There are eleven of us (teams Jubilee and Valor) living in a former primary school building, situated in the middle of the Mita neighborhood in Livingstone, Zambia. We have running water, two toilets, a sink, a two burner stove, a night guard, and a chest freezer.
Every morning, I wake up between 6:10 and 6:30 to have quiet time and coffee (Zambian grown and roasted, liquid gold). By 7:40, the whole gang is up, sunscreened, bug-sprayed, ready to go –and in a nearly single file line, we head past Namatama field, through Mita market, to the Maramba Old People’s home, the cries of “Mzungu! (white man!)” following us as we go.
Our mornings are spent serving breakfast, sweeping rooms, mopping floors, raking leaves, and clearing and cleaning dishes. Once we’re finished with the work, we mill around, greeting each of the elderly. For the most part, they speak good English. We talk about their lives before coming to the home, how long they’ve been there. Last week, a few of my squadmates and I brought out instruments and held mini concerts for each group of elderly. They love to listen to “Jesus songs,” to hear about where we’re from, what we’re doing here. They love to have the bible read aloud. The grounds are like a sanctuary, but to say that ministry with the elderly is easy –to both be a part of and to simply witness- is a sophistry. Everyone inside the home is there because their families either cannot or will not care for them. They’re stubborn. Some of them have to be wrestled into the showers. Most of them are living in warm, concrete rooms that smell of urine and mold, barely able to move themselves between their bed and the doorway. They sit in silence all day long, the monotony of their lives broken only by the small work they’re able to do: ropemaking, twisting and twining pieces of plastic bags into 14 meters of rope to sell at the market for 5 kwatcha ($0.50) Even so, there is joy in their smiles. They are so genuinely pleased that we are there with them, that the joy is contagious. The workers of the home say that we have dirty hands, hands that aren’t afraid to do work along with them.
In the afternoons, we walk through mud filled streets from our house to a field a mile and a half away. As we go (usually chanting some form of “we’re going to the field, we’re going to the field!” while carrying a soccer ball), we managed to wrangle up somewhere between 10 and 40 kids for sports ministry: a mixture of warm-ups, stretches, football (aka soccer), a bible story, and songs. We run around in the afternoon heat until we are collectively (kids included) exhausted, before walking homeward with our entourage –usually two to three kids clinging to each hand. We eventually have to shake them free and tell them, “Milo, milo! (tomorrow, tomorrow!)” It’s become an afternoon tradition to pick up fritters as we pass through the market (Zach and I have gotten real good fritter shopping, you shouldn’t be paying any more than .50 kwatcha for a big one no matter what the 12 year old selling it to you says)
We eat dinner sitting on the floor of our living space. On Fridays, we study Luke (we’ve been reading it backwards, starting with the resurrection and leading up to Jesus’s birth on Christmas Eve) On Sundays, we have worship and open feedback between both teams living in the house. We have a wall with mailboxes: envelopes in which we put encouraging notes to each other. We have house rules (don’t complain about the heat, don’t complain about the bugs, live in open feedback, etc.) We have a “Christmas is Ruined” list (yours truly ruined it first: broke the broom trying to kill a massive moth on the kitchen wall). We have a war room set aside specifically for prayer. We worship as a house when it rains, when we’re discouraged, when we feel like it, and every time in between.
This month has been everything I ever imagined the Race would be. We’ve had real community. We’ve seen difficult things, experienced it together, and worked through it. Together. We’ve walked miles through rain and blistering heat. We’ve driven into town practically sitting on each other’s laps piled into a 14-seater van with 19 other people. We’ve watched some of the most incredible lightening shows in the endless African sky. We’ve sat on the porch in the evening and sang Christmas carols with the neighbor kids. We’ve napped in our hammocks in the afternoon heat. We’ve danced in the pouring rain.
