Blessings Blog-Following Friends!
We are overjoyed and grateful to share that God has abundantly answered prayers and we have received our van from Japan and now have it in our possession in Zimbabwe! Thank you for your prayers! We had quite an experience with getting the vehicle. I thought it would give you all a look into our lives a little bit and give you a look at how getting things done can happen here. So, here is the low down on getting our van:
On Monday we arrived in Beitbridge to begin clearing the vehicle at 8:45 am (nothing is open until 8 and nothing gets going until 8:30) so we got an early start and were optimistic of our results that day. So, we submitted the first paperwork we had to submit of the day and were told to come back after 2 hours. So, we went and had a coke and "lunch" and sat and waited for the 2 hours. Then, we went and retrieved "Lazarus" our clearing agent. So, we got our first set of papers and went down to the infamous Beitbridge Border post to get the "Returning Resident Rebate Letter" which allows me to bring the fan into Zimbabwe free of duty. They assess the duty for this vehicle at $6,799. So, that's 84% of the buying price of the van, so we knew going in, get the rebate or we can't afford to get the van. So, at 11:58 we had our paperwork and headed for the border. At 12:30 we spoke with an official who told us to wait until 2pm for a shift change so that whoever helped decide whether we were eligible for the rebate could finish the process and not have to leave half way through. So, at 2 pm we really got the process started (so at this point we have waited for an hour and a half). I went through the intervew process and they found some "problems" which we began to "sort out."
The first issue was concerning my status as a returning resident. They said they could not prove that I had been out of the country for all of the last three years. This was due to the fact that when I left the country last time I flew through South Africa and they had placed a immigration sticker on top of the "exit" stamp from Zimbabwe. After about an hour of going back and forth trying to prove when I left Zimbabwe, and at this point they were saying that was the only problem, I asked if I could pull part of the sticker up and see if the stamp was there. They agreed and I began to gently pull the corner up! Sure enough it was under the sitcker, praise God! After this, they said there was a problem with my "permanent residency reinstatement." I had previously visited the offices in the capital to make sure this was sorted out! As it turns out, they weren't happy that the stamp didn't bear the hand written insignia of "Acc RR" which stands for Accepted Returning Resident. At this point they told me to got through immigration on the other side of the building. The line was over 500 people at that point. God did a wonderful miracle though and gave us a very nice guard who had seen what was happening and pushed us to the front of the line. At that time, the immigration officer expressed her dissatisfaction with my immigration status but stamped my passport and signed it with the warning, "We will not be approving you again, if you forget.!" So, I have to remember to get it signed if I ever leave for a few years and come back. Now with the correct immmigration stamp I returned to the customs agents and entered the final process of getting our rebate. After another 3 hours they kindly gave us our rebate and we were off to get the van! So, the customs ordeal took 6 1/2 hours! But, we got the rebate so we were praising God and were delighted to be going to get the van.
Back at the stock yard it took 2 hours to get the paperwork done, and then we had to push start the van cause the battery was dead and the guy with jumper cables and battery he had were dead too! So, after some pushing and sweat, we got the van running and it was running really well! With much elation we finalized the paperwork and got on our way to the hotel we were staying at which was 48 miles from the border.
We made it to within 1.2 miles of the hotel before our tire blew out and we were sort of tossed too and frow in the road. Praise the Lord we lost the tire right at a gas station and were able to limp into a secure area to work on our tires! Well, it turns out that the spare tire wasn't the right size, didn't have the right lug nut pattern and didn't hold any air, so we were out of luck for the night, but we knew we were going to have to go back to Beitbridge to get tires. So, we left the van at this gas station/truck stop and prayed God would protect our "new" car. We finally arrived at our hotel at 11:15pm and crashed into bed for the night.
The next morning we went back to the van to get the two tires we thought were bad and take them to the border to try and find new ones. Upon further inspection we realized the van had three spit tires and bulge in the forth! If God hadn't held the other tires together we would have probably flipped the van going down the road! So, we put the van up on 4 jacks and head back to the border with all 5 tires in tow! When we got to checking at the border, there weren't 5 tires of our size (14 inche) anywhere in the entire city. So, they called in to some friends in another city to get some driven in. They said it would be noon before they arrived. So, we waited for them from 9am untl noon. Finally they arrived at 1:45pm and our tire fixing friends got us back on the road with 5 new tires! Needless to say it cost a bit to get tires driven in from 180 miles away without notice, but again, God took abundantly good care of us! An hour later we put the tires on the van and went back to the same hotel because it was too late to take off for home, only having 2 hours of daylight left! (in Zimbabwe you don't drive at night because of cows, donkeys and broken down cars that didn't make it to the side of the road.)
Finally, at 4:30 this morning we left for home, each of us very excited to see our wives and children and ready to stop traveling for a few days! It took 10 hours, cause the van has a max speed of 57miles per hour, but we made it and are very happy to be home! We feel so blessed by God's faithfulness and providence through the entire thing too! He truly gave us everything we needed and more! We have the van it is in great condition and drove 450 miles on its first long trip with absolutely no problems (not to mention it is HOT!) I am very tired but glad to be home and very blessed to have been successful in getting a vehicle! The Lord had me reading the story of the persistent widow before going into the ordeal at Customs on Monday, so I feel doubly blessed by the way He prepared me before hand to be persistent, patient and focussed on Jesus through the entire process! That you for your prayers, they have been answered! God is good and gracious and worthy of all praise!
There will be more posts soon!
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