Bush Beat Blog

DATE:  NOVEMBER 26, 2017

Our annu­al State Lev­el Social Ser­vice inspec­tors dropped by mid-morn­ing Thurs­day, and stayed till 1.p.m.  They checked the children’s records, then vis­it­ed all the chil­dren in their homes, ask­ing the old­er ones many ques­tions.  They also inspect­ed the new children’s home still under con­struc­tion.  This 3 mem­ber team depart­ed very sat­is­fied with how our chil­dren are pro­gress­ing in school as well as in their rapid growth rates.

State Children’s Director, State Children’s Lawyer and Balama Director

Our 5 old­er boys had just left for sum­mer vaca­tion the pre­vi­ous day, but Cape­na explained that all the boys are very inter­est­ed in attend­ing the new AGRICULTURAL TRAINING CENTER that is being built just out­side the Bala­ma city lim­its. To enter, a stu­dent must have com­plet­ed 10th grade, so it will be anoth­er year before our only 10th grad­er can apply. Three of the boys are in 9th grade and the youngest is in 7th grade.

STATE LEVEL WOMAN’S GROUP MAKES SURPRISE VISIT

For the first time, the State Lev­el Del­e­ga­tion of the Mozam­bi­can Woman’s Orga­ni­za­tion (OMM) vis­it­ed our chil­dren giv­ing out lots of hugs, hand­shakes, and words of encour­age­ment.  This 12 mem­ber del­e­ga­tion had tears rolling down their cheeks as Cape­na told them the his­to­ry of some of the chil­dren who now live with us.  They left us with many words of encour­age­ment and voiced a need for this type of pro­gram in all the Districts.

OMM Director greeting our older girls

Capena and District Administrator with OMM Delegates speaking to the older girls

OMM Director loving on a special needs orphan

DRY SEASON MEANS LITTLE WATER IN THE WELLS

An increas­ing num­ber of peo­ple from our area are pump­ing water from our church’s water well each day. Novem­ber is the last of the dry months, so many of the area’s wells dry up in October.

To accom­mo­date the increased need, we are open­ing the well at 4 a.m. so that the “ear­ly birds” can beat the rush, and only close it at dark. Our well is deep­er than most of the area wells, and is sit­u­at­ed in a LARGE water reser­voir that has nev­er gone dry.

So we share what we have, so that oth­ers may have safe water to drink. After all, our church is called IGREJA AGUAS VIVAS.  (Liv­ing Waters Church)

JESUS GAVE US BOTH SPIRITUAL AND PHYSICAL WATER TO SHARE WITH OTHERS. 

I HOPE YOU ALL HAD A VERY BLESSED THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY WITH YOUR FAMILY.

THANK YOU TO ALL OF YOU FOR YOUR CONTINUED PRAYERS AND LOVE GIFTS!

Bless­ings,

Bush Bun­ny Bren­da Lange

And the Bala­ma Staff

Our address for Love Gifts:

ORPHANS UNLIMITED

562 Hwy 123 Bypass, # 301

SEGUIN, TX 78155

Bush Beat Blog

DATE:  NOVEMBER 18, 2017

This week was finals week for all Bala­ma school chil­dren as class­es let out for our “sum­mer break” just yes­ter­day. It also sig­naled the com­ple­tion of food give outs to the 2,000 plus orphans and the wid­ows who care for them.

Thanks to your love, the vil­lage orphans have the need­ed seeds to plant their fields and help pro­vide for themselves.

I am grate­ful for the “break” from my “3 a.m. alarm clock”.  The 3 a.m. get up was nec­es­sary this week so that the food trucks could roll out and be at their des­ti­na­tion short­ly after dawn (4:30 a.m.) I love help­ing the chil­dren, but 3 a.m. is a bit ear­ly even for this bright eyed, bushy tailed, morn­ing per­son.  Makes for a very long day.  (My nor­mal get up is 4 a.m. daily.)

I get teased a lot by vis­i­tors because I go to bed with the chick­ens, but those same “teasers” show no inter­est in meet­ing me for a hot cup of tea before my ear­ly morn­ing start time.  If you live in Bala­ma, then get­ting up when the roost­er crows means YOU’RE LATE!

I’m sit­ting in front of my lit­tle 12 volt fan (run by a solar charged bat­tery) as I write, for it is 92F or 33C IN MY OFFICE while I’m prepar­ing this blog. Life is a real blast as Novem­ber is our hottest month of the year. I am able to sleep in this heat thanks to Eric Dry (before he left) hav­ing mount­ed a small 12 volt com­put­er fan inside my mos­qui­to net which cov­ers my bed.  For those who have slept inside a mos­qui­to net in sum­mer, you know that the net­ting restricts the flow of any breeze.  The fan inside the net is a mar­velous solution.

WANT TO BUILD A MUD HUT IN THE RAINY SEASON?

Build the roof first and then build the hut under­neath.  This pre­vents any dan­ger of melt­ing your mud bricks if it rains dur­ing construction.

This lit­tle hut is for our con­struc­tion guard who dou­bles as night guard for 2 of our orphan homes. FYI:  The 2 foun­da­tions we need­ed to con­struct before the rains begin have been com­plet­ed in record time this week.  So we are good to go.

Every­one is prepar­ing their fields for plant­i­ng.  Let it rain Lord!

KIDS BLOWING OFF STEAM AFTER FINAL EXAMS COMPLETED

A great crowd gath­ered at our soc­cer field Fri­day after­noon after school let out for the year.   No one has to tell you there is a game going on, for every­one can hear the crowd roar­ing when a goal is made.   Around Bala­ma, soc­cer is THE SPORT, and the favorite pas­time of our orphans.  If you are too young to play, then you yell to your heart’s delight from the side­lines to encour­age your team.

I know the lit­tle ones love the game for they play their own ver­sion of it almost dai­ly dur­ing activ­i­ty time.  It’s fun to watch them try to run and kick the ball at the same time.  Good thing we have a real­ly sandy field for them to play on as it soft­ens those “missed attempts” as they try to imi­tate the old­er kids with a “super kick”.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO MY AMERICAN FRIENDS!

May your fam­i­ly time be full of love and grat­i­tude for what the Lord has pro­vid­ed for you and your family.

Bless­ings,

Bush Bun­ny Bren­da Lange

And the Bala­ma staff

Don’t For­get…

Our new address for Love Gifts is:

ORPHANS UNLIMITED

562 Hwy 123 Bypass, # 301

SEGUIN, TX 78155

Bush Beat Blog

DATE:  NOVEMBER 12, 2017

Our food buy­ing team was return­ing from their first load to Tuane (too-any) Vil­lage, 8 miles (13 km) into the bush when a loud POP forced them to stop to see what was wrong.  The main spring bar on the right front wheel had SNAPPED IN 2 PIECES, leav­ing the truck helpless.

Move­ment could mean mas­sive dam­age to the axle and wheel.  The driver’s call alert­ed me to his seri­ous prob­lem, so my “kid helper” days under­neath the chas­sis of my Dad’s 18 wheel­er was about to pay off.

Cape­na and I as well as our head brick lay­er went out armed with rebar, clamps, chain, and all the sup­port mate­ri­als we would need.  Our head brick lay­er is an expert at bend­ing rebar, and had the need­ed tools.   With his exper­tise, this team of men were able to secure that pow­er­ful blade in place with rebar and chain so that the truck could be SLOWLY dri­ven back to our base.

That 6 miles took about 90 min­utes and each major bump made us hold our breath as I drove at 5 km/h (2.5 mph) in front of them.   I was over­joyed when the tem­po­rary repair held, and the truck was safe­ly back in its park­ing place.  (Tow trucks do not exist out here.)

A phone call to my expert buy­er, who just hap­pened to be in Pem­ba, and he orga­nized the replace­ment parts to be sent to the town of Mon­tepuez, 30 miles (60 km) from us.  Thanks to our mechan­ic in Mon­tepuez, who sent out his 2 best  assis­tants, the truck was ready to go by Thurs­day noon.  Get­ting a major mechan­i­cal job done that quick­ly is noth­ing short of a mir­a­cle in our eyes.  Those springs were orig­i­nal parts on our 13 year old 6 ton truck that has done most of its work haul­ing food on rough dirt roads.  That is one tough truck no mat­ter how you look at it.

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER

Our Food Team was met with 213 smil­ing faces as the orphans and wid­ows greet­ed them as they rolled into Nama­ra Vil­lage on Fri­day.  No one com­plained that they were 3 days late, for they were thrilled to see us bring­ing their much need­ed food sup­plies.  The oth­er 3 food give outs were resched­uled for this com­ing week, and we are very hap­py that the rains have held off so far. Each morn­ing angry look­ing storm clouds greet us, but with­out fail, they were moved out of our area by pow­er­ful winds.

THANK YOU JESUS! For It is a relief to all of us to know that we are to con­tin­ue help­ing our pre­cious orphans in the villages.

Pre­cious Adeli­no, 1yr., enjoy­ing time in the sand.

DORM AT NEW CHILDREN’S COMPLEX ALMOST COMPLETED

The 21 meter (68 feet) long dorm and fos­ter moth­er com­plex only lacks its final floor and the mount­ing of the doors and win­dows.  This will be done when the com­plex is almost com­plet­ed for we must first build a small kitchen (cook­ing and dish wash­ing area).  Once done, all that’s left is to replace the mud brick walls on the 2 bath­rooms and the orphans can move back in.

Dig­ging kitchen foundation

Our team is work­ing at max­i­mum speed 6 days a week to get as much done before the rainy sea­son begins.  The rains will slow us down, but not stop us.  On days it’s too mud­dy to work, we will make con­crete bricks at our base.

Flex­i­bil­i­ty is what makes our build­ing team very effi­cient at what they do.

Final touch­es on dorm walls

We owe it all to Jesus!

He sent us, trained us, and guides us each day through what­ev­er chal­lenges we may face.

Bless­ings to all of you!

Bush Bun­ny Bren­da Lange

And the Bala­ma Teams

School kids warm­ing up for Bawana games.

Kids Bible les­son after Bawana games

Don’t For­get…

Our new address for Love Gifts is:

ORPHANS UNLIMITED

562 Hwy 123 Bypass, # 301

SEGUIN, TX 78155

Bush Beat Blog

DATE:  NOVEMBER 4, 2017

MANUEL took the final 5 tons of corn to Melu­co last Fri­day as the first 2 day rain of the sea­son caught us by sur­prise. On Sat­ur­day, the team deliv­ered plant­i­ng corn as well as the final food sup­plies to the 120 Ele­phant Vil­lage orphans. Now every­one (chil­dren and adults alike) in all Dis­tricts are busy prepar­ing their fields for plant­i­ng.  Around here, they take the Bible very seri­ous­ly, for those who do not plant will not reap a har­vest.  No har­vest means your fam­i­ly will go hungry.

More than 250 chil­dren at the Ele­phant Vil­lage showed up for the BAWANA games and Bible les­son. (They start­ed with 67.) We will con­tin­ue the Bawana Games once a month at the Ele­phant Vil­lage dur­ing the rainy sea­son when our team takes basic food sup­plies to the Melu­co orphans.

The team plans to expand the games to once a week when the rainy sea­son is over end of March. WHY wait?  Our Melu­co-based BBC team must trav­el over 42 miles (70 km) to get to the Ele­phant Vil­lage.  Even motor­bikes strug­gle to get there on mud­dy roads.  Those that try risk a seri­ous accident.

DOUBLE PAY LOADS

Our truck team stretch­es God’s gifts to us by orga­niz­ing “dou­ble pay loads” when­ev­er Manuel takes the 7 ton truck to Meluco.

With the con­struc­tion of the new orphan com­plex for the 14 aban­doned chil­dren, there is always a need for sacks of cement which can be bought in the town of Mon­tepuez upon his return.

Build­ing in con­crete allows our con­struc­tion team to work most days through­out the rainy season.

Unload­ing sacks of cement after last food give out at the Ele­phant Village.

THE KEY:  the foun­da­tion of the build­ing must be dug and poured and cement­ed in before the ground gets soft. Our plan is to com­plete the orphan house we are now build­ing as soon as pos­si­ble.  But first we must inter­rupt our present con­struc­tion to dig and pour the foun­da­tion for the kitchen and the 2nd orphan home by the end of November.

One of our moun­tains of sand for rainy sea­son building.

Our trac­tor team began stock pil­ing tons of sand and rocks in Octo­ber to make this pos­si­ble BEFORE the our dirt roads become a mud­dy mess.

GOD EXPECTS US TO “BE PREPARED IN ALL THINGS”.  Be watch­ful for HIS COMING, for no man knows the day or hour of Jesus’ return, BUT con­tin­ue to move forth with the vision I have giv­en you.  Those are our march­ing orders.

Rocks for construction.

SHALLOW WATER WELLS NOW DRY

When I returned from my RSA trip, I imme­di­ate­ly noticed the longer lines at the water well near our church.  Octo­ber and Novem­ber is when the local hand dug wells dry up.

Woman at the well, Bala­ma style.

Only the deep­er “bore holes”, like our church well (110 feet or 34 meters), have an abun­dance of water.  That well pro­vides for our 23 homes of orphans as well as any neigh­bor­hood fam­i­lies who wish to use it.  God Blessed us (Liv­ing Waters Church of Mozam­bique) with a large reser­voir of water under­neath our mis­sion sta­tion. FOR CLEAN WATER IS LIFE TO OUR BODIES AS JESUS IS LIFE TO OUR SPIRITS.

BUSH BUNNY FUN PHOTO OF THE WEEK

My rid­ing bud­dy Mohsem (Mo-seem), on a horse­back tour that took us with­in 21 feet (7 meters) of the 8 year old bull Giraffe and his Water Buck bud­dies that reside at Horse­back Africa.  Mohsem loves to do the “sit­ting trot”. He could hard­ly stay in the sad­dle for laugh­ing him­self to tears for he loved the bouncing.

Mohsem and I on horseback.

Mohsem’s par­ents are both Pedi­a­tri­cians work­ing the last 11 years in Malawi with Bay­lor Uni­ver­si­ty to stop the spread of AIDS from the moth­er to her new­born baby.

FACTS told to me by these Doc­tors.  TEN YEARS AGO over 60,000 babies in Malawi con­tract­ed AIDS from their moth­ers.  LAST YEAR, only an esti­mat­ed 4,000 babies were detect­ed with AIDS.  NOW THAT IS AN IMPACT! FACT: Babies born with AIDS live only a few years even with prop­er care.

SAVING GOD’S CHILDREN, 1 CHILD AT A TIME.

BLESSINGS,

BUSH BUNNY BRENDA LANGE

AND THE BALAMA STAFF

Don’t For­get…

Our new address for Love Gifts is:

ORPHANS UNLIMITED

562 Hwy 123 Bypass, # 301

SEGUIN, TX 78155

Bush Beat Blog

DATE:  OCTOBER 28, 2017

Sor­ry for the silence over the last 2 weeks, but bad weath­er knocked out the WIFI at Horse­back Africa.

HORSEBACK AFRICA WAS A THRILL!

400 hectares (1000 acres) of beau­ti­ful wilder­ness forests with lakes, small moun­tains, and a beau­ti­ful scenic over­look to the val­ley below. Took me back to younger days as we rode well trained hors­es on short gal­lops through the bush between sight­ings of many wild ani­mals. They mean it when they say the wild ani­mals accept the close­ness of a horse as it grazes near them, leav­ing rid­ers “hands free” to take photos.

Bren­da on horse­back approach­ing giraffe

The finale of each ride was a brisk gal­lop over their polo field in a mat­ter of 4 sec­onds (or less)!  “Hang on” takes on a whole new mean­ing for they put me on the fastest horse they had, and Napoleon expects to be first across that fin­ish line!  He is a full blood Arab that missed his call­ing as a race horse.

The wildlife is not fear­ful of the horses

WALKING WITH THE LIONS

They might be cubs but to walk with them, humans must stay in a “ close knit pack” to remind them that “we” are stronger than they are. Strong meat tear­ing teeth and razor sharp claws are the norm with even the small cubs.  One cub just touched me with a claw as he lay on his back for me to scratch his tum­my, leav­ing a small cut on my hand.

Bren­da with 3 month old cub. Cute but they play rough.

Note: Lions do not chew what they eat. It’s rip and swal­low with all diges­tion done in the stom­ach.  No won­der they pre­fer to eat only twice a week!

The first thing you learn is to beware of the “McDonald’s Look”. Expe­ri­enc­ing it first hand from a lion, young or old, caus­es an quick rush of adren­a­lin for sure!

7 month old cub look­ing to play

When the Lion Mas­ter tells you, “smack the young ones on the nose if they give you that look for it means he is siz­ing you up for his next “Big Mac Attack”, AND YOU’RE THE BIG MAC!  One of the 10 month olds weigh­ing in around 80 kgs (176 lbs.) not only gave me the look, but pro­ceed­ed to stalk me as I walked near his fenced in enclo­sure. Not some­thing you want to see when they are loose in the wild.

The McDon­ald’s look

WARNING:  THE MOST DANGEROUS STALKER OF ALL IS ON THE PROWL

Oct. 31st is as impor­tant to Satan as the Res­ur­rec­tion of Jesus Christ is to the Chris­tians. Com­mer­cial­iza­tion has made this hol­i­day seem so “harm­less” to the pub­lic, yet it is the blood­i­est satan­ic hol­i­day of the year with human sac­ri­fices per­formed world­wide in hon­or of Satan. The woman who led me back to Jesus in 1988 is an X‑Satanist her­self, so I have this straight from the source. WHAT TURNED HER BACK TO JESUS? The baby sac­ri­fice she wit­nessed on this Satan­ic Hol­i­day. DO NOT BE DECEIVED. 

Satan wants the hearts of your chil­dren, and the inno­cence of “trick or treat” and Hal­loween Par­ties on this date is his way of get­ting you to open the spir­i­tu­al door so that he can cap­ture you and your children.

BLESSINGS,

BUSH BUNNY BRENDA LANGE

AND THE BALAMA STAFF

Don’t For­get…

Our new address for Love Gifts is:

ORPHANS UNLIMITED

562 Hwy 123 Bypass, # 301

SEGUIN, TX 78155