Day One and Two



Me feeling happy and eager before my tearful goodbye.

 

Our awesome team!  From left to right - Russ, Ryan, Me, Kiersten, Rebecca, Kerri, and Nate.  I miss them all so much!

The spot where we met Lila for the first time just over a year ago.  Can you say Holy High Emotions?!

 

 

Wass smiling as he looks at pictures I brought of Kewogo.  He is our driver, helper, and friend while we are in ET.

 

 

 I will write about day one and two together as they mesh together due to the long travel time.  Matt and I left the house at 4:00 am in order for me to catch my 6:30 am flight to DC.  When I was checking in the woman assisting me gave me quite a scare when she was confused by my Visa.  I knew it was a valid Visa but for whatever reason she kept questioning it and we finally realized that she didn't know what she was doing and I helped her to read it.  I guess I needed that shot of adrenaline because I was wide awake after that scare.  Then, a nice man helped me tape up my donation bin better and Matt and I headed to Tim Horton's to eat after I was all checked in.  We had just been at this same Tim Horton's for breakfast just two weeks before as we boarded the plane for our wonderful time in Mexico.  All of a sudden I had the desire to be heading back to Mexico with Matt (or anywhere for that matter) rather than Africa by myself. I knew it was just silly fear creeping in but as we said good bye I was beginning to fall apart and the tears started flowing.  It reminded me of when I was in labor for the second and third time.  I knew the outcome would be wonderful but darn it  - don't make me walk into that hospital and go through it all! I did not want to go through that security line and get on that plane.  When I walked through the body scan machine (that I am certain causes cancer) there was a security woman on the other side who saw my tears and asked if I needed a hug.  She was so sincere and compassionate and I took her up on it.  This was touching to me because just the day before when I was at BSF we were sharing in our group and one of the women told me how much it meant to her when I approached her a few months ago after I noticed she was sad and simply gave her a hug.  She was retelling this with tears in her eyes about how much this simple gesture had meant to her and it made me realize that I never wanted to miss an opportunity to reach out to someone in a time of need. This woman reached out to me today and it had such a calming effect on me.  Right after that I received a text from a friend telling me she was praying for me and then as our plane took off I watched the most beautiful sunrise.  I thanked God for that comfort I needed. I settled in with my bible and continued to be comforted by his Word and I prayed that I would not miss opportunities to encourage others and to be tuned into the needs and feelings of others always and especially on this trip.  As I watched the houses, cars, and roads get smaller and smaller I thought about how very, very, very small I am on this Earth of 6 billion people and how God can use even little old me and our team to help serve the people in Gambella. I am so thrilled over this opportunity.  I looked at the silly little screen that separated first class and thought about how thankful I am that Christ sees no class distinction. There is no separation that divides the "deserving' and "undeserving." We are all the same in God's eyes.

I was the first of my team to arrive in DC and I was very anxious for the others to get here and meet everyone.  The only ones I knew were Nate and Kerri as we traveled with them on our first trip last year. Finally everyone started to arrive and after we all introduced ourselves Nate immediately pulled out his tripod and we took our first picture of what would be hundreds.  Our team consisted of me, Nate and Kerri of Portland, our AGCI leader Kiersten of Portland, Russ and his 16 year old son, Ryan, of Sioux City, and Rebecca of Albuquerque.  Our plane was filled with Americans going on a medical mission.  However, it wasn't full at all and it was so different from our flights last year. The plane was smaller that the ones we flew last the I had switched my seat to sit near everyone and ended up having a whole row to myself.  I was able to stretch out and try to sleep.  This was going well until two women decided to have a conversation over my head.  The one woman was confiding that she was confused by her male friend's actions. Did he like her or not? She had been a faithful wife to her alcoholic ex husband for 36 years so surely he could trust her.  Her acquaintance placated her with platitudes. He is just scared.  NO HE IS NOT SCARED!  HE IS JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU! This is what I wanted to say.  Hasn't she heard of the He's Just Not That Into You Guy?  I think every woman should know about the man who gives women this advice.  I will definitely share his wisdom with my daughters some day.  I wanted to tell her she is a lovely woman and that she needed to quit worrying and move on from this joker but I didn't think this unsolicited advice would be well received so I just continued to sigh loudly hoping they would get the hint and move which they didn't. 

I kept looking at everyone else with their eyes closed and feeling envious because I had hardly slept at all and as it turns out everyone else had felt the same way.  We all thought the others to be sleeping when we actually weren't. Kerri and I talked during the last two hours of the flight and surprisingly the flight ended up going pretty fast. As we deboarded the plane I relished the familiar smells of Ethiopia and it  struck me as to how natural it felt to be back there.  We quickly got our luggage except for Nate and Kerri.  Theirs had been bumped due to the darn medical mission people with their supplies filling up the cargo.  We waited a while to sort through their unfortunate situation as it meant they would not receive their luggage before we had to leave for Gambella. They handled this news beautifully and were mostly concerned with their donations not making it. We checked into The Ember Guest House and then went straight over to Hannah's Hope.  I wasn't prepared for the emotions I would experience as I walked through the gates of Hannah's Hope again.  A huge rush of emotions raced through my body and my eyes immediately filled with tears but never fell.  Almaz (the director of HH) hugged all of us and said that she always tells people to come back and visit and we actually did which made her so happy. The kids were just washing up for lunch when we arrived so we went into one of the large sitting rooms to talk to Almaz about our trip.  As always, she was full of wisdom and said, "Do not make Gambella like America.  You Americans are very task oriented. You don't have to do, do, do while you are there.  Just love on the people you are serving there."  Wow. You mean set aside our agendas and what we value as self-important? She is wise because she knows this is hard for us to do.  Her words stayed with me the whole trip and I couldn't wait to get to Gambella to love on the people. When we were finished with Almaz we played with the kids for awhile and then we had to leave to go take Nate and Kerri on a shopping trip for some clothes.  We helped Kerri pick out some fabulous pants (wink!) and then we headed to dinner.  Our energy level was just through the roof (not!) and we could barely keep our eyes open during dinner.  We headed back to the Ember House after dinner and upon discovering their was no internet we all went right up to bed.  We had a 5:45 am departure time.  I fell asleep at 6:15 pm and awoke to some noise at 7:30 pm and thought I had slept all night! I was so very happy to learn that I didn't have to be up for nine more hours. I fell right back asleep and slept until 2:00 am.   A fly decided to make its home above my ear while buzzing loudly and I couldn't go back to sleep. I kept reflecting on my time at Hannah's Hope and emotion finally took over and the tears started falling.  I was reliving every bit of our being there last year and the memories are just too huge for me to even be able to put into words. After a while I had an urgent desire to talk to my family.  We talked and everyone caught me up on their games, goals scored, etc. and then sweet Brooke was crying and missing me which, of course, made me cry again.  We said goodbye knowing that I would most likely not be able to talk to them for a week. That was hard. I then got up even though it was still the middle of the night and got ready for our big day. Then, the Orthodox prayer call began and grew louder and louder by the minute.  I recorded it to be able to share it with everyone when I got home.  It was a welcome reminder of where I was as it can be hard to remember when I lay safe in my cozy bed in the dark stillness of the night.