I love coffee, so after 7 months of mostly instant, you can imagine the pure joy I had when a squad mate’s mom brought her an Aeropress (like a French press) when our parents visited us in Ireland. I’ll probably get wrinkles from that smile. However, let’s not get ahead of ourselves, we are still Racers after all…too bad my efforts to stretch out the coffee grounds I’m sharing with two squadmates doesn’t also stretch the chemistry of flavor. I really like getting punched in the taste buds, and this was like a tap on the shoulder you could even mistake feeling in the first place.
I already feel like I have lived here in Dragonastri-Oti, Romania, and it’s only day one. Racers have a system. In groups of 2 or more: find an ATM, use correct conversion rate, find grocery store and target the same exact items we have narrowed down after months of limited options/control/or freshness: fruits, veggies, liquid milk, yogurt, eggs, chocolate, a carbohydrate, a protein), figure out the non-English washing machine, hang clothes between other squadmates’ clothes whilst keeping an eye out for the wild dogs, and drink plenty of filtered water – because yesterday was a travel day…so you can infer the rest. I’m a nurse, so I’m not blushing.
Our original route was supposed to have arrived in Nepal now, and next month India. Here we are in Romania instead, and next month, will be Albania.
The drive from Moldova west to Romania was the second prettiest drive of the Race. I made a mental order of the prettiness. The first? Johannesburg to Cape Town. The third? The Northern Irish countryside. The fourth? Entering Cambodia from Thailand.
There’s this certain feeling us Racers have during the transitions. We travel as a herd, but we’ve collected stories and moments that belong to each team, and to us individually. We are a group of 33, but we’ve experienced each country differently, grown uniquely. It’s this undocumented place between a place of leaving to a place of arrival where I feel I have to split my thinking, my prayers, between two places. A closure and a beginning.
This feeling occurs also in that team meeting where we hear for the first time where we will live, who with, what our ministry will be, we get briefed on the culture, and safety concerns. Like here in Romania, we “can’t look wild dogs in the eye”, or “walk left out of our building due to previous Racers having dead rats thrown at them”. Maybe this is why they call it “missions”, it feels like we are being prepped for a mission – the unknown that we will enter in the immediate future. We often arrive somewhere new knowing next to nothing about it, not for lack of preparation, but because this is the way the Race is designed. We are flexible people now. Hire us. We also may bow unintentionally and say a Thai thank-you even though we are definitely not in Asia anymore…Still hire us, we are funny.
Month 10 though. I didn’t anticipate being one of the “tired” ones on the squad, but what I am feeling is not the “tired” I was expecting.
Racers might ask if I am a “spiritual tired”. No, God’s been true to His word and has met me on the Race, and because of His presence, I am spiritually stronger.
Am I am an emotional tired? No. I haven’t had a lot of relational ministry the last number of weeks, and I haven’t cried in a while/felt like I’ve needed to.
Physically tired? No. I am young and resilient, so I assume my body can hold up under these conditions month after month. I have had enough adequate sleep, we haven’t had real time changes for a while, and I am maximizing our healthy options out here.
Eating enough protein? Probably not. Meat is rare these days. But I’ve resorted to mass quantities of chick peas.
Mentally tired? No. This is nothing like getting my degree or going to work.
On the Race I have contrasted life out here to life at home and have concluded that home is more demanding. The first world would understand the demands of home. And I tend to find my worth in others’ opinions of me, so therefore I put value on my life at home.
But I think I have misjudged.
It’s a different kind of demanding out here.
There’ll be times I’ll be in love with my squad, and then moments like just yesterday where I am dodging the busier places of our living quarters…I decide the kitchen is probably the worst, so I sit outside next to a pail of dirty water, but my perch is next to the door and people are arriving back home from the grocery store and offering me greetings while I try to comprehend the book I am reading…so I walk into the unknowns of the backyard, and sit on a palate, making sure I don’t get tetanus. It’s nice. Then the laundry machine is finished and people stroll out to hang their clothes, and they take notice of their surroundings and offer inclusive comments of “awwww look at all the fluffy bunnies in those cages, I didn’t know were out here, wow they smell, aww, look Alana, aren’t they soooo cu-“…so then I go to my room. The one place I never go when it’s not time to sleep is my bed, but I figured it’s an exceptional time to make an exception. I open the door to find half of my 7 roommates in there, and, low and behold, another one, also trying to find solitude…sitting literally right beside my tiny sleeping space. You’ve got to be kidding me. I go out to the hot deck, it’s nice out there and all, just can’t continue reading on my kindle app because we have made a pact to not have electronics within the visual field from the street here in our Romanian town. So I sit and follow cars up and down the street; an Audi, a Volkswagon, a communist “piece”, a bike, and then a horse-drawn carriage. I’m not kidding. The horse’s hooves actually sound really wonderful. It’s hot though, so I decide to shower because no one will bother me in the shower. I used to think the same about the toilet – but nope, that’s not the case at all. So I collect all my shower items from around the friend who’s sitting in my space, because simple tasks are not simple on the Race, and I find a shower that’s empty. I hang up every single thing by their tiny little tags on the tiny little hooks I am thankful for, because it makes showering in the equivalent of closets much easier…all to hear my friends talk about doing a workout soon. So back on the clothes go, and I go workout. Handstands make me happier anyway.
You know what I was thinking about? Maybe this “tiredness” won’t go away. Maybe this is how things will be until completion of the Race. Then again, maybe things won’t be like this, but there is no way of knowing. So here’s a point of decision. Wish me luck.
Better yet ;), would you mind pausing before you close this window and pray for us? There are 4 squads with 2 months left. We have no personal space, but we have big hearts for each other and for the people we meet.
Why am I here in Romania?
We’ll have to see.
