banksy's blog

06/06/09

2009-06-06T06:04:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone, sorry it's been so long since I last posted on my blog. I'm in Abuja again so I thought I'd take advantage of the good internet access. This morning was a particularly fantastic morning for me. At 4am our driver Zongo took me to Abuja international airport to pick up Susanna! I have to admit, even though I've been planning this with her and known she was coming for ages now, I couldn't quite believe it was her when I saw her! It's been so strange being away from her for so long and I really have missed her. After the initial shock (!) I'm now really looking forward to spending the next few weeks with her in Africa. After a few more days in Jos we'll all travel down to Abuja with another girl, Kirsty, who's here for 3 and 1/2 weeks. Then we'll get stuck back into work again!

I've really needed a break...really needed a break! I just feel like I'm out of steam these days. Things aren't easy in Ogugu, mainly because I'm not used to the African way. What might not seem like a well organised programme to me is actually one of a kind for the kids, but I still struggle with wether or not I'm making an impact. It's not so much physical tiredness but a lack of motivation, I feel discouraged that I'm not doing enough. Thankfully Mission Africa had scheduled a retreat in Jos with all the Mission Africa missionaries and short-termers in Nigeria. I was talking to one of the gappers about my lack of motivation and it was great, he helped a lot. We started talking about how I'm not here to change the world, just help out. Plus I have to remember I'm living here, not just doing a short spurt of activity for a few weeks where I'd have the energy to pack lots in. I'm starting to see that my day-to-day relationships are just as important as the programmes we run. The retreat as a whole was really good. We heard from the other people what they were doing and everyone prayed for eachother. We had great food, a ggod laugh together and got to relax. Beach volleyball and table tennis were an added bonus! The compound was beautiful as well, right in a really scenic part of Jos with lots of gardens etc. I'd like to think when I go back to Ogugu that I'll not only have new strength and enthusiasm, but I'll have learned not to stress myself about putting on the best ever programmes for the kids, I'll just do what I can.
Soon after Susanna leaves a summer team, a nurse, his wife, a doctor and 3 of linda's friends will be coming, a white-man invasion of Ogugu! I'm really looking forward to it, as much as I love the Nigerian people I'm living with here, it's always great to have some westerners visit, and most of them seem to be from our wee country which is good!
I know this is short blog entry and sorry about that, I'll trry and get on more when I get back to ogugu and have time to type it up before I come! Check facebook for some photos, not sure if I'll be able to get them up though!

02-05-09

2009-05-02T03:35:00.000-07:00

Hi again! So my semi-holiday's over and I'm back in Ogugu now, which is actually great bercause I was starting to miss working with the kids and I was also feeling a bit guilty about munching down pizaa and ice cream in Jos instead of the usual rice, beans and yam that people in Ogugu normally eat! I can't remember how much I wrote in my blog last time but I'm assuming I didn't mention my time at Jos so here goes...

Jos is great.

And now back to Ogugu..only joking! Jos is great though; it's on a plateau (hence it being in Plateau state) and is therefore really cool. Well, cool compared to Ogugu, and you're not in constantly sweaty clothes! However it is closer to the sun which no one reminded us about so we kind of got burnt and now I have these brown arms and neck with pasty whire everywhere else! Apart from getting to use internet, eat western food and chill in a hammock where we were staying, we did get to do some other cool stuff. Firstly we got to meet the other GAPpers who are based in Jos: Debbie and Ellie (who did the orientation with us), Micah from my school, Emmanuel and a guy called trevor from Canad who had a seriuosly cool game called apples to apples - buy it! It was really great to spend time with them all again and have them show us around Jos. Micah and Emmanuel brought us to Gyero, a village outside Jos, where they had a football tournament organised for the boys who live there. It was great fun and I had my first experience of a motorbike taxi down the dirt track to the village, but just pretend you didn't read that mum. Then we went to a place called Edin Bege or something which was a place for streetkids. We played footy with them in their yard and it was brilliant fun aswell. Chris found a fake monopoly set so that topped the day off!

Debbie, Ellie Emmanuel then travelled down to Ogugu with us and work with the kids there. The kids instantly took a shine to them and it was a privelige to work with them and beat them at tricks! Well, that's not fair, I lost a good few times myself and Debbie, who never quite seemed to know what she was doing, was kicking our butts at it. When the Jos crew left, Billy and Linda gave us our new jobs: Ryan is in charge of visiting 93 orphans and giving them food, school money and checking if they're being looked after. Chris Duncan will be doing a purpose driven youth programme in 6 churches in the Ogugu area conference and I will be running a support group for "people living positively" (people who are HIV positive) which I'm a bit apprehensive about but looking forward to it too.

Got to go as I'm typing in the internet place and have some other things to do but thanks for all your comments and emails-sorry I can't reply to all of them!

PS photo is the footy in Gyero

2009-04-13T03:42:00.000-07:00

some more photos- hopefully when I get to Jos on Thursday I will get some more up on Facebook. If you don't have facebook it takes a minute to set up an account and then you should be able to view them-I'll make my page public if that's possible. Or you can look at them if you know someone else who has an account and doesn't mind you using it for a few minutes!

(top: football training on the football "field"!

bottom: Ogugu night scene...can't be bothered thinking up proper titles! )

8-4-09

2009-04-13T03:24:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone! Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve updated my blog but the network’s been down anytime we go to the internet café. At the minute we’re in Abuja; we were invited up by Billy and Linda for easter and then we’ll go on to Jos for a wedding. I’ve asked to do some photography for it which I’m pretty nervous about, I’ve never done something that big before and I don’t want to disappoint them with rubbish photos! But we’ll see how it goes and it’ll be good experience. It’ll also be good to see the guys from Jos and buy some chocolate! Anyway…

A lot has happened since last time, most importantly, we’ve got our schedule going which is great. Kids are coming to the stuff- too many now in fact – and they seem to realise now that we’re here to work with them primarily. I don’t think they’re used to having older people playing with them; there’s a real age gap here. People are almost obsessed with labelling people as old or young, they often call some of the kids “just a small boy” and use it exclude them from playing footy with them or whatever. I even got stopped by the police whilst driving back to Ogugu from Ankpa (police nearly always stop us, I think they’re just flaunting authority and looking for money because there’s been no real need to stop us at all!) and he pointed at me, laughed and called me a small boy. I didn’t find it quite as funny as him. But anyway, we’re trying to break all the age barrier stuff with the kids we work with to include them all and try and play with them anytime they come round. It’s been really great fun and to be honest I’d rather not have a schedule sometimes, just play snap, footy or skipping with them (they love snap and skipping, what a combination!)
Church has been a strange experience. We went to Becky (our house help)’s church, which was a lot better than some of the really weird services we’ve been too; last week we went to a pastor’s induction and it was bonkers. After the speaker telling everyone God will bless you if you’ll only give N4000 (£20) each towards the new pastor’s car – “your story will change for better!” -everyone lined up to s=come and dance around him and throw money at him, it was all very awkward, although the dancing was entertaining I have to say! It’s a bit disheartening sometimes when you expect to hear some sort of prosperity gospel message wherever you go. Instead of being taught about God’s crazy grace that he just gives to anyone who’ll receive it, whatever they’ve done, they’re taught they must give money to the church to be blessed. Thankfully Chris has been able to preach at the UEC and looks like he’ll get a good few more opportunities. Not that any of us are great preachers but we can tell them about things like grace and “blessed are the poor..meek..poor in spirit etc.” and all the other great things they don’t seem to hear about.

So we’ve acclimatised pretty well now to the weather and the little cultural things you need to know about, which is good. I felt a bit out of place and far away when I first arrived, which I guess I am, but now I’m getting used to things and enjoying the experience. Last week we were watching Man United v Porto (very disappointed abiut that result!) and Arsenal v Villareal in the packed out football shack, with a thunder storm pouring through the cracks, and I just thought, “This is brilliant!” Driving’s fun, food’s great normally and the people are really friendly and help us do what we’re here to do. So far, so good! Already I feel enthused about going back to Ogugu, getting stuck in and stepping it up a gear.

(photo is me Chris, Ryan and some of the children of Ogugu)

13th March 2009

2009-03-14T04:28:00.000-07:00

I miss home.

I’ll be straight out honest about it, I miss home! The food (chocolate mainly, buttery toast, pizza, hot dogs, bacon, haribo, marshmallows, pie, Old El Paso nights, Chinese takeaways…our main discussions have been about what food we’d love to have!), the climate - yep, even the climate(!) - Belfast, Dundonald, my church, my house, but most of all, the people. I miss Susanna. I miss my mum and dad, my brother, my friends-old YF buddies, Benny and Jordan’s house on a Monday night, Bible study guys on Sunday afternoons…

So the most important thing I’ve learnt is that I didn’t realise quite how important the people I know and love are to me. I know I sound like a bit of a sop at the moment but it’s true! It’s not that I don’t like the people of Ogugu-they’re so welcoming, friendly, genuine and have the best laughs ever! And it’s not that I’m not getting on with my team mates, they’re too really great guys and I’m so thankful they’re here with me. It’s just that when you’re away from everyone you’re friends and family with and realise it’ll be like that for a while, it hits you how important they are, so I guess I took things for granted a bit!

Missing home has been a good thing, but I also realise I can’t let it cripple me and stop me doing the work out here I’m meant to be doing.

So don’t worry, I’ll try and not miss you all too much!

Anyway, the past week or so has been quite eventful, mainly having the team from Jos round, which was great. Micah, Debbie and Lindsy are all from Northern Ireland and then Emmanuel and Ellie are from England. They’re all gap-ers working up in Jos, the plateau state of Nigeria doing different projects like football training, working with street children and disabled children (Open Doors) and whatever else there is to do. To our envy they can have British or Nigerian food for tea! We all had such a good time together, playing card games, watching a movie, eating together, having good banter meeting the chief and other things. But the best parts were definitely teaching the UEC church choir Blessed be your name and singing with them on Sunday morning. Me and Micah played guitar with them and it was great! Then we also had a time of worship one afternoon just sitting round and singing songs together which was also great! We had great fellowship and banter together and I can’t wait to “revenge them” in Jos.

We also got a schedule set up for some of the work we can do here but it’s quite frustrating, there isn’t really much organisation, people don’t turn up on time, or at all, and we’re finding it quite hard to be useful at the minute! But it’s ok, it’s just the beginning and it could take a good month to get things running properly. Hopefully I’ll be doing crafts, bible studies and teaching maths (can’t believe it!) along with anything else that needs doing like visiting churches and different areas around Ogugu. Me, Chris and Ryan spent some time praying together and sharing what we were worried about, which was great because we’ve all been worried about the lack of organisation and communication difficulties. I felt that it was going to cripple our ability to do much out here and even asked God why on earth we were here! But sharing was good and now we can stick together and help eachother to just go for it. It will take time and after speaking to Liam and Corlette, nearby missionaries who’ve ben here for ages, we realised they have the same problems and you just have to learn to be patient!

It’s all a bit crazy and uncertain at the minute, but don’t worry, we’re getting there. We’re also enjoying soft drinks for 20p a bottle and footy matches for 25p a viewing so we can’t complain too much! I'll try and get photos onto facebook so keep checking but don't expect much! Again sorry if I don't reply to emails etc byt getting the blog up's a priority and it can take a while.

2009-03-05T03:49:00.001-08:00

So I found out the local dialect for hello.. Hi!

A bit boring but thankfully Ogugu isn’t-we arrived on Friday with Billy, Friday Ujah (best name ever!) and Zongo, Billy’s driver. The journey down to Ogugu showed us a different picture of Nigeria, it began to get a lot greener and jungley if that’s a word. The landscape really is beautiful and hopefully I’ll be able to send some more pictures this time, check my facebook page. The people are really welcoming and gracious, not just the people of UEC (Mission Africa’s church denomination) looking after us but most people on the street you bump into. The man in charge of looking out for us while we’re here is Elder Reuben and he is one cool guy, a 50 year old Nigerian who wears beach shorts and rides a motorbike (take note Rodney and David! Only joking). He is really friendly and constantly cracking jokes, which we can’t really make out but they’re funny anyway because of his laugh!

So far we have been settling into the house, meeting the local people and building a fence around the Mission Africa compound, which is the hardest, sweatiest work I’ve ever done because of the heat and humidity! It’s great, locals just turn up and help out for half an hour or so then go on their way again. We also went to church which was an interesting experience, lively, colourful, very musical and thankfully not as long as I expected! However, the sermon was weird, it was edging on a prosperity gospel message and had little to do with the passage he read from God’s word. Billy told us that there are problems with the speakers saying whatever they want up front and getting away with it because they’re seen as very important. Hopefully when we take services and get involved we can be true to what God really wants his people to hear and live like. There is a lot of potential in this little community so please pray for it.

It’s been tiring, I’ve been homesick at times, other times I’ve felt under-enthused about getting stuck in but at the same time it’s been a really great experience meeting these people. They may not be as materially privileged as we are in the west, but when I look through the small cultural differences, I can see people just like back at home, I see the same arguments on the football field, the same banter between friends and the same human beings that God loves. I can’t wait to learn more from them and start helping out more wherever I can.

PS sorry everyone but internet access sucks here I cant use hotmail today for some reason so could barely open any emails or send any!

First post from Nigeria!

2009-02-26T03:47:00.000-08:00

Hi from Nigeria! I’d be all cliché and say hi in the local dialect but I don’t know it yet so I`ll greet you London style as the other Chris would say,, eeezy bruv!

It is VERY warm here! Sometimes I’ll be sitting indoors under a fan and still feel like I’m going to melt, but it is a very nice change from Northern Ireland weather, sorry to rub it in. At the minute we are staying in Abuja, the capital of Nigeria with Billy the missionary, a Nigerian man who keeps us safe from people in the market trying to rip us off – “hey white boy (usually accompanied by a teeth kissing noise), you come here, hello? You buy here, buy, buy, buy! I have the best price!”

Everyone has the best price.

So far we have experienced the crazy traffic system were everyone honks at everybody, in fact, some people just drive down the road and honk their horn whether anyone is around or not. I’m not exaggerating! As well as the traffic there are loads of road side vendors “hawking” (selling) and we’ve been getting some very funny looks. At first I thought this might be because we are like white western cash machines to them but possibly because we’re staring at everything and everyone we see goggle-eyed. On the Wednesday night we went to an outdoor pub to watch the Arsenel game, Graeme and Benny will both be pleased to know that the other Chris from London is an Arsenel fan. Unlucky for him - Man Utd. were on the big screen. So we all had a sprite for like 50p and it was delicious, I’m serious, everything tastes sweeter, bread is sweet, powder milk is sweeter, the oranges (which are yellow) are fantastic and £2 for a MASSIVE basket.

The food is also fantastic. Red stew, rice, beans and Moy Moy or something which is like a bean and onion mash with egg in the middle-all very good and spicy!

So far so good, the African culture is lively, noisy, expressive and welcoming and Billy has been a great host. Soon we will be going to Ogugu (sorry I keep changing between Agugu and Ogugu, it’s definitely Ogugu) and I’m not sure when I’ll be on next. I miss you all very much already!

Speak soon ><>

PS the photo is Chris Duncan and Ryan McQuitty outside Billy's apartment in Abuja

2009-02-02T05:16:00.000-08:00

Got my Visa! Hopefully I'll be going with Ryan and Chris, my team mates, on the 22nd February when Billy and Linda, our supervisor-type-people, can go to Nigeria too.

I'm still preparing and trying to get everything togetherin time. It's going to be hardest saying goodbye to people and seeing them for the last time. When I heard my visa arrived I was excited but it kinda hit me how I'll actually be going and staying in Nigeria away from everyone I know. Please pray for me as I try to get ready ad for all my friends, family and girlfriend Susanna as I say goodbye.

Location

2009-01-23T07:34:00.000-08:00

The green country is Nigeria where I will be going. The other two contries, Burkina Faso and Chad are the two other places where Mission Africa work. If you want to know any more about Mission Africa check out their website:

http://www.missionafrica.org.uk/Home.html

They do GAP years, medical electives, summer teams for fornights and lots of other things too - check it out!

Intro

2009-01-23T07:19:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone! This is will be my blogspot while I'm away in Nigeria that I will use to post news and photos about my placement as often as I can. For those of you who don't know I will be staying and working in a rural village called Agugu in central Nigeria untill the end of July. I will be going with an organisation called Mission Africa and hopefully working with orphans, doing some AIDs education, sharing my faith in Jesus Christ and whatever else I can muck into! I'm really looking forward to learning from a different culture, meeting new people, helping those in need, really gorwing in my faith and soaking in a bit of what Africa has to offer. Please feel free to leave comments and ask questions, however, I won't be going untill around the 12th February so don't expect too many posts from me untill closer to the time! I will also be sending out a weekly prayer letter by email if I can so if you're inerested in receiving it, please leave me your emaill adress and I'll add you.