(A message arrived this morning, in reply to one I sent earlier in the week. Answers to a few questions are included. If anyone reading this has other questions for Dan, please do write them in the comments section and I’ll pass them on to him via email)
Saturday 16th July
Today was I-Night, or rather, “Doulos International Festival”, because it was held at 3.00pm (African time, so started at 10 to 4…).
I was on the prayer team, so we left at about 11ish, to the Catholic University which was kind enough to let us use their hall. Biggish hall, too echoey and windows along the top of the walls with no curtains… kind of made the projected material a problem.
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We did quite a lot of praying, and in the </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">end the day went well, I think. Sadly, not so many people went, about 150 </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">people in the audience, I guess. An ex-Doulos now-pastor from this country </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">preached half way though, for 15 minutes. And he actually did 15 mins, </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">too, which is quite amazing in ANY part of the world.</p>
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I can’t get used to </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">the style though. He was right after the “Tales” drama, which is </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">fantastic, all mime, basically the whole story, Father and Son make world, </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">people, angels, an angel turns away, tempts man into sin, Son becomes a </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">man, other men kill Him, and through His death, He defeats the turned </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">angel, and brings back people to him. Very beautiful.</p>
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Then this preacher </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">gets up and, basically, shouts for 15 minutes solidly. I’m kind of </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">sceptical, I mean, I know “there is no ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ ways, </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">culturally, only different” and all that, and I know my personal culture </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">doesn’t do this kind of thing, but through the whole drama, everyone was </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">riveted, as soon as he began preaching, people started leaving, and </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">carried on leaving through the whole thing. I dunno.</p>
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Also, from a </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">beautiful, flowing, poignant mime-drama, suddenly into full bore hell and </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">fire preach (I don’t speak Portuguese though, so I don’t know if it really </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">was). Anyway. I can’t judge, and I guess he knows what he is doing, and </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">God can use anything. Oh well.</p>
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We got back about 7 o’clock, it’s now 10 to </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">8. Quite cold too, for me. Other people complain it is too hot still. </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">Strange people.</p>
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</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;">[re: stars in the Southern Hemisphere]</span></span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;"><br /> </span><br /> <span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;"></span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;"></span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">On sea watch, boy, it was amazing. No light polution or other </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">polution for 40 miles in ANY direction, on a dark unlit deck… </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">You wouldn’t believe how many stars. I saw the milky way too! </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">fantastic. Different stars, it’s lovely. I got to see whales </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">too on watch!! I have got photos of many things from the </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">“scratch” sharing drive.</p>
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</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-style: italic;">[ re: Scottish Dancing – were all the STEP team involved?]</span></span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;"><br /> </span><br /> <span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;"></span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;"></span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">Just me. They have a notice board on the way to the dining room </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">and all groups put a notice up like “All Scottish dancers meet </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">in forward lounge at 8pm” or something. And so I went, they said, </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">“oh cool, another man. we need you to dance with us in 2 days time, </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">ok?”. Funny. Other people are with other groups. Swing dancing, </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">tiniklin, irish, etc.</span>
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<span style="font-family: trebuchet ms; font-style: italic;">[How does music and drama work on the ship?]</span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;"></span>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">A different music person leads each week, and they pick whoever </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">they want, and know about for that particular week. A couple of </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">the guys on the STEP play drums and guitar, and one girl plays </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">piano. Perhaps we will lead one week, just the STEP. We have also</span><br /> <span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">had our own impromptu (and promptu) worship times too.</p>
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The drama </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">team is for long termers only, but they teach everyone shorter </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">dramas (the table drama, the chair drama, the window sketch, </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">the balloon drama, etc), and also ways of sharing the gospel using </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">3 bits of string, or a square peice of blank paper, and so forth.</span>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;"></span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;"></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms; font-style: italic;">[re: thick socks, which he said he was lacking in a previous message]</span>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">I don’t really need any, and I will try to look in Charlie (the </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;">spare clothes place), or at the market on monday (my off-day). </span><span style="font-family: arial; font-weight: bold;"></span>
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