Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Joint Service, Parents' Day and Election Day

[Note: The following entries were written on Monday, Jan. 25. Due to technical problems, however, we were not able to post them until Tuesday the 26th.]

As we mentioned earlier, yesterday a joint service was held for all of the Mennonite Churches of Trinidad and Tobago. (They call it MCTT, even though there are no Mennonite Churches in Tobago quite yet.) We had invited one of my friends to come along, and told the rest of her family that they would be welcome too. As of Sunday morning when we woke up, we still thought that we would only be picking up one girl. But, since it is Trinidad, there was always the possibility that they would call that morning and like a ride there. Sure enough, there was a call that morning before we left for church asking if we could pick up her parents and little brother too. Since our car is only supposed to fit five people (but in Trinidad that means six) we thought we could take her and maybe one other person in the car, but not four extra people. So we called some friends who would also be coming from Charlieville if they could help. They said that they could pick up Olivia and I, and my parents would bring the other family. The service started at 9:30 (or at least that's what it said), and when my dad drives, it takes about 45 minutes to get from our apartment to Diego Martin. It was a few minutes after 9:00 by the time they picked up Olivia and I. So we were worried we might be a little late, and since the worship team would be starting out the service with some singing, we didn't want to be too late. But it all turned out fine because of two things. One: even though this was a lot more on time than some other things we have attended, it still didn't start at exactly 9:30, so it was okay to be a couple minutes late. And two: it might take my dad about 45 minutes to get to Diego Martin driving legally, but apparently it only takes some Trini drivers about a half hour or so! The joint service was very nice, and they had a great meal afterward as always. We were noticing how different this was than even the last joint service. The very first joint service we attended was the first weekend we were here, and we were meeting a lot and lot of people. The next time (at the end of November) I felt like I knew a lot of people but didn't interact with a whole lot of them. But this time I felt like I really talked to people and knew them and it was good to see a lot of them again.
~Roxy

Last Friday was Parents Day at our school. So, the students were supposed to bring their parents to school with them to talk to the teachers and then we'd be done around 11:30. We went early so Roxy could finish building the model of a bridge she's making. It was supposed to be done for Parents Day but her group had some conflicts and it wasn't finished yet. Then, everyone assembled in the big upstairs room. This room is usually divided into 3 classrooms just by whiteboards, but they move them out of the way for certain events when they need a bigger space. First, the principal talked to all the parents and students. It was kind of like the chapel service we have every Thursday. Then the staff were introduced and parents could ask questions. After that, the teachers divided up and went to their own classrooms, where the parents could come see them and talk to them and get grades. Each class has a form teacher, who, in most cases, is the teacher they have the most classes with. So, the form teachers had the report cards for the students. I liked the way the report cards were set up. They had the grading scale, your final exam scores for each class, your course work scores for each class, and then your final grades for each class, plus some other information, like how many days you were absent and that kind of stuff. We ended up waiting forever to talk to the principal and we were pretty close to the last ones to leave.
~Olivia

We awoke this morning to hear the stunning results of the local elections here. The political system here is a parliamentary system of government. There is the ruling party and one major opposition party. There is a second opposition party which is largely a group that broke away from the major opposition party because of discontent with its leadership a few years ago. Well, yesterday was election day for internal elections in this major opposition party. The man who formed the party over 20 years ago and who had at one time been the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago was, for the first time in party history, being challenged. And to everyone's surprise, he lost to one of two challengers. Not only that, but the person who beat him was a woman. She won by more than 10-1. The whole victory has a sort of Obama quality to it.
The system of government is different, but the politics is not so different from American politics. It was heated and nasty, with allegations of corruption and personal scandals. The media has been totally consumed by it only breaking to update on Haiti. This country has been an independent nation for a relatively short time compared to what I am used to. This is only the second generation of leaders really, though many have been around with concentrated power for nearly as long as the Bush's and the Clinton's. It has been interesting to watch a government without a real executive branch. Let's just say democrats and republicans are not the only groups that have a hard time working together and live within a political system that encourages adversarial relationships.
~Barb

One of the highlights of yesterday's joint service was the licensing of a new pastor, Navin Benny, to serve at Hope Mennonite Church. This is an important step for the church here. As we've probably mentioned somewhere along the way, there have been only four pastors to serve six congregations—and one of the pastors is an American missionary, Richard Keeler. The goal is eventually to have a local pastor for each one of the congregations, and another local person to serve as overseer for all the Mennonite churches. This licensing brings that goal one step closer to reality. There is also another individual who is in formal training for pastoral ministry, along with some others who are considering such a calling. We see our work here largely as supporting the development of such leadership. Even though we may not be teaching future Mennonite pastors in our classes, our service at WITC helps support the institution where those future pastors are trained. And our current service at Diego Martin Mennonite Church is allowing one of the current pastors, Rawl Gunpath, to have a well-deserved sabbatical so that he may hopefully be re-energized for further service.
In addition to the licensing, yesterday's worship time also included a commissioning for one of the current pastors, Ganesh Kalloo, to serve at Charlieville Mennonite Church, which has been without a pastor for quite some time. Ganesh will continue to pastor the Mennonite Church of Chaguanas as well, splitting his time between the two congregations. This, again, is a very important step since it marks the first time that all six of the current Mennonite churches in Trinidad have pastoral leadership.
We also found out yesterday that the work permit has been approved for the new overseer, David Yoder, who is now expected to arrive in Trinidad from Pennsylvania in a few weeks. That position has been vacant since very shortly after we arrived here. Finally, we continue to pray for the health of Richard Keeler, who has been back in the U.S. since just before Christmas for diagnosis and medical treatment. We are hopeful that he will be well enough to return soon and bring the pastoral team for the Mennonite Church of Trinidad and Tobago to full strength.
~Richard

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