Monday, February 21, 2011 – Beautiful and Ugly

Today was the first day Kelsey, Abigail and I started our project at Queens.  Today was beautiful and ugly. 

The ugly: Waking up at 5 o’clock in the morning to a raining ceiling in the living room with little sleep under my belt. 

The beautiful: The weather was the perfect mixture of warmth and coolness with the gentle breeze.  It made this mornings walk that much prettier. 

More beautiful and ugly to come but first I must share this funny experience with you. 

On the minibus ride to Queens, I got squished in the very back row against a window and Malawian man.  This is normal, minibus’ fit 14 but they always manage to squeeze at least 4 extra people.  So, halfway to Queens the man sitting next to me asks me to open the window.  I try but it was broken and I could not get open.  After a minute or two the man says never mind and I apologize.  He then hesitates and then says in perfect English, “Just so you know, I broke wind.”!  Now, it took me a minute to process what he said, but after repeating the phrase in my head I realized!  I bit my tongue, shrugged my shoulders and acted like I was no big deal.  I felt bad for him because I know a situation like that can be embarrassing.  However, inside I was busting up!  I could not believe this Malawian man admitted to farting!  What makes the situation funnier is that in Malawi it is illegal to fart in public!  (Now I know why God decided to make me different from my family and a doer of SBDs because I could get in some serious trouble otherwise! Thank goodness God knew what He was doing! J ) I totally could have given this man on the minibus a hard time and told him, “You know, that is illegal, right?” but if I had opened my mouth, I would have laughed out loud!  I love how our God has a sense of humor!

After that funny experience we made it to Queens. 

The ugly: As I walked through one of the corridors a mentally unstable patient grabbed me by the arm.  Thankfully, one of my team members was behind me and got the man to let go.  It startled me but just told myself to shake it off and focus on. 

The beautiful: In the morning we visited three of the Pediatric wards.  We prayed with the children and their parents and passed out a little book we made for them.  The book is about being a child of the King, it is simple but the kids really love it!  We also went around to people sitting out front of the hospital and asked if we could pray for them.  We encountered one lady who was waiting on her husband and really needed prayer.  Her husband had cancer in his leg a couple years ago and was told that if it came back they would have to amputate it.  Sadly, the cancer has come back and he was in the hospital to meet with a surgeon.  God knew that she and her husband needed to be prayed for and He sent us to her to do exactly that; it was a divine appointment. 

The ugly: As the three of us sat on the grass and ate our lunch we encountered the sprit of begging multiple times.  The spirit of begging is very common in Malawi, the people now it is wrong but because of the poor culture and environment that they live in, they do it anyway.  The spirit of begging is not of God.  It is difficult because we want to help them but we can not because we must not encourage the spirit of begging.  Anyway, so multiple people asked for food and money and it was difficult to deal with. 

The beautiful: After lunch we went into the Pediatric burn unit and Moyo ward (a miscellaneous ward) and prayed for the kids.  It was really encouraging in the Moyo ward because I had prayed for some of the kids that last Wednesday and they were doing better!  So that was really neat to see! 

The ugly:  After we finished at Queens, Kelsey and I had to get some things at the store and as we bagged the items the cap on the bleach came off and I got bleach on my favorite pink shirt!  I was really annoyed, there are spots all down the front of it so I can’t wear it anymore.  Super bummed. 


The beautiful:  We got iced coffees at the café next store and it was really, really good.  It was Starbucks quality for half the price!  It made me feel a little better about the whole shirt thing. 

The ugly:  Once we finished our coffees we walked to the nearest minibus station to catch a bus to town so we could catch another one to go home.  When we got there the men were more obnoxious than normal and where yelling at us, telling us what bus to get on.  It was crazy and quite frustrating.  One man grabbed my hand and tried to pull me to a bus, but I quickly yanked my hand a way.  For a culture that does not touch and is not physical, I got grabbed twice in one day!  Honestly, it was totally Satan, he knows that my love language is touch and to have these strangers grab my arm or hand would freak me out.  It worked until I realized it was Satan, and then I rebuked him.  So, once we finally got on a minibus Kelsey and I were relieved.  You would think that the crazy would end there, right?  Wrong.  Once we got to town we went to the next station to get on a bus to go home.  Well, would you believe it; we experienced MORE shouting and yelling from the men, trying to tell us where to go.  Once we got on the bus the yelling stopped but we had multiple people come up to the bus windows begging.  I’m telling you, it was crazy! 

The beautiful: We made it home safely and some friends of ours came over for dinner.  We had a nice time socializing and it was a nice way to end our insane day. 

Today just goes to show you, and myself really, that there is serious warfare going on.