so, i just came back from what i earlier dubbed was going to be the "best trip ever". it ended up being good. not sure about the best trip ever though. the first day, we were scheduled to take off at 6 am. not really a fan of starting to do strenous exercise that early in the morning. anyway, we end up starting to walk around 7:15-7:30. around 9:30, i realise that i didn't have breakfast and i tend to get low blood sugar when doing a lot of exercise and no food. so, we attempt to fix the problem, but travelling with 7 africans and 1 canadian, africans don't get the concept at all of low blood sugar.
anyway, we do assessments in about 5 villages. total it takes 10 hours and we get to the last village where we'll sleep at about 5:30. 8 hour of walking the first day. the village was called nyemah and it was so clean and the people were SO incredibly kind. they gave us water to take a bath in, in this cute homemade bathhouse they made and they even gave up their beds for us! Even though we brought tents to sleep in.
So, the 2nd day comes and we move on. everyone acts like they are in such a hurry but i being the stubborn person i am have a pace that i go, and we're still making good time, but some of the faster walkers want me to go faster-hence ticking me off a little. we do 2 more villages in 3 hours instead of the 4 they said it would take and keep going another 3 hours to another village. now, when i say that i'm walking, this isn't some little stroll on the trail. this is a "knock you in the face-no motorcycle can go on this road-bush trail". in between our resting points, i can feel blisters beginning to form and even pop. so we get to this village and again they give us their beds to sleep on. by this time we're completley exhausted and are grateful for just a good night's rest. but we don't get one.
taya and i usually just sit and chat for a while before we go to bed. so we were doing the usual when i hear this noise and ask her what it is. she calmly replies a rat. i think okay. we live with mice. but then, the lid to the bucket in the room comes off completely and i just say, "what was THAT" in order for the rat to do that, it has to be massive. so, all through the night there are about a dozen rats and we can hear them chewing something, not sure if they are chewing through our bags or not. so taya and i keep the headlamp on all night, trying to scare the rats away-but it doesn't work and we only end up with about 2 hours of sleep that night still having to walk another 4 hours to end our journey.
might i add here that the people were so grateful that we came. i was already the first non-Liberian/non-native African to be there about a month ago and now i think taya and i were the first american and canadian in there and also the first "white women" to spend the night there.
so back to the journey. back the 3rd day, today, my feet are completely killing me, i ended up hitting my bad knee on a tree log the day before , so my whole right side just is not cooperative. i'm moving slowly, but we're sitll making it in the time they said. and i'm just getting beyond ticked off with lots that is going on, and i feel like complete crap and can feel my blisters popping, which honestly feels like your feet are bleeding. and i'm just ticked.
we end up waiting for about 4 hours for a car to come and then end up walking small in the dark and by then, i'm pretty livid. everything is just getting to me, and i think everything is ridiculous and asinine. i guess we are all entitled to our bad days, but after awhile, feeling this way really bothered me.
why? because i have a masters degree, i've spent over 3 months each on 4 continents: i should have my life together. i should only be moving forward in who i am, right? it hasn't exactly worked like that. it's moments like those where i am reminded of a quote from my favourite book Mere Christianity. C.S. Lewis writes: "surely what a man does when he is taken off guard is the best evidence for what sort of man he really is. surely what pops out before the man has time to put on a disguise is the truth?" Almost 9 years ago my life was completely changed from who I used to be. I found this true love and amazingness of a man called Jesus Christ. only those who knew me can really attest to who i used to be. many will tell you i'm completely different and it's true. it's too much to explain who i used to be, but just trust me. so, on this trip the woman that came out at times wasn't the evidence of who i thought i was or who i want to be.
i had a pretty bad attitude for about 1/3 of the trip. and afterward, i felt horrible for being so angry because in a way, it reminds me of who i used to be and how much i don't want to be who i used to be. i often think that i'm making progress and it's moments like those where i don't feel like i'm making progress at all. as c.s. lewis also says, "we all want progress. But progress means getting nearer to the place where you want to be". again, in moments like those, i don't feel very progressive. because progress means changing for the better and i don't feel like i'm always better than i was. it's a day by day process i guess. certain days you do feel sucessful and a better person but other days, it just doesn't happen.
sometimes, i'm constantly reminded that no matter how many degrees i have, or want to have, i'm always as person "in progress". i hate failing. and it's crazy how the littlest things can make you feel like such a failure, even though you know you haven't completely screwed up. yes, i am a perfectionist and i'm learning that just because i don't handle things the way i should, or things don't work out the way i hope, the world actually won't fall apart. it's true that “after each failure, ask forgiveness, pick yourself up, and try again. Very often what God first helps us towards is not the virtue itself but just this power of always trying again….It cures our illusions about ourselves and teaches us to depend on God.”
so, this trek through the jungle was somewhat the same. it was long. it was hard. it was full of good moments. full of crappy moments. full of moments of laughter and moments of anger. but in the end, it was completely worth it. on the way up, there is this huge hill and i had to stop for multiple seconds, but johnny and bob helped me through. and that's like life too. people are purposefully put in your life to help you up that hill to get to the top. before i left to work on this project, i knew it would be difficult. i knew what i was doing and once again c.s....
"the process will be long and in parts painful, but that is what we are in for. nothing less."
yep. i don't want anything less.
~P
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