October 2019 - Pizza makes great bait!

Pizza is wonderful bait for catching university students!  Never fails!  We went through 50 pizzas over two nights to feed almost 80 final-year animal health students.  As part of the CVM short-term mission trip I host each year, we offered two Tuesday evening review sessions last month with pizza working like a charm.  It is always fun to bless the students not only with academic help, but also with good food and lots of laughter.  This year, the students requested topics including hematology (evaluating blood cells) and round cell tumors.

On the Saturday in between, we offered extra-curricular suturing practicals for a portion of the class.  This is a skill that isn’t included in their course, but it is always a big hit.  They really enjoy getting the chance to learn how to handle the instruments and perform a few simple suture patterns.  I usually pick up trotters (pig’s feet) at the local butchery as the skin isn’t too thick or difficult to use and utilize donated expired suture so there is no cost for the students.  One year several of the students took the trotter home afterwards for a stew!

Having the team visit was also a good excuse to organize another rabies vaccine outreach with the students and the local SPCA.  We visited a village about 10 minutes south of Mahikeng and had our busiest clinic yet!  Nearly 100 dogs vaccinated in just 4 hours.  We even had to send the van driver to bring more vaccines!

All-in-all, the two weeks of the short-term team flew by.  This month, our Acts 29 witnessing team students are preparing for our spring break outreach, which will once again be in the country of Lesotho.  We will be joining with a local ministry for the week in serving children head-of-households and encouraging Christian college students toward campus evangelism in the capital city of Maseru.  What is my most important responsibility for the outreach?  Keeping the team supplied with cookies of course!  At least, that is what the students tell me :)  Good thing I’ve got 10 pounds of Costco chocolate chips in my fridge!  After all, chocolate chip cookies work almost as well as pizza!