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RAINY SEASON REALITY IN REMOTE AFRICA 
Going the extra mile leaps to a new lev­el when try­ing to deliv­er sup­plies to our iso­lat­ed Melu­co orphans. Dri­ver Manel and Mon­sur, his helper, left our base after an all night rain at 5 a.m. Fri­day morn­ing.  Bala­ma was wet, but Melu­co report­ed a dry night.Since 2 bridges are out on the main road to Melu­co, we had no choice but to go via the “back road” through the game reserve, which Melu­co Hos­pi­tal vehi­cles had suc­cess­ful­ly used on Thurs­day.   

At the Revia Low Water Cross­ing, just 40 km (24 miles) from our Melu­co Mis­sion Sta­tion, Manel encounter a rag­ing tor­rent of water cross­ing the road. With a rocky bot­tom, this “low water cross­ing” is pass­able in the rainy sea­son, EXCEPT when it is 4 ft. (1.2 meters) deep in swift run­ning water laced with large boul­ders in the cross­ing area! Our Land Cruis­ers have “snorkels” on the air fil­ters, so they can eas­i­ly go through this lev­el of slow mov­ing water, but not fast mov­ing water laced with huge rocks. 

Manel called the Melu­co orphan­age man­ag­er, and said if you want your sup­plies, meet us on your motor­bike at the oth­er cross­ing on the main road. This is a 70 km (42 mile) trip through an iso­lat­ed area with 2 bad bridges that con­nects to the main road. SO WHAT DO YOU DO?  You turn around and dri­ve the extra miles to the only oth­er pass­able spot 5 hours dri­ve away. This 100 yard/meter wide Riv­er “walk way” cross­ing made it pos­si­ble for Syl­vai, the Melu­co Man­ag­er, to receive the small sup­plies essen­tial for the babies, but not the 6 bags of corn and rice they were trans­port­ing. 

THIS IS WHAT JESUS MEANT WHEN HE TALKS ABOUT GOING THE EXTRA MILE TO HELP A FRIEND. Manel did not ask me if he should do this. As a mature Pas­tor, he did WHAT JESUS WOULD DO! Make an alter­na­tive plan and make it hap­pen. He returned to Bala­ma by 7 p.m. that night after hand­ing over the small sup­plies at the riv­er. A hard 14 hours of dri­ving, but a day that end­ed in suc­cess. (Sor­ry, no pho­tos avail­able of the flood­ed rivers.) 

YOUR CONTINUED PRAYERS DO MAKE A DIFFERENCE TO US, FOR WE NEVER KNOW WHAT SITUATION WE WILL FACE IN OUR WORK TO RESCUE ORPHANS.  

KIDS PLAY TOGETHER, TAKE THEIR PILLS TOGETHER 
Fri­day, Jan. 31st was the end of a dis­trict-wide deworm­ing pro­grams for all of Mozambique’s chil­dren. Since our fam­i­ly of orphans is over 100 strong, the health depart­ment brings the pro­gram to us. The fast and effi­cient staff mea­sured the chil­dren for weight before admin­is­ter­ing their deworm­ing tablet. 
Our fam­i­ly lined up from small­est to old­est for easy weigh­ing before receiv­ing their deworm­ing med­ica­tion.​
  
Receiv­ing their tablets 1 by 1.​ Unfazed by this sim­ple act, the chil­dren swal­lowed their tablet and were off to play with their bud­dies. After all, the whole gang was there, so what bet­ter time for a mas­sive soc­cer game!

RAINY SEASON BRICK MAKING KEEPS OUR CONSTRUCTION TEAM BUSY With con­struc­tion halt­ed on Orphan House #7 because our dirt roads are now mud pits, our con­struc­tion team turns to dai­ly brick mak­ing. After all, about 10,000 bricks are need­ed to make 1 Orphan Com­plex, so we use our time wise­ly to keep the pro­gram mov­ing. 
Brick mak­ing site in Bala­ma.​ Some have asked how we make the bricks, so below is the link to a short video I made as they worked.  https://youtu.be/lVuRZ12gAkc 

This 12-man-team makes 256 CINDER BLOCKS in 3 hours. Each brick weighs 31 lbs (14 kg), so it is not an easy task car­ry­ing all that weight and get­ting it set just right so that the wet cement/sand mix­ture comes out of the mold in 1 piece. The bricks can be moved after 24 hours, and placed on lev­el ground in an open area where they will be watered for 3 days to help them hard­en. Then they are stacked for final cur­ing over the next 15 days. 

“IT TAKES A VILLAGE” TO SUPPORT AN ORPHAN COMPLEX, AND AS YOU CAN SEE, THERE ARE MANY FACETS TO THIS “VILLAGE”. THANKS FOR MAKING THIS PROGRAM POSSIBLE THROUGH YOUR PRAYERS AND LOVE GIFTS. BLESSINGS,BUSH BUNNY BRENDA LANGEAND THE BALAMA STAFF Please don’t for­get to check out and share our OU Video.https://youtu.be/M0XCggD68d8