This blog is a fun little story about white water rafting and the cow that tricked me. Tuesday morning, we got up at 1 a.m. to travel to Malaybalay. We knew that we had some sort of surprise waiting for us; and, after getting off the plane at 5:35 a.m. we discovered that we were going white water rafting. Right then. On, like, 3 hours of sleep.
Now, white water rafting would normally be an activity for our day off. But, because Malaybalay is 3-4 hours away from the rafting, and the rafting is close to the airport, our leaders decided to surprise us with an adventure as soon as we landed. (Which is great because now we can do something else awesome on our next day off!)
I would like to tell you that I was totally up for it, but I really, REALLY was not! I’ve noticed that so much travelling makes my tummy a little queasy, I was tired, and when you add those things to the fact that I felt like I was struggling to connect with my team and missing my friends back home, you can understand. I was trying my hardest to stay positive, but, I know my face said “grrrrr, I’m miserable.”
God knew I was struggling, and he used the trip to bring me joy, despite my grumbling spirit. First of all, Mindanao is gorgeous. Second of all, this island is where a GIANT croc was captured a few weeks ago (google it, you’ll see)!- we weren’t anywhere near where that happened and I didn’t see any reptiles larger than a small iguana, but the whole idea made me laugh. (Especially when we got out of the raft to swim in the river!)
Now, the cow: We were approaching rapids, and there was a cow grazing right next to the river. I found the whole idea very funny and was like, “hey guys, look at the cow!!!”- and promptly got propelled out of the boat by the rapids that everybody else was (wisely) paying attention to. Oops!
I immediately thought back to our little safety talk before the rafting started. It could be summarized as “stay calm, grab the boat, and, if you’re really really far away from the boat, then, we’ll throw you a rope.” (I remember thinking at that point that I’d be really annoyed if I got knocked out of the boat and had to be towed in by a rope. Ha!) Christin almost grabbed my hand, but, the rapids separated us too quickly. So, there I am, ingesting large amounts water and realizing that the raft was nowhere near me. Fortunately, our very adept rope-throwing rafting guides were on it, and, within seconds I had the rope in hand and was being towed in.
It was the most fun I’d had all day. I’m not looking to go too deeply into this, but, God knew that silly cow would amuse me and distract me. And he also knew that I would love being knocked around in the river, even if I didn’t think so leading up to it. In God’s math, Cow + River = Happy Rebecca. So, he made it happen. Awesome.
Immediately after my adventure we stopped to have a snack (which also equals Happy Rebecca, btw) and then did something even more awesome: jumped off a cliff into the river. The scariest part, honestly, was climbing up the makeshift bamboo ladder, which was a singular sturdy piece of bamboo with nubs where stems used to be to use as footholds. Okay, jumping was scary too, but totally worth it! I’m realizing as I write this that I might not have jumped off the cliff if I hadn’t already been knocked into the river. God is so good, and I’ll take a little knocking around if that’s what needs to happen to be joyful!
