So it’s the end of January, I’ve spent the last month of my life in Seronga Botswana on the edge of the bush, with plenty of time to think and journal. It’s halfway through the race, 6 countries visited, 6 cultures experienced, and only 5 more to go. I then came to realise that I’ve only written 4 blogs over this time, and thats not to say that there have not been any stories to tell over the last 6 months. More often than not I start to try and tell the stories that are in my mind and then get stuck, there’s more half written blog entries in my journal than I care to count, and endless lists of blog titles that I’ve forgotten about.
So what goes wrong? I start and then I give up half way through; I have often just thought that I’m too lazy and too distracted to get anything done, but this month I realised that it goes much deeper than that. I struggle to finish any of my blogs because I struggle to put my emotions, feelings and experiences into words that feel adequate enough to fully give insight into what I have experienced over the last 6 months. They feel too small, inaccurate and unworthy of being able to encapsulate the moment I was trying to recreate in words. But this month I realised that no one really knows what I have been doing or experiencing, people who have supported me have little to no idea what fruit their contribution has yielded; I realised that being scared of my writings not being good enough wasn’t fair. I realised I need to start at least trying to share my experiences, and let everyone else decide if they’re good enough. Although I still don’t feel like I can fully achieve this I have realised that even a poor attempt at explaining and describing the last 6 months is better than pretending nothing happened. So here’s a little snapshot of my thoughts and feelings that I felt my words were too inadequate to describe over the last 6 months, hopefully this will help bring you up to date on what my race has been like.
A short and incomplete list of things that I wish I had said:
How beautiful the starry sky was driving from Romania to Bulgaria, and the awestruck wonder it inspired in my heart for the Lords creation.
How the Bible started to become clearer and more tangible as I pursued God’s word every morning whilst watching the sunrise and drinking tea in Bulgaria.
The joy that MariClaire and I experienced when teaching English and Maths to kids in Bulgaria.
The way that personal prayer became a daily occurrence in Macedonia, when my team sat together in silence every morning talking to Jesus cultivating a personal, conversational relationship with him.
How proud I was when I managed to buy the team bus tickets by myself in Macedonia.
The unexplainable joy I felt when I arrived in Zambia and found marmite.
The strange echoes of home that exist in Africa that have been such a comfort to me as time goes on and home feels so distant at times.
How fully and completely gripped by fear I was when I first sat in a hammock, now people can’t keep me out of them!
Being able to lead a group of young people in Zambia, in a session on self worth and identity in Christ and being able to hear their testimonies of how God is working in their lives.
That time we lived in the bush for a month and had to drive 3 hours and take a ferry to get to the supermarket.
The moment when my squad leader realised ‘old bean’ is a nickname/ term of endearment in the UK (according to the kindle dictionary), and we haven’t really used each others names since.
Having a Birthday in Africa and being so incredibly well loved and celebrated by my squad mates, and getting a knee-pit burn in my new shorts. (Don’t worry I’m pretty sure there will be a blog to come about that one.)
Now this list is my no means all inclusive, there are so many experiences that I haven’t listed here, but I hope that this will at least give you a taste of what’s been happening.
