After a long week of travel, I am finally in Africa. I was
in Moldova last month, and before leaving I made sure I got to milk our
translator’s goat.
The goat agreed that I could milk it, only if I promised to
call it the next day…. I bailed town and took a train to Romania.
I met up with
our squad in Bucharest and we hung out in a big house in the suburbs. We had a
blast catching up with each other, exchanging stories, having dance parties and
just living and loving life together. This year of my life I am beyond blessed
with all of the individuals I am surrounded with.
Last week we flew from Bucharest, Romania to Johannesburg,
South Africa. We had some connecting flights in Istanbul and Dubai in order to
save money on flights which was random and suh-weet. I watched a couple of
movies on the flights, A Bugs Life and Inception with Leonardo Dicrapio, both
are phenomenal.
We arrived in Africa, but Johannesburg is by no means the ‘real
Africa’. It is incredibly Western, even more so lately because of the 2010 Fifa
World Cup was hosted in South Africa.
All of the poverty in the city was deemed
unpleasant to the eyes and was swept to the city’s limits to give tourists a
better experience. Johannesburg looks like any typical American city.
While in Jo-burg, we stayed in a hostel in the heart of the
city. It was an incredible facility and so much fun. We were scheduled to leave
the hostel after one night, but plan A fell through. So did plan B, C, D, … and
plan X. We ended up leaving a few days later on a 65 person bus that had no A/C.
We have 65 people with us so it was perfect. Cramped but perfect.
Waiting for the bus.
The next 72 hours of my life was a hazy, dehydrated, hot,
dysfunctional, hysterical, sleepy and dirty voyage that I will never forget. We
crossed 4 borders and eventually ended up in Malawi, Africa at the end of the
story. In the middle of the story I can hardly recall what happened. My brain
as well as time seemed to melt like a stick of butter. I remember the pivotal point in the trip was
the night that we spend the night in the bus at a border. For our safety all of
us stayed inside of the bus and tried to sleep. That bus must have been 247
degrees Fahrenheit, or maybe it was Celsius… I cannot recall.
After a long, restless, sweaty night we continued to another
border and we had to stay at that border that night. I slept outside on a cardboard
box underneath a semi-truck trailer. It
was a freaking hilarious
and memorable night. That bus trip was so much fun, mostly because I had some
awesome bus buddies.
They were a riot… as you can clearly see.
haha, but really, these guys and a few others that are not pictured really made the trip so much fun.
later than we anticipated. Our contact
this month is Pastor Harvey, an incredible man of God. We are partnering with him and a ministry
called Harvesters International Ministries (HIM). Collectively we are planting
churches in rural villages and telling/ showing Jesus’ love to everyone we meet.
Africa’s beauty
So far we have all preached in different churches this past
Sunday. We have reached out to the local community and have kept it real with
them. Tomorrow we are traveling out into a small village and are going to tell
people about Jesus and hopefully establish a new church.
I love Africa. The people here are amazing, the culture
fascinates me and the scenery is GORGEOUS. I really don’t like using technology here in
this country because everything is so basic and ground-roots so I will save
some of my other African stories for a later time.
Well, these are ramblings of some of my recent endeavors, more to come later.
