Pictures of my "faith journey" in Africa...

I finally got my pictures developed from disposable cameras of the last 3.5 months of traveling to Rwanda and back by bus...although the low quality pics don't do the trip justice because most of beautiful moments aren't visible because they took place inside of me, my prayer is that you will be inspired to do your own little trip with God whatever that looks like...It could be tapping into a talent you've always known you had, but haven't, or maybe it's taking a trip by yourself and God to a place that you always imagined yourself going to, even it's just an hour away...God knows what's been on your heart to do because He has given you those desires, ones that make you feel scared, but know deep down they would give you life if you trusted Him to move with you. There's something inside of us that longs to feel alive and do something we have always been afraid to do. Just do it! God and I dare you to step out of our comfort zones to see how to fly...May these pictures and stories push you out of your nest!
GETTING THERE..
SOUTH AFRICA (CAPETOWN, JOHANESSBURG), MOZAMBIQUE (MAPUTO, DONDO)...

After an 18 carride from Maputo, I landed in Dondo at midnight. Here is the family that took me for 5 days in the village, that I mentioned in the previous blog about their generous hospitality. I lived very, very humbly again, taking baths under the stars, and washing/drying my clothes in the sun. My portuguese quickly had to resurface in my brain because for most of the day, I was in the village with few people to speak English to. But I was amazed how quickly I learned and remembered! They really blessed me on my last night of staying there with a delicious chicken meal and touching prayer and words. I was very, very blessed.

Emma, Zacharias' niece, is only 13 years old, and she is an amazing cook! She cooked every meal for me, and even taught me how to cook my favorite Mozambiquan food-- Matapa, which is cooked greens with a rice and coconut sauce! YUMMMMMMY!

I was so tickled by the creativity of the children in the village...they use anything they can find as a toy. They even made their own playclay from the mud, which came to life as people, trucks, and even cameras...What imaginations!

MOZAMBIQUE (QUELIMANE)...
After saying goodbye to Zacharias' family in Dondo, I jumped on a crammed bus at 5:00am and ended up in a city called Quelimane, 16 hours away. I was completely exhausted and dehydrated (you can send me an email why...too long to explain) and the thought of getting on another bus right away the next morning almost killed me. Fortunately I was blessed by a Brazilian YWAM team I had met in Capetown that was staying in Quelimane (again amazingly orchestrated by God). They told me to stay as long as I needed to rejuvenate, eat their food, sleep in their beds with them, etc. They were great to me!

My favorite guy though was a Mozambiquan named Tito, who heart for learning and teaching english to children was huge! He helped me with my portuguese too and he taught me how to make "dolce de coco," which is a bar dessert made of sugar, coconut, and lemon...This picture is him grinding the coconut out of the shell.
MOZAMBIQUE (PEMBA)...

So I hopped on yet another but at 5:00am and didn't get to Pemba until 8:00pm...Here is a picture of what the seat looked like on my bus...I am not exaggerating the rides, trust me! But it was a miracle how I got there (again another story to ask over email if you are curious), and I was picked up by the every so wonderful Salyer family, who I had stayed with in Capetown...I was a huge breath of relief to see Brad in his 4x4 to pick me up and take me back to a place that had a comfortable bed with air condition...let me tell you!


However, the greatest reason I wanted to go to Pemba where I was just a year ago for the mission school was to see my adopted African son, Antonio and the other children I grew to love as my own. It was one of the best reunions I could have ever imagined, because there was no way to tell him that I was coming ahead of time...all I did was ask around the familiar faces of the children if they knew where I was...and when Antonio say me and I saw him, we ran to each other. I had tears in my eyes and we hugged for a long time...He looked so much older. Seriously, blessings come in strange packages. You will never know how much you mean to someone unless you leave them for a period of time and then surprise them. The look on their face will say it all, and if it's of love, there's no better feeling than that...
TANZANIA...

I'd have to say that it was probably one of the most exhilerating feeling exiting the border post of Tanzania and walking towards the entrance of Rwanda.
!!!RWANDA!!!

I just had to cross over the bridge to enter the promised land!

You know how the home crowd greets their football team as it enters the field? That's how I felt listening to the rush and roaring of Rusumo Falls as I crossed over...it was like God cheering me on and what was going on in my heart!

2322 miles later by land, I had seen God's promise fulfilled! He deserves all the glory for getting me there safely, and providing amazing hospitality all the way there and back! You can read more about this in one of my previous blogs...


Breathtaking hills, eh? They don't call it the land of a 1000 hills for nothing!


I stayed with a beautiful couple for 3 weeks who had recently gotten married...Their love for each other was soooo cute and fun! One of Shema's favorite hobbies was cooking, so she wanted to show me how to do it Rwandan style! I even got a bigger belly staying here! Her servant Tayo made the best beans! I couldn't help but have seconds!

THE RETURN...
UGANDA...

I met Anita randomly at the bus station as I was preparing to leave from Rwanda to go back thru Tanzania. I did NOT want to go back the same way on the most hellish busride of my life, so she encouraged me to go to Uganda with her and go through Kenya instead...well, I did, only we stayed together for 10 days! She wanted me to experience EVERYTHING in her culture, from meat on a stick to fried grasshoppers (yummy) to peanut sauce and matoki...and the belly continued to grow! I wrote about her hospitality as well in the previous blog...


Anita made sure to introduce me to all of her family and friends! Hilarious, loud, and welcoming! The way I like them!



Anita even took me to an Ethiopian hairdresser who knew how to make my hair into tight, tight African curls! The secret???? Drinking straws, no kidding! I absolutely loved it! It inspired me to get them permanently when I got back to Capetown...

I even got to ride motorbikes for taxis! They drive like crazy!

Meeting this beautiful African sister, was ordained by God in His perfect timing...the Power of God's love was demonstrated mightily in my time spent with her...Katie will always remain close to my heart...please pray that her life will be used for God powerfully...she has Him in her...

And of course I had to make a couple of little precious friends too! Every morning these twins would cry out "Mazungo! Mazungo!" (White person! White person!) to come out and play with them. They would even lay like this on Anita's porch waiting patiently. This picture was not posed, which made me want to eat them up more because they were SOOOO cute!

And I can't help but see the beauty of God when little African children are taking baths in big bowls like this...when they are wet, their skin is glistening and shining. It's overwhelming how adorable they are, so pure and innocent, giving me so much joy in my heart...It's a wonderful picture of how God sees us when we become His children...clean, shiny, pure...
KENYA, TANZANIA (DAR ES SALAAM)...

It was a blessing to stay with Daniel's family again for almost a month...I truly felt like I could be myself and that I was apart of their family. I felt no pressure to serve in any way. They said, "God sent you to be with us for however long and for whatever purpose. It is not for us to say when to leave." I know God had prepared this place for me to rest and enjoy being in a free, Christian African environment. I enjoyed the prayer and worship group they had every night before we'd eat dinner. They danced and sang many nights until late, besides my color and language, I really felt like I fit in...

I was blessed to have a beach only 15 minutes to walk to at night. The stars and moon would come out over the ocean and the wind would move the palm trees...I could have slept there overnight feeling the fresh breeze on my face.

However, out of all of the countries I visited, I'd have to say that Tanzania had the biggest and tastiest fruits that were sold everywhere! Juicy pineapple, mangos, coconuts, and bananas! I came at the right time!

Daniel's mom, also known as "Mama Miriam," was the amazing woman of God that really kept this family all together...her heart is so big and generous to see her family become all God entailed them to be in Him. Please pray that she continues to receive wisdom, peace, and strength from our Father. She is the one who shared her bed and bathroom with me for a good majority of the time being there. I truly respect and honor her...
MALAWI, MOZAMBIQUE (TETE, DONDO, MAPUTO), "HOME SWEET SOUTH AFRICAN (JOHANNESBURG, CAPETOWN) HOME"...
It felt so crazy to be back in Capetown once again...It really did feel like home because I had people waiting to see me and hear about my adventures. I realized how much I had gotten accustomed to the things here, and I enjoyed the last 3 weeks of my time visiting and catching up with my YWAM brothers and sisters, my Faith Ministries brothers and sisters, and of course, the wonderful Salyer Family, who once again, came to my rescue on a couple of accounts...more miracles...

Home Sweet American Home!

Yes, that's right! My feet are finally planted on American soil...I mean freezing cold, solid snow...WHAT A CHANGE! I just can't seem to get warm! Even in my own house I feel like my toes are going to fall off! But more importantly, my heart, has definitely been warmed by the wonderful welcome from my friends at the airport, and then a hilarious, priceless dumbfounded look on my dad's face when I surprisingly walked into the house with them a day earlier than planned...man, I got my parents good! It was a hard secret to keep, but it all worked out perfectly!
I want to apologize for not keeping up with my blogs after I reached Rwanda...I don't have any excuses, except I just felt bad that there weren't any pictures to share with you...However, I included pictures of my journey on the blog above, so when you read this, you can see the faces of who I am talking about above. So, what am I supposed to write? How do I sum up almost a year and a half of my life that even if I tried to put it in words, they would always fall short of what my heart wants to express...sure I could use all the cliche words like, "life-changing, amazing, the best year and a half of my life, challenging, exciting, words can't describe, incredible, etc.," but all those adjective "don't do justice" (another cliche). All I can say is I would gladly do it all over again, not because every moment was enjoyable (one would argue that I would even describe 1 hour on an African bus, let alone 20, as that...), but because I now have a PERSONAL testimony of how REAL and FAITHFUL God was (and still is) for me in those 3.5 months. For example, did you realize I only had to pay for 7 nights accomidation? That's almost 13 weeks of generous African hospitality, none of which people I knew before I came to Africa...Did you know that sometimes I didn't know where I would spend the night that day, but God always placed a Christian African brother to get me to a safe place? Or how I met Daniel at the bus station in Tanzania, and trusting God after meeting his mom, I left with them to be blessed with the most beautiful swahili worship, prayer, and meal before heading off for 32 hours on the worst busride of my life the following day? And before leaving said, "if you ever come back through Tanzania, please stay with us. It's not good for our Christian sister to be staying in a hotel?" Or another time when I met Anita, another sister, in the bus station in Rwanda who invited me to stay at her place in Uganda (which ended up being over 10 days)? She didn't even know me beforehand, but pampered me to a complete hour long pedicure and manicure without me mentioning anything? (keep in mind I had been in the dirt for 2 months without a proper feet cleaning due to lack of running water...) Her comment, "if you lived here with me, I would never get old because you would always make me laugh," as well as other comments about my morals and values, were confirmations from God that He was giving me His joy to pour out onto His people, as well as teaching them it is possible to live holy lives. Every country (South Africa, Mozambique, Tanzania, Rwanda, Uganda)in which I spent either 1 day or over a month, each said that I have a home there. How do you put just this small part of my time traveling into words, when I am used to a country that won't even let their own relatives stay at the house because there's "not enough room?" One "2-bedroom" house I stayed in was a village in Mozambique. I arrived there one night at midnight by bus. And God began to shower me with His favor as soon as I met Zacharias' mother, who is in her late 60s, works hard in the rice fields, has to rise with the sun at 4:30 every morning, woke up to greet me and serve me chicken dinner she had cooked for me, a rare delicacy when one lives in the village where money is "tight." Remind you, she doesn't speak English and has never met me before, but considers it an honor to have visitors. As she showed me my room, which was about 9 by 4 feet cement with space between the wall and roof, sinking mattress that swallowed me in when I laid on it, and a mosquito net with holes that wouldn't keep out a flying mouse. Now if you can imagine this in 90 degree temperature and no window for a breeze, by my standards, it was definitely NOT a comfortable place to be. But God began to teach me a beautiful lesson when I saw a little boy wake up from other room to use the latrine (a hole in the ground to use for bodily functions) outside. I poked inside that other small room to find 3 other children laying on a straw mat on the cement--no mattress, no pillow, no space to sprawl out to make themselves comfortable. On the way back into the room, Valdo stopped still halfasleep to smile at me and shake my hand to greet me. I almost had tears in my eyes when I realized I was getting the African village version of a 5 star hotel, only it was better...Let me tell you why. Who was I to be blessed with their best that they had to offer me, while the rest of the family risked getting malaria and had to sleep on top of eachother on the hard ground in the humid conditions? And they did this for 5 nights in a row without complaining, in fact wanting me to stay longer? WOULD I DO THAT FOR A STRANGER--GIVE UP MY COMFORTABLE BED AND HEALTH FOR SOMEONE I DIDN'T KNOW, AND DO IT WITH A SMILE? OUCH! But then I was seeing it from God's perspective. JESUS CHRIST gave up everything for my life and yours. I realized in this humbling moment that these people, who quickly became my adopted Mozambiquan family, were more like Christ than I probably have ever been. They gave up their best for an undeserving person, just like Jesus did for you and I.
Another woman in Tanzania did the same thing...I had only met her once briefly before on the way through, so when she showed me where I would be sleeping, I wanted to laugh in disbelief. There were two couches in the living room, but she guided me to the opposite side of her own double bed. Instead of leaving me to the couch where most people would put strangers in their house if they couldn't have their own room, I took the place where her husband normally slept when he wasn't away on business. It was now my place to lay my head for the next 10 days. What would you say to this offering?
Now some people might argue, "Well, that's African culture and we do other things to show we're hospitable people, like taking them out to eat and paying for their hotel." Here's the question I started to ask myself, what do you think Jesus would approve of? Would I give people I didn't know the best I had to offer? I can honestly say that although the conditions were a bit "uncomfortable, dirty, buggy, hot," I have never before felt so welcomed and loved by STRANGERS in my life. NEVER. How would you feel? Would you honor them by receiving it?

God asks us the same question: Will we receive God's best? And in return to be a living example of Jesus? Will we become a Christ follower despite the uncomfortable conditions? When we really understand in complete reverance and disbelief of how He gave His us His son to die a horrible death on a cross even though He was innocent and were not, not in a way where we feel guilty so we HAVE to give up our lives, then we will be compelled to love God and others the same way. With this incredible revalation, I was motivated by LOVE to give back, not guilt. Out of complete freedom in joy, not out of obligation. God deserves our best because He gave us His. Without it, I would be on a straight road to hell. And how can we repay God? It's impossible, and God made it that way so we would always need Him to help us live a life worthy of His Son. He gives us grace to try and doesn't expect perfection. It is NOT burden--something to dread and complain about--but a very precious privilege. I get to represent Christ, not Allah, or Buddha, or strange gold statues, but a true, living, loving God because He chose me to work with Him and for Him. And THAT is life. Nothing else satisfies. So find your life in Him by receiving the free gift of His Son Jesus Christ and abandon your life to Him because when you lose the life you have tried to keep for selfish desires, you will find it in His amazing purposes. God will show you what He created you to do for His Kingdom...He's planted it in our hearts and we need not to be afraid to go after it.