It's Not A Vacation!

This is everyday life! I must admit that when I first came in 2004 I was on vacation. I was like a kid in a candy store wondering what to taste first. It was different then, that was then and this is now and now has been going on for awhile. 

There are so many things I’d like to share with you from my early beginnings, but I’m not allowed to reproduce copyrighted materials and those things I’ve written in a copyrighted  book that I’m seeking a publisher for. So I may hint at some things, but not fully expose some things as we continue.

Coming to Africa has been a part of me since I was a child. It was my spirit and even now when I think of leaving Africa that same spirit cries that causes the body of me to weep.  Six weeks, that’s all it was suppose to be so I was on a natural high! Every drum beat I heard I felt!  Every taste that was on my tongue delighted me and all the colors of the fabrics, people fruits and veggies excited me! I was free, a freedom that I had not ever known. I’d party till eight or nine the next morning and wake up midday so I could go hang out on the beach. don’t party any more till the wee hours of the morning and I hardly ever go clubbing now at all. None of it’s new to me anymore, but I’m always looking and open to the new!

It’s not a secret that the infrastructure here is not close to what’s available in the states or most of the developed world so electricity is not promised to you. As a visitor when there were power cuts it was an adventure to light candles and guess what time electricity would be restored. Now I prepare for it because it’s not fun or an adventure any more when there is no electricity for hours and it’s hot! I’ve been blessed to be able to have an inverter system. What that is a solar battery that’s connected to an apparatus (inverter) that stores electricity when the current is flowing so when it’s off on goes the inverter and voila, I have electricity! Yayyyyyy! Something I have learned is to be more thankful for things we take for granted, like having an arm to fan with! We complain when it's hot. but imagine being hot without an arm to fan yourself. Whoa, thank you LORD!

It’s been a struggle! Since I didn’t plan to come and stay I didn’t have a back up plan so what was going out was out with nothing coming in. I had a couple of bucks in the bank, just a couple and my frenemy stole that! Huh, what!? That’s right, that’s what I said! The woman that was supposed to be my friend, the one I had helped out was writing checks against my account in the states and withdrawing my money from the bank till it was gone. She had even sold my car and was here in Africa telling me that the purchaser was sending the money any day knowing she had smoked up the money. I could have sent her to prison once the bank realized the error, but that’s not me. GOD will take care of her more than I can and no Chase Bank didn’t return the money. She was living in the same house with we while harboring all these lies. Anyway later for her, she’s taken enough of my energy and can’t have any more!

So here I was in Gambia, no money, no job, no plan B, but I had more than enough! I’ve got GOD on my side. I had already started my organization and got my first contract to teach HIV/AIDS in the workplace for another NGO here. That money allowed me to go back to the states for a few weeks to see my Mom, the last time I would see her. I wanted my Mother with me in Africa because I knew in my heart and spirit that I couldn’t stay in the states then, what was for me here had not been completely revealed and my spirit called me back. 

By the time I got back frenemy had moved out of my house, thank GOD and the journey continued and so shall we. 

 Have a blessed weekend, back on Monday!

The Familiar

Wow, the celebration at my church here in Gambia was simply amazing and the WORD that was delivered was answer to my prayers! I’m refreshed, even more inspired and ready to for this journey to kick into high gear!  

Funny thing and truth is that I didn’t even go to church before I came to Africa. I’m a believer, read my Bible every day and have so for over 20 years, praise and worship GOD, but church was just not my thing. Church people turned me off and some of them still do, but I now know that I’m not going for them, but for me. For years I worked a job with a shift from 7:00AM-7:30PM on Saturdays and Sundays and when I wasn’t on that shift I would watch church from my bed after hanging out on Saturday nights till the wee hours on Sunday morning. 

So what changed? Africa made me miss going to church! It snuck up on me really, nothing planned or though out. After being here a few months someone asked me what I missed most about living outside of the states and surprisingly I said going to church! Huh, what, where’d that come from, who said that? I said it without a thought; it just flowed from the depths of me.  I went on to explain to my shocked acquaintance that the African American Church represented an experience, the African American Experience, part of my familiar. Even if you’re not Christian the African American Church stands for so much in our communities, history, liberty, education as well as miseducation.   

The familiar is more important than we give it credit for. Take food for example: people ask me what do you eat? Huh, what!? I eat local Africa Dishes and things I"m used to from the states, some may have to be modified to what s available, but you get use to the substitutions. Many of the local dishes have a familiar taste and I imagine what we call “Soul Food” is only a variation of traditional African Dishes. Take Yassa, which is basically smothered whatever, fish, chicken meat or just veggies over steamed rice, yum. I don’t eat meat and was not eating fish before living here, but added it to my diet for the protein.  Nyebbeh is beans, usually made with black eyed peas or small red beans in a spicy sauce that many people including me eat for breakfast on a baguette. There’s usually a woman near by selling it for about 20 cents and the baguette will cost you another 20, but hey you can’t beat that! Sounds weird for breakfast, but once you try it with a good cup of coffee you’ll be hook! Meat balls, or fish balls are called “bullet” and that’s probably cause when the Europeans came with guns the bullets were round then like spicy meat and fish balls. Let's not even talk about the freshly ground peanut butter without all the additivies, ummm! It’s all relative.

 

http://www.visitthegambia.gm/gambia-cuisine-National-Dishes.html

It’s avocado season so last night I made guacamole to go along with my spicy tortilla chips I bought at the super market.  One of my quickie familiar dishes is Ramen Noodles, yes I said that! I like the curry flavor variety and I add frozen spinach, baby corn, and fresh carrots, a few slices of ginger and scallions with a twist of lemon or lime at the end. Quick healthy 10 minute dinner when you want a break fro the sauces and rice of the local dishes.

Africa is always alive and lively, but night time is a whole different story. It’s almost like an outdoor party begins after 8:00PM. So when you see people in the states hanging out at night, especially on the corner with no agenda that too is a part of the familiar. 

The familiar is important and a part of you, it is part of your roots! The heart and soul of you! That thing that sometimes you try to forget, but like a magnet it has a pull on your being you can’t explain or run from.

Fresh Roasted Peanuts (groundbuts)

 So I guess that’s why Africa brought me back to church, it’s my familiar!  For that I'm forever thankful! Tomorrow we start talking about the struggle!

Celebrating!

I miss sharing with you all very much, however my church home here in Gambia, Abiding Word Ministies is  is celebrating the completion of 24 years as a church! The convention/celebration is from Oct 31, 2012-Nov 4, 2012. Programs start at 7:00PM GMT. This was the 2nd night and it has been dynamic!

We have guest musicians and pastors from USA and Nigeria. AWM is a muticultural church as is all of GOD's children.

I tell you all of this to share my joy and to say that I will continue sharing more of my journey with you after the program is over. You see I like to write late at night which is for most of you early-mid evening and since I get home late from the program I filled and spent. So I'm not gone and I have not cut the telling of my journey short, in fact I'm building on it!

Stay tuned in to me and tune us in for live broadcast from Gambia and see how we worship as you worship with us African styleeeeeee! live.awmgambia.org 7:00PM GMT  3:00PM EST 2:00PM CST 12:PM PCT (that's before the time changes)

Back at after I finished getting my praise on and hearing these awesome WORDS!

When Praises go up blessings come down!

Between...

Trying to adjust myself to different time zones Chicago (CST) and Gambia (GMT) is difficult to master. I’m not talking about traveling to one time zone while leaving the other behind, I’m talking about living in them both at the same time. One foot on the continent of the USA and the other on the continent of Africa, my two worlds!   

It affects every aspect of my life and trying to create a balance is likened to a juggling act. I have become so much more aware of this on holidays and the time changes in the spring and fall in the states.

Gambia celebrates Christian as well as Muslim Holidays, plus their (our) own national holidays. This is a long weekend in Gambia due to the Muslim Holiday of Eid al-Adha also called the Feast of the Sacrifice along with the time change in the states heightened my awareness of this fact this weekend.  I’m in a work and holiday mode, all happening simultaneously in my mind and body. 

Preparations have been on the way here for this holiday for weeks before the actual holiday. Work slows, staff is short and offices closed early Thursday and some will not reopen till Tuesdays. Not so in the states so that part of my work has to continue even though my mind and body is in a long holiday weekend state. So I have to focus on the things that need to be taken care of state side, but since I’m here some things are connected and I can’t separate me. Huh, what? Yep, it’s like that! 

On top of that, I woke up this morning with the birds singing, sun shining brightly, but the time on my cell phone read 6:15AM. Huh, what, no way I thought! It felt like I had been sleep longer than that, I was confused. I checked my second phone; yes most people here carry more than one cell due to the multiple networks in the country. Like I was saying, I checked my other phone and it read 7:15AM, huh, what! I went to my iPod for the tie breaker; yep it was 7:15AM, the seasonal time change in the states that my 1^st phone had kept up with had reset itself back one hour for CST.  To help people remember there’s a slogan: fall back, spring ahead. For those of you unfamiliar with this system the last weekend in October time is adjusted back one hour and in the spring it is adjusted ahead one hour. You’ll have to do your own research to find out why. It had it’s concept in farming, that’s all I’m going to tell you. So now my mind and body has to stay with the same GMT where my roots are, but adjust to the hour difference in Chicago where my roots lay.    

Two church homes; never leave home without one! I’m a member of two churches; Salem Baptist Church of Chicago, with Reverend James T. Meeks and Abiding Word Ministries of The Gambia with Pastor Frances Soska Forbes so that means I  tithe at two churches. When I’m away from one I miss the other! Geez! 

I have not fully been in one place in almost 9 years. Some may call it fate, others destiny; I say it’s HIS guidance and purpose for my life and pray I’ve done what I’ve been called to do and that I’m learning all that there is to go to greater heights! My heart is torn to pieces to be away from my family, especially my grans, but GOD has placed me on this journey with my heart and mind and I’m not ready to reap the consequences of not following HIS direction.

To be at peace at where I’m at, but miss where I’m not. When I’m fed up and say I want to go and get excited about going, I get sad because of where I’m leaving. I wish I was there, but don’t want to be away from here.   The heres, theres and wheres are all interchangeable, because I’m either here or there.   

Here or there?

It’s just that kind of day! 

Oh wow, I just realized it when I looked at my computer clock that time has not changed. So now not only am I here and there, but ahead of myself as well or at least my clock says so!

Natural Mystic….

When I described Africa before I used the word mysterious and that it is. It’s in the air, trees, water, people, everywhere: especially the trees which seem to have a language of their own. The mysteries are intertwined with the various cultures and traditions of Africa. When you hear people talk about some of these mysteries you want to discount them because they sound spooky and some quite foolish. Then you realize that some of what you’ve heard is some of what you’ve heard before from your great grandparents, grandparents and other elders in your family or neighborhood.

GOD seems so much closer here, almost like the static elsewhere blocks HIM out somewhat. I’m not talking about what I’ve heard, I’ve seen some things! A few months after my arrival I moved from the small house in Kololi I was living in to a larger house in Kotu. The house was still was being painted, but I needed to move to accommodate that so called friend (let’s call her frenemy from now on) that had joined me here. A side note: Gambia has some of the most beautiful birds I’ve ever seen in my life: all kinds of colors, sizes and beautiful sounds. The house had a small *Bantaba in the front yard close to the main house, a flock of yellow birds flew into the compound so fast that two of them flew into the Bantaba. One appeared dazed, but shook it off, staggered a little then flew away, but the other one just laid there. I couldn’t believe something so beautiful would die just like that in front of me in my new house. I began to cry. The painter came out and asked me what was wrong and I pointed to the bird lying lifeless on the ground. He shrugged his shoulders, but was apparently moved by my tears he picked it up and blew on it. He then took it to the backyard and laid it on the cement sewer cover and said it would die or was dead. You would’ve thought it was a lifelong friend the way I was carrying on.  I sat on the back stoop sobbing and began to pray for the bird. Frenemy came from out of the house and stated, “It’s the cycle of life, now it will be part of the food chain!” Huh, what!?  I could not bear the thought of a cat or anything else eating that beautiful yellow bird and the coldness of the people around me. I prayed and cried, cried and prayed refusing to leave the stoop in the backyard as I guarded the beautiful yellow bird as I prayed and cried for its life to be restored. My faith has taught me that and I felt that faith moving even more in Africa. I sat there for what seemed like hours when I noticed that the bird stretched out one wing then fell on its side. I prayed harder: the bird drew in the wing it had fell on and stretched out both wings as I continued to pray. Finally the bird tried to stand but fell over again, and then it spread its wings again, flapped them and stumbled around on the sewer cover for a few minutes. More tears, more prayers more flapping of wings till it was off the ground about a foot. Another attempt and it flew off the sewer cover onto the grass and then up and away high into the trees! No joke, no lie, no exaggeration! Yes, it’s mysterious here and GOD feels so much closer or is it me that’s so much closer to GOD!? I was elated! Frenemy and the painter could not believe it, but that’s where their faith lies.

That’s not all! I had a young man that worked for an old friend of mine that has been my lover off and on here for years when he’s in town from his second home in Sweden. Yep, that’s what I said, I’ve never claimed to be a saint, special yes, saint no. Anyway this young man started to demonstrate some signs of mental illness, his family said that someone had given him something to do this to him. His mother told me that she knew I could help him, I told her that all I could was to pray for him and that I prayed in the name of Jesus since I was a Christian and hoped that wouldn’t offend her since they were Muslims. She said she didn’t care. Long story short I prayed for the young man and his sanity was restored and when he felt discomfort he’d seek me out cause he said with me he found peace. HalleluJAH, it’s not me, but GOD in me!

The story doesn’t stop there with the things I’ve witnessed and done, but we’ll save more of that for later. Not to mention the talk of the penis snatchers, gins, witches and oh yeah, the spirit that has sex with women in the night. Yes I said penis snatchers! Uh huh, a guy touches another man and his penis disappears! Like I said mysterious, I wish I could spell the sound of spooky music: hahahaha. That would really get ya now!

The Language of Trees!

 

***Bantaba is the name of the place, often under the shadow of a tree, where people gather, discuss, drink tea and spend time together. ***It is also the original design of what we know today to be a gazebo.