Rope: khalani ticheze

Sit down, lets chat.

The immigration lady in Johannesburg took my passport before looking at me, she opened it and beamed in the way that only African women can, radiantly – with impossibly white teeth. “You’re so pretty!” she said, before looking up at me.

Which is good, because then everything changed. After 15 hours of flying, at 1am in the morning my body’s time, no makeup, teeth un-brushed, hair un-straightened, stressed (as the line had taken almost an hour and I was close to missing my next and most crucial flight), I was certainly not at my best. I probably smiled at her with plane breakfast still in my teeth and a bobbie pin hanging half way down my neck. You could tell, the second she looked up at me, she’d changed her mind. She honestly even added “in the photo” to her sentence, before she stamped me into the country, and the continent I guess, and gave me directions to flight number two.

Lining up in New York and talking to the South African Airways man, I was ‘that person’ who held up the boarding line by saying that I was going to Malawi. He told me I didn’t have a visa. I told him I didn’t need one. He told me, with furrowed brow, that he would need to check. I was right (of course) but not before a 5 minute hold up, a good 50 people grumbling behind me. The guy up next asked if I was in the peace core. Because, why else, would you go to Malawi right? I told him no. And nearly 18 hours later, I stepped off the plane in Blantyre, into the sun, into the country, into Africa.

Things are exactly as I expected.

This is because I was expecting the unexpected, and had no idea what to expect in the slightest. Sick of the word expect yet? Sounds odd when you type it that many times. Like saying waffle over and over. Try it.

But, I have a fantastic house, which is not what I was expecting at all. I won’t be here too often because I have a fairly structured schedule (something else I wasn’t expecting), but here I have electricity (albeit fluctuating). And a double bed. And internet. And a kitchen. And a flushing toilet. And a heated shower. I have a night guard, but also vegemite toast. I have shops just down the road, and a washing machine. In many respects this is more luxurious then dorm life in Seattle.

So far I’ve been to church, met the other missionaries, been food shopping and tried to sleep off my jetlag. To be fair, I’ve only been here 24 hours.

I’m not really sure how to feel. I’m excited. I’m comfortable. I’m ready. I’m relieved to be done with flying for a while. I have a feeling this is all going to go much too quickly. I don’t really know how to process everything that’s going on in my life, and all that’s going to happen. And I’m thriving off of a ‘take each day as it comes’ kind of mentality.

Language is hard. I wish I had more of a brain for it.

I need to read my Bible.

I read something today and I don’t know where, but it was about change being possible. But only through seeking the right answer, for the right reasons. The answer being Jesus. Yesu Khristu. I can think of a lot of things in my life, my heart and my attitude that need to change, and I’m ready to find that answer here, in this place.

AFRICA.