After a slow start on Monday getting our rental car, we finlly got on the road to Victoria Falls by about 10:00am. We had an uneventful trip that took about 5 hours. After we met our laison guy (Derrick), checked into our accommodation, and dropped Derrick at the store to do some grocery shopping for our meals, we headed down to the Falls. This is the driest time of the year and last year was a poor rainy season so there is not as much water flowing over the falls as there normally is. It is still an impressive sight. The river spreads out to a mile wide before it goes over the edge into the gorge. Dr David Livingstone a scottish missionary was the first white man ever to witness this magnificent site in 1813. His African luggage bearers told him that the Africans call it Mosi-ao-tunya (The smoke that thunders). There is a statue of Livingstone on the Zimbabwe side of the falls looking down the length of the gorge. It is 73 meters or 230 feet at the Livingstone statue end and about 108 meters or 324 feet at the Zambia end. We got some great pictures and I have a few included in this blog report. We saw some warthogs and some monkeys on our walk down the gorge and back. The Zambezi river which flows over the falls is the boundary between Zimabwe and Zambia.
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| "Dr David Livingstone I Presume" |
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| Vu and Mark |
We ate dinner on Monday night in the dining room of the Victoria Falls hotel which is where Judy and I stayed 37 years ago, which was the last time we were here. This is where and when I asked Judy to marry me. She should have been here to share the occasion. The Maitre d' in the dining room has been working here at the hotel for 44 years so he was here when we were here all those years ago.
Our mission here is to train about ten students to present the Smart Choices program so that they can continue teaching it after we are gone. It is Pastor Vusumusi Lusinga who arranged our program last week at Lupane who also made the arrangements for this weeks program. We got through the first three lessons of training before lunch. The students/instructors had an opportunity in the afternoon to teach the first three lessons to another small group of new students. On Wednesday we repeated the same process using the lessons 4 to 6.
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| Victoria Falls Class held at Mosi-oa-Tunya High School |
Pastor Vu is also the director in Zimbabwe for the True Love Waits program. This program ancourages young folks to wait until they meet their life partner and get married before engaging in any sexual activity. Abstinence is the central message of the Smart Choices program also, so these two programs will complement each other nicely. Pastor Vu intends to keep teaching both programs. The students that we are teaching are people that Pastor Vu has already trained for the True Love Waits program.
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| Pastor Vusumusi (Vu) Lusinga |
The students are all very enthusiastic and excited about the program so we will see what kind of fruit God grows from the seeds that Mark, Vu, and I planted this week.
On our way back to Bulowayo tomorrow we will be visiting the Hwange Game Park to reconnect with Gods beautiful creation.
Glynn Smith
Beacon of Hope International
Web: www.beaconint.org
Blog: blog.beaconint.org
Skype: africanson3
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