race, our homes' cutest trash producer who does her part by wearing cloth diapers!)Trash is one of those things we take for granted in the States. True, we know it’s a problem. We know that there are huge landfills and what not. Many of us do our best to recycle and reduce, but we don't usually think about where exactly is my trash going or what am I going to do with it.
On an economically poor and geographically small island, trash is an issue. Where does it go? Unfortunately the answer is usually, “Wherever is most convenient.” Open fields, unclaimed land, forest areas, and most tragically seacoast are all fair game. All along the city waterfront you can find piles of trash spilling into the ocean. The smell is ripe and unpleasant and garbage floats in and out with the tide. Our first time swimming in the ocean here was also a game of avoiding the floating diaper and other trash.
When we first arrived it was easy to be judgmental. The people simply didn’t seem to care. They threw trash about anywhere. When they ate a candy bar, the wrapper was haphazardly thrown on the ground. Where is their sense of pride? Do they like living with all this garbage?
Then trash became a problem for us. When we moved to our new home it was not before a week had passed that we had accumulated enough garbage that we needed to do something with it. But with a poor city, there is no removal service. What do you do? We asked our neighbors, and they explained that they throw it into the sea. We didn’t want to do this, but the trash was piling up. What were we to do? There was no place to burn and/or bury it (our practice in Chad), so the first couple of weeks we left it to the discretion of our house help, who comes twice a week. Out of sight out of mind. But then one day he explained to us how he went down to the banks with our trash and waited till no one was looking before throwing it into the sea. This was depressing. But what could we do?
It turns out islanders do take pride in their
homes. Many villages are very clean. But the anonymity of the city breeds apathy and the sheer number of people overloads the capacity of the city to handle it all. Cheap plastic goods can also be blamed. Things break so quickly and all the plastic toys, electronics, sandals, and bags take up space, refusing to rot.But God is good. There are designated spots where trash is periodically loaded onto a garbage truck and removed to a designated landfill. These spots are few and far between, but we’ve discovered one that is in proximity of our house, but a long ways away. So, once a week we borrow the truck and use it to run our trash down to this dumping area. We feel good knowing we are not throwing our trash into the sea, but what about our neighbors who don’t have cars? How far are they willing to walk to keep from throwing their garbage into the sea?
PRAYERS ANSWERED
Our language continues to come slowly but steadily. We’ve had some good visits this week. The desire to speak and understand is at once a motivation to keep going and at times a frustrating hurtle. Pray that motivation would outpace frustration. Weaning Grace has been going very well. She is down to one feed a day and has given us very little trouble about it. We have noticed she eats a lot more at meals now! It sounds like our future teammates are making good headway in their preparations to come.
PRAYERS REQUESTED
We were unable to meet with two of our language helpers this week. Pray that we could make headway even when we don’t have formal lessons. We’ve been waiting months for a screen door on our house to be put in—progress has been really slow. The screen door will allow us to be neighborly in the evenings (have main door open) without allowing all the mosquitoes in. Finally the door has been delivered, but it sits in our hallway waiting to be installed. Pray that the carpenter might come soon. Our teammate Amy is turning 30 today. May God bless her on her birthday.
