Week 5: In which we have a birthday celebration, visit a township and be a carpenter.

Well, hello.

Sorry this is a bit late. We've had a busy weekend. On Friday we celebrated Heather's birthday, mostly by opening presents, watching The King's Speech, playing pass the parcel and eating tasty food at Knead. It was a great day.

Then, on Saturday, we had the pleasure of going to visit our friend Jon, who lives in Table View, right on the other side of Cape Town. We took a train and a bus to get there, but it was well worth the trip. We spent Saturday afternoon walking along beaches and enjoying the view with ice cream, then spent the evening watching the sunset, eating food and hanging out with a lovely Venezuelan man (that's Jon). We stayed the night, so on Sunday morning I went to church with him (Heather wasn't feeling well, so she opted out) and ended up playing djembe in their service, then we had some lunch and came home. It was really nice to have a bit of a break, to get off the base and see something new. We had a great weekend and are feeling rejuvenated and ready for the week.

Table Mountain, Heather, Me, Jon and ice cream. What more do you want?

On Friday we also concluded the week's teaching on 'Biblical Worldview', which was stretching and inspiring in equal measure. The focus of the week was to draw our attention to the fact that we all view the world through our own particular set of opinions that we may never realise we have - basic things like 'can people be trusted?', 'how is wealth measured?', 'are children a blessing?' - formed through our experiences in family, education, relationships, significant life events and the like. Once we've realised what we basically believe - and sometimes it takes a bit of digging to get to the root of a belief - we can have a look in the Bible and ask 'what does God think?'. It's led to some interesting discussions on all manner of things, including free will, overpopulation and birth control. There's been some pretty heavy duty learning involved (our Dictionary of Big Words is ever-increasing), but it's been eye-opening and humbling. I can barely describe the depth of what we've been looking at here, but we've taken lots of notes so do get in touch if you want specifics.

We've also started our local outreach, so every Wednesday afternoon Heather and I will be going, with a team of about 12, to Masiphumelele, which is a township about half an hour away. On Wednesday last week we just went and had a walk around, playing with kids and talking to people as we went. It's brilliant to see a side of Cape Town so different to everything we've seen so far, and it's clearly a place where we can do a lot of good. We're looking forward to how the next few weeks shape up.

In other news, the teams and locations for our 10-week outreach have been confirmed, and it pleases me to tell you that we'll be going to Israel and Jordan. Details beyond that are still to be decided, but that's where we'll be. We're very excited, especially as it may well mean being in Bethlehem over Christmas.

For those of who have expressed concern at my death-ladder escapades, your prayers have been answered! I'm now flirting with some basic carpentry: last week I refurbished an old cabinet, and this week I'll be making some drawers and sprucing up some old furniture with an electric sander and some varnish. I've really enjoyed it, I feel much more like a man (and a bit more like Jesus) now I'm getting to grips with how to make wood do useful things.

Heather continues to excel at her 'Hospitality' work duty, and it's paid off: She's been making the cakes for people's birthdays, so when hers came around a few different people took it upon themselves to produce all manner of delicious goods, from pancakes through to the biggest chocolate cake I've ever seen. Hallelujah.

That's all I have for now. This week we'll be looking at 'The Freedom Manual', but even after today's introduction I'm a little vague about what it actually is, so there's plenty of intrigue until next time...

Lots of love!

Sam and Heather

MJ News: He is a keen student of ethics and morality. On Saturday he climbed Table Mountain. He's lovely.