Tonight there may be close to 1,000 more people in Hamilton than were here yesterday. There are around 6,000 people who reside in the Hamilton area (which is why we qualified for a Walmart yaaaay!). The reason for this nearly 20% overnight population increase is due a youth/young adult ministry here in Hamilton. This is my initial connection to Hamilton and why I’ve traveled here in the past. The ministry I currently work for moved here last year because their children were here  and they were involved with the ministry. There are often large conference over a weekend and people come from all over the United States, but mainly this region. I did see more license plates from out of state today than any other time living in Hamilton.  I remember being in a conference here this summer on my birthday actually where I saw someone I knew from Tulsa. I was praying over some young people when I spotted this guy staring at me with a confused expression. He was absolutely shocked to see me in this tiny town. He had seen me with young adults at my church in Tulsa but he wondered what on earth I was doing here in the middle of no where. We talked afterwards and he explained that he and one of his brothers were in Hamilton for a couple of weeks helping their dad with a work project just outside the city. The hotel they were staying at informed them that they would not have any available rooms over the weekend. You can imagine this family’s surprise at such a remark in a small town. They began to ask questions and found out “some Christian gathering of young people” was up the road. So my friend stopped by and saw me! It was quite funny, but it is like God to show up in a powerful way in a small hidden town.

Today was eventful when the rain shut down the Internet at my office. I’ve experienced rain shutting down the Internet in Madagascar when my boyfriend calls me, but again…I am still in America. Just the other day I heard this question from the other end of the phone, “Do you hear that rain?….” Click and the phone call was dropped.  I was able to resume working at my home and the Internet came on a couple of hours later.

I think that the country dogs out here realized that they gave me too much of a break yesterday so they decided to multiply today. There were two outside of my office today, one around the corner from my house, and of course good ole Coco was in my friend’s garage. I attached a video of him for you below. He is growing on me. He also lives in my friend’s garage right now. He is a handsome dog and has grown so much over the past couple of weeks since he bit me. I also saw a cat outside my door tonight. Have I mentioned that I am NOT a cat person? Although I’d rather encounter them when I’m out running than all these dogs.

Last thing for tonight is that I have officially adapted to the open doors culture here in HamaBama. I have been getting multiple letters and packages a day, mostly of things to take to Africa. It  has been the easiest thing to have stuff sent to my friend’s home verses a PO Box since no one knew my current address (I still don’t know it haha)! Tonight I went out to my car and on my front seat was a stack of things that came in the mail. I laughed out loud because not only had I left my car unlocked, but my friend thought to check if my car was unlocked to leave my mail there. That made a total of 5 pieces of mail that came today! All but one was a surprise to me haha! We’ll see how much of my stuff I can actually bring to Africa. This is fine with me because it just means I’ll have more room to bring home fun things from Africa. Any requests? I know what you are all thinking…you’d rather have something from Hamilton right? ;-)

Goodnight!