Debriefs are the best! Reuniting with squad mates, going out to eat, having dance parties, getting advice from mentors; each day is filled with new excitement. For our month 8 debrief we met in Jinja, Uganda. Our hostel was located right on the Nile river, there were monkeys running around on the roof tops and palm trees surrounding the pool. It was our own piece of paradise for 5 days.
One of the activities that most of the squad participated in was rafting the Nile. It was an all day adventure. I joined in with the other 30 racers and hopped on the raft with the rest of the team leaders. I knew it was going to be intense, we were facing class 5 rapids and it did not disappoint. At the beginning of the day we practiced flipping our raft and getting back on. This practice prove useful since our raft flipped 3 times. One of the times we flipped I was stuck under the raft as the rapids kept pushing me under. After 2 or more minutes of me being thrown around by the rapids I was able to catch my breathe and be pulled back in to our raft. Although I didn't enjoy that part of the day I still had a good time facing all the rapids of the Nile.
Some of my friends bungy jumped and even got dunked in the water, I enjoyed watching them conquer their fears. I decided not to jump since I jumped while I was studying abroad in New Zealand a couple years ago. This debrief was a fun way to end our time in Uganda and get pumped up for this month in Rwanda. There is so much history in this country and I feel blessed to be a part of the culture for this month.
I'm spending the month in Kigale which is the capital. We are living at our pastors house with his family and we will be working at a school teaching the students as well as preaching at churches and going to youth nights and women's events. I am living with 12 other girls this month since all of the men on our squad are working together this month. That means lots of movie nights and opportunities to build relationships with some awesome girls. This is my last month in Africa, it has been an incredible experience so far and I'm looking forward to these last few weeks before we move on to Asia!
