We had Monday off since we were at the Easter camping all weekend, and then on Tuesday, we went to visit our contact’s sister because it was her 43rd birthday on Friday. We had heard that she was in the hospital since Sunday due to HIV/AIDS. We had brought her a card and some treats. I noticed that the hospital had a sign that said it was funded by Americans which I thought was neat. While we were waiting outside of the hospital, a woman came out wailing and crying. Her husband had just died, it was so sad to hear and see. I’m pretty sure that they didn’t have a waiting room inside, but only outside. We went in to visit with the sister, but she was sleeping, so we just dropped off the card and treats and prayed. The inside of the hospital reminded me of movies where you see nurses in hospitals during wartimes. The nurses were wearing traditional nurse uniforms (some of the nurses were white women), and all of the beds were just out in the open with no curtains. They had told us that she hadn’t been doing well since the night before and was having convulsions and had been sleeping most of the time. It didn’t look good because last week she was only in a clinic, and they let her go home, but now she was in a hospital. We were going to do things after the visit, but we told our contact that he could just stay with his family, so after that we went and brought them some food.
The next day, we found out that his sister had passed away in the night. It was really sad as she was only 43 and has a husband and three children. The grandparents, siblings, and grandchildren all live together in the same house though, so that’s good to think that the children will still be well taken care of. I think the sister knew she had HIV for about nine years. We had only met her and had been there for the last week of her life, but I noticed that she had such a peace and the joy of Christ in her. I think it was good that we were here at this time to have met her and encourage her and be with our contact and his family during this hard time. It was sweet too because I asked them if she got to see her birthday card before she past, and they said that she woke up and was looking around for a bit, and they showed her the birthday card, and they said that she smiled. I’m really seeing what I’ve always heard about in Africa that HIV/AIDS is such a real problem and tragic reality.. We heard that one of our other teams had a man in the car with them pass away from HIV as they were driving him to the hospital.
The next day, we went over to the family’s house, and brought over some raw food because we heard that was customary. There was a lot of extended family over there. There wasn’t much crying, but a lot of sitting in silence. On Friday, we went to the funeral of our contact’s sister. The service didn’t seem too different from ones that we have in America. We then got on trucks and went to the cemetery with what seemed like everyone who was at the funeral service. It was sad too because the graves that I saw all seemed like the people had died before the age of 60. Another burial service came during the middle of our contact’s sister’s service, and it was really sad because they were all wailing and crying. The people at his sister’s service seemed to be pretty calm at the time- I thought a possibility could’ve been because they have the hope that she is with Jesus now . They asked our team leader if she wanted to say anything when others did, so she did. After the burial, we went to the family’s home for a meal. It was a good, honoring service to his sister. I believe that she is with Jesus now- healthy and happy.
We’ve been hearing about Victoria Falls all the time since we’ve been here in Livingstone and that we had to go see these waterfalls because I think they’re the biggest in the world or something, and we finally got to see them on Thursday. We were told that you haven’t been to Livingstone if you haven’t seen the Falls. It costs like $1 for a Zambian to go, but it costs $20 for a foreigner to go. I went with two of my teammates, and they were so beautiful! It’s crazy how tall the waterfalls were and how much water comes rushing down. They’re named Victoria Falls because Queen Victoria was queen at the time when Livingstone was taken to them by the native Zambians. We walked on a bridge and got soaked by the falls. It was really fun! Then we walked down to the river, and the water was moving all over the place. After that, we went on this trail that was high up overlooking the falls, and the sun was about to set, and it was so beautiful! It was so peaceful there, and it seemed like a mini rainforest. God’s creation is so beautiful.
We saw some signs that said “Beware of the baboons”, and I kinda laughed at it, and we didn’t see any baboons until the end when my teammate almost got attacked by one. We came across like 4 adults and 4 child ones. I think baboons and monkeys are so funny! (I realize now that they can be scary too ha). Some were laying across the trail sucking their thumbs, some were taking out lint out of the others back, some were riding on the back of their mothers, some were holding their babies. We went across some baboons, and it was fine. Then, we saw a really big male baboon and a female baboon sitting on a ledge, and I took a picture of my teammate so that you could see the baboon in the background. Then, she was going to take a picture of me with the baboon. Just then, the male baboon looked like he got mad at the female baboon, and he pushed her off the ledge, and then in an instant they both looked mad and came running toward us and then went the other way, but the male baboon turned again toward my teammate and looked like he was about to attack her because he stuck out his arm toward her, but then he turned the other way. We both screamed and ran! It was so scary and so funny! We all started bursting out laughing after that because she almost got attacked by the baboon. I don’t know if it would have actually done anything, but yeah ha. Maybe it would have, and that would have been really bad! We thought we should’ve looked up what to do if a baboon attacks you on Google haha. Later, we found out that our other squadmates were told to not hold anything in your hands because they’re more likely to approach/attack you if you are holding things, but we didn’t know that ha.
On Saturday, we were invited to a wedding at the Salvation Army church. We were told that it started at 10am, so we kept checking because we live next to the church, but it didn’t start until about 12:15pm.The ceremony didn’t seem very different from wedding ceremonies in America. I think it’s because it was a Salvation Army church. One thing that was really cool was that the bridal party did a choreographed dance down the aisle. I loved their dance! The bride and groom were wearing their Salvation Army uniforms, but the bride was wearing a veil and had her head down the entire ceremony until the groom removed the veil, and then she had her head up. The groomsmen had really nice black suits on, and the women and pretty dresses with great hair. After the ceremony, the reception was right next door. We were told it started at 2pm, but it started at about 3:30pm or 4pm. It had downpoured in between the ceremony and the reception, but I was told that it’s actually considered good luck in Africa if it rains on your wedding day. They had purple and white streamers with purple balloons. The groomsmen changed into purple dress shirts and the bridesmaids changed into cute purple dresses. The bride changed into a beautiful white wedding dress and the groom a fancy suit. There was a lot of people at the reception. Everyone looked really good. The bridal party danced a choreographed dance into the reception hall, and they dance so good! Especially the men. The men here all seem like they know how to dance, they really know how to shake their hips! I think the people grow up dancing here. They had the flower girl and ring bearer do a choreographed dance together. Then, they had us eat, and they let all the people who weren’t from the town go first. They seem to really acknowledge visitors here. The food was great!!! Normally, the people eat shema for almost every meal, but the wedding food was so yummy! It was noodles, rice, chicken, beef, potatoes, and cole slaw. Not only that, but everyone got a bottle of pop! I loved the meal haha. After the meal, the bride and groom had their first kiss and had cake which I missed because I went to freshen up a bit in the bathroom. They then had their first dance, and there was a few other dances and some presenting of certain gifts, and then it ended at about sunset. We thought it was going to end a lot later, but it ended pretty early we thought. We danced a little with the flower girls, and then we left. It was really cool and fun.
On Sunday, my team and I went to a different church because we’ve only experience d the Salvation Army here. The church that we went to reminded me of black churches in the south in the States. I liked that we all worshipped together and that the preacher was really passionate. I don’t know if I really agreed with everything he said though, but a lot of it was good. It was about 4 or five hours long. In the evening, we went to this really nice hotel/restaurant to watch the sunset. It was so beautiful. I felt so emotional that day though. Even though I was at that beautiful place, I was so crabby and frustrated. I feel that I’m getting to the point where I’m ready to go home, and I realize that I need my alone time and on the Race you’re with people 24/7. And I’m just getting sick of things on the race like always needing to be with someone and not all of us having phones, and I got frustrated because people were at a place to get internet earlier in the day, but I wanted to go somewhere else because mine never works there and communication was just confusing, and I was sick of not having internet. But I needed to remind myself how blessed I am to be here and to make the most of the Race because the last month will probably go by really fast. And that there will be plenty of internet when I go home, so I can go another month without much of it. It’s kinda like a real race and how the very final stretch can be very hard because you’re so tired, but you know there’s just a little left to go. I also was emotional because I was thinking about some things that I wanted to see God clearly do at some point during the Race and how I feel that I haven’t really seen those certain things yet, but I have to remind myself that the end of the World Race is not the end of my Race with Christ. There is still more that he is going to do after the World Race, and we still have one month left. I was crying a lot that night, but my teammate prayed, and the next day I was a lot better. On Monday, we had some women from the community and our contact over for lunch since we’re about to leave.
There’s some stars that don’t look very high in the sky- they look a lot lower than they do in the States. It’s pretty cool. One of the things that has been frustrating is that it seems that the taxi drivers really try to charge foreigners and white people more money, and sometimes it’s frustrating because they make up stories to charge us more. Ok that’s all I got for random things haha.
I found the culture here to be fantastic and frustrating. We’re travelling to Lusaka (the capital of Zambia) to meet up with the rest of our squad tomorrow, then we’re leaving for our last country- month11!!!!! Malawi here we come! We will have three weeks of ministry, and then our last week on the Race is called “Final Debrief” where we will talk about and process the entire Race before returning to America, my home sweet home. 🙂
