5:45am, time to wake up. Naturally, my alarm goes off to Kanye West’s “Good Morning.” I struggled hard trying to turn my alarm off and roll out of my tent simultaneously (However, this is something that I’ve now mastered). I stumbled across the cement floor to what I needed most at that point, coffee. I filled up my cup and got ready while trying not to wake any of the other racers that were spread out across the floor.
6:20 comes and I joined my team outside at the bus stop. As we were standing outside I broke the silence and finally asked my team if they had any idea what we were about to do. They replied, “We don’t really know, but a woman is supposed to come pick us up from this spot in the next few minutes.” I’m thinking, “Welp, this is hilarious.” Soon, we found the woman that was told to pick up “the group of white people” and we were off.
By 7:40 we had gotten off the bus and walked to another bus stop. We boarded another bus to who knows where. Having no idea where we were and not being able to talk to our contact we just clung on for the ride.
8:20 comes and we’ve gotten off the bus only to walk to another bus stop. At this point I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to know where we were going, so the game of charades with our Spanish speaking contact began. After multiple awkward faces and dance moves our contact told us we were going to a hospital. I was pretty excited. A hospital huh? Let’s do this.
By 9:00 we had boarded a third bus and arrived at our destination. We started walking and soon we found ourselves in one of the poorest streets I had ever seen. Earlier we were warned not to bring any valuables because of the danger of the area we were entering. Words and phrases were being shouted at the women on our team that our translator refused to translate. Streets consisted of mud and concrete slabs. Homes had mud floors, and cats and dogs roamed wherever looking for anything solid to eat.
We broke off into two groups and our group followed the contact. We walked uphill on a “street” about three feet wide. After walking for several minutes our contact looked back at us and gently said “this way” while signaling with her hand. We turned down a narrow mud walkway between houses built of sticks and tin. After about 40 feet we slipped through a small fence and into one of these enclosures. As we walked through the door we were met by one of the worst smells anyone could have ever imagined. The mud floor was smooth from being consistently walked on. To my left was one bed with a teenage boy sleeping in it. Soon after we entered three other boys emerged from another room and joined us. No parents were present during our time there. Our contact asked us to take a seat and our only option was the floral couch that was in such bad shape a landfill would reject it. But we sat.
One of the boys sat down with a workbook and started talking with our contact. He started filling in blanks and reading sentences. Our contact then asked him a question. The 10 year old boy went into the other room and returned seconds later with a bible. At first I didn’t recognize that it was a bible. It didn’t have covers. The corners were bent and torn. The binding was falling off. At one point he went to Psalms and the entire book fell from the binding into his other hand. His bible was worn, and it wasn’t because he threw it around. It was because he loved it. He soaked it up. He didn’t have a shirt for everyday of the week, but he had a bible that he used everyday of the week, every morning that he woke up, every time he had a meal, every time he made it home from school and he didn’t get robbed, and every time he thought about everything he was blessed with.
With three Americans sitting in his tin home he still knew that he had more than all three of us combined.
“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” -Matthew 13:44
Thanks for reading.
P.S. – I still don’t know why she told us we were going to a hospital, haha.
