detour diaries

Sometimes life drops you in the oddest places when you least expect it. It isn’t that the place itself is odd, it is just too surreal that you are there. One minute you know exactly where you are and which direction you are headed, and the next minute you find yourself somewhere completely out of context with your feet and your head seeming to occupy different planets.

Although the silence of my long writing hiatus may have you thinking that life has dropped me off the face of the planet altogether, I’ve just been lost on a long detour.

Detour: (n) 1. roundabout way, a roundabout road, especially one that is used temporarily while a main route is blocked. 2. A deviation from a direct course of action.



Carberry, Scotland: I pinch myself often. I hang my hammock in giant beautiful ancient trees and run barefoot through vibrant green grass of the expansive castle grounds. How did I get here? I'm supposed to be living in Sudan. I stop and smell the flowers in the sculptured rose garden on my way to breakfast where they serve yogurt everyday. On a sunny day it seems like paradise compared to Darfur, but Paradise was six weeks ago watching the sunrise over crystal blue waters off the fabulous coast of Zanzibar.



Zanzibar,Tanzania: Was I really there?? Another pinch. I have the pictures to prove it, so it must be true. Hammock napping over pristine white sands. Real coffee with liquid milk waiting on my terrace at sunrise. Wandering the narrow streets of Stone Town and swimming with sea turtles and schools of iridescent fish. Zanzibar moments were barefoot paradise. Drinking in every shade of blue horizon between sunrise and sunset in attempt to quench the thirst in my sea-loving soul after 13 weeks of brown dusty Darfur.



Nairobi, Kenya: Nairobi was the transit city on my r&r itinerary. A place I planned to pass through and visit friends, to drink coffees at the java house and to catch planes and buses to my places of rest. Unexpectedly, Nairobi was where my random detour began. I returned from paradise and had barely washed the Zanzibar sand out of my hair when my life took a hairpinned curve toward hell in a split second. The story itself won't be recounted, but I learned first hand why the city is notoriously referred to as "Nairobbery". I learned that despite watching all 3 seasons of 24, I'm not very much at all like Jack Bauer. I learned that sometimes you can't control when life sends you on a detour and that mostly you can't understand it. Was it an unfortunate roll of the cosmic dice? Simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time? Or was it the age old reality that lots of evil exists under the sun and sometimes bad things happen to good people?



Lausanne, Switzerland: I contemplate these questions and many more from my hammock haven overlooking Lake Geneva in the world's safest country. The sun lights up the alps. I drink french vanilla coffee, pick blackberries in the field and relish the solitude in my own personal wood between the worlds under the care of my own personal angel. I wonder at the quaintness of eveything Swiss. Wealth, beauty, efficiency. The perfect green fields, stunning mountains,crystal lakes. Could there be a place any more opposite than Sudan? How do such differences coexist on the same planet.

Although the last time I had words to share I was longing to get out out out of Sudan, now I’m just dreaming about going back. Could I possibly be missing the dust in my bed, sweaty nights, sandy bread, the rat in my room, and the intolerable heat? Definately not, but I do miss sitting with the bread selling ladies under the tree, sleeping under the stars in the desert, learning new Arabic words from my friends in the kitchen, and wondering on the smiles of the brightly colored people who still find reason for joy in the midst of living smack in the middle of one of the world's worst humanitarian crises.

After many weeks of wrestling with the decision to return to Sudan or not, it seems for the time being that my detour journey won't be going via Darfur. The next stop on my fly-by-night itinerary will be in the USA where I will regroup and find my way again.

Perhaps this blog raises more questions than it answers, but life is sort of that way right now. I am comforted though by something a far away angel reminded me of recently: There are no detours for those who are in God's path. Even though I feel so confused and lost, I'm thankful that someone up there knows the answers and the way. I am not wandering alone.

You make your plans and then a great wind comes along...
-Sabrina Ward Harrison