August 2006
Vol. 6, No. 3

Hello Everyone,

The Johnson family

We’ve had a full month since our last newsletter, what with exams, trips to the interior, a houseful of visitors and our normal routine. Here’s our latest update.

As most of you know, much of our summer has been spent with Aïchatou preparing for her final clinical exam in obstetrics/gynecology. It is the next-to-last step for her to achieve her medical school diploma, leaving only a research thesis to complete. Despite her confidence after the exam, we learned last week that she did not pass. We’re not sure what happened, but under Niger’s medical system, she can have the status of “7th-year medical student” indefinitely until she is successful. The normal practice would be for her to sit again for the exam in 2007. She is still allowed to work in medicine as a medical student under another the supervision of another doctor. So, we are very disappointed with this result and are not entirely sure what will happen next for her studies and career. Thank you for all who offered prayers on her behalf and we’d appreciate your continued prayers on this matter.

Not only are we in the middle of the rainy season, but we’re also in Niger’s vacation season right now, since school is closed between July and September. This is the time when many of Niger’s families send their kids to stay with other family relatives for a few weeks. Aïchatou remembers when, as a young girl, she and her siblings would visit aunties and uncles in Niamey, Maradi, Diffa, and once even in Burkina Faso during the summer holidays. So, we weren’t too surprised to learn that her brother’s three children (ages 10, 7 and 4) from Zinder would spend a month in Niamey and that we would need to host them for a least one week this summer. Luckily we still had RCA volunteer Amanda with us, who was willing to entertain the cousins along with our two kids. She was a big help before leaving us on August 14. Again, you can read her final blog entries of her time in Niger.

Speaking of the rainy season, this has been a very good season for Niamey and the more western part of the country, but very spotty in the east near Maradi, Zinder and Diffa. Many crops were not even planted until July, so that means the rains must continue for all of September (the normal ending period) and even into October for there to be an adequate harvest. Grain prices are largely stable this year, unlike 2005 when prices kept rising during the rainy season.

After the exam in late July, we took a 13-hour trip across the country to Zinder. We had many objectives for that trip, some professional, but some personal. It was the first trip Aïchatou and the girls had made to see their family in Zinder since April 2005 (I had already been to Zinder for work twice in 2006). I had also not had any one-on-one meetings with the EERN president to discuss the mission work since our return in January. Additionally, I needed to spend some time in Maradi to visit the Dogon Gao Bible School and to follow up with some matters with the EERN’s new Permanent Secretary, as well as plan for the Grand Opening of the Words of Hope recording studio. We loaded our family of four, plus Amanda, plus the three cousins into our Toyota Prado Land Cruiser. It was a tight fit to say the least and with five small kids, we took a lot of bathroom breaks. To add to the challenge, my vehicle had started to overheat two days before we left and I developed pink eye (conjunctivitis) in my right eye that same day! I later found that the radiator had some small holes that were allowing fluid to leak, so in the meantime, we kept adding water at every stop. I always get a little antsy on these kinds of trips, but with all these dynamics going on, I didn’t mellow out until we arrived at Zinder at 7:30 p.m.

We spent 11 days in Zinder and I made a two-day side trip to Maradi for the aforementioned activities. We went out to Aïchatou’s family farm and spent our weekend out there. Believe it or not, they actually have some catch basins constructed and grow rice where there is standing rainwater! It was nice to get out of Niamey and have a change of scenery. Marie enjoyed seeing the farm’s “jimina” which is Hausa for ostrich. The girls did really well with all of the traveling and Aïchatou’s family enjoyed seeing them running around. Laurey was held by everyone, but now that she can walk, she isn’t quite as accepting of strangers as she once was.

I don’t know if many of you will be interested in obtaining a $50 book, but if you love history, anthropology, and missiology, there’s an incredible work that was released in June 2006 by Barbara Cooper, entitled Evangelical Christians in the Muslim Sahel. It is basically a story of Sudan Interior Mission’s (SIM) work in Niger since 1924 and its evangelization activities. It really provides the context for what happened with the evangelical church and mission in Niger in the past and the legacies of those encounters for today. It does not always present missionaries in a good light, but the insights Cooper reveals about the relationships between Nigeriens and Westerners are fascinating. I’ve written a review on Amazon.com that you can read. If it is too expensive for you, perhaps you can convince a public or church librarian to purchase it!

Prayers and praises

Please pray for divine guidance as we plan our program for the future. We’ll almost certainly be returning to Maradi and Dogon Gao in early 2007, but we’re not sure where things are going for Aïchatou’s study and career.

Give thanks for the rains that have fallen across Niger and pray that they’ll continue until a bountiful harvest is ensured.

Pray for the Grand Opening of the Words of Hope recording studio, which will be held September 1-3 in Maradi. Nine people from the United States are coming to participate in the festivities and we’ll have our hands full helping to host them. Pray for their travels and health as we cross Niger together. Give praise that daily Christian recordings will start being broadcast in Hausa and in French on FM radio on September 1.

Pray for our PC(USA) colleague Kara VanderKamp, who had her first experience with malaria this past week (everyone in Niger usually gets it and the treatment is quite available and relatively inexpensive). Pray that God will encourage her and give her good health. Pray also for the Christian Reformed Church missionary family Persenaire-Hogeterp whose two-year old son is seriously ill in Niger from a yet-undiagnosed illness. The Johnsons have been relatively healthy, battling only minor ailments.

In Christ,

Tom, Aïchatou, Marie-Florence and Laurey

The 2006 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 314