Memorial 2014

Ok, I realize that a month between posts is a little excessive!  I know one or two of you reading this manage to post something on your blog once or twice a week... I'm not sure how you do it!

But, something that I couldn't miss posting, our Memorial and a little bit leading up to it.

First, the statistics:

Our congregation hosted a Memorial in a village about 30 miles south, Toussiana, attendance 56

Memorial at our own Kingdom Hall, attendance 114 (includes 40 with ASL)

The Jula congregation who shares our hall, attendance 175

So, in total, we had 170 in 2 separate locations, for a congregation of 39 publishers.  The interesting thing to add to that is how the dynamic works with Jula.  We heard several publishers say that they had invitees attend Jula rather than French, since it was first.  In fact, a little girl that we invited went early and attended Jula, as well as most of French.  This isn't really surprising, as both congregations cover the same territory, and 90+% of the population speak both languages, at least somewhat.  For the invitation work, the 2 congregations tried to focus on separate areas and not work the same territory (which worked most of the time), but we would tell anyone who struggled with French that there was also going to be the same event in Jula.  So, they really had their choice.

Anyways, that whole dynamic is slightly bizarre to us, coming from the American background of foreign language where you stick to your language group and don't preach very much to those in other languages.  But, it is different here.  Jula isn't a foreign language, it's been here for 1000 years.  Almost the whole population of Cote D'Ivoire, half the population of Burkina Faso, and half the population of Mali speak Jula (or a form of it) as a first or second language.  French is much more recent, but it's not really a foreign language either.  It seems safe to say that there is no one in West Africa who doesn't at least know a greeting and some basic words in French.  Mostly, the language is different based solely on the education a person receives.  While that has mostly meant that learning to speak, read, and write French meant you were educated, there is a shift the other direction now.  Some schools are teaching kids to read and write Jula as well, which can be seen by how we are receiving publications in Jula for our ministry.  While we haven't been here long enough yet to see how the growth is in the Jula congregations, it's very obvious that things are not nearly as clear-cut as we are used to!

Ok, enough school-book stuff.  Now, what actually happened???  Well, let's start the day before the Memorial.  There was a service meeting in the village of Toussiana, which we supported.  We had passed through this village before (see the previous blog post), but this time we did more than just stop and get gas and a Coke.  First, we head out from home just after 8 am, thinking that would be plenty of time to get there by 9.... Wrong!  Fortunately, this is Africa, and being 30 minutes late is rarely enough to cause a big problem!  We pulled up just before the group set out, so no problem.  I got to work with our service group overseer, Aaron, who said that most of the area we were working had already been covered so we were just reminding people about the Memorial.  As it turns out, it wasn't until our last door that we actually found someone who had already received an invitation.  Now, remember, when I say "village", I really mean a town of a few thousand people.  We were able to cover just one small corner of the town with the invitations.  Realistically, several hundred were distributed.  The day we were there, I was able to place 15.  It is all walking territory, but the houses are very spread out, so we would walk for 2-5 minutes, talk to someone, then walk for a few more minutes.  Aside from the joyful work we were doing, I must say the surroundings were very beautiful!  It's getting near to the rainy season, and the plants seemed to know it.  Everywhere we walked, green sprouts were popping up beside the road.  And, compared to the constant bustle and noise here in Bobo, it was so peaceful.  Between houses, the only noises to be heard were the birds and insects.  It was very tempting to find a chair under a mango tree and just sit and relax for a while!

But, speaking of nature, specifically insects: be grateful if your Kingdom Hall has glass windows and a ventilation system!!!  It just happened that there was a hatch of flying ants on Monday in Bobo... and our KH doesn't have glass or screens in the windows, just shutters.  Of course, the shutters have to be opened during meetings to allow airflow... which allowed the flying ants in!  They weren't just allowed in, they were attracted to the lights, especially at the stage.  The poor brother giving the talk had the worst of it.  They were constantly landing on him, crawling on his head and neck, even getting in his mouth once!  His concentration during all of this was quite amazing, and I'm proud to say that he maintained stellar audience contact despite the flying distractions all around him.  Oh, and have I mentioned the emblems?  Despite the brothers' best efforts, many a flying ant went for a swim in a good Bordeaux.  Without a doubt, I can say that my first Memorial in Africa was not one I will soon forget!

Hopefully, wherever you are at, you enjoyed celebrating the memorial in an equally memorable (maybe without bugs!) way.  The one thing that I came away with this year is how much more work there is to do!  Seeing how the best efforts of our congregation to cover just a small portion of our territory resulted in about 130 people joining us for Memorial shows how much potential there still is.  And we only distributed about 6000 invitations... In a territory of 90,000-100,000 people!  What would the response be if we could actually reach all the people in our territory???  It's such a good thing that Jehovah has patiently allowed time for us to try to find out!