Hi everyone!
It’s been so long since I’ve written a blog; almost a year now, actually. I thought I would give a little update on what life was like while I was living in Africa and also a brief update on what life has been like since I’ve been back in the states.
Africa was an experience that I’ll never forget, and to explain it all would take a lot of coffee and several days; but I would love to share just a small bit about how amazing and challenging the experience was. In Malawi, my team of seven girls was reunited once again with the whole squad, so all 23 of us were living together, partnered with Zehandi Missions. We lived in our tents and had absolutely no running water.
This a sunset over the hill where we made camp and in the distance is Lake Malawi.
We lived on top of a hill that overlooked the beautiful lake Malawi and was surrounded by local villages on all sides. These villages are where we would walk to get our water; it was a daily chore that was necessary for cleaning, washing, and bathing – so all 23 of us would make the mile walk into the villages each day to get our 20L of water. Without the well water, we would not have been able to cook any of our meals, flush the one toilet we all shared, drink water, or bathe our dirty bodies. In the first month, the only food that we were served was the local nsima. Nsima is corn flour that is boiled in water. For breakfast, we would be served a milkier nsima that resembled a type of porridge, for lunch we would have nsima and pumpkin leaves with nuts; dinner was nsima with potatoes. Between the 30+ people living at Zehandi we would share two tomatoes and some onions for our dinner that was served with the potatoes on top of the nsima. Eating the food of the culture was great and helped me relate with the people so much more, but my body was definitely not prepared to handle how little nutrients I was taking in, so an infection started.
Breakfast nsima
As many of you might know, due to my mom’s Facebook posts, while living in Malawi I acquired 54 staph infections. Most of the infections covered my feet and legs, but as the days progressed, the staph began to spread to any and all open wounds I had.
The first picture is of my feet when I woke up in the morning. (Notice how dirty they are and I have yet to step out of my tent. Dirt would accumulate in our tents at night due to the wind storms.) The second is of my right foot when my staph infections were pretty bad.
One of my most memorable experiences from my time in Malawi was when, one evening as the sun was setting, I made the trek down to the well to get some water. As I got down to the well, I sat with the women and held their babies and helped them pump their water. When it was my turn, I got my water and then began the challenging, uphill walk back to our camp from the well. On my way out of the village, I began to hear the chants of the witch doctor who lived on the outskirts of the village. This was not unusual; it was actually something that we expected as just part of the walk home from the well. We would always pray for her as we walked by, and so, as I carried my water home that night, I prayed for her and those who she was casting her spells and chants on. I prayed that the Lord would wreck her spiritually and that her hut would be filled with His light. I continued my prayer until her chants faded into the background and then the Muslim call to prayer went off. It was very normal to hear this, but I remember this time specifically because it occurred as soon as the witch doctor’s chants began to be inaudible. As I made my way back to our camp I could not stop thinking about how needed God was in these villages, the country of Malawi, and Africa in general. At the time, I may have been suffering with 54 physical pains, but I had the knowledge and love of God in my heart and a large number these people did not know Him at all. God had called me to Malawi to be His Light in a country where He is so needed. It was my job at the time to live as the locals lived. That meant sleeping in a chicken coop when the days were too hot to do anything else or spending all day chucking corn with a local woman who had five children and had lost her job because she taught at a school where no one could afford to attend anymore due to how expensive it was.
The time in Africa was difficult, but the Lord was with me the whole time and He comforted me through all of the struggles I had with Malaria and all of my infections, and he filled me up with an energy and spirit that was not my own, but something that can only come from someone as powerful and loving as my God. So living in the dirt for three months, having 54 staph infections and Malaria was bad, but I would suffer through it all over again just to see God enter the hearts of the Malawian people and to experience such a dependent lifestyle with Him. My faith and my team’s faith was so strong in Africa because life without God was near impossible there, so as I look back on the three and a half months in Malawi the trials and struggles were worth the physical pain because of the spiritual growth and dependence on God that was happening inside of all of us. I hope this story will give you some idea of what the three and a half months in Malawi was like for us.
At the well with some of the women we met. I am holding one of their babies on my back.
While in Malawi, I also taught homeschool to the three South African children who lived on the property with us. The experience was very challenging, but it is an experience that I really value now at college. I am currently attending Clemson University where I am secondary education and English double major. There is not one day that goes by that I do not think about the people that I met on my journey around the world, especially the 32 JAZ girls that I lived with in the Philippines. I plan on one day returning to the Philippines, if it is God’s plan for me, to teach and work in the communities alongside Kids International Ministries and the JAZ girls. Since I have been home, I have also been trying to find a way to stay more connected with the JAZ girls even though I am so many thousands of miles away. I have decided that one way I could daily commit myself to them is for me to train for a half marathon and run it for the girls in the Philippines; so I am now running a half marathon that will be in March and I’ve made a pledge to raise 1,300 dollars that will go towards the education and a daily life cost of the JAZ girls. In this upcoming week I hope to write another blog and provide more information about the JAZ girls! Thanks so much for taking time out of your busy day to read this blog; it is so appreciated and, please, during this week, be praying for the JAZ girls and the Philippines as they are still recovering from Typhoon Haiyan.
