Ok, It's Alright With Me

6/13/11

I’m starting to realize my coping skills are sub par compared to the rest of the world’s.  One roommate (whose name I have no idea how to spell) was puking her guts up her entire first week here, and poor Lucy just found out her dad is in the hospital.  He’s alright, but Lucy is behaving remarkably, and is calmly finding her way home a day or two early.  If it were me on either count, I’d be a wreck and in tears and blindly crying to some poor stranger begging them to take me to the airport.  Pray for her dad and their family.  I think he’s stable, but it’s still stressful to have someone in the hospital anytime. 

In other news, I got to visit the village of Mozilla today.  I’m not sure if that’s actually how it’s spelled, but I enjoyed myself, regardless of spelling uncertainties.  I went on an ‘Outreach’ with the HIV clinic today.  They drive into the remote villages once a month and bring medicine and do check ups free of charge for the patients who can’t physically make it to the clinic.  I didn’t do a darn thing but watch and carry a couple of boxes of pills, but I got handshakes and hugs and a feast of a meal in return.  I can’t get over the genuinely kind hearts of the people here.  This one woman, who isn’t even seen by the clinic, cooks a MASSIVE amount of food for this group every time they come.  She does it free of charge for the ‘kind people that save our village.’  I wanted so badly to eat every bite of beans and potatoes that she gave us (two of my least favorite foods in the entire world), and I did pretty well for the first serving, but I struggled with the second and third servings that she slapped on my plate without asking.  I’m guessing she wasn’t too offended because she offered for me to stay the night next time I was there.  Freakin amazing.

I’ve been carefully calculating the days and hours that I have left (I can still get some credit if I only do half the time, a dangerous piece of knowledge), but I’m starting to feel like I need to try A LOT harder in adjusting my attitude.  You were all right, it doesn’t take much other than my presence to give a sense of hope, and that really perplexes me.  Stephen had such pride on Saturday when he looked at the clinic he helped to build from the ground up, and couldn’t be happier to have a student come, and to hopefully build a bridge for more students to come to his home village.  I think (I could be wrong), but I think that part of why the villagers especially get so excited about muzungus is 1) I have weird hair that they love to touch and 2) someone from the outside has taken an interest and just that fact might mean something (however miniscule it may be) for the future.  Well, crap.  I just want to get home and buy shoes that aren’t caked in dirt and eat enough Willy’s cheese dip to last a lifetime.  

Here’s my list:
1. for now, I have a healthy family not lying in hospital beds thousands of miles away
2. for mountains of beans and potatoes.  They tasted terrible, but were filled with enough love that I could stomach it. 
3. for funny drivers that pretty much just honk on dirt roads until cows move, and ask TONS of questions about ‘Joooor-ja.’  I’m starting to question my abilities in communication.
4. for mountain top views and sunflowers in Kabwohe.  If nothing else on this trip does, I think those could have changed my life.