I'm Rob Thiesfield — an ordinary bloke who heard an extraordinary call. In my early twenties, while praying one night, three words settled into my mind with a clarity I couldn't shake: South America. Africa. Asia. They didn't feel like ambition. They felt like a direction.
So I followed. I left New Zealand, circled the globe — Singapore, Hong Kong, China, Korea, Japan, Spain, Italy, Austria, Finland, the UK — and eventually landed in Argentina, where I married a beautiful Argentine woman and raised two children. Over the years I lived and worked with YWAM in Corrientes, Puerto Madryn, and Chile, doing what missionaries actually do: the ordinary, the exhausting, the occasionally absurd, and the quietly miraculous.
This site is not a highlight reel. It's a record — three eras of writing across nearly two decades — of what it looks like to actually live a life with God rather than simply attend one.
"Every day with God is an adventure." — Rob Thiesfield
Three eras · One story · Pick a chapter
The original site, built while still figuring out what "following the call" actually looked like. Leaving New Zealand, the World Trip through Asia and Europe, arriving in Argentina and encountering YWAM for the first time.
Covers the History of NZ, The Call, the full World Trip, and the first days in Buenos Aires.
Read the beginning →The name Samafas crystallised here: South America, Africa, Asia — the three continents God had spoken of years before. Stories and photos from the early years in Argentina, written in both English and Spanish.
A simpler site for a simpler time, when the adventure was still brand new.
Visit the original →776 posts across 14 years. Puerto Madryn, Corrientes, Bolivia, Uruguay, Chile. A Siambretta motorcycle. School outreaches. Wedding preps and children and the slow, beautiful grind of life on mission.
The fullest record of what the day-to-day actually looked like.
Read the blog →