Bab's dock/church

Saturday I had an oppurtunity to go to bab's dock-- it's this place on the lake with kayaks, canoes, a sail boat, hammocks all along the "beach" and a volleyball court.. so i took that oppurtunity. and i am very glad i did.. :) It was so much fun! it was raining that day, but still.. it was really cool. we drove for about forty minutes out of town which was really interesting because i got to see alot more than just downtown cotonue.. aaa! i just figure dout how to put pictures on here.. these are pictures on the way there.. and at the lake.. i'll put some more up from that day..anyways, lea and i took out a kayak and we were out in the very middle of the lake when it started to pour down rain, and it's really warm here.. so it was really refreshing, and being out in the middle of it all was just beautiful.. we just sat there laughing and talking about how beautiful his creation is till it stopped raining.. and then as if God just wanted to perfect the scene a bird came flying by.. it was really great. I got to talk to everybody about alot of different things, it was just a really nice day. let's see.. i feel like adding pictures now, so that's what I'll do-- there will be a picture of my room, one of me and Dina (she has red curly hair) and one of me dina and chelsea in front of the ship.. and the sunset--there was a beautiful sunset one night, which is very rare.. because it's rainy season right now here.. soyou can't really see the sun. :( but it was so very beautiful one night.. the picture of the girl with the braids is lea.. we took them out after she had them for three days because they got on her nerves.. and theres one of me dorothea and dina i do belive before we took the boat ride to bab's dock.. we had to take a boat ride through this river thing until it opened up into the lake.. and if i can upload all of these i hope to put up some pictures PJ took.. they're really good.. the random toilet shot is of the toilets at bab's dock.. cuz we thought they were wierd... and we thought wed take a picture.. ha. you basicaly went in this hole and dropped in tree bark shavings to make it not smell bad.. i do realize this isn't that funny to anyone else. but lea and i thought it was for some reason.. anyways..

Sunday

On sunday i went to church, not the same one that i went to las time though.. i went to church in a soccer stadium this sunday. There were more than a thousand people there-- almost filling up the stadium (the practice stadium).. we got there and realized we were the only yovos.. four white people-- three girls and one guy in the midst of more than a thousand locals.. it was really cool. we walked in and were first taken to these really nice seats, but i felt really wierd because i would have much rather just sat with everyone else.. they came back and moved us though because the president of Benin was coming!! that was exciting.. so we moved to the back of the stadium with everyone else, and listened to the many announcements in french translated to the native language. and then leah leaned over and informed me we were sitting in the mens section, and sure enough! i looked around and we were the only women on that half of the church.. ha oops. it was actually pretty funny. they seperate women and men during church... well at least at this one church we went to. then hooray! the worship started.. that's always my favorite part. there was a whole lot of dancing, clapping and singing and then the message began. it was really hard to understand.. and we had to leave early for some reason (i cant remember now.. this was last week) BUT... we had to walk down the stairs to the middle of the stadium to leave.. hahaha. so not only did we draw attetnion to ourselves because we were white, but we were also the only women in the mens section and we had to get up and leave in front of everybody. wow that was awkward. sunday night we had an international night of worship on the ship-- it was so cool. there are 32 countries represented on the ship.. so alot of the countries got groups together and led us in worship. Liberia's was my favorite.. it just turned into a raggae jam fest and we all danced around the room for a while.

Ouida

well, i went to ouida-- a town about two hours outside of cotonue-- this saturday. we went and saw the gate of no return, which was a monument put up for all the slaves taken out of benin. It was really sobering. I don't know how else to describe it. Then we walked down the beach a little ways and there was another monument put up for all the missionaries that had come into benin.. it was really cool too-- to was a big rock slab basicaly, with the shape of benin cut out of it.. and then there was a cross on the other side, so through the shape of benin you saw the cross. I liked that monument alot. after we went there we went to a museum in downtown ouida.. a "prosperous" town-- meaning it had rock instead of dirt roads and more concrete houses instead of wood shacks. we were given a tour guide for the museum.. and he told us all about the history of Ouida, as well as the historyof voodoo in ouida and cotonue. voodoo is so prevalent here.. it's really scary, i don't know.. i guess you don't think about spiritual warfare so much at home. He said that alot of people go to catholic church sunday mornings and then practice voodoo at night "it's no problem.. it's normal here" what? my gracious that one sentence hurt my heart.. how exactly are we supposed to make it known that Jesus is the only way, that God is the ONLY God.. that even though that is there tradition here, that that is wrong. so if you'd like to pray.. pray for this spiritual warfare going on..

Sunday!

well... this sunday i went to action faith church-- i think im going to go there the rest of my time here.. it's a whole whole lotlike New City fellowship back home.. the songs are in english, so i actually knew them!! i was so happy to be singing a song i knew that i was singing at the very tip top of my lungs.. it was so great. and the message was really good, but we had to leave early because we were going to a futbol game that night, the word cup qualifiers it was benin VS Mali. that was quite fun! we were all herded through the doors, ive gotten used to feeling like cattle. we got there two hours early so we had front row seats!! it was really fun. Chelsea and irina and leah disappeared for the second half of it all.. because they went outside to get ice cream and couldnt get back in.. so that was slightly worrisome because i dodn't know where they went. i have to go back to work. that's what my weeks looked like so far though... i'm praying for all of you! o and if you're friends with me on facebook i put up an album...