Our last month in Africa. Back in Swaziland. And
in the interest of being completely transparent with you guys, I’m not gonna
lie… those were some rough weeks. Our list of projects was super small to
begin with and with 13 people in one place, said list vanished pretty quickly.
Since we were not in walking distance (no, not even “world race walking
distance”) to anything or really anyone else, we got to sit inside the
caged fence of our property and just wait. For what? We didn’t know. But alas,
we made it through the tough stuff and I think even accomplished a few things.
Yay! There are some photos below to prove it.
Do you know me? If so you’ll know that I love a
good number of things, including finding the positive side of any situation and
creating a well-made list (but hell, let’s be honest, I even love a poorly made
list… which brings us to the following)
things that went RIGHT during my last month in
Africa
we had running water for several days at a time
before it unexpectedly went away
transportation was never more than 4 hours late
(and even in that statement, i use ‘late’ as a very relative term)
learned how to cook/eat/enjoy a potato
approximately 37 different ways
the mice that shared our huts with us didn’t
bring TOO many friends with them
the thorns that constantly punctured our skin
weren’t poisonous (or at least, we don’t think so…)
ramen noodles became the definition of a
satisfying meal
free wi-fi was only a 1 hour van ride and a 10
rand cup of coffee away
found that eating sniggles in mass quantities
all month only adds about 7 lbs to your total body weight
half the shovels were broken before we got
there, so we technically didn’t break all of them!
listening prayers were a heck of a lot easier
when there was literally nothing else to do
found out by personal experience that not all
african bee stings are fatal… score!
for me, being required to wear a skirt when it’s
hot out is like being told that you have to be comfortable. deal.
coke from a glass bottle just tastes better
we didn’t set an orphanage on fire
Alright, so honestly, it wasn’t the best month
of my life, but that’s OK because I know that it is the bad months in life that
make you appreciate the great ones even more! (yeah, I actually think of life
entirely in terms of months now… no weeks, seasons or years necessary,
because obviously everything about your world changes after each month. thanks
for that healthy new long-term perspective, WR)
A few details on Swazi Round 2: We lived at
Thembeni Care Point in a blue circle hut about an hour outside of Manzini,
Swaziland. This Care Point provides a multipurpose building, community soccer
field and 2 meals a day for children all throughout the area. Some of the kids
that came to us walked 1-2 hours just to have something to eat after school. So
we spent our time loving them, playing games with them and also helping with
some construction projects on the property.
Aaaaaaaaand now it’s photo time 🙂
