Hello everyone!
We arrived in Swaziland last night and enjoyed our time in Mozambique!
We spent our time in 2 different villages and a little rest time at a resort on the Indian Ocean.
I wrote a few blogs while I was in the bush and plan to post them.
Here is a run down of our 1st day in our first “bush” experience.
We found it quite humorous, hopefully, you will too.
7:15am
– I rolled out of bed preparing for our
8:00am pick up.
7:15 – 8am
– packed up my stuff for our
8:00am pick up.
8am
– breakfast (rolls with peanut butter) with the team waiting for our
8:00am pick up.
8:15 – 9am
– I realized our
8:00am ride wasn’t coming so I read and journaled.
9:00am
–
8:00am ride still wasn’t here so we helped the local women cut reeds.
11:00am
– the
8am pick up arrives!!!
11:30am
– Three teams and all our stuff packed into one truck and trailor, and a blazer. We have learned well how to squeeze into vehicles.
We prefer the spooning method – (everyone right cheek up)
12:15pm
– We are the first team to be dropped off in the African bush.
There was much confusement and people thought that we were not safe, but we were confident it was a mix up.
We set good-bye to the rest of the teams.
It felt like saying goodbye to parents at summer camp.
12:25pm
– Time to set up camp.
A little old lady named Marie helped me carry my stuff.
She helped me set up my tent and before I knew it she was in my tent looking out at me smiling as she began arranging my stuff.
I attempted to thank her and received a great big hug with a few pats on the bum to top it off.
12:50pm
– We tried to communicate that we were going to eat our peanut butter and honey sandwiches for lunch.
We ate and Spano was pulled away to do the “manly” thing of putting up the tarp for shade.
1:15pm
– We finished lunch and noticed the women had begun shelling peanuts.
Candice, Morgan, and I offered to help.
With much giggling and excitement they let us help.
1:25 – 1:40pm
– We had finished shelling peanuts and our time was filled with awkward silence and stares with us and them muttering things under our breath and laughing to each other.
1:40pm
– a girl arrives with two covered plates of food.
We assumed it was for them since we had already eaten lunch.
Silly us!
Soon, each of us had a plate full of white rice-like mushy stuff and fish.
I was the lucky one who got the complete head of the fish on my plate.
(Yum! Yum!)
As the women sat and watched us eat intently bite after bite.
We smiled, as it was the best thing we had in a long time.
2:00 – 3:00pm
– We spent our time trying to communicate in two different languages.
Except you can only ask how to say what things are so many times.
We exchanged songs with each other.
3:00pm
– They walk over with 3 more plates of the rice like stuff and green gritty salsa to go with it.
We accept the food again with fake smiles on our faces.
3:45pm
– We walked to a home to pray for some people except when we got there, they wanted a message.
Spano did excellent at whipping something up.
4:30pm
– arrive back to “home.”
4:35pm
– Candice, Morgan, and I adventure to the bathroom for the first time.
At our location, we had what the white South Africans call a “long drop” because you straddle the hole and there is a long drop.
We figured it’s a good way to work on our leg muscles ;).
4:50pm
– On our way back, a woman was walking by with fish in her hand.
She stopped us and began taking 3 fish of her bundle.
I kept thinking to myself, “Oh geez, I’m going to have to touch these things.”
Luckily, Candice took one for the team and took them back with us.
5:30pm
– Lessons from our translator in their language, Giswa.
6:00pm – 7:30pm
– Wasted time trying to figure out what we should do.
7:30pm
– Called to dinner for guess what?
The white rice stuff and the green gritty stuff and fish again.
(We use real technical names around here.)
8:00pm
– We were ready for bed and were planning to head to sleep when we noticed more people gathering at our home.
It was then that our host, Ibilo, told us people were coming for a service tonight.
We were going to have a “programa” as they called it.
8:15pm
– I was the chosen one so I whipped up a speech about not worrying and trusting in the Lord.
It went well.
9:00pm
– We finally get to head to bed with African men sleeping outside in between all our tents.
9:15pm
– off to sleep finally!
This was only Day 1!
Actually, this bush experience has been one of my most favorite parts of the trip this far!
I loved it!
