Wendesday was visiting day - agriculture ministry, the new Mbour church, and seeing the benefit of the feeding programs

Today was our excursion to Ponte Sarene to see the progress David Makobo has made with the farmers we had met in 2014 when he had just started his agriculture ministry. His program is two months of classroom training during the rainy season, then they start with the winter crops like peppers and cabbage in November and move on to onions and eggplant during the spring. There is often a second crop of onions and a warm weather vegetable as a second crop before the rainy season begins again. Today, we are in Ponte Sarene about a month earlier in the season than we were in 2014 and I could see a dramatic difference in the size of the eggplants compared to then due to David's  techniques of composting, fertilization and irrigation. He has 31 students who participate in his plot to learn (that produce is given to the church) and then each man has his own plot to utilize his acquired skills. They work cooperatively and have a model similar to a Microenterprise group for lease of the property and to expedite labor.

Machine embroidery at Mbour

Then we went to the new Mbour church which is recently constructed and not yet decorated but has plenty of room to grow beyond its current membership of 80 adults and 40 children. It also has a thriving Womens Skills Center which has recently hired an additional aide to help the teacher, Marguerite , with her 36 students. They were a merry group, working both indoors in a classroom and outdoors on their embroidery, sewing and knitting. Pastor Jean Pierre has plans for a separate school and a clinic on the property as the membership grows and funding permits. We gave Pastor Jean Pierre about 20 Beanie Babies from my mother's and daughter's collection for their Sunday School.

Beanie babies arrive at Mbour

We had a late lunch at the Bandia animal preserve on the way to the children's feeding program in Theis. Unfortunately we didn't have time for the safari and we were too late to have anything but pizza to eat with ice cream bars for dessert. Poor us!

Ellie and Kathe at Theis

In Theis, we were swarmed by children at the feeding program. Nanos introduced us to several boys who had been in the feeding program since it's inception, one of whom I swear I recognized from a very early photo. They were obviously great examples of the benefits of a feeding program, being normal sized for ages, bright, gregarious, fearless and personable. Even Deb was charmed, at least for a short time. It was definitely a God Experience - showing us one of the results of our hard work in the annual Trinity Pumpkin Patch.

Preparing food at the feeding center

Won't be back to Dakar until 9pm, and I suppose they'll have dinner waiting, but I'm exhausted. I'm glad we got so much squeezed into today, but I'll be glad to return to teaching classes tomorrow. 

CAM