Adventure

Sometimes life brings adventures our way when we are not even looking for them. It feels like that seems to happen to me a lot living here in Tanzania. Ok, so here is one of the latest “non-planned adventures” that came upon me.
Eli, our assistant director has a very good friend who is a pastor in an area that is near Mt. Kilimanjaro. The mountain is his backyard. What a beautiful place! I was invited to speak at his church last Sunday. The week heading into Sunday Eli informed me that on Sunday it is possible that if there has been a lot of rain out there that we’ll have to drive part of the way and walk part of the way to church.
I asked Eli what he meant by, “Walk part of the way.” He said it would be a good idea to wear my hiking boots because the walk would take us up and down and up and down for more than an hour and he plans on wearing his hiking boots.
Yeh, well I don’t own hiking shoes. I own flip flops. My life here has turned into long skirts down to my ankle and comfortable flip flops. My flip flops don’t even have much traction on them. But Eli, the ultimate optimistic person you’ll ever meet, shakes his shoulders and says, “Ok wear your flips.”
I kept thinking to myself during the week that all the school-aged kids would be going to church with us so if they can walk up and down and up and down the mountain in their church shoes then I can do it too.
So on Sunday morning we headed out to church…a van full (18 in total). I looked around and everyone was dressed nice for church so I kept thinking that if they can do this then I can do this. Eli’s wife Rosa was in the van and I was sitting there holding their five-month old baby girl. Will I be climbing up and down and up and down with flip flops and a five month old? My flips don’t even have traction!
I decided to turn my thoughts to the road we were traveling. As we headed off the paved part of the road I looked around and the road looked pretty good. Oh yeh…it doesn’t look like much rain has fallen over the past week…we are looking pretty good, road wise! Then Eli informed me that we'd have to wait and see about walking…we had a lot more driving to do and the part where we might have to walk is about 30 minutes more up the mountain. Yikes! So the 18 of us just settled back for the ride and beautiful scenery. It is quite lovely, as you can imagine.
I started to picture myself with the baby strapped to my back trying to maneuver the slippery terrain. I kept telling myself that I could do this…I have really mastered the art of mud skating. But then we took a turn and Eli announced that we were going to make it all the way to the church. We drove the rest of the way of the road and then Eli took a left onto what I like to call a “non-road.” Eli laughs when I say that. Last month we visited his parents’ village where I spoke at his dad’s church and part of that drive was on a non-road…so interesting to drive a vehicle where it really shouldn’t be going.
So we turned on this non-road and then stopped. Eli announced that we’d be walking from that place. I said, “I thought we didn’t have to walk because there hasn’t been much rain.” Eli just laughed and said, “Sister Lydia, we are where everyone walks all the time. We just don’t have to walk up and down and up and down the mountain.” The next thing I knew two women from the church showed up (walking) and one of them took the baby from me and we started walking. It was fun. We were one long line of 20 people (counting the two women from church) walking a narrow path in the midst of so much beauty on the way to church.
We had an amazing time at church and after lunch as Eli visited with his good friend the kids enjoyed playing and running all over the place. We went for a VERY long walk and had a blast.
The pastor asked us to come back again soon. We made a plan to come back in a couple months if all our plans work out. We are looking forward to returning to this beautiful place, but I think just for the sake of enjoying a good adventure we might have to do the walk up and down and up and down next time! Eli thinks it will be a good idea...the children think I am joking…ha! I’ll be writing a follow-up to this blog about that upcoming adventure!!!!