{"id":495,"date":"2007-06-01T09:24:48","date_gmt":"2007-06-01T09:24:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html"},"modified":"2007-06-01T09:24:48","modified_gmt":"2007-06-01T09:24:48","slug":"arrival-in-afri","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html","title":{"rendered":"Arrival in Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>After a very long plane ride, we arrived in Joburg two days ago. The kids were really great on the plane. The only issue was that Hudson would only sleep when we were holding him! So, mom and dad were wiped out, but we made it!<\/p>\n<p>We stayed the night in Alabanza, a missionary training center, outside of Pretoria, South Africa. It was very cold and we had one portable heater to share for the 7 of us (it&#8217;s winter here). Hudson was fast asleep, but woke up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at 1:30am. He screamed until 5:00! Last night, he was so exhausted, he slept through the night.<\/p>\n<p>Today we were at our first care-point called, Thulwane. You may remember this from the <a href=\"http:\/\/tomdavis.typepad.com\/tom_daviss_blog\/2007\/03\/pizza_and_banan.html\">Pizza and Bananas Video<\/a> from the last time I was in Swaziland. The team had an incredible time with the kids. We were able to outfit every single one of them in a brand new pair of clothes. Emily was heading up the &quot;Extreme Makeover&quot; team and it was a raging success. Thanks for your prayers! Video to come, so stay in tune!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/tomdavis.typepad.com\/.shared\/image.html?\/photos\/uncategorized\/2007\/06\/01\/p6010020.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"280\" height=\"210\" border=\"0\" src=\"https:\/\/tomdavis.typepad.com\/tom_daviss_blog\/images\/2007\/06\/01\/p6010020.jpg\" alt=\"P6010020\" style=\"margin: 0px 5px 5px 0px;float: left\" \/><\/a><br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After a very long plane ride, we arrived in Joburg two days ago. The kids were really great on the plane. The only issue was that Hudson would only sleep when we were holding him! So, mom and dad were wiped out, but we made it! We stayed the night in Alabanza, a missionary training&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":87,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-africa"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Arrival in Africa - Red Letters<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Arrival in Africa - Red Letters\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"After a very long plane ride, we arrived in Joburg two days ago. The kids were really great on the plane. The only issue was that Hudson would only sleep when we were holding him! So, mom and dad were wiped out, but we made it! We stayed the night in Alabanza, a missionary training&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Red Letters\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2007-06-01T09:24:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/tomdavis.typepad.com\/tom_daviss_blog\/images\/2007\/06\/01\/p6010020.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Tom Davis\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Arrival in Africa - Red Letters","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Arrival in Africa - Red Letters","og_description":"After a very long plane ride, we arrived in Joburg two days ago. The kids were really great on the plane. The only issue was that Hudson would only sleep when we were holding him! So, mom and dad were wiped out, but we made it! We stayed the night in Alabanza, a missionary training&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html","og_site_name":"Red Letters","article_published_time":"2007-06-01T09:24:48+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/tomdavis.typepad.com\/tom_daviss_blog\/images\/2007\/06\/01\/p6010020.jpg"}],"author":"Tom Davis","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html","name":"Arrival in Africa - Red Letters","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/tomdavis.typepad.com\/tom_daviss_blog\/images\/2007\/06\/01\/p6010020.jpg","datePublished":"2007-06-01T09:24:48+00:00","dateModified":"2007-06-01T09:24:48+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/#\/schema\/person\/c78d22af30aa2e0860a621fadf855b92"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/tomdavis.typepad.com\/tom_daviss_blog\/images\/2007\/06\/01\/p6010020.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/tomdavis.typepad.com\/tom_daviss_blog\/images\/2007\/06\/01\/p6010020.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/2007\/06\/arrival-in-afri.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Arrival in Africa"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/","name":"Red Letters","description":"Christian, Christian Inspiration, Christian News, Christian Activism News","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/#\/schema\/person\/c78d22af30aa2e0860a621fadf855b92","name":"Tom Davis","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/b5c\/b5c5842c5b6dd6c51062873d0bb1dfafx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/b5c\/b5c5842c5b6dd6c51062873d0bb1dfafx96.jpg","caption":"Tom Davis"},"description":"Tom Davis currently serves as CEO of Children's HopeChest (www.hopechest.org), a global orphan care ministry headquartered in Colorado Springs. A tireless advocate for fatherless children, Davis has spent most of his adult life calling U.S. believers to become the hands and feet of Jesus Christ to the 143 million orphans living around the world. Through those connections, thousands of orphans now have the bright and hopeful future--one that is filled with opportunities and the love of the one true Father. Davis speaks hundreds of times each year at churches and conferences, mobilizing the church to action on behalf of the poor. He is the author of four books. His most recent novel, SCARED is a fictionalized account of his first-hand experiencing living and working with orphans in Swaziland, Africa. Davis' blog is the premier resource for the latest developments in Christian orphan ministry. Davis also currently teaches courses as adjunct professor at George Fox University in Newberg, OR. When not traveling the globe, Davis resides in the mountains of Colorado in the small community of Palmer Lake. He and his wife Emily have seven children, including two adopted daughters from Russia.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/author\/tdavis"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/87"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/redletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}