Across the dirt street from Elvis and Beta’s house stands a tiny two room school painted a cheery yellow color. The school yard is a flat rock and dirt patch of earth overlooking Beta’s potato and corn fields on one side and running up to the steep terrace of another corn field six or seven feet above.

Strung across this flat patch of earth, held up by two large tree branches, wire, and lots of string, is a volleyball net. And it is here where we come every night to play volleyball with the guys in the village.

On the World Race, sometimes you host asks you to do something that doesn’t really seem like “ministry” but friends if I’ve learned anything this year it’s that anything done in the name and in the love of God is indeed ministry. And also to just trust your host in all things.

Thus, I find myself the first night we’re here in the village ready to go play. Then I noticed it was a group of men, not a woman in sight, and I actually got super intimidated. Ministering to groups of men is still highly uncomfortable for me. I asked Beta about it and she told me in Shëngjergj, most girls and women stay in their homes, meaning we really don’t see many women around… ever.

So it’s our first day in the village and this group of guys, most of them falling somewhere between the ages of sixteen to thirty, thinks it’s hilarious to play volleyball with the Americans. Soon, however, they realize that we aren’t exactly the most seasoned volleyball players, especially us girls.

Listen, I played volleyball for fun all the time in University, but that’s not playing for a couple hours every single day like these guys do; I’m a good player, they are all amazing players. Slowly, the ball gets passed to us less and less and soon most of us are standing around not doing a whole lot.

Daiva, Bliz, and Rashidat didn’t play much after that first day, opting instead for playing with the kids in the village and stepping in occasionally for a game or two here or there. Walker and Joshua kept playing, and they soon found a place with the Albanians. It helped that they were guys, I think.

And then there’s me.

Like I said, I really, really enjoy playing volleyball, but I didn’t have place on the team here. They let me stand on the court, but every time the ball got hit to me, one of the Albanians would jump in front of me and get it instead.

In the beginning, I wanted to be all angry about it. I actually didn’t play one day because I assumed they were all just being sexist or something and changing a whole group of men’s minds about whether women should play volleyball or not wasn’t something I wanted to undertake.

With this sour attitude, on our fourth or fifth day there, I’m sitting with Beta having coffee before the guys come to play.

“You know they don’t mean anything by not letting you hit the ball, right?” She asks, almost reading my mind.

“I know.”

“Really, they do it to everyone.” She sips her coffee and looks at me with a twinkle in her eye. “You should push them if they try to get in your way. That’s what they do to each other.”

Beta is a HUGE trickster and loves telling jokes. Sometimes the language barrier makes it hard to tell what’s a joke and what she really means.

“Beta…” I say, giving her a look.

“What? Try it and see what happens. I’m serious. If you want to play, play like they do.”

I finish my coffee turning her strange advice over in my head. I broke it down like this; here was my host telling me to go play volleyball for ministry and push over the people I’m ministering too when they won’t let me have the ball. Hmm. Okay.

We set up for a game and Kejsi, one of the teenagers of the group and one who doesn’t intimidate me so much because I teach him in English class, calls me over to his side of the net. The ball is served a handful of times and then one comes right to me, I rush up ready to set it and—Kastro runs right up next to me.

Nope, not today.

I check him with my hip and slide in with enough time to set the ball up. Kejsi spikes it down and gets ups the point.

Kastro looks at me with his mouth hanging open and I shrug. Adi and Edi, two of my volleyball teammates who are highly animated, are both going “ohhhhhhh!” and pointing at Kastro. Kejsi smiles, smacks Kastro on the back of the head and says something to him in Albanian while pointing to me.

Kastro smirks and says, “Okay, American.”

Over the next few days I had to throw a few more pushes to assert myself on the court. I also learned the value of yelling when someone gets in your way. Yeah, I still get the ball stolen out from before me all the time, but now it’s usually me plus a couple Albanians yelling about it. I’ve got friends on the court now who even have let me serve for a couple of games here and there.

Volleyball has been a weird form of ministry for me, but one that’s also been healing for me in getting over my intimidation of men. Now these guys are brothers, teammates. And when we have nightly bible study with them, it feels like gathering with family.