McMurray Car Fund (by Thom)

We’ve had people asking about our car fund. I always find it a bit uncomfortable talking or writing about raising support, but it needs to be done. As of August, people have given about $7,200. We are grateful for every gift. We are closer to our need of $10,000 than we expected to be at this point! Normally in Mali, $10,000 will buy you a decent used sedan (things are very expensive here) but we’ve seen some good deals lately. We have recently test-driven two 4x4’s that were in or near our price range. We decided to pass on the one, and really liked the Jeep but we can’t afford it right now. It’s a great deal, but we’re about $2,000 shy of being able to buy it. I hope you’ll continue to pray for us in this need, and if you would like to help us you can send a check to:

The C&MA
McMurray Vehicle Fund
P. O. Box 35000
Colorado Springs, CO 80935

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Regretfully... (by Thom)

When we started this journal we were hoping you might take advantage of the “Comments” option and leave feed-back, and some of you have. However, we’ve had a few “inappropriate” messages left as comments (not from any of our friends or family, just people who stumbled across this page on the internet). Because of this, we’ve decided to make the comments invisible. We don’t want to discourage communication though, so I will regularly post our email address here for you to see. Please feel free to drop us a note! Our email address is mcmali@gmail.com

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(More) First Impressions (by Thom)

When you tell people you’re going to Africa, one of the first questions always deals with the mosquitoes. “I hear they’re as big as bald eagles”, or something like that. Since we arrived at the tail-end of rainy season, there are plenty of skeeters, but they’re not as bad as you might think. We seem to get 2 or 3 new bites a day, but it’s no worse than what you’d get if you spent time outside during a Midwest August. Amanda and I have a very nice house. We live on the same property as the mission offices, so it’s very convenient for us now, especially since we don’t have a vehicle yet. Our yard does actually have some grass! That’s pretty rare here, and the grass is sooooo cool! Someone called it “Dr. Seuss grass” because of the surreal way it contours. It kind of looks like Astroturf that needs to be pulled tighter from the edges. When I get a chance, I’ll put a picture on our photo website.

We’ve had a lot of rainy days since we arrived. It seems most times it rains we lose power: sometimes for a moment, sometimes for a few hours. The longest was about 6 hours. Hot water is also touch-and-go. It seems funny to me that normally these things would bother us but they haven’t so far.

We’ve gone to three different churches in our 2 Sundays here. The first week we attended a French speaking service in the morning. Everyone was very friendly. There were a couple other Westerners in attendance. That evening we went to an English-speaking service that tends to cater to the missionaries. It was on the other side of the river, which was exciting. Bamako is broken in half by the Niger River. Our side is a bit newer, but gets less attention from repair crews and the such. Most of the government buildings seem to be on the other side. The river is a bit wider than the Mississippi is in St Louis, for some perspective. Of course it’s quite a bit wider now than it will be in 8 months. When things dry up, it looks like it’ll still be 300 yards across. This past Sunday we went to another French speaking service. It was an outside church, and we had a grass-roof lean-to for shade. It was very nice, though. The church was in an upper-middle class neighborhood. Again, everyone was very friendly, and we spent at least 35 minutes after the service talking with people. The church reminded us of a church we attended in the states in that, when Junior Church began, more than half the seats were suddenly empty!

That’s just a few of the many things we’ve seen and experienced in our first 2 weeks here. We’ll keep you posted with more updates from here, so check back every few days. Also, we know we could be wrong with what think would be interesting to write about, so if you have a question or idea let us know about it! If you’re wondering about something, the odds are someone else is too! Write us at mcmali@gmail.com

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The Journey There & First Impressions (by Amanda)

After spending a month in the States we are finally in Africa. Wow! I can hardly believe it. We have been here three days and I feel great. Although at times it can become overwhelming God has blessed us in so many ways. Our house is wonderful and I am excited to slowly furnish it and make it my home. The biggest blessing though has been the fellowship of other missionaries. As we sat in the airport in France we were blessed to meet one of our fellow missionaries from Koutuala and she was a wonderful companion as we waited for the next flight, but God’s grace did not end there. When we arrived she helped us navigate through customs and waiting just beyond that point was our field director Joel ready to help. He and his wife then took us to our house and had food waiting for us there. Every day, they or other missionaries have guided us or helped us in our transition. They have continually shown the love of Christ to us and tried to answer all our questions or gave us the names of somebody who could. I have never felt so privileged or grateful to be in the body of Christ. There are many other things I would love to tell you so I hope that you feel free to ask any questions and I will try to answer them the best that I can.

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We've Arrived! (by Thom)

We're here in Bamako, Mali! You’ve probably noticed that we haven’t updated the site lately. There is a good reason, and it isn’t because we’re to busy to think straight! Amanda and I have been wonderfully occupied with all the new things here in Bamako, but we’ve thought a lot about all the things we want to share with you. However, our internet connection hasn’t cooperated. As things look now, we’ll be getting a satellite internet connection soon – maybe even before the end of the month! Until then, we can only update this site when we visit someone with a high speed connection. However, we can get our email on our 28.8k dial-up connection, so feel free to drop us a line! In the meantime, please remember to pray for us, that we can be as useful to the other missionaries as possible, as we learn a new language (Bambara),as we look to purchase a car, and as we continue to raise the funds to buy that car (we’re about 75% of the way there).

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