A Snapshot of Life in Africa

I’m sure some of you wonder what the little, day-to-day parts of life are like here in Africa. I’m not sure I can describe it all accurately, but I’ll do my best…

Dad asked me last week to describe Arua, the town I live in. That’s easier said than done. The best I came up with was to imagine Dodge City or Tombstone from an old western, cover the buildings with plaster and crazy colors of paint, fill it with a ton of people, bikes, motorcycles, and the random goat, cow, or chicken. That’s a pretty fair picture.

Sleeping under a mosquito net reminds me of what it would be like to be a princess in a castle with a big curtained bed… only the curtains aren’t there to keep you warm. They’re there to keep you from getting malaria.

Take a one-gallon milk jug and fill it with water. Put a couple of ice cubes in it… not many, just 2 or 3. Punch 3 or 4 holes in the bottom of the jug and hold it 3 inches over your head… and you have the water pressure of my shower each morning. (I do have to admit, the water does warm up eventually…. about a minute before you’re done.)

Walking to church Sunday morning, we walked down the road under some beautiful tall trees. One problem: 2 of the trees are bat trees, meaning that the top branches of the trees are covered in sleeping bats. Bats are sort of like birds: you have to be careful when you walk under them. Yes, I got pooped on. Fortunately, it was only my toe, and by the time we got to church, it had worked its way off. (Standards of cleanliness have already changed!)

It doesn’t really surprise me when the generator (because we’ve had no electric-company power for over a week now) dies in the middle of a neighborhood dinner. Somebody just gets the battery-powered lights and everyone else just keeps talking!

Halfway through lunch today, I looked out the window and saw one of the goats wander into the building behind the house… where our language study takes place. Fortunately, Buddy didn’t eat any of our notebooks (this time!)…. he just pooped all over the place.

The coolest thing? I’ve started to get settled in and “comfortable” with life here. I’m not saying it’s easy, but I’m getting used to it. But every now and then, whether it’s going to visit one of the Storyers and sitting in her mud hut under the thatched roof, or sitting under a mango tree having Bible study with other Western women, or driving through a small village of mud huts on the way to the Bible study, every now and then it hits me: I live in Africa. And every time I think, this is absolutely ludicrous, and totally stinkin’ cool.

Praise the Lord for bringing me to Africa! Where else can you battle ants, mosquitoes, goats, and a new language, all in the same day???