We arrived here in Yaoundé on Friday evening through what felt like nothing short of a series of miracles. We left France last Thursday with thirteen bags packed to the gills. Our neighbors dropped us off at the bus stop and off we went to Geneva to go ahead and check in early for our flight in the morning. Upon arrival at the Geneva airport, the bus driver kindly forfeited his lunch break to help us lug all our bags to the check-in. I told him “Vous êtes vraiment un ange” (You are truly an angel.) He smiled and replied, “Je sais” (I know). I don’t know, maybe he really was. We felt like he was anyways as.

At the check-in desk, the woman apologized saying that her luggage scale was broken and that she’d have to just let all our bags go through. “Just put them through!” she insisted. What a blessing! Even though we had used our luggage scale to make sure the bags were right around 23kg, we did have some that were a little over and we were dreading having to open them up and shift things around, especially with the kids in tow. They’re not at all the age at which kids are gifted with patience.

Our bags thus got all checked in without a hitch. We stayed the night at a nearby hotel with a pool and then headed back in the morning to catch our flight at 7am. Well, when we got to the airport in the morning we realized that we were missing a boarding pass. Going back to the check-in counter I told the lady we needed to reprint a boarding pass. She said she couldn’t do it because the computer showed that we hadn’t paid for two of our excess bags. The thing is that I had in fact paid the week before by phone. She went on to say that it was going to be 450 Swiss Francs per bag, coming to roughly $900. After some wrangling and noting that time was running short for us to catch our flight, I insisted that she was going to have to trust me. She took me to her supervisor (who turned out to be the same lady who had checked us in the day before) and the supervisor said, “Just let them through. Print the boarding pass.” Incredible!
I could go on. When we got to the long security line, an agent let us skip the line with the kids. Rejoice!

The kids did extremely well on both flights. We left Geneva at 7am and arrived in Yaoundé at 7pm on the same day in the same time zone. A colleague picked us up from the airport, after Cameroonian customs just put us right through as well. Each night since arriving we’ve been for dinner at the home of fellow colleagues and have felt welcomed by expats and Cameroonians alike.

Just one quick example. While walking home from church on Sunday, I crossed paths with an older Cameroonian gentleman who stopped me in the middle of the road to talk. Being familiar with Wycliffe, he thanked me for coming. “Thank you for coming here.” This for me was quite simply overwhelming to hear. I don’t expect to be thanked. I don’t feel like I’ve done anything extraordinary, even though I’ve moved my family far away from anything familiar. But his thank-you brought me to tears.

We are delighted to be here. We believe that God has brought us to this place to glorify him through Bible translation so that the Church would be fortified and that many would come to know Jesus. We start month long orientation on Monday. After orientation, we will work with a language project placement committee to determine which project to join. There are many options as there is much work left to do here. Which project to join will quickly become our primary preoccupation as soon as we become settled in enough to think straight. We’re currently relearning how to live. Mosquito nets, water filter, bleaching our produce, market shopping, haggling, where to find what, what to eat, etc. It’s a different world, but it’s dynamic and exciting.

There is a palpable sense of community and interdependence that forges strong relational bonds. We feel very welcome here.

Many Cameroonian Christians with whom we have come in contact have welcomed us and then added “Que Dieu vous protège” (May God protect you.) Security is a constant concern, especially for expats who stick out tremendously. Please pray for protection.

Please also pray for the building up of new relationships; adaption to a daily life that feels a lot like camping; and wisdom as we begin exploring language project options. We praise God that the children love it here. Poppy told me yesterday, “Africa is fun, Daddy!” (This is the same girl who told me that “Paris is not for children,” after visiting there.) We are grateful for the wonderful network of both expat and national colleagues without whom we would necessarily feel absolutely lost.

And about those thirteen bags of luggage: we glad we brought everything that we did.