Last week I had the opportunity to experience some rural, Tanzanian villages.
The experience is one I will never, ever forget.
Despite all of the warnings to drop all expectations on the
World Race, I have to admit I came to Africa with a couple of hopes. I hoped
for experiences in a tribal village. I hoped to be able to tent. I hoped to see
so many miracles that we lost count. I hoped for lots of adventure.
And thus far in Africa, I haven’t had these experiences.
Yes, my time here has been amazing. We have seen miracles, and have seen God
moving in incredible ways. But we’ve been mostly in cities, and I was truly
hoping for a bush experience. But God truly knows the desires of my heart, and
He is such a good father. And He has now fulfilled these hopes in incredible
ways!
This is the story of three days of the race that changed my
life. So much happened over these three days that I will be writing about in a
series of blogs. So stay tuned as the adventure unfolds!
There are two teams staying in Kibaha this month, Divine
Collision and Wreckonciled. Last week we were asked for some racers to go on a
camping trip this week for three days. We ATL’ed it (Asked the Lord), and we
came up with the answer that Joy, Jeremiah, Joel, Brent and myself would go from
Wreckonciled, and we would be joined by Katie E. From Divine Collision. So on
Monday morning the six of us set out on our adventure with Pastor Zephaniah.
We walked over to our church at 9am to pick up what we
thought were just a couple of boxes of supplies to bring to Pastor Helen, whom
we were going to visit. Turns out we’re bringing a bicycle, a wheelchair, two
walkers, six pairs of crutches, a stack of children’s chairs, and a box of
Frisbees. And we’re taking a public bus.
We eventually figure out a system to carry it all, as well
as our daypacks and tents, and head over to the bus stop where we wait for about
an hour until a bus arrives. We load up our gear and head out.
We arrive in a small town called Kabuku. Pastor Zephaniah,
Joy and Katie go to buy water, rice and beans while the rest of us stay with
our mountain of gear, watching it closely, as well as watching the crowd of
over 80 people (mostly children) who have congregated to stare at the muzungus.
After a while a jeep pulls up and our driver for the trip, Samson, arrives. We
load up all our stuff head off into the bush to Pastor Helen’s village, where
we are staying for these three days.
This journey itself is an adventure, as we careen through
the darkness on roads for which the term is only a very vague description. We
arrive at the village in time for a dinner at 11pm, and then crash in our
tents. We were told to sleep well because wake up is at 5am, and we have a very
busy day ahead of us!
