Domingo (Sunday)

Church today was such fun.  There were only about twenty of us.  The service was translated for us.  The rest of the church attendees speak Portuguese and Ndau (pronounced "endow"), a local language.  The sermon on Galatians 5 was short but good.  The prior part of the service was much longer.  It included a lot of singing and dancing!  I really enjoyed it.  If I listened carefully, I could sometimes get the gist of the Portuguese thanks to my Spanish studies.  Spanish is coming back to me now that I'm trying to learn Portuguese!

The church is unfinished, but goals have been set to finish it in two months.  At the moment, it has a sand floor, no doors or windows, rafters, and tin roofing over part of the building.  There are a few plastic chairs for the leadership, plain wooden benches for the rest of us, and a woven mat for the kids to play.  The benches have no back and are about six inches wide.  For the most part, women sat on one side and men on the other, but there were a few young women who sat on the men's side.  

When the sun moved and the tin was no longer over us, the women behind me moved their bench to the shade.  The woman next to me kept trying to get me to move with her to the spare spot on that bench, but I didn't want to take her spot.  As a result, the mama in front of me turned around and would not be content until I moved closer to the other lady on my bench, so I too was out of the sun.

When the offering is taken, the various age groups take turns leaving the church and re-enter with a song and a dance to put their offering in the plate.  The groups are single/young women, the mamas, and then the men.  Dad has danced in with the men before, but he declined today.  I'll try to get pictures of that sometime!  In fairness, Mom and I both felt too shy to participate today also.

I didn't take any pictures at church.  I will be back quite often in the coming months, so I thought I would just observe today.  However, I started taking pictures as we drove home.  The pictures aren't great quality, but they give you a sense of more than just the beach here.