Minding the technological Gap

Yesterday I received the email pasted below. It is from a YWAM staff member working on the Buvuma Islands of Lake Victoria in Uganda, East Africa. She is writing about the move to change YWAM's international magazine from a print edition to an e-zine. I post this here because Catherine sums up one of the reasons why we need Communication Teams in places like Africa:

"Thank you for all your hard work on the new YWAM E-Zine magazine. I know it has taken tremendous effort. I therefore offer my contribution with extreme care because I don't want to discourage you. But the truth is you are not reaching as many people as you think. I know for a fact that most of the staff of YWAM Uganda do not have Internet access and the speed of our connection certainly does not allow us to view your magazine. So we are all out of the picture, again! We had an HIV & AIDS global gathering in 2006 but the only way to attend was to apply on-line. Very few of the staff had registered so finally a lady from UK who is on staff printed out a bunch of application forms and gave them to people. After they filled them out she just gave the whole lot to the organizers in person. And the whole idea of doing Go Manual surveys on the Internet is a constant source of frustration to us.

There are also many YWAM locations that do not have electricity. For instance we live on a remote island on Lake Victoria in Uganda. It has been a month since I was able to do emails and it requires a trip to stay overnight (and I have three small children).

I appreciate that Lyn Green wants to focus on healing the nervous system of YWAM. That is really needed. However, I don't feel the Internet is the best route for the majority of the YWAM staff in the field. I know printed media is expensive but it was the best way to make sure all the staff read the YWAMer magazine here. The National Office just left copies in the waiting area of the office and people read them. Now hardly anyone can read the computerized one."

In our capacity as bridge-builders we have to face issues such as these ... to find funds to print a magazine and post it to YWAMers in Africa; to phone people and fill in their YWAM surveys for them; to tell YWAM around the world the challenges staff deal with on a daily basis, as well as their triumphs and success stories. What a privilege to do this for people like Catherine!

College of Communication gathering

Last week we were able to participate in the meetings of the College of Communication, one of the faculties of YWAM's University of the Nations. The meetings were hosted in Kona, Hawaii, at the main U of N campus, and with the help of video conferencing 11 other locations were able to take part.

We were included in these meetings by virtue of the fact that we are now not only a YWAM Communication Team but also U of N school leaders. We felt very much like the new kids on the block, given that we have yet to actually graduate any students, but this gathering was the ideal opportunity for us to be introduced to some of the movers and shakers in the College of Communication.

There are YWAM communication schools running all around the world, in locations as far apart as Australia and Sweden, Hawaii and South Korea, Nigeria and India. In these U of N accredited schools, both small and large, students can train in general subjects such as Communication Foundations, or specialised subjects such as Digital Film-Making. We are proud to add Field Journalism to that list!

The gathering will become an annual affair as the college leadership team seek to bring greater connection to the different expressions of the college around the world. If this sounds familiar that's because it's yet another response to God's word to us as a mission to work towards greater health throughout our organisational body by promoting better communication.

And that, dear readers, is why we are here!

Trip to Uganda & Rwanda: Update

Evelien writes:
The first two weeks of August Tim, Henk (who works with DTS at YWAM Muizenberg) and I travelled to Uganda and Rwanda. Our mission: Tim was invited to teach at the DTS in Arua (Uganda) and in Kigali (Rwanda). We also spent two nights in Jinja (Uganda), for an interview with Sam Kisolo, the national leader, and to talk about the Communication Consultation that will take place in Jinja in April 2009.

For me it was great to discover a new part of Africa by travelling around by bus; we spent hours travelling from one place to another. I certainly enjoyed the views of nature and African life. And if you are looking for banana paradise, you can find it in Uganda and Rwanda!

It was great to connect with the different YWAM bases, to see how they live, and to get to know staff and students a little bit better. It was really encouraging to see the involvement of the bases in Arua and Kigali in the community.

In Kigali, Rwanda, the YWAM team is doing some amazing work in the local community: a primary school, vocational training, projects with widows, HIV-AIDS, ex prostitutes, orphanages and many more ministries.

Of course we communicated about communication! Good communication makes a difference. Having so many different ministries in the local community also means having lots of stories and testimonies. But how can we make sure all these stories will get ‘out there’? There is such a need for communicators. Communicating these stories, about what God is doing in Africa, will make a difference! Come and do the School of Field Journalism in January 2009!

Communication tools

Internet is a great communication tool. However, travelling throughout Africa shows that access to internet is not as common as it is in other parts of the world. Even though there is internet available in Africa, there are lots of places where the connection is very poor. It can easily take half an hour to read 2-3 emails. In some places the YWAM staff members have to travel to an internet café first to check their email. Thinking about “My Facebook” in rural areas? Sounds nice, but you can forget about it.

For us as AfriCom and everyone who wants to work on better communication, this means that we need to think of different ways to communicate with our YWAM family in Africa.

YWAM offers Medical Students Outreach Opportunities in Africa

A group of university students gathered together last week at the Tygerberg medical campus, in the northern suburbs of Cape Town, for a week-long mission conference. There were 18 different Christian organizations exhibiting, sharing and presenting their work. YWAM Africa's work was represented, along with All Nations, MAF, Doctors Without Borders, Open Doors, Mercy Ships, Life Winds, SIM and others. Floyd Mc Clung, director of All Nations, and Brian Sanders, from Underground Network church in the US, were the guest speakers.

AfriCom's Pam Kudiwa was glad to spend her birthday week behind the YWAM stand. “In the midst of the diversity of ministries I could see a beautiful portrait of what God is doing across Africa, painted by different brushes but inspired by One. Standing beside our YWAM Africa stand my mind could not help but think of how much creative freedom there is to network as organizations that are working for the same cause. This networking resulted in me collecting many ministry pamphlets, and holding conversations that did not just end with 'What is DTS' but with questions about what other organizations are doing and how we can partner together.”

Besides their busy schedules, filled with studies and hospital work, an impressive number of students passed through the missions stands seeking for more ways to get involved in the world around them. Medical students whose passion is to pursue God's purposes showed their willingness to take time to do short term outreaches, and others just browsed for information. One group of medical students - whose only free time is in two months tim- are giving up their chance for a holiday to have a mission adventure with YWAM in Mozambique. They heard about the opportunity to cross the Zambezi River to bring medical supplies to an isolated village and jumped at the chance: “Can you please find out if we can go in October and November? We will organize our own transport and whatever else it will need for us to get there” Conrad said.

What a privilege to be a Communication Team for YWAM's work when there are so many willing volunteers just waiting to be informed and mobilized!

Celebrating the Nations

Here in Muizenberg the communication adventure remains alive. Martial and Pam joined together with the staff and students at the Muizenberg base for the global YWAM Prayer Day that takes place every first Thursday of the month; the theme for this month was the Christian Magna Carta.

After the prayer time there was a celebration dinner at which more than 20 nationalities were represented. The celebration was marked with food from different nations across the globe, ranging from main meals to deserts. The food combinations were just amazing. Pam was not feeling too well, so had to enjoy the aroma without benefiting from the taste.
However, what she missed at the meal table she made up for on the dance floor: the meal was followed by a dance party, with performances from the YWAM kids.

Starting this weekend Pam is teaming up with Virmz Largo (staff from the Muizenberg base) for a mission conference at Tygerberg college campus, in the north of Cape Town. They will be exhibiting YWAM's work around Africa, sharing the platform with other mission organisations based in Africa. There will be many opportunities to hear what others are doing across the continent and to talk to students who are interested in missions opportunities.

Trip to East Africa

On Saturday Tim and Evelien leave for 2 weeks to Uganda and Rwanda. They'll be flying into Entebbe and taking a bus on Sunday to Arua in the north of Uganda. There is a YWAM base there where Tim will teach on the Discipleship Training School for the week. His subject is Worldview, which he loves teaching and he invariably ends up having great discussions about things like gender, leadership and even attitudes towards work. Evelein is going with him and she will teach a couple of evening sessions to give an overview of the Bible. Accepting invitations to teach on DTS has always been a great way for us to make contact with bases around the continent.

It'll also be fun for Tim and Evelein to be at the base for YWAM's international prayer day, which takes place once a month. All the information about the prayer day - the theme for the month, teaching notes and so on - are available on a website, which can put them off-limits to staff around Africa with limited Internet access. Our team emails a short, easily downloadable version of the notes and sends out sms messages to as many staff as we have cell phone numbers for. So if they need a reminder to visit the Internet cafe, or to ask their leader for a print-out of the information, they can do so ahead of time. This is one of the ways we are trying to be part of bridging gaps within YWAM.

From there they will take a bus to Jinja where we have a large training and ministry centre (shown above) and where YWAM's national director for Uganda is based. There are a couple of reasons for spending the weekend in Jinja - no, not because the source of the Nile is there, nor because you can do great white-water rafting on the river! Firstly, the YWAM staff in Jinja have for some years been running great HIV/AIDS-related projects. We are in the process of producing a video for YWAM staff around Africa, promoting healthy practices and attempting to reduce the stigma surrounding HIV/AIDS. Needless to say, we do have HIV+ staff members; how we live together in community in a way that honours and respects one another is a critical issue. Tim and Evelein will be recording a couple of interviews with staff and leaders at the base for use in this video.

Secondly, next year we are hosting YWAM's annual communication consultation at the Jinja base. Visiting will give Tim and Evelein (especially her as she'll be doing much of the logistical administration) a chance to get together with the staff members there who will be helping us to host the event by organising housing, catering and so on. Hopefully by meeting face-to-face now we can avert some misunderstandings later ;-)

On Sunday they leave Jinja for Kigali in Rwanda. Again, Tim will be teaching on a DTS, this time on the subject of Missions. He's a great mobiliser and passionate about the subject, so it should be a good week. Kigali is where the regional director is based, so this visit will also be a chance for Tim to discuss with him our plans for next year. We are running a School of Field Journalism in South Africa and after 3 months of lectures we'll go to East Africa for a 2 month field assignment. Our students will join us for the communication consultation in Jinja and then go to different locations around the region in twos and threes. It's good that Tim and Evelien can meet with Method (the regional director) to discuss which locations they can go to; currently we're thinking of Sudan, Burundi and DRC.

Their final assignment will be to interview Method and his wife, Mary, who is the base leader in Kigali. For the last few years our team has been producing a news bulletin/magazine for YWAM in Africa. We've had a bit of a lapse for the last year due to lack of staff time and in this time the producers of the global YWAM magazine, the International YWAMer, have decided to convert to an e-zine. Given that we know it will be difficult for many of our staff around Africa to receive an e-zine and check out all the incorporated web links, we are going to amalgamate our Africa bulletin with the global magazine and continue to print and mail copies to bases around Africa. The first edition is due out at the end of August and obviously there'll be a time-delay between the e-zine going out and our print version being ready. Anyway, the theme of the first edition is Communication (there'll be an article about AfriCom!) and this trip is the ideal opportunity to interview Method and Mary for an Africa-focused article.

Then Friday it's back to Entebbe to sleep over and catch an early flight back to Cape Town via Johannesburg. Our two intrepid team members will no doubt be bushed, but they'll have accomplished a lot ... which makes the 2 weeks away from home very worthwhile!

Face Lift

Our office has a new look - we have painted the walls and done a few touch ups here and there. It looks great: the result of amazing team work!

The whole team is together for a few more days and we are trying to make the most of it. At the end of next week Tim and Evelien are teaming up for a two week teaching trip to Uganda and Rwanda. This will also be an opportunity for them to do some preliminary research and organisation for YWAM's CRIT communication consultation next April and for the field assignment for the students of our School of Field Journalism. There will definitely be more news about their trip in future updates.

Visa requirements in Africa change constantly and one has to stay up-to-date with any new hoops that need to be jumped through! On previous trips to Uganda visas could be obtained very simply at the port of entry. A few days ago we discovered that our travelers will have to obtain visas from Pretoria before they leave. One of the requirements is a letter from your employer confirming that you are going on holiday!

Other news:

Martial and Lea have been back from their honeymoon for 2 weeks now; it's great to have Martial back in the office. Over the weekend we joined them for lunch in their new home. Thanks to technology we managed to share their wedding day by video - that was part of the lunch :-)

Student and staff applications are starting to come in for the School of Field Journalism next year. We continue to have a sense of anticipation as we brainstorm and prepare for that time.