These three months I sure grew a lot. I am going to summarize the three months of Africa into one blog post. Leaving Cairo we stopped in Sudan and from there we went to Nairobi. We stayed at the Milimani Backpacker’s jungle-like hostel. It was right in Nairobi, the hub of Kenya but it felt like you were in a jungle. We had our squad debrief there and it was so amazing. Within 48 hours I was in the middle of Nakuru national park. The most beautiful images and clouds and animals that I had ever seen in my life. The colors were unbelievable and every picture I took felt like it did no justice to the beauty that I saw there. We went on a safari at the park because in most of Eastern Africa there aren’t many wild animals outside of a national park. The first animal that I saw there was a zebra and the last animal was a lion with blood dripping from it’s mouth.
We left Nairobi and headed to Eldoret, Kenya. This is actually the place where 95% of all Olympic Kenyan runners come from. Like any place that I have traveled to it takes a minute to get used to some of the things that we experienced there. For example the outhouses that were simple squatties, just holes in the cement floor. We got water from a well, and stayed in a mud house lined with dried cow manure. The food was hard to get used to but amazing all at the same time. At first we thought we were roughing it but then we realized how amazing we had it. This month I would say that I was pushed to my limits and stretched beyond what I thought I could bear. I got to preach this month to over a hundred Kenyans that gathered on the street as we played worship songs and sang. I got to meet an amazing family, Moses and Bilhah and little miss Joy. I tell ya, this little girl is so smart and speaks such proper English it would amaze you.
From there we arrived in Kampala Uganda by bus. It was raining and weary when we got there. It was just so hard for some reason. We had just taken a 14 hour bus ride from Nairobi. We were tired and hungry and all that I could think about was getting horizontal and sleeping. There was mud on the streets (feces) and we had to carry all our packs several blocks through traffic and people, and slippery roads. It was just really frustrating. Then we took a bus that was packed to the roof with people and chickens and everything else. We arrived in Lira that night and were very surprised and excited to stay at a resort hotel. Which may not have been amazing to american standards but was absolutely amazing to a world racer. I got my own room for the first time on the whole race. I lit a candle and put on music and spent the most beautiful time with Jesus, and took a WARM shower! Lira, I will truly miss you, the church the people the hospitality and the food.
After two days we traveled up to Amolatar district. No electricity. No running water. No nothing. This was the most difficult living situation we have had on the race so far. I don’t know about you but I ate purple chicken everyday. Rice, chapati, potatoes, we had every single day without fail. We didn’t have transportation for our team to get to ministries so we were stuck in a cement storefront building most of the time. Can I remind you that it’s a hundred and maybe twenty degrees? However, many people got healed, and many gave their life to the Lord. We made some really great lasting friendships, and our contact was so nice and amazing.
Our squad had a chance of a lifetime to go whitewater rafting starting at the source of the Nile river. We camped for a couple days at a beautiful riverside location. I got to go bungee jumping for the first time in my life and feed monkeys daily. The rafting was amazing… until I almost died. On our last rapid which in my book is a class 6 rapid. We started going off into the most terrifying part of the whole rapid where we were not supposed to be going. As our boat was flipping I tried to hold to the rope and it practically dislocated my shoulder. I get thrown under the boat, but I didn’t realize that. I was so disoriented and confused. I tried swimming to the top. I didn’t know which way was up and down. When I started swallowing water I knew I was in trouble. I knew that I had no more strength left, so I gave up trying to swim. In some weird way everything started becoming peaceful and I knew that I was either going to die or go unconscious any minute.
I started to pray and immediately I popped out of the water. I don’t know if I had said “God” or “Jesus” but immediately I felt someone pulling my life preserver up out of the water. I still couldn’t breathe because I had swallowed so much water. There was too much water in my lungs. I immediately began violently throwing up, I couldn’t take in a breath, it was so scary. I was so tired I couldn’t even swim to the boat and a rescue kayaker came and helped me get to the boat. Even at the boat I was so disoriented that all I remember is Danielle pulling me out of the water. All I could do was cry. That night I called my mom telling her I loved her and that I almost died. I was so thankful for my life.
We found out that instead of going to Tanzania with the other teams we were going back to Eldoret, Kenya. We were the first two teams on the world race to ever go back to a contact for another month. We got to make it even better than the first month, to really give it our all. God really broke my heart for the street boys of Eldoret as you can read in other blogs that I have written. I got Malaria and worms and heart problems, and a swollen spleen. You name it, I got it. That took a lot of time out of the month just being sick. We got to work with the church that we had planted in January. Also there was an orphanage that we got to help out with.
I thought I really wanted to leave Africa, but sitting here in Asia I realize that I miss it so much. My heart will continue calling me back to Africa.
