Zambia

The trip to Zambia was pretty awesome.  We were tagging along with Fr. Gabriel and Br. Ruben who were visiting the mission checking on seminaries doing pastoral work for a couple of months.  On the way to the mission, I began to wonder how the first missionaries decided they were far enough out in the middle of nowhere before building their church.  From the boarder town of Chipata, we drove for 60 miles down a dirt road that would have been impossible to take with a regular car.  There is one point near the mission where during the rainy season it is impossible for any of their trucks to pass.  There is a river with a walking bridge they leave a truck and they leave a truck on the other side.  If anyone needs to go to town they have to walk a few miles to get to the truck.  Living at the mission was Fr. George, from Mexico, Fr. Raul, from the Philipines, Br. Richard from Uganda, and Br. Oscar and Br. Paul from Portugal.

 

Fr. George and Raul regularly go out to the villages for a few days and visit christian communities that are further away. Natasha and I went with Fr. George and Gary went with Fr. Raul.  We started in the morning and drove further out into the middle of nowhere using roads that disappeared for awhile and went through dry river beds.  When we arrived Fr. George began confessions as I hung around the church made from a few trees and a grass roof.  The kids around were a little shy at first and wouldn't get too close so I made faces at them from a distance.  After the mass we socialized for a while until lunch was ready, the typical nsima and chicken meal eaten with the hands.  After mass, Natasha and I went with someone from the village to the community school.  It was a two room school made from bricks, a grass roof, and a sheet of scrap metal for a chalk board which accomodate grades one through six.  The head teacher brought us to the headmasters house and showed us his supply of overused books.  He wasn't shy about asking for financial support at the end of the tour.

 

Returning to the village, we found a few girls performing some crazy traditional dances that we watched until some came and said my bath water was ready.  He led me to a small enclosure made from grass and inside there was a pot of hot water and a bar of soap sitting on a few rocks.  After washing as best that I could balancing on a couple stones, we had dinner and listened to the choir perform with drums and a homemade guitar.  The first night sleeping in the hut I woke up to a few bug bites which didn't phase me that much until I could hear them crawling around when I put my head back down.  I turned on the flashlight to see that I was covered in little black ants.  The second night I shared a room with a chicken sitting on her eggs and a rooster that made his way up to the top of the was inside the roof.  It wasn't a problem until about 4:30 when the rooster decided it was time to wake up.  After my heart started again, I didn't wait long to find a stick chase him away.  I guess I can be glad he didn't decide to jump down on my face.