We were seated right in front behind the speakers and director of the school (not by choice). The entire thing was done in Amharic which is a language not even close to Arabic, meaning that everything took twice as long (when they used an interpreter, sometimes they just stuck with Amharic) and was a little difficult to follow. We were pretty surprised when our friend got up and rendered a fantastic speech as the valedictorian. When it was time for the presentation of the certificates we found that we had forgotten something. You see, none of us have ever been to a graduation like this before and we didn't realize that you were supposed to bring huge fake flower necklaces or tinsel or really anything bright and tacky to hang around their necks. The whole ceremony was really great, everyone clapped through the whole presentation, like 30 minutes straight, and it was truly a celebration. Usually I really dislike graduations; they're long and boring and you go just to see one person walk across the stage for like 15 seconds. But in Africa graduations are a huge celebration and definitely much better than our boring American ones, although they do still wear the same goofy hats.
Really the thing that struck me the most about this graduation was the service that was held before. It was really a privilege to be in a service with people fleeing persecution because of their beliefs. I've gotten used to going to weekly gatherings with Africans. At first it seemed so different; now I love the way that they express their love to God. But there was something so very different about the way these people worshiped and it was really a blessing to experience worship with them. I couldn't understand the words that they were singing but I could feel the passion and love in their hearts and it was pretty much indescribable.
No comments:
Post a Comment