Having arrived back in Zambia to quite a lot of changes it was really excellent and encouraging to meet with Pastor Albert this morning!

He told me that the parents are all very happy with Enoch, the teacher we took on in August and that the newly decorated school is being put to good use.  The decision to limit class sizes to 30 pupils (compared to 200 pupils in the grade 6 class at the local government school last year) wasn't popular in the beginning but now is showing dividends. The parents have been buying school uniforms from the sewing class this month and next month are aiming to begin paying K5,000 a month for each of their children.  Pastor Albert is hoping that starting this now will help them to be ready to keep paying Enoch's salary after August when his current funding runs out.

We made so much progress in Kamfinsa last year with establishing the Hammer Mill, building the pastor's house, finishing the school and starting a sewing class that I was expecting this year to be a year of consolidation.  However, having heard what is happening in Kamfinsa it seems they are determined to keep moving forward.  Normally, when we leave Zambia for a break in the UK we return to find little if any progress but today appears to have broken that trend!  Firstly, the borehole that was being drilled just as we were leaving Zambia has been finished and Seeds of Hope who drilled the well, didn't stop there, they have since been out to Kamfinsa and put together a borehole committee! They taught the committee to maintain the borehole and encouraged them to buy a lock and chain to ensure it is used responsibly!  This seemed to really inspire the villagers as they then also formed a committee for the hammer-mill.  They wisely decided to use some of the profits from milling to supply the village with fertiliser to help bring in a bumper harvest!!  More Maize grown = more milling = more profit!!   

Amazingly they also found a man who not only used to run a hammer mill but is also a skilled carpenter!  Last year, along with the sewing machines, we also helped take a whole variety of carpentry tools to Kamfinsa which the villagers were longing to use. Now they are managing to pay this carpenter (without outside help!) to both run the hammer-mill and teach people to make furniture in between!  I am delighted to hear that the village is starting to be able to fund things like this from scratch by themselves!!

And it gets better!!! :-)  The sewing class has been doing so well making school uniforms that they got a contract from MTN (one of the biggest mobile phone networks in Zambia) to make uniforms for a school MTN are sponsoring.  The MTN school is quite a way beyond Kamfinsa village but in the same direction from the main road and so MTN should be maintaining the road out to Kamfinsa once the rains have finished.   The sewing teacher, whose salary was being paid by a friend of my mum's, should have finished teaching at the end of January (when the money ran out) but this MTN contract has meant there is enough money coming in to keep paying the teacher... the ladies are not quite ready to go it alone, so they are really happy to have the teacher for a bit longer!

All this news is the kind of thing I have been wanting to hear for a long time - of course I mustn't get carried away, but the village just seem to be really making a go of everything! Praise God!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We've seen the events of this week unfolding for about a year now ever since Soapbox trustees came to Kaniki at the beginning of March 2012, but didn't think it would quite take the turn of events it did. It's been a highly emotional week. We, as a couple, have given our all to AQ for 3 years (2yrs leading, 1 year hosting), Tim was on team and then led for 2 years and Gemma was also on team back in 2001 -that's 7 years of our lives!! It was hard to see it ripped apart, never to be the same again. God can, and I'm sure will, continue to change people's through it if it even manages to continue beyond this year, but still it will never be the same again. The range of emotions has been vast. When we felt God was speaking to us last year about releasing AQ we never thought it would have been this tough and needing to be walked out in so much grace and the need to forgive. More grace is needing to abound.

In short, AQ is no longer at Kaniki. Sad times. It has been such a significant part of our lives, and we wouldn't be who we are without it.

Obviously God has called us to other things with the building of a school and overseeing KOP, though we do still hope to host teams and individual volunteers who come to help us with the various work at Kaniki.

Arriving in Zambia after three and a half months away and returning with an 8 week old baby was never going to be an easy task. Abigail did amazingly well on the plane and several people not only commented on how cute she is but also that they'd never seen such a quiet baby on a plane before. Immigration never cease to amaze - we thought we might have to pay for a visa for Abi (we don't need visas as we have a work permit, but she's not on that yet - it's in the pipeline - prayer would be good). A seemingly simple task turned into a fiasco. Firstly they wouldn't accept the advertised £35 as they didn't want to lose out on exchange rates and so sent Tim to get the exact amount in kwacha, which involved all kinds of shinanigans going forwards and backwards through security at both departures and arrivals to get to an ATM and then change the cash into the right denominations. When Tim returned to immigration after his tour of the airport, almost everyone had passed through immigration. We thought we were home and dry only to discover that the immigration officer had given Gemma's passport to someone else by accident and left hers with us. Tim again had to dash around the airport looking for the mysterious woman carrying Gemma's passport. Thankfully, in the car park she also realised the error and the passports were exchanged. To add to the early morning drama, the bus from Kaniki coming to pick us up broke down which meant we had to wait at the Flying Mission guesthouse (which was actually a huge blessing as we could be fed, watered and showered, plus a quick nap for Tim and Abi). However this meant getting 2 taxis (so we could fit our luggage in) costing a shocking $100, which got completely stuck in mud on the way and had to be winched out by the guesthouse staff. This all before 8.30am. We didn't arrive back in Kaniki until well after dark. Despite the tiredness we were seriously pleased to see friends again who'd cooked us a lovely dinner and bought groceries for us. We live with some good'uns!

We were hoping we might be able to use an AQ vehicle when we first got back to Zambia  as Abigail needed to be registered here and have her all important  vaccinations. However not even 2 days after we arrived both AQ vehicles were taken from Kaniki and so we were left looking to borrow a vehicle from somewhere. God provided a way and so far we've managed to borrow an automatic which took some getting used to and a vehicle with barely any brakes! Good news though is that Abigail has finally had her Hep B and BCG vaccination today, and after 6 months in the making we finally have our Zambian driving licenses - and the search for our own family vehicle begins....