Postscript

Going to church in different places is something I greatly enjoy. Have a look at some scenes from the church service I went to in Bili.

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You’re looking at a draft of the translation of the book of Ruth in the Mono language.  I’d say it’s about half-way through the translation process.  A lot has happened to get to that point, and a lot has yet to be done.

How the Bible gets from it’s original languages (Hebrew and Greek) into another language is a process that involves many people and lots of checks and revisions.  You can see a slide show of the process here.

Here’s a little about what’s happening in the Mono project:

The Mono Bible translation project, like many translation projects, began by the request of Christians in the Mono language community.  For a few years, some foreigners came to live in the community.  They helped to develop an alphabet and documented the sounds, grammar and structure of the language.  They left after just three years because of the war in the area.

The community did not lose hope and continued to pray that God would help them to have the Bible in their language.  Several years later, Gaspard and Marie Yalemoto were selected by their community to continue the project.  They went to Bible college and seminary to receive training in theology, linguistics and translation principles.

They joined ACOTBA-SUBO, the local Bible translation organization in this area.  ACOTBA-SUBO provides infrastructure for resourcing Bible translation projects and accountability for the people involved in each project.

The five member Mono translation team does much of their translation work at the ACOTBA-SUBO office in Gemena, DRC. The team is lead by Pastor Gaspard Yalemoto.  It also has two full-time translators (including Marie Yalemoto) and one person who helps to type the text into the computer. All of the team members are mother-tongue speakers of Mono, and the team members involved in translating the text have all received training in Bible translation principles.

Special computer software provides the team with exegetical and linguistic helps and makes drafting and revising the text simpler.

The Mono language community is estimated to have about 100,000 people.  Several of the main villages have a translation committee.  These committees play an important role in general promotion of their language including encouraging literacy classes and the use of available scriptures.

But, a very important part of their job is to coordinate the testing of each passage of scripture as it is translated. The testing process involves seeing how well people comprehend the meaning of the passage.  If something is unclear or misunderstood, they offer suggestions to the translation team in Gemena for how to correct it or make it clearer.

Testing is done with a cross-section of people from the community including pastors and church members from different denominations, men and women, young and old.

The translation committee in Bili is distinct from the others. Bili is considered by the Mono language community to be the linguistic center of their language, or the place where the purest form of Mono is spoken.  Sometimes important key terms can be challenging to translate and the translation committees may have differing opinions as to how to advise the translation team.  When this happens, the opinion of the committee in Bili carries the most weight in how to advise the translation team.  With feedback from the translation committees, the translation team makes revisions to the text.

Another part of the checking process is for the translated passages to be checked by a translation consultant.  Consultants have advanced training in theology, linguistics, and biblical languages.  They also must have previous experience in a Bible translation project.  Consultants ensure that what is translated is accurate to the meaning of the source languages (Greek and Hebrew).  After consultant checks, translation teams have more revisions to do, and more testing.

Goma is one of the ACOTBA-SUBO staff that is completing training to be a full-time Bible translation consultant.  When he completes the program, he’ll serve as the primary consultant for ACOTBA-SUBO translation projects, including the Mono project.

Some scripture is already available in Mono.  Mark 10 was read in Mono in the church we visited in Bili.  I loved seeing this man’s smiling face as he heard God’s word in his own language.

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The community we visited in Bili speak a language called Mono. With about 7,000 languages in the world, you might think that many language names are repetitive, but most of them are quite unique.  However, the language name, Mono, happens to be one that four different language communities, in very different places, all use:

• Mono in the Solomon Islands
• Mono in Cameroon
• Mono in the USA (California)
• Mono in DRC

Each is a separate and distinct language community.  They just happened to each chose that name for themselves.  The Mono of DRC are by far the largest of all of these groups currently with  over 100,000 speakers.

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We arrived in the village of Bili just after dark. It was hard to tell exactly how many people were there, but my estimate was that two to three hundred people greeted us on our arrival with singing, dancing and waving palm branches.  Of all the visits I’ve done, many to remote places, I’ve never experienced a welcome quite like this.  They even had a palm branch archway that the truck drove under.

It was overwhelming, and it was hard not to cry.  Mama Marie (that is Marie Yalemoto, who we traveled with) walked next to me and held my hand as we walked through the excited, singing crowd.  They were singing we thank you for coming, we welcome you, we have been praying for your journey, we are glad you are here. Wow.  This was a much more anticipated trip than I had realized.  They told us later than no foreigners from our organization had visited this village since 1995.

I flipped my camera into video mode, but unfortunately, I didn’t have a light that would stay on.  I only had the flashing of the trucks hazard lights to see anything that was going on.  However, you can hear the singing and get a sense of the excitement.

I couldn’t help thinking…who am I…who are we to be so excited about.  But, it wasn’t about us.  Our visit reminded the believers in this community that God had not forgotten them.  Bigger than our plans to “capture their story”, God had a plan to use us as his encouragers…and also to use the community to encourage and inspire us…and they did just that.

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Our trip to Bili was to visit the Mono language community.  More on that later.  As I’ve already shared, it took us 12 hours to get there due to the condition of the roads.

Ours was the only vehicle, other than a couple of motorcycles, that I saw the whole way there.  Pastor Gaspard and Marie, who we traveled with, go to Bili about four times a year.

They travel by motorcycle, so when the pick-up truck passed through the villages on the route, it got some attention.  Kids seemed to be especially excited, and they would often run along the side of the road yelling, Mbote.  Mbote means hello in Lingala.  Lingala is the trade language of this region.

The long road trip was great for getting some photos of people and life along the way.

A humorous side note… I really wanted to get out to get a photo of this road.  The truck was really packed. When I tried to get out, my foot got stuck under my computer bag.  I fell out of the truck, sort of slowly as I gripped the door trying to save myself from the descent.  Gravity won.  I ended up on the ground, on my back, with my legs in the air above me!  Thankfully, the fabric of my skirt was stiff enough that it stayed up!

When we entered Mono land, even more people started coming out to see us.  A big welcoming party was waiting just a half hour down the road, but we (that is Maralee and I) didn’t know it, yet.

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We did two road trips while we were in DR Congo. The first was going from Gemena to a small town called Bili, and then back to Gemena. Google maps estimates this 181 mile (291 km) trip should take four and half hours in each direction.  It took a full 12 hours, each way.

The second was our road trip from Gemena to Zongo, which is the last city in DRC before you arrive in Bangui, Central African Republic. Google maps estimates that this 155 mile (250 km) trip should take just over three hours.  It took eight hours.

Google maps calculates travel time on the average speed limits for the roads, but on these roads I don’t think it’s possible to even approach the speed limit, let alone exceed it.

Not all the roads in DR Congo are bad.  But, like in many places, development can sometimes be limited to only certain areas of the country.  I’m sure there are lots of nice roads in the capital, Kinshasa.  But, cities far from capital cities, and many rural areas, can sometimes miss the benefits of infrastructure funding.

One of the more adventurous aspects of our road trips was crossing bridges.

Many of the ones we encountered were made from large logs, and only a skilled driver would be able to navigate them well. Thankfully, we had a fantastic driver–Luka; he also had an assistant that helped with the most difficult parts of the road.

We often clapped and cheered when the truck made it across one of the challenging bridges. Yes, it was THAT exciting!  I don’t think I could have successfully navigated so many bridges like that.

At one juncture we had to drive through a stream because the bridge was not passable.

Having had to go over a lot of challenging bridges made us really happy when we crossed a good one like this.  I have a new respect for the importance of good roads and bridges.  I was also really thankful that JAARS donated this great truck to ACOTBA-SUBO.  It’s necessary, and it’s being put to good use.

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A fun part of traveling, for me, is trying the local carbonated sodas.  In many of the countries I’ve visited in Africa, they have their own special flavor.  Here in DR Congo, I tried Africa Fun.  Not only is it a fantastic name for their fizzy drink, it also tastes great.  It’s a refreshing lime flavor.   I loved it–Africa Fun in a bottle!

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Gemena, the city where ACOTBA-SUBO has its office, has a population of more than 100,000. It is located about 650 miles as the crow flies from the capital city of DR Congo, Kinshasa.  However, without roads to connect the two cities, it can take days to travel between the two cities.  Add to the equation the deteriorating condition of many roads, and the trip could probably take more than a week or even up to two weeks.

Thankfully, Gemena has its own international airport. We actually flew there from Bangui (the capital of Central African Republic).  It was a quick one hour flight.

The city is bustling with shops and restaurants.  Several cell phone companies advertise their services, and at least one even offers pennies per minute calls to the US.   We visited a fabric shop that had some great African fabrics at low prices.  For about $12-$16 USD, you could get six yards of one of the beautifully patterned fabrics that many Congolese wear.

What I didn’t see in Gemena were paved roads and electric power lines.  It seemed like this is a city that runs off the grid, for the most part.  The Catholic mission guest house where we stayed had power and internet three hours each night thanks to a generator and V-SAT.  A few solar panels gave power to one light in each room.

Some of the staff had their own solar panels that they would put out during the day in order to power their own devices in the evening.

The ACOTBA-SUBO office has a solar power system and V-SAT–both are absolutely essential for being able to do work here. Without power and access to the internet, their work would be very difficult.

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ACOTBA-SUBO stands for Association Congolaise pour la Traduction de la Bible et l’Alphabetisation-Sukia Boyinga.  In English that means Congolese Association for Bible Translation and Literacy (A.C.O.T.B.A.) — Conquer Ignorance (SU.BO.). It is a Wycliffe partner organization in this region of DR Congo.

The ACOTBA-SUBO team–made up of linguists, Bible translators, literacy and education specialists, staff who specialize in helping communities use translated scriptures well, and office/administration staff–is entirely Congolese.  Many of the staff are facilitating Bible translation work in their own mother tongues, but some also provide guidance to translation projects in other languages in northwestern DR Congo.

DR Congo is about one third of the size of the land area of the 48 contiguous states of the USA (double the size of South Africa), and has more than 200 living languages.

Life has not been easy for the people from this region. The revolution which began with the removal of Mobutu Sese Seko, who led the country from 1965, and replaced him with Laurent Kabilia in 1997 continued from then until the signing of the peace accords in 2003.  It hit this area quite hard because Mobutu’s family was from the Equateur province. The war itself is considered to be the deadliest conflict in the world since World War II.

The Equateur province was further affected in 2009 by a conflict over fishing rights which displaced about 200,000 people.

Everyone we talked to had a story about how one or both of these conflicts personally impacted them in some way.

Many of the people of this large country have been impacted by the different conflicts that have happened here. But, it’s safe to say that northwestern DR Congo has not faced the same kind of on-going violence that is still a part of the every day lives of many people in eastern DR Congo.  We were about 1200 miles from that area which gets much of the media’s attention right now.

I traveled with Maralee, who is a friend that I used to work with in Orlando, Florida.  Since the time we last worked together, she’s become fluent in French, so she served as my French interpreter for the trip and helped me with interviewing, too.

When we arrived at the ACOTBA-SUBO office they had an official welcome ceremony with official introductions, speeches, a short sermon and singing.

ACOTBA-SUBO was formed by four churches in Gemena that recognized the need to translate the Bible into the local languages of the area.  From their commitment and resources and help from the Wycliffe Global Alliance and its member and partner organizations, the organization was born. Through the cooperation of those two groups, the organization continues in its mission.

In many parts of Africa relationships are described metaphorically in familial terms.  During the introductions, it was shared that the four churches were like the mother of ACOTBA-SUBO, and Wycliffe was like their father.  They saw our visit as their father sending his sisters to encourage them.  They welcomed us as their aunties.  That made me smile.

Everywhere we went during our week in DR Congo we heard people singing.  Here’s a taste of some of the singing we enjoyed when we arrived.

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Have you ever had an experience so full and so rich it was difficult to know just where to begin when describing it to someone else?  That’s how I felt about a recent trip that I took to Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo. It’s been almost three weeks since I returned.  Now that I’ve had a chance to process everything, I want to share just a taste of what I experienced.

This trip began in Bangui, the capital of the country of Central African Republic, which is…if you haven’t guessed…right in the center of Africa.  It’s the only other country on the continent, besides the Republic of South Africa, which is the name of a geographic region as well as a country name.

I traveled to CAR with two others from South Africa.  To get there, we criss-crossed the continent from South Africa up to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in the northeast, and then over to Douala, Cameroon in the western part of central Africa, and then finally to Bangui.  It was a long trip that took two days of travel.

I only spent two days in Bangui after that.  I  met with the team that would be staying in CAR to gather stories there, and then I hopped on a small plane and headed to the city of Gemena in the Equateur province of northern Democratic Republic of Congo.

Congo… after months of planning, we had arrived.

This was just the beginning of what would be an amazing week.

More to come.

*Photos courtesy of Maralee Gutierrez.  In the photos with me are Maralee, Bolobo Obed, Goma Mbele, and our pilot, Rob.

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