It seems like I am always surprised by how my attitude changes by just 2 liters of cold water, a coke, and a candy bar! Now for those who know me that is not my regular diet but after hiking mount Kasunga that is what left me a really happy woman. (please note here that I am a cheap date!)
Story goes we took over 50 of the children in our village to hike Mount Kasunga, well picture me, first with my charge of 15 interns and then 50 more African kids - it was incredible, and I stayed centered the entire time!!! So my bag is packed with pb&j sandwiches and boiled eggs for everyone's lunch and we rent a huge coaster that we stand for the hour drive to the mountain.
We get there, hike to the top, enjoy our lunch, I enjoy the less weight and then we say a quick share time about the incredible view from the mountain's top....and we head down. Now, in the midst of watching everyone half run down, half stay at the top, me staying centered...i remembered my silent hill climb with group in San Diego, and I began to look at ways to live differently even in the hike down. So I am suddenly aware of two women who are rolling logs down the mountain, we are talking big logs that crash down and I am first fearful of the kids getting hit. Then I am in awe of having a job of rolling logs down the mountainside in the sun...with babies on your backs and barefoot. (noting to myself I will never complain about being too tired to vacuum!!)
As I am in awe of these women I yell to the group to think about what it would be like to have this as your career. I then take a log and give it a couple of rolls, wow, definitely hard. Then I decide, what would change the world here? Maybe if we all rolled a log down, the women might remember us as the azungus who helped them work? So I began to roll a log (note, they roll 3 logs at a time!) but I could only do one, so I am rolling it for awhile and I look back and the woman is just watching me and when she sees what I am doing, she smiles!
Well, even with my encouragments I only got one other log roller (i think the Klemmer group might have responded differently) but I was different when I made it down the rest of the mountain.
Climbing onto the coaster, my girls kept telling me Christy, I was so proud of you. I was so proud of you as my leader, pushing those logs down. And I thought, I want to live this way everyday, looking in the most ordinary places to live beyond.
(not that hiking a mountain in Africa is an ordinary occurrence!)
love you guys!
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Fantastic... way to go Log Roller! Did anyone click some photos? I'm having a bit of a difficult time getting a real clear image of what this task entails. But, it truly sounds amazing!
And, I'm glad you were so satisfied with your "treats" afterwards. I would have loved to have hiked that mountain with you!!!
Love you!
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