Out of my Journal

January 22, 2010
For every question I cannot answer, You are there to make it known. When there's steps that I can't climb, You are there to push me up. You are always there, everywhere. You always know what's unknown. With You, there is no fear of today.

January 23, 2010
What does it mean to be human? How can you smile in a different language? Love is a universal language and intellect has no political bounds. We are what we are and that is a truth we can't deny. Our color, our words, are only a gesture of our artistic beings. For we are all one with an underlying need. We all as humans need Him, and to experience Him we experience each other. How can I deny that you are human? We are humanly in need of His love to save us from ourselves.

January 25, 2010
Can you hear me breathing? Can you see my star-struck eyes? My heart so excitingly beating, my mind so humbled in awe. In this very moment, at this place in time, I am alive. I am truly alive. I can see your wonders, smell your beauty, hear your love, and as I sense myself moving closer to you, I know that I'm alive.

February 2, 2009
Love, where is your logic? Does it bother you to confuse us so? Do you long to make sense, or does the joy of confusion make you smile? As you dance through our hearts and leap through our veins, do you ever tire? The world keeps turning and love keeps pouring out its indescribable love. There is no remedy like love.

February 14, 2010
Sometimes life gives us answers, other times it leaves us floating with questions. Sometimes joy surpasses our understandings, other times sorrow rips through our being, but through every moment and situation, love is there to lead us through.

March 2, 2010
Who am I that you love me and think of me? How much do you love me that you were willing to suffer death for me? The pain and despair that came with being powerful enough to willingly accept carrying all sins on your back; I will never have to endure it. Oh how wonderful you are.

March 4, 2010
What is life without love? A river without water or an ocean without salt. What is adventure without fear or a risk without a chance of suffering? To live not just to breathe, to learn not just to pass the test; the journey is greater than the destination.

March 9, 2010
My God is the God of the universe. He leads me through every season of life and he always knows what's going on. He knows I suffer, He knows I'm joyful. Every second he plans out for my life is necessary. My God created the universe and He loves is so.

March 15, 2010
The pain hurts, but the healing fills me with joy and every dark night is followed by morning.


April 10, 2010
God knows my every thought when I complain and He knows my every fear when I hesitate to follow Him. All those thoughts and fears need to be washed away because the Lord knows what He's doing. God disciplines those he loves and if he is throwing me into a pit of thorns, it's because he wants me to run with wolves. We're in His hands and that's enough.

April 28, 2010
Gaze out beyond yourself and see that you are more than alive. Speak above the noise that holds you back and find the truth of peace. Feel the wind slide across your face and know that I am real. Beat the drum of life once more until you find the rhythm of love.

A Week in Cape Town

Monday: class in the morning, lunch at one of the only Mexican restaurants in Africa, afternoon souvenir shopping at the Green Market Square in downtown Cape Town, train ride back to BI

Tuesday: tour of the peninsula, Cape Point (the southernmost tip of the African continent), visit to Boulder's Beach (the home of a colony of 3,000 penguins!), almost got finger bit off by a penguin protecting its mate's eggs, evening visit to the Kalk Bay theater to watch Theater Sports (a show similar to Who's Line is it Anyways)

Wednesday: class in the morning, lunch at a pizzeria in Fish Hoek, a night spent watching Friends episodes with my roommate while eating chocolate cake

Thursday: chapel at BI, lunch in the cute little town of Stellenbosch, visit to Spier Cheetah Conservation, pet a cheetah for 5 minutes and learned about the organization's work to save the species, talkative evening with friends at Olympia Cafe

Friday: class in the morning, afternoon TBA

This morning I had breakfast with Jamie and talked about the 6 days that we have left in this country. We couldn't think of anything else we would like to do because we have pretty much covered everything we wanted to do while in South Africa. If we thought hard enough I'm sure we could come up with more things to do, but I think our point is that we are satisfied with this trip. Looking back I know it has been easy and it has been hard, it has been mind-blowing and it has been refreshing, but overall it's been a great trip.

Saying Goodbye to the Marshalls

Sunday was my last afternoon with the Marshall family in Ocean View. Alice got teary-eyed as she hugged me goodbye because she said she felt like Kayla and I had become part of her family in the 9 days that we stayed in their home.

Staying at that home was highly uncomfortable because I was with complete strangers that spoke a different language and live in a culture different from my own, but I learned so much through it all and I made some friends that I will never forget.

I'm now staying at the Bible Institute dorms in Kalk Bay and when I sit in the dining room I can look out the window and see the beach stretching out for miles. We're in an area that's very different from Ocean View. There are shops and cafes down the road and we can take the train into the city.

When I think about how much Cape Town reminds me of San Francisco, it makes me miss home and it makes me excited about going back, but, when I think about leaving next week and I look back at all that has happened on this trip, I feel so sad that it's almost over.

Robben Island

The visit to Robben Island was like coming up for a breath of fresh air after days of slowly sinking deeper into a sea of frustration. Not to say that my last few days here haven't been a blessing, but sometimes you have to suffer a lot to dig through the mines before you can find a diamond and, even if you gain a precious stone, you're still left with scars and wounds.

Robben Island is a lot like Alcatraz in that it was an island used only as a prison. It's the place where Nelson Mandela spent 19 years in the same prison cell and was often dragged out into the hot sun to work in tedious tasks used as torture. Several other political prisoners were sent to that island during the apartheid years because they were gathering support against apartheid laws and were encouraging black consciousness.

On the bus ride around the island I saw Penguin Crossing signs and, sure enough, there was a penguin crossing the road in front of the bus. We stood on the edge of the island and gazed across the 17 kilometers of water that separated us from Cape Town. Afterward, we walked through the cells and read several stories about men that were sentenced to prison in such unjust ways. All they wanted was freedom and peace in a world where they could be treated as humans and nothing less.

The ferry ride back to Cape Town was when I felt air rushing into my lungs again. It lasted about 30 minutes and I enjoyed every second. I stood there on the deck holding on to the edge so that I wouldn't lose my balance as the waves rocked our boat from side to side. I felt the salt water midst spraying into my face and when I smiled I could feel the wind pushing back my cheeks even further. As we moved away from Robben Island and watched it get smaller and smaller, I could see the buildings of Cape Town getting bigger and bigger, but all around me I could see water.

Something about it was so peaceful that I want to capture those 30 minutes in my head and remember them when I have to toil through 30 minutes of hard work or when I have to endure 30 minutes of things I wish could be different. Something about it made me feel like God is still holding on to me, God is still holding on to Africa, whether it's the townships or the cities, God is still holding on to us.

On a day like today...

...a stranger's home has become my residence

...I said goodbye to my South African mom as I walked out the door and towards to the taxi that would drive me to school

...I decided to dress nice just because

...Class was actually interesting as we learned about the apartheid years and their effect on the community we're living in

...an ice cream cone has never tasted better

....Olympia Cafe and Deli offered an interesting environment for dinner with a loud crowd, a delicious meal, and a dark, but warm room with windows for walls facing the beautiful bay

...I washed my hands with soap for the first time in two days

...frustration lingered as I battled through the tiredness that comes from not sleeping well

...a simple poem at a quiet bookstore made me feel connected to someone completely different than myself

...God felt as distant as the place I call home that's thousands of miles away

...God felt as close as the wind blowing the scarf off my neck

On a day like today, the mystery of life reaches far beyond my understanding and all I can do is be.

First Week in Cape Town

Cape Town is a wonderful city.

Homestays are interesting. I would talk more about it, but I think I have to wait until the week is over before I can process all of it.

As the time to go home gets nearer, I'm finding that I'm more and more homesick.

If I had to describe my current emotion on this trip I would say that I'm tired. South Africa is still wonderful, but it gets harder to face the difficult parts of my trip when I'm too tired to enjoy the good things and I'm running low on energy.

Road to Cape Town

After many hours of riding in a bus and several nights of staying at beautiful hotels by the beach, we have arrived in Cape Town. Yesterday we spent the day at Carmel and visited an Ostrich Farm and the Congo Caves.
The Ostrich farm was interesting because everyone thought they were the most disgusting-looking creatures, but I thought they were beautiful. We had a chance to feed them, but we had to be careful because they could bite our fingers off if we made any sudden movements or if we held our hand out in the wrong position. Some girls screamed as they fed them and some guys dropped more than half of the corn kernels. I hesitated at first, but then I gathered the courage to hold out my hand and I ended up enjoying it. My friend Jessica screamed too much to be able to feed them, so I finished feeding them her bag of kernels. I did get pecked once by an ostrich and I had a red spot on my hand from where it pinched my skin, but it was still fun.
In the tour through the farm we saw the incubators, the ostrich eggs, the beautiful feathers, and the actual ostriches. We got the chance to stand on ostrich eggs. It sounds cruel, but ostrich eggs can actually hold up to 170lbs on top of them without breaking. I stood on four eggs and it was like standing on rocks. We did have to be careful because there was an ostrich nearby and the guide told us that if it chased us, the best thing we could do was to act dead.
After holding the eggs we went to a place where 7 people got to ride an ostrich. Only 7 could ride so we put our names in a cup and had a lottery. My name wasn’t picked, but I did get a chance to sit on an ostrich. It was the weirdest feeling in the world because the wings were on top of me and I sat towards the back of the hump. I also stroked the ostrich’s neck. The people who rode it struggled a bit because there was no saddle and they had to hold on to the wings.
One thing is certain: ostriches are scary. They attack when you least expect it and they have one strong toe that could kill you if it penetrated through your skin. We had to hide all shiny objects and be careful with our cameras because they pecked at anything shiny. The good thing is that, as long as you follow all the rules and don’t do anything stupid, the ostriches will be nice. I still can’t figure out how they balance so well on such skinny legs and I’ve decided to never eat an ostrich burger again (I’ve had 3 this semester).
The Congo Caves were incredible! When I first heard cave I thought about a small hole in a mountain, but these caves should be called the city underneath a mountain. It really is a full-on cave. In some parts we came into rooms that were 30 feet high and 20 feet wide and in other parts we had to slide on our stomach to get to the other side. We were inside the mountain for a total of 2 hours and we traveled about 2 miles into the mountain. Some of those caves are thousands of years old and they made me feel like an explorer or like the lady in the movie The Mummy when she is searching for ancient artifacts.
Cape Town looks wonderful so far. We arrived this afternoon, dropped off our bags in our hotel room, and headed out to explore. It’s so windy I had to wear a sweater and I was so happy to see people and cars everywhere. I hadn’t realized how much I miss being in an actual city. It almost didn’t feel like Africa until I looked up at Table Mountain. Table Mountain sticks out higher than any building and it’s a beautiful sight. We met a guy who told us some spots we have to make sure to visit before leaving Cape Town and we walked by a Chocolate House. Any girl walking past a building called a Chocolate House has to walk in because the temptation is too great.
Eunice is a kind elderly lady that works in the Chocolate House. She opened all the drawers around the room that contained hundreds of chocolates. There were probably about 70 different kinds of chocolates and they all looked delicious. We picked out a couple and tasted them all. It was delicious, except for the chili one, I didn’t like that one so much.
We had dinner at a cool Indian place and walked through more of the city. I’ve anxiously awaited Cape Town for so long and I’m finally here. I hope all goes well these last couple of weeks and the illness is just a nightmare we remember every once in a while and then brush it off and change the subject. It’s good to feel healthy again, especially in a city with so many ethnic foods to choose from.

East London

I know I said I wouldn’t have internet for a while, but the hotel we’re staying at tonight gave us free internet and I decided I should leave the blog on a happier note. Free internet is not the only thing this hotel has; it has delicious food, fancy rooms, showers with no bugs in them, a beautiful view of the ocean that’s literally right outside my window and a comfortable queen size bed for each one of us. After spending a week in the wilderness and in such a mess, it feels so good to have clean rooms and sanitary restrooms.
I can’t say the illness is over because everyone is still feeling slightly off and we couldn’t fully enjoy dinner, but I think the worst is over and the sky is going to be a little brighter from here on out. Last night was terrible. One of the girls in my chalet slept in front of the toilet because she was so sick, nurses were in and out of our chalet checking up on people, and I had a high fever on top of my stomach sickness. My roommate Kayla was the sweetest thing in the world and nursed me through the night. I’m on a strong medication for the stomach illness and it’s giving me really bad side effects, but it’s kept me from getting sick enough to go to the hospital so I think it’s worth it. I felt nauseous and dizzy throughout the night as I was in and out of sleep. My fever struck hard around 1 in the morning and I woke up because my whole body was shivering and I was sweating. I hadn’t eaten an actual meal for two days so my body was having trouble fighting off my sickness and I was dehydrated. Kayla brought me water and salty crackers, which the nurses said would help, and she also gave me medicine to bring down my fever.
There was a point where I just wanted to cry because I wasn’t comfortable in any position. If I laid down my stomach hurt and if I stood up I got too lightheaded to stand. Sitting down was a good compromise, but I got to a point where I was too sick to move. The medicine and crackers helped and Kayla forced me to drink the full water bottle before playing an episode of Friends to help me fall asleep. I felt better after eating and I lay down and watched a couple of minutes of the TV show. It didn’t take long for fall asleep.
This morning I woke up in a daze and climbed onto the bus. We’re traveling down the coast of South Africa and our first stop today was East London. It should have taken 9 hours, but our bus broke down and we had to wait for the other bus to drop off people and then come back to us. After a while we found out that bus had a flat tire and we had to wait about 2 hours for it to come back for us. We walked across a dangerous highway to use a very unsanitary bathroom and then sat in the bus watching Troy on someone’s laptop.
I wonder what people think when they see our group because everyone looked half asleep today and so many people looked pale. No one really bothers about looking good because we’re so exhausted. Arriving at the hotel was like taking a breath of fresh air and it made me feel human again. My stomach is still upset because I have to keep taking the medication for 4 days even if I don’t have any symptoms anymore because it’s like an antibiotic and if I stop taking the medication I can get sick again. The bus ride hasn’t felt too good, but everyone has a positive attitude and we’re getting through it. I know I’ll sleep well tonight.
We are well taken care of because we have God guiding us through this week and, like I said before, the sky is clearing up and I think the worst is over. I’m excited to see Cape Town because I’ve heard so many wonderful things about it. Tomorrow our drive will only last 4 hours and we’re going to spend the night at Port Elizabeth, which is the hometown of one of our Community Life Coordinators. After that we only drive a couple of hours each day and do fun stuff like visiting an ostrich farm and climbing through caves.
My fever is gone and I just have a slight cough, but it goes away when I put my scarf on. I’ve been wearing my scarf all day, so I’ve been fine. My stomach ache will probably last until I finish the medication, but I’m having no trouble at all sleeping on the bus so I’m getting plenty of rest. Everyone else in the group is looking better too and the leaders have stocked up on medication like motion sickness medicine and re-hydration formula. The sun never fails to come out after a storm.

Dropping Like Flies

In a couple of months I'm sure we'll be joking about the current situation on campus, but at the moment there's panic breaking out and everything is just so chaotic we don't know what to do anymore. I don't know what to do anymore and I've gotten to the point where I just want to fly home and leave Africa behind. I know that's only because, at this moment, I'm feeling very fearful, but we're facing the fact that there's only so much people can handle as foreigners in a third world country.

The Zulu experience this past week was truly a Zulu experience because we faced a lack of hygiene that's common in many villages throughout Africa. Sometime this week, some of our students picked up a bacteria that caused stomach illness. We still don't know exactly what it is, but our best guess is that it's a contagious bacteria that our bodies are rejecting. So many people have been rushed to the hospital that I lost count and there are only about 7 people in our group of 53 that haven't gotten sick. Even some of our leaders have gotten sick and the nursing students had to step up and try to help us.

The first group of people rushed to the hospital took 3 hours to get there and the doctors said they would have died if they hadn't made it on time. I got a cold this week and have been battling a fever. This morning I was also hit with the stomach sickness and I've been laying in bed all day. It's not as bad as other people because I've managed to stay hydrated and keep it under control. Before heading out of the states, the doctor at the University Health Care Center gave us all a prescription for this sort of illness and I've been taking mine. It's like antibiotics so I have to keep taking it even though I don't have symptoms anymore so that it doesn't come back.

We are at AE tonight, but we're leaving for a week long road trip to Cape Town tomorrow. We have no idea how the bus ride is going to go because people have been getting sick at random times and it comes out of nowhere. The nurses think it depends on how your immune system reacts to it and is able to fight it off. I haven't eaten a full meal since yesterday so that my stomach doesn't have anything to throw out.

I could type out some stories to give you a picture of this horror film we're living in, but I don't think anyone would want to read them and I would get sick just by retelling them. Some people have overcome the illness already and are fine, others are going through it at different levels (kind of sick, sick, and rushing to the hospital because they are really sick), and the last small group of people that haven't get sick are waiting to see if they'll survive.

We're all helping each other and encouraging one another, which is truly a blessing, and we're praying for God to come to our rescue. This morning as I realized I was getting sick, I read Jeremiah 12. In this passage Jeremiah is complaining to God and God responds by saying, "if you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?". I know that God is with us through this illness and he knows what He's doing. If we are being given this test, it's because He's preparing us to be His light in the world.

I'm hoping that tomorrow we can drive away from Pietermaritzburg and leave this all behind. I'm also hoping we can have a good time in these last couple of weeks we have left and that we can hang in there. God has done some amazing things this semester and for that I'm truly thankful.

P.S. If I don't type for a while after this blog, it's not because I've died of stomach illness lol, it's just because tonight is one of our last nights with internet. We're going to be in different hotels this week and then we're going to arrive in Cape Town. I'll have internet in Cape Town so hopefully I can update this blog by next Sunday and let you all know that we overcame the illness and that we're having a great time on the west coast of South African

Safari + Zulu Experience

This week was incredible on so many levels. It all started with a safari that was amazing because it was like a zoo and a Disneyland ride put together. I hadn't realized that on safari we wouldn't just see cool animals like elephants and cheetahs; we would see them in their natural habitat and we would be out in the wild with them!

On our first drive through a game reserve, we were in a van and saw the animals through open windows. We saw some elephants and giraffes and we got pretty close to them. We also saw zebra and different kind of buck/deer like antelope, nyala, and impala.

On our second drive we got into cars that could go off-road and they didn't have windows, just a roof and a small door so that the car had a big open space for us to stick our heads out and see the animals clearly. We drove to the camp were we slept for 2 nights. The camp was in the middle of the wilderness and it was unfenced so animals could walk through as they pleased. We learned basic safety tips and we put our stuff into our chalets. The chalets were made out of wood logs and straw and the walls were a material that is see-through so that if any animals came we could see them from inside.

We woke up early every morning so that we could catch some of the animals that only come out at that time. We returned to camp for meals, but we headed out after each meal and basically drove around each day. We saw so many bucks that Kailee and I decided they would only be cool if they were being eaten because there were just so many of them that they weren't exciting anymore. We also saw some warthogs and wildabeasts, which are the animals that stampede in the the movie The Lion King and kill Mufasa. By the way, I found out that The Lion King is pretty accurate because Wildabeasts often trample lions. After observing them, we realized why; they get scared so easily and they just run away in groups without any real direction. It's like they freak out and just run, but don't know what to do so it's kind of entertaining to watch. We also saw several giraffes that made me feel so small and we saw several zebra. In the evening we sat at the edge of the water and watched the hippos popping their heads out of the water. We also saw baboos in the trees and we searched for a leopard, but we didn't find any.

My favorite sighting was the elephant we saw. One thing I hadn't realized going into the safari was that we had to actually search for animals because it's not just like a zoo where each animal has a designated location; the animals are all running freely. We searched for an elephant all day and got excited when we saw broken trees and fresh poop. We knew we were on the trail of an elephant and we were looking in all directions when all of a sudden we saw it standing there 3 feet away from the road. Usually Andrew, our safari guide and driver, would turn off the car when we saw animals so that they wouldn't be scared away by the noise of the engine, but with the elephant he kept the car on and he looked like he was ready to drive away at any moment. The elephant was pretty big and had huge tusks. He looked at us for a while and then gave a warning call with his trunk. After staring at him for a couple of minutes and taking a lot of pictures, Andrew started trying to find a way to get around the elephant and he moved the car forward slightly. When the elephant saw this he turned and walked away a little, but as soon as we started driving past him he turned around and then started charging toward us. It was so incredible because I was filming a video and I saw this huge elephant just start running towards us and when we drove off he lifted his trunk and made a loud elephant noise.(You can probably see the video on my Facebook page) We were so excited and scared that he was going to charge his tusks into our truck and kill us all. We spent the rest of that hour just talking about it, replaying videos, and retelling the story of how cool it was to get charged by an elephant.

My second favorite sighting was the cheetahs we saw. We went to a private reserve to see lions because the place where we camped didn't have the risk of lions walking into camp. We searched for lions all day and found tracks, but it had been raining all night so the lions were in a place where even the huge land cruiser we rode in would get stuck in mud so we didn't see lions. I wasn't bummed out about it because we still saw some pretty cool things. When we spotted 3 cheetahs, it felt like we drove into a discovery channel show. We were told not to stand up because the animals are used to the shape of our vehicle and can't distinguish individual people in it so they think the big truck is just a herd of animals and it's an animal that doesn't interest them so they don't do anything as we drive past them. If one of us stood up we would be something that the animal doesn't recognize so the weak animals would run away, but the dangerous animals would attack. We drove up to where the cheetahs were and the whole time I was thinking, "this can't be real". I got nervous as our driver got closer and closer until we were standing about 10 feet away from the cheetahs.

As if seeing cheetahs wasn't enough, we happened to see them while they were hunting. Our driver informed us that cheetahs don't hunt unless they are hungry. These cheetahs looked like they weren't starving, but they were observing the pack of impala across the field that was grazing. We waited to see if they would attack and prepared ourselves for something great. As we sat there we radioed another car so that the other people in our group could see the cheetahs and they appeared on the other side of the cheetahs. As they came closer they scared away an impala that had been hiding the whole time behind us and in a matter of seconds we saw the impala sprint past us and right past the cheetahs and run across the field towards his fellow impala. At this, one of the cheetahs took off after it and started to sprint towards it, but he gave up and stopped. It was obvious that the cheetah could have caught it if he wanted to, but he didn't. We were slightly disappointed and, if the cheetah had caught the impala, he would have been my favorite sighting, but it was still cool and it made me realize how incredible it was to be on a safari.

Our group of 53 students split in half this week so that half of us were on safari and the other half were on a Zulu experience trip. On Wednesday we switched and went to the place where the other group had been. We heard that 6 people had drank bad water and were rushed to the hospital with chronic diarrhea, but when we saw the other group we realized that it was much worse. We saw them climb out of the bus and we realized it was more than 6 people. We didn't get much information then, but it was enough to make us nervous about going to the Zulu place.

We made sure to bring our own bottled water and, when we got to the Zulu village, we noticed they had taken extra precautions to make sure we didn't get as sick as the previous group. We stayed in Zulu huts made out of mud and we ate traditional Zulu food. The night we got there, we were welcomed with a pot of Zulu beer from which each person had to take a drink because it's tradition to have visitors drink. We were welcomed into their home as visitors, so we were pretty much forced to drink it. All of us were nervous because it was homemade beer and it didn't taste too good, but we forced it down with a smile on our face to be polite. After dinner we saw some Zulu dances and sang songs with them. All the people in the village were excited to see us speaking Zulu words and singing Zulu songs because they said it made them feel special that Americans would come to visit and would be interested in their culture.

The next day we hiked to a forest where we met a medicine man and saw some of the herbs he uses to heal people. He wasn't like a Sangoma that provides spiritual healing; he was more of an intellectual person that knew what plants could cure stomach aches and things like that. We also learned how to throw a Zulu spear and we had some fights with Zulu sticks and shields. We weren't very good at it, but some of us actually hit the targets. I don't have good aim at all, but I managed to almost hit a target with the spear.

Good hygiene has been so hard to keep this whole week. The Zulu village didn't have running water or electricity. We had to use toilets that don't flush and showers that are basically just buckets full of water. After hearing about so many people on the previous group getting sick, we were really nervous and cautious about what we ate and drank. The food was actually pretty good and it was truly a cultural experience to spend 2 and a half days there. We met a lot of the local people and bought beaded jewelery from local women. We also played with some of the children and learned some Zulu traditions.

I slowly got sicker and sicker this week. It started out with a sore throat on the safari and then I lost my voice. I started coughing when we got to the Zulu village and this morning I woke up with an aching body. As I climbed out of my mud hut I realized how dizzy I was and how much my face was burning up. The ride back home was miserable for me, but I had a feeling the other group had gone through way worse and, when I got home and talked to some of them, I confirmed that their experience had been horrible.

The other group hiked for 4 hours to the forest in really hot weather. Our hike was only a third of theirs. One girl passed out because of heat stroke and a lot of them were dehydrating because they didn't have enough water. The water they were provided with wasn't the best water and they didn't have tubs to wash their hands before meals. When they got back from the hike it started to rain. We got a thunderstorm at the safari place too, but we had trees to cover most of the heavy rain and our chalets had good roofs. All the mud huts in the village were leaking and the group had to walk around barefoot because it was so muddy and slippery. Some people started getting sick after dinner and soon more and more people were sick. There were only two bathrooms, so after a while people just started emptying out their stomachs anywhere on the grass around the huts. Three trips were made to the hospital and, on one of them, the bus almost crashed because of the storm and the crash would have been big enough to kill some of those people. I can't tell the story for them because I don't know the details, but out of 22 people only 7 didn't get sick.

We still don't know what caused the illness, but we think it was the bad water. One of the girls that didn't get sick was the only one who didn't drink the water. Some people were okay, but then got sick later. It couldn't have been a bug because my group would have probably caught it too. Whatever it was, I'm glad it's mostly over and a lot of the people are feeling better and are even laughing at the situation.

I haven't really showered in a week because the two showers I've taken in 5 days didn't feel like enough and because I've been covered in dirt for so long. I've also been sweating like crazy and I've been sleeping in mud huts that don't smell very nice. It felt so good to come home to Pietermaritzburg and take a good shower, put on clean clothes, and eat from a nice kitchen in a nice dining room. I just want to sleep and rest because, as exciting and incredible as these 5 days have been, they have also been stressful, tiring, and tough to get through. I can sleep peacefully knowing that i can get up in the middle of the night without having to worry about walking 20 feet to a bathroom and finding a rhino in the middle of the road and I can rest knowing that I have stood 10 feet away from a cheetah while it hunted and I lived among wild animals for a couple days and have survived the Zulu experience. God is good.

Go Sharks!

I went to a Rugby game this evening. I think it might actually be called a Rugby match, but I don't really know just like I didn't really know anything that was going on throughout the whole game. It was quite entertaining nonetheless.

Let me just say that rugby is a brutal sport! It's so intense and it looks so hurtful, but the fans love it and the players are hard core. When I go to Giants games back home there's a good amount of people wearing black and orange, but at the stadium tonight literally everyone was wearing black and white or had a sharks logo on them.

One of my favorite parts about watching games in stadiums is getting to know the people around you. The three people sitting in front of us were Americans working with the peace core in Lesotho, which is a country about two hours away from Durban. It was entertaining to talk to them because they don't have electricity where they are staying and they haven't seen Americans since November. One of the guys said he was really happy to see Americans and he asked what was going on in the world.

The stadium we went to in Durban is right next to the new world cup stadium. I stood right outside the soccer stadium and wished I could stay there until the World Cup. There's an arc going across the top of the stadium and there's a swing attached to it that's supposedly the world's highest swing.

Tomorrow is my last day at God's Family Life Center. I love that church so much and I'm sad to say goodbye to them. I hope I can come back and visit some day.

After church I'm coming back home and I have to pack for this week. The schedule involves going to a safari from Monday to Wednesday and then going to a Zulu Experience trip for the rest of the week. In the safari we're going to drive early in the morning to see animals like zebras, giraffes, and lions and then we're going to camp in the game reserve for two nights. The camp site isn't fenced off so we have to learn a bunch of rules to prepare us in case any animals come close to camp. Reg says that previous semesters have had hyenas running around outside the camp and once an elephant walked right through the camp. There are no lions around the camp because they're in a private reserve that we're going to drive to during the day so we don't have to worry about being attacked in the middle of the night. The Zulu experience is going to be a trip to a Zulu tribe where they still live in huts and they have a tribe chief. We're going to eat traditional Zulu food and experience some of their tribal customs.

After we get back from these two trips we're going to have one last day in Pietermaritzburg. After that day we're going to head off towards Cape Town. There's a lot of traveling in these next two weeks and I probably won't have internet as often as I do now, but I'm excited to experience some more of South Africa. I have to enjoy every bit of it because i know 4 weeks will go by fast and, before I know it, I'll be back in the states again.

Mandhla's House Part 4

This blog can also be titled: Every Mother's Worst Nightmare

Every mom hates when her kids come back home with muddy clothes and brown shoes because boy is it hard to wash mud off clothes. You know those kids that go out the door wearing nice, clean clothes and come back an hour later with mud on their face, their shoes, their pants, their shirts, even inside their ears? Well, that was us today.

It was pouring rain all night and all morning. During our morning devotion, Bruce told us the rain should clear up, but we would continue working even if it didn't. Sure enough the rain stopped an hour into our work, but the sky remained cloudy throughout the day. At first, I thought the rain was annoying, but later I realized what a blessing it was that God gave us rain. Today was the designated day for mud because we had to cover all the walls with layers of mud. The rain had given us a head start because the ground was already moist and the clouds that persisted to cover the sun all day ensured that the mud we made didn't dry out too fast.

Making mud and throwing it on walls sounds like an easy concept, but it actually takes a lot of time. We had a pile of dirt that was set apart specifically for the mud and we dug small holes in it today. After digging a hole, we poured water in and mixed the dirt with water like brownie mix in a bowl. The mud had to be just right before we could pour it on the walls because that would ensure that the mud will last there. After mixing dirt with a shovel several people took off their shoes and jumped in. Phendille showed us how to mix it and some of the guys from Haniville helped us roll mud balls so we could carry those to the house.

I helped out with carrying mud balls to the house and then taking small chunks and throwing it onto the wall. At first, I just placed the mud on the wall and tried to even it out, but Neels showed me how to do it right. He said we had to make sure all the cracks inbetween the rocks were filled in with mud and we had to put another layer once the first layer was dry, so it didn't matter if this first layer wasn't even. The best way to make sure mud got into every crack was to literally throw it as hard as you could onto the wall.

It was a great sight. There were about six people standing on piles of mud stepping on it until the mixture was right, five people were on their knees in front of the pile of dirt rolling mud into big chunks, and about seven people, including myself, were carrying mud chunks to the walls and throwing mud balls as hard as we could onto the walls. Of course mud splattered everywhere and our hands and feet were covered in it.

What a fun day. Any mother would have disapproved of our dirtiness, but we loved every moment of it. Some people even started mud fights, but we had to stop because we were wasting resources.

It was a nice way to finish our work in Haniville, but it was not so nice to say goodbye. On the bus ride home today I wondered if I will ever see Haniville again. I wonder how long my memories of that place will last and how much it will change my life because right now it's too soon to tell. I made such good friends there in just a short amount of weeks and I've learned so much. Haniville will always have a place in my heart.

Mandhla's House Part 3

His love endures forever.
His love endures forever.
His love endures forever.

We said that phrase 26 times this morning as I read Psalm 136 out loud. Every morning at Walk in the Light we start out with a devotion and songs and someone from the group shares a small message. I read the psalm out loud and asked everyone to repeat the phrase, "his love endures forever" that's at the end of every verse. Afterward, I spoke about the goodness of God's everlasting love and about the fact that our work in Haniville is part of a bigger picture.

It's our last week here. We can look back and see how God's love has endured in our lives and in our time here, we can look out today and see God's love throughout the township, and we can look ahead and have faith that God's love will remain in Haniville because greater things are yet to come in Haniville.

I know we had at least some impact on the community and they had a huge impact on us; that's something we can take back to the states with us.

After our devotion we set out to work. Today the task involved: finishing the wiring around the house, digging a place for the veranda outside Mandhla's door because he's always wanted one and we decided to make one for him, and filling in the walls with rocks. To make sure that the rocks didn't stretch out the wire, we nailed thin tree poles to the walls. The house is starting to look more like a house, but we're nervous about finishing it on time. It would be wonderful to finish it, but, even if we don't, I know God will be faithful in getting it done somehow.

The best part of today was what I called voluntary child labor. We needed to collect rocks to fill in all the walls. The walls are pretty big so we needed a lot of rocks. In a place like Haniville, you would expect it to be easy to find rocks and rubble everywhere, and it is, but it's a tedious task to pick them all up and carry them back. There's a group of kids that hang out around the house all day watching us work because they have a break from school and we sometimes take a break from manual labor and play with them. The kids are always willing to help us, which is both a blessing and a problem. It's a blessing because they're so adorable, but it's a problem when they get in the way and prevent us from getting work done right and fast. Today it was definitely a blessing because we had kids lined up behind us carrying rocks from all different places. God gave us a lot of helping hands.