Jono Miller

Shane Paxa is a newcomer to Rzhyshchiv from Western Australia. I have yet to meet him but have talked with him via email. I appreciate reading his thoughts and happenings. It's great to keep on the news but also to see things through the eyes of someone new. I like the way he spells people's names - exactly how a newcomer would say them.

Here's one of his days:

The past week has held many an adventure, escapade and challenge. I guess the best accomplishment of all was Marsha and I taking home the first prize in the Rzshishiv youth group 8-ball tournament last weekend. The close knit church here is exhorting and encouraging! It’s great to see a God inspired bunch of young Ukrainians ever seeking to be more like Him and striving to do everything for his glory! As summer is now upon us, we venture to the “beach” of Rzshishiv – a sandy part of the river – to play volleyball; a great outreach to the community.
There have been a number of excitements at the farm this week too! After catching a bloke on our strawberry farm, helping himself to berries, with the sole excuse that he had “drank too much vodka and needed to eat something…” we decided to add 2 more rungs to our electric fence ending up with a hight I like to call “the ball challenge” (self explanatory). To our delight, we now have copious strawberries in the 10m radius of our gate entry, where we had yet to see a ripe strawberry… coincidence? I think not.
The consequences of not learning the language of the country you are living in were felt this week, as we sprayed our entire crop of strawberries with what we thought was a harmless insecticide, but after a thorough translation of the back of the packet, we found a devastating 7-10day period to wait before eating the produce! Adding insult to injury, we further discovered the strength of insecticide we used was not potent enough to ward off the blasted bugs!
Daniel our pastor copped an 11 sting day while playing with our 4 bee hives on the farm without the help of my masterpiece of a smoker, Gaven found out what the bottom of the pond feels like, Leanna found herself in and amongst 30,000 bees swarming above her head, and I built a sprinkler system in our hot house, learned the Ukrainian alphabet and cooked up a few storms – earning me the chef position for Camp-120. (see next note)
A full week of enjoyment!
God bless
-Shane-

Read more notes from Shane here.