpa! Craziest environment I have ever been in. You know all those movies of the crazy markets in India, or Africa...Ya nothing compared to this, what an experience! Especially being a Yovo, and everyone screaming at you to come into their shop and tugging at you, wow, fun times for sure! Haha

I got some traditional clothing! I am officially African!

At Monday night’s meeting we had a huge surprise celebration for three people! Two of our leader’s birthdays had recently passed, and Abby’s b-day as well! We made sloppy joe’s (their favourite food ever now haha!), and decorated the house and had a great time together! The two DRIME Benin leader’s were touched that we celebrated their birthday and gave them gifts, because apparently you don’t really do that here, so they really felt blessed! I’m glad we had that opportunity to just bless them, because they have been working so hard with DRIME and doing an awesome job!

DRIME in the past few weeks

Sorry, my bad for not blogging in so long! (Take that as a compliment, it means I’m busy doing good things in Africa!! Haha)

Anywho, DRIME stuff has been going magnificently in the past few weeks! I’ll give you all a quick summary.

We promoted/presented DRIME in two more churches, which turned out great, receiving great response from the churches about this ministry! Praise God!

We were invited to partner alongside a church for an evangelism event. The crowd really loved the dramas, and because of our loud music, the area we were in soon was packed with people thirsty to learn about Jesus-Christ!

We have successfully started DRIME Benin’s first ministry season! They decided on having practice and ministry both on Sunday’s one after the other. Since then, we have had three practices, and two ministry times. At this past practice and ministry time, we totally left it up to the leaders to plan and run the day, we reinforced that statement by telling them we will not be present that day! As usual, they did simply awesome running their team by themselves. Because of their leadership skills, and love for our God, we are confident DRIME Benin is going to thrive in this country and continent!

DRIME Benin so far has been doing ministry at the beach because that’s where people seem to go Sunday afternoons/nights (seriously the whole beach gets packed!). The turn-out has been amazing. We get hundreds of people watching at one time, just observing and receiving the message of Christ! We have had some amazing opportunities here!

On another DRIME note, God is showing us over and over that he is in control and that he will provide for us! We recently worked out the monthly budget for DRIME Benin, and it seemed like a lot, but it was all necessary! And of course they have to raise it all. But God showed us that anything is possible with him by proving a man named George into DRIME Benin’s life! We were doing ministry one day and this man comes up to me and says “hey I think I am your neighbour.” (We had new neighbours that just moved in and we had yet to meet them!) So we went about chatting, and he came over one night while Abby and Janna were out and just started spilling how the ministry had touched him so much! He’s a believer himself and kept repeating how the dramas were so simple, yet so powerful, and that it amazed him that people left their “fun at the beach” to come and watch the dramas intently. He said that the whole thing amazed him. He’s a business man, and was telling me how he wants to see DRIME in Nigeria and Ghana and that he can help, which is amazing! So to start, he is definitely sponsoring DRIME Benin! Out of the blue, he gave us 30,000 CFA’s for transportation for the next ministry time (transportation is only 6,000, so he blessed DRIME Benin with their first donator!) and he rented us this whole high tech intense sound system for that ministry time too! He also said how he is going to keep renting it for DRIME Benin each week, then at the end of this month, he is going to buy us a whole new sound system! One thing that was so powerful that he said was that “I believe DRIME is the next move of God”...Wow! That is so incredible! God sure is looking out for us and DRIME Benin! Praise Him!

We have also been putting together the DRIME advisory council, which is a team of people who have a passion for the ministry, and that give council to DRIME Benin leaders and support them, and promote DRIME in their own circles of influence (People like business men, pastors, elders, directors of organisations etc.)! It’s been going great, we had our first meeting on Wednesday, and it all worked out great!

On a last DRIME note, we went with GAiN and a team from North Carolina to a village on Tuesday to do ministry, what a great day! The drive there was awesome, because honestly, the village was in the middle of nowhere! We drove through straight up bush the whole way, with a tiny little path that was big enough for a bicycle (which of course a bicycle would never make it due to the intense terrain!). We continually were wiped by bushes and branches in the car because of our tanking it through the bush! Haha. So we finally decided to put up the windows (duh!) The day was awesome! God sure moved in that village, bringing most of the village to come and know him, setting them free from the chains of fear and captivity! Praise God!

Our last tasks here as DRIME Benin base planters is to have a leader`s retreat, to finish the training, and debrief the trip with the leaders! Pray for a great end trip weekend with the leaders, and that we can finish well, praising God for everything he has done in this country!