ukuqala3 arrive with a passion to build together...

starting the works last week

this morning saw the arrival of the full team from the university of stuttgart who will be spending the next six weeks at the village of hope creating the third phase of the ukuqala project and unlike the previous ukuqala teams the ukuqala3 team will not just be focusing their attention on one area of the village of hope, this year it is their plan to bless us in three different ways.

the first will focus on completing the ukuqala2 building which needs to have it's outer coat of lime and clay applied, thus ensuring it is waterproof and able to take our first lot of volunteers in what will be our short term mission team accommodation.

the ukuqala3 team arrive!

they will also be building an ablution centre which will be made up of three separate buildings, a toilet block, a building for showering and also a wash room with sinks and washing machines, this will be positioned near to the ukuqala2 building thus enabling us to provide facilities to our short term volunteers.

filling and leveling the site

however the main focus of their time will be around extending our current children's unit, building a new straw bale constructed bedroom block which will enable us to host more children, provide them with a bigger kitchen and bathroom as well as creating a new entrance and office space. all of the above will mean that the current long term volunteers will move out of that space and share the following six weeks with myself and maz in our home.

david knight from southcourt baptist church is helping the team, his building skills and knowledge have already been seen to provide great insight and we pray that his time with will be both productive and satisfying.

long and short term volunteers join the walkers house

we will include the students in all aspects of the work we are doing in grabouw, they will have the opportunity of joining our outpatient careworkers in the community as they visit the sick in their small homes and the sports outreach and rainbow smiles clubs will be blessed with their input which we hope will provide them with an opportunity to see how other people live and who the legacy of their building works will benefit in the future.

all in all we know that it's all going to be a crazy time, the german team will have to learn to work in africa and realise that things move on a little slower over here, not that i have learnt that very well but that is the reality of it, our team will have to move around and have their space invaded, but we are so blessed to have them around and we thank God for sending them to us to enable us to serve our community better.

for more info on the ukuqala project please click on this link.