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Having met at the University of Wisconsin, Adam and Christine Jeske got married and ran off to live in abject poverty in Nicaragua. El Porvenir, a mountaintop village without electricity or any water but rain, took them in as their own. While living in a small room in a barn, they helped with the village's organic coffee cooperative (see www.buildingnewhope.org for more info) and taught various adult classes, including math, Bible study, and crocheting. But this year largely allowed Adam and Chrissy to walk the path that two billion people live in today.
After a season in the US piecing together jobs teaching English, Spanish, and piano, Chrissy and Adam ventured off in a new direction. They became English teachers at Lanzhou Teachers College in northwest China with English Language Institute. During these two years, they built deep relationships with students and colleagues, had a daughter, Phoebe Joy, and received MBAs in International Economic Diversity from Eastern University.
Staying briefly in Georgia, the Jeskes lived and served at Jubilee Partners, a Christian service community (see www.jubileepartners.org). This community of people seeks to live out Christian justice, in part by working with refugees from places like Somalia and Afghanistan. Ezekiel John Jeske, called Zeke, was born in Georgia. Next up was a year for Adam as a Residence Hall Director at the University of Wisconsin--Oshkosh, near extended family. Chrissy consistently amazed Adam by dreaming up interesting activities with the two kids.
After years of searching for a spot in Africa to live with some of the world’s neediest but most God-cared-for people, Adam and Chrissy found their current home in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. In July of 2006 their family of four moved there to serve as Project Directors with Microfinance for Youth. This pilot project seeks to reach high school-aged AIDS orphans with loans of $50 to start very small businesses, so that they might stay in school and support younger siblings and extended family members.
At the end of 2007 they stepped down as microfinance directors in order to broaden the range of their activities. In the coming years they hope to see growth in the Zulu church they attend, work with High Ground (a new career guidance/leadership development program at a local Christian camp), counsel and support youth in income-generating activities, support a nearby primary school, and continue writing about lives and issues here for international magazines and papers.
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