I Lived to Tell About It

Our last ministry stop in Africa was Beira, Mozambique. The whole squad, minus Cori, Tiffany and
William, who stayed behind in Malawi because Cori and Tiffany came down with
Malaria the day before we were to leave Malawi, went to Beira to spend our last
two weeks with a woman by the name of Mama Rita, an incredible woman with an
incredible story.

 

After Malawi, I was tired. I felt physically, spiritually and emotionally drained. I felt like I had nothing more to give, and I
did not want to go back to Mozambique. This
being said, I was sad that we only had a couple weeks left in Africa. I LOVE Africa. My heart was breaking at the thought of
leaving, and I decided that I would enjoy the people and culture while I still
could.

 

When we got to Mama Rita’s, our squad quickly found out that
it was going to be a challenging couple weeks. The living conditions were definitely rougher than anywhere else we had
been. Mama Rita’s house is quite small,
with three small bedrooms, a common area and a small kitchen, yet Mama Rita’s extremely
large family all live in the house. When
we came, the family moved outside, and we somehow squeezed 19 people inside. The heat made it hard to sleep at night, and
even if there weren’t bugs actually biting you, you could still hear a constant
hum in your ears from the zillions that lived with us. If the heat and bugs didn’t bother you, the
rats would. Rats could be seen and heard
running through the rafters and all over our stuff. Some people were even lucky enough to have
our house mates run over them during the night. And if that wasn’t enough, the guys creeping around at night trying to
kill the rats were just as nerve wracking.

 

 

 

Despite the “roughness” of the situation, I was determined
to love it and enjoy what time I had left in “real” Africa before heading to
South Africa for debrief. However, two
days after arriving, I started feeling sick. I had no energy, no appetite, a very high fever, and I spent most of my
time sleeping. After two days of this and
no change, it was decided that I would go see a doctor.

 

I went to a private clinic in the city where it was confirmed
that I had Malaria. I was immediately checked
in and put on an I.V. That is where I stayed
for the next five days. Two of my squad
mates, Hannah and Scottie, stayed with me the entire time. I’m not sure how they spent their days
because I was asleep AT LEAST 22 hours out of every 24. I would wake up to go to the bathroom and
throw up, then go right back to sleep. I
got a lot of visitors, whether it was to see me or to enjoy the air conditioning,
I’m not sure. I would do my very best to
stay awake while my visitors were there, even though I couldn’t hear anything
that was going on. The medication I was
on made it feel like I had cotton stuffed in my ears. People would talk to me, and I would just
stare at them.

 

 

 

 

After leaving the hospital, I went to stay in an inexpensive
hotel, where I was for the rest of our time in Mozambique. Honestly, this was a little frustrating for
me. I really wanted to be with the
people back at Mama Rita’s, but instead I was stuck in a boring hotel room with
two other people and a squeaky air conditioner that scared Kimi. I did not understand why God had allowed this
to happen. I wanted to be with the
people, but instead I was isolated. My
squad was amazing, and they came around me and loved me and took care of me,
yet I still felt very alone and cut off from God during this time. I couldn’t help but wonder where He was in
the whole situation.