At the beginning of the year, I was curious: how many beds would I sleep in this year? How many times would I have a hot shower? How many borders would I cross? So, I decided to keep lists of all the World Race facts and figures I could think of.
As the year went on, I realized that some of the items weren’t so black and white. I mean, does it take a trip to the hospital or just a head cold to constitute “being sick?” (I decided it required fear and misery.) Or what about “Borders Crossed?” The bridge over Victoria Falls is in both Zambia and Zimbabwe, so should I count each time I jumped back and forth over the line painted on it? (Why not?) Can I say I entered a new country if that new country (Mozambique) rejected us and sent us back to Malawi? (I have no idea.)
Anyway, I hope these numbers help give you an interesting glimpse of my Race. Enjoy!
Hours on long distance buses: 260 (that’s almost 11 days!)
Hours on a plane: 66
Borders crossed: 23 or 50, if you count me stepping on either side of this sign on the bridge in front of Victoria Falls:
Countries I set foot in (not counting airports): 15: Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, Albania, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Kosovo, Italy, Zambia, Malawi, Mozambique, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia, United States.
Currencies used: 12
Most people fit in a 15-passenger van: 26
Stamps in my passport before the Race: 6
Stamps in my passport after the Race: 41
My backpack’s weight at the start: 38 pounds
My backpack’s weight now: 45 pounds
Months I slept in my tent: 3
Months I slept outside: 1
Places I slept in: 27. Check out some of them below!
Locations featured, from top left: La Ermita, Honduras; Tirana, Albania, Cape Maclear, Malawi; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Mzuzu, Malawi; Phnom Penh, Cambodia; Beira, Mozambique; Sofia, Bulgaria; Lusaka, Zambia; Antigua, Guatemala; Blantyre, Malawi; Lilongwe, Malawi.
Got miserably sick: 2
Colors my hair has been: 3 (brown, red, and purple)
Dreadlocks I have now: 1
Sticks of deodorant lost: 3
Hot showers: 60 or so
Times I was electrocuted by a hot shower: 1
Times I watched King Kong: 4
Times I watched How to Train Your Dragon: 5
Monkey movies (movies featuring monkeys with starring or supporting roles): 9
Times I used a dishwasher: 3
Times I was a dishwasher: lost count
Times I walked more than a mile to get internet: lost count
Ate rice: lost count. (Why did I even try to keep track of this?)
New foods tried: lost count
Sugar free sodas consumed: 6
Times I ate bugs on purpose: 2
Times I ate bugs because I was too lazy to pick them out of my food: lost count
Belongings lost, given, or stolen: lost count
Double rainbows I saw: 7
Times I preached a sermon: 13
Times I was offered a husband: 8
Books I read: 17
Times I washed my clothes in a machine: 25
People I’ve been on a team with: 21
Languages I’ve worshipped in: 12 (English, Spanish, Farsi, Bulgarian, Bemba, Nyanja, Chichewa, Tombuka, Khmer, Bahasa, Tamil, Burmese)
Wonders of the World we saw: 3 (the Colosseum in Rome, Victoria Falls in Zambia, Angkor Wat in Cambodia)
Days spent on the Race: 319
Days left on the Race: 0
