My good friend, Ashlyn wrote a blog about things that happened in Africa. I loved the idea, so I took some of hers and wrote some of my own. Here they are:
1. Your team carries 10-12 ginormous jugs of drinking water at least 3 miles total back to the missons house.
2. The place for water to shower, cook, and wash with is at a water pump AKA the place you can get an arm workout.
4. You drive two hours once a week from the village your ministry is located for the sole purpose of finding wifi and buying your groceries for the week.
5. When you are trying to travel somewhere and your ETA doubles. Special memories involve the 12 hour bus ride from Zimbabwe to Botswana that became 24 hours.
6. You have a whole in the ground in the backyard as a toilet for a month.
7. A local has to teach you how to properly hand-wash your clothes.
8. You get made fun of by Zimbabwean kids for your weird American accent.
9. You meet some of the most warm, loving, and hospitable human beings in your entire life.
10. You have to detour your walking route when you see baboons socializing in the road.
11. You find a monkey raiding the camp kitchen.
12. You play basketball against a D-league player at the University of Botswana.
13. You eat sudsa, nsima, or pap which is all the same African staple maize meal.
14. In the middle of the night your teammate goes to the squatty potty outhouse and something pounds down on her back and shoulders as she leaves. The bricks of the outhouse just fell on top of her.
15. The stars are brilliantly bright and indescribable.
16. Most locals no matter the age are open and some even are eager to have a conversation with you whether about Jesus or the weather that day.
17. You look into the sweetest eyes of kids and experience the wild joy of them.
18. You get caught in a torrential downpour that lasts 5 minutes.
19. You fit about 19 people in a combi (basically a giant white van) that is only supposed to fit 12.
20. There are no lines. To anything. Ever.
21. A herd of adorable, overly excited children follow you around the village shouting your name “Auntie _____” or mzungu.
22. Children stare in your window all day just to watch you live your life because they think you’re really cool.
23. You end up in hundreds of selfies requested by the locals.
24. You meet people that take their education seriously and want to learn as much as they can.
25. You wear and sweat in the same long skirt multiple days in a row without washing it because it’s 1 of 2 that you own and its required every day due to cultural expectations in the Malawian village.
26. You walk around a big bus rink for 30 minutes to find the right minibus that will take you across the city.
27. Locals want to touch your hair or skin. Especially children.
28. You lose your breath trying to climb the path on the steepest hill you’ve ever seen in the woods to get to ministry in the morning at 5:30am.
29. You meet people that are living your dream. A family that lives in the bush that are wildlife management director/veterinarian who moves populations of elephants, rhinos, giraffes, bushbuck, all the African animals for a livelihood. Or the Zimbabwean/American couple that owns acres upon acres of gorgeous land with a Christian camp bringing a multitude of children closer to Christ.
30. Men ask you to marry them through the window of the bus.
31. You must sometimes pay for toilet paper or bring your own in order to use the squatty potty, stool, or Western toilet. Or you use the restroom on the side of the road. Literally in a bush.
32. You find people that are always willing to help you and be a guide to you.
33. You eat a freshly slaughtered goat for Christmas lunch or pluck the feathers of the two chickens your teammates killed for dinner.
34. You stumble upon the strangest most interesting insects and creatures.
35. You sound silly trying to pronounce the people’s unique, elegant names.
36. You jump off a bridge behind one of the greatest wonders of the world with your best friend.
37. You and your squadmate play spikeball barefoot and contract horrible parasites (hookworms) in our feet for weeks. He couldn’t walk.
38. You learn some new songs and dances that the local children teach you.
39. You are thankful for the people you have met and all that the Lord taught you in Africa.
