The first day of the seminar is over and it was a roaring success. Anyway it is over for us. John Colgan was the speaker for the morning session and Steve Carr took charge of the afternoon session. We have a record attendance this year. The men registered 473 people today. We will get a few new people tomorrow. Some of the congregations hired motor kings to bring their people to the seminar; several hired buses. Nakpa brought 90 people. This morning we made multiple trips to Yendi and back shuffling people. One trip to town had to be made because someone’s belongings were left at the bus station. We missed most of John’s lesson this morning.
When the people took a break for lunch we (John, Steve C., Steve T. and I came back to the mission house for lunch and a small rest. On the way back out for the afternoon session John and I stopped to buy the bread for breakfast tomorrow. We bought 225 loaves of bread. The bread will be divided and served with porridge.
After the cooks served the noon meal we knew that we were going to have to buy more food. Steve T. and I missed most of Steve C. afternoon session because we were in the market buying meat and beans for tomorrow’s meals. Today was Yendi’s big market day and it is also the Damba Festival. Damba is a festival that is celebrated in this part of the world as Mohammed’s birthday. When we came to town to get the meat we got stuck behind a parade. On festival days the chiefs from various villages come to Yendi to celebrate. Those that have horses ride on them while other walk under large umbrellas that are twirled by those holding them.
Hopefully tomorrow will not be so busy and we can sit and enjoy the lessons. Everyone seemed to enjoy the lessons and there were lots of good questions. The only problem we had was the noisy children. We took care of that problem by moving the tarps they were sitting on to a shade tree a little ways away from the adults.
We left for the mission house around 6:00pm. It was dark by the time we got back to Yendi. The traffic was terrible; there were still too many people on the streets.
We just got a call from Timothy Niligrini. He said that 45 more people had arrived from Jakpumba and Niliyundo. That makes the total 518 and he got a call from the people at Nanjuni; their group will be coming tomorrow. I foresee another trip to the market for more food tomorrow!
We are tired, take care and have a great day.
In His Service,
Steve and Kandie
John Colgan and Steve Carr
