I must admit that I have been awful at blogging lately. Much has happened in the last several weeks since I blogged last. I guess I'm getting to a place where I want to be fully present and save the reflection for later, which is not usual for me considering how much I tend to self-reflect and externally process things. I'm coming to realize too though that this isn't necessarily a bad thing. I've learned that there are a lot of things about my time here in South Africa (experiences, ways in which I'm challenged or changed, etc.) that I won't be able to process until I get home. And that's okay.
Finals two weeks ago went splendidly well; I got good grades in each of my classes, which was quite a relief. It's extremely difficult to try and do school work when you are surrounded by waterfalls, hiking trails, a game reserve, animals you don't get to see often (or at all) back home, and a 53-person community where something is always going on (i.e. soccer, rugby, movie nights). So finals ended about two weeks ago and we were all so stoked to be done (well, the nurses and Zulu students weren't done, but most of us were). Our sort of "spring break" was the rest of that week, which was a total blast!
Because it's somewhat difficult to take 53 students on a safari all at the same time, we were split into two groups where one would go on safari and the other would do other stuff back home, and then we would switch. I was on safari group #2 and am very grateful that it was so. My group had all the nursing students in it; a pretty rad bunch of people. They're a few years older than most of us so they are kind of like big sisters (and a big brother for the one male nursing major) to us.
On Tuesday night of that week something pretty radical happened to me. I attend a small group every Tuesday night with a bunch of college students, both from APU and from one of the churches that a lot of us go to. The message preached on was about destiny and God's plan for our lives, and in explaining how we can sometimes be disobedient to the things that God is calling us to do, the guy sharing gave the example of how he had felt led to pray for my foot (as I'd sprained it the week before and was on crutches) but ended up not doing it. When home group ended I was approached by a girl who asked to pray for my foot; I told her yes, and she did so, but nothing happened. A while later someone else approached me, asking if he could pray for my foot. I told him he could, and initially, nothing happened. The third time he prayed for my foot, however, I was overcome by the Holy Spirit and my foot started to tingle. I stood up, walked around, and even jumped on my foot with next-to-no pain! I was shaking, I was freaking out so much. I must admit, I've never been a direct part of a healing (whether praying for someone or being prayed for), so that only added to my freaking out. I ended up leaving home group that night without the need for crutches and haven't used them since. What a good God we serve!
On Wednesday, March 6, we went on the Karkloof Canopy Tour (zip-lining), which was lots of fun. One section of zipline had you going up to 50 mph; another was a straight drop and another took you over the entire canopy, giving you a view of the entire surrounding area. There were plenty of beautiful sights to be seen, that's for sure. We spent the rest of the day hanging out and had a movie night that night. We have a lot of those here, which I enjoy; I don't normally watch this many movies when I am home in the States.
On Thursday we went to Midmar Dam and spent the day playing volleyball, swimming, and had a brie (barbeque) dinner. It reminded me a lot of home, which is always refreshing.
Friday through Sunday of that week my group went on safari, meeting the other safari group only to swap places with them. We went on a drive that afternoon before dinner, though it was somewhat unpleasant due to the excessive heat and humidity. The vehicle I was in ran into a breeding herd of elephants and even got charged by one of them. They're very protective over their young, which makes sense considering they're in the womb for 22 months! We also saw many rhinos, giraffes, buffalo, impalas, and other creatures. To my surprise we ended up staying in luxurious tents, for lack of a better description. I didn't sleep much that first night due to the heat and humidity.
We drove around nearly the whole day Saturday, running into another breeding herd (getting charged again) and even ran into an elephant short of 10 feet away from us on our way to lunch. We turned a corner, I heard a gasp behind me, and next thing I knew to my left was an elephant right by us, charging our vehicle! Our driver, Reg (the director of our program), slowed down thinking that we saw something (which we definitely did!), but we shouted at him to keep driving and he sped off quickly, just in time for the elephant to miss us. It was a pretty traumatic experience. Hah. That same day we also saw a lioness (see the above picture), though she was a ways away. We were glad to have seen her though, 'cause we could have not seen her at all, and a safari without a lion sighting would just be tragic!
Last week we had our Community Engagement class from 8am to 4pm, Monday through Wednesday. The class itself was great but the length made it pretty difficult to sit through. I was really tired all last week too, having not slept on safari and staying up late for no good reason almost every night. Thursday we started at our service sites, which was the day we'd all been waiting for. I'm at a non-profit called RivLife (short for "River of Life") with 15 others from my team. We were split into four groups of four and would be alternating what we would be doing each day. But for that... I'll continue in the following post. :)
To be continued...
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