Day 9

I had promised the Ladies at the project that I would be back Friday to do their nails.  My mom and Josh could not come because they were making soap, and buying more supplies so I had to go myself.  Paul had to pick up gravel 2 hours out of town so he was dropping me off.  When we got there we set up the soap cutter, and stamp.  The ladies cut the soap, and stamped “Soap 4 Hope” on the soap we had made earlier in the week.  After that I did some of their nails, and gave them hand massages.   Two of the woman at the project had brought their baby’s (both girls).  The first was named Given and the Second Precious.  Given was born July 18 and Precious June 18, and their mothers are great friends.  We had devotion lead by one of the girls, and I got to play with Precious.

Afterwards me, Tinta, and the two mothers waited for Paul to get back. Tinta is one of the employees at the project, and also needed a ride home with Paul.  We all waited for about 40 minutes when Tinta got a call from Ally (Paul’s wife).  Paul’s truck had broken down and she had to go pick him up.  In a split second we went from waiting for our ride to being stranded in a very rough neighbourhood.  Plan A was to get a taxi to an intersection were (extremely dangerous) shuttles take people uptown.  The shuttles are dangerous for two reasons, 1 they are the riskiest, scariest, untrained, drivers in Africa (that I know of), and 2 the taxi drivers and people in the taxi have been known to mug passengers that are vulnerable aka a 15 year old white girl who can’t speak their language.  I was scared. 

The four of us (plus 2 babies) start out in the first taxi.  We have been driving for about 2 minutes when one of the mothers tells the taxi driver to pull over onto the curb.  I have to say we are in a very poor neighbourhood and I really didn’t feel like walking through it, or even being in that cab.  I felt that I was a walking target, I just wanted to be out of my body, to blend in.  I was terrified to be who I was for very real reasons and I don’t ever want to feel that again, although I probably will. 

We pay the taxi driver 40 rend and step onto the hot pavement.  The ladies parents live down the road, and her sister has a car, so she could drive us home.  So we start walking down the road.  Then we come to a little house with an open gate, with a blue car outside.  We walk into a little room with couches and a table.  The old TV is on, and the static images are hurting my eyes.  Two ladies and a man are sitting in the room.  They are the lady’s sisters and brother.  We explain our situation and the sisters agree to drive us uptown once they finish filling out a form.  We sit down and about 5 minutes later her father walks into the room.  Tinta gets up and greets him, then I get up.  This man is a pastor at a local church and the moment I saw him I could see the kindness in his soul.  I walk up to him and shake his hand.   Tinta says who I am and that I came from Canada, and what I am doing here, in a language that he understands.  His eyes light up and his mouth forms a smile lacking teeth then he says something I will never forget, he says in broken English “it is an honor to meet you, you are so blessed,  We are blessed to have you stand on our floor, in our home, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you”.  I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t think, all I could mutter out was “thank you so much”.  I should have said more, I should have hugged the man, I should have told him that I was thankful to be in his home and not on the street, but all I said was thank you, and I hope he understood. 

We waited in the little room for about an hour.  I was so impatient on the inside, but I smothered it easily because I was in a better place than in a taxi, or on the street.  Then the time came and we all squished into the back of the little blue car and started driving.  It was hot, I could hardly breath from the fumes, but I was so happy, so so happy.  When we finally got home I hugged my mom.  She had been so worried, and had had no way to contact me.  I thanked the sisters and they soon drove out in that blue car (thank you blue car).   Me Josh Tinta and my mom all talked for a little bit and then Tinta went home. 

We went to the mall that evening for Internet, and I uploaded some photos, which took 2 hours to figure out.  At 9 I went to bed, and was so happy to be home.

-Z