belated prayers

This morning I was persusing the webpage of Food for the Hungry, one of the partners in my project here in Darfur. I was excited to see that their prayer country of the month is Sudan, and that their prayer guide for the month had alot of great information and great points. Then I suddenly realized that today is June 30. Better late then never. Check it out while it is still there, and keep praying for Darfur and for Sudan, and for me even though its July.

sepia skies

I’ve watched my fair share of grey skies sweep across the ocean at sea, I’ve seen the harmattan descend on Sierra Leone to hide the cotton trees and hills from my view, and the other night I sat on the hill overlooking my new little hometown and witnessed my first real dust storm moving in from the desert to paint the sky sepia tone.

In the evening I often wander up the small “mountain” that overlooks El Geneina in an attempt to find a breeze and escape the four walls of our compound which sometimes seem to hold my spirit captive. There is something about having the wind blow in my face and wisp the sweat from my arms and legs that is liberating and renewing- even when the wind comes in the company of a cloud of dust.

On occasion the Darfurian sky is blue, but lately it seems that the heavens above Sudan only come in the same shade as the dirty white milk powder we use here as an inadequate substitute for dairy products. The creamy sky nearly matches the colorless sandy expanse that stretches out from the edges of the city beyond the mango trees as far as the eye can see until melts into the equally colorless horizon. I watch.

An orange brown cloud forms in the distance, and the storm comes quickly. They call it a haboob, and the immediate weather change it brings is similar to someone suddenly switching on an industrial strength fan in your sauna. The cloud gathers and darkens and picks up momentum until it grow into a steadily advancing wall of darkness of dust and debris. My company on the hill comments that the sky looks a little bit like Armegeddon, and I agree.

The local children are perplexed that we would actually want to stand on the top of the hill and watch the storm roll in. “The wind is coming”… “The rain is coming”… “Go home… go home.. go home…” They try to warn us in Arabic, convinced that we do not comprehend that we will soon be enveloped in dust, and possibly soaked in the rain to follow. It comes… I am cooled…. I close my eyes to enjoy the breeze and try to forget that I am being showered in dirt.

The storms come like clockwork almost daily now, bringing momentarily relief from the heat, and leaving sand in my eyes, in my bed, and every crack and crevice of my world in their wake. I fought the dirt for awhile, but think I’ve finally resolved myself to living my life under a layer dust in Darfur.

I am learning that dust in the eyes doesn’t always cloud the vision: Sepia skies are beautiful- almost orange.

Every moment is a golden one for him who has the vision to recognize it as such.
Henry Miller

wonder woman

"...Although her gentle smile and delicate frame disguises her strength, Hawa knows about tools and explains that she has learned to disassemble a hand pump, untie the heavy iron parts, and put the whole thing back together again."

Read Hawa's story here...

too hot

Another blog all about me, but I’m so hot this week that I can’t think about anything else.

My body is radiating. My arms and back and legs are on fire. For a few days this week I honestly believed that I had a fever, the insanity and fear of which has driven me to start taking my malaria pills. I don’t have a thermometer, but I’m beginning to think that after 7 weeks of insanely raging temperatures my body has reached its heat saturation point. I give off heat like an electric blanket on a cold night. I hide in the shade but even in the shadows I sweat through my clothing. My skin cannot take in anymore heat or my blood will begin to boil. It is scorching, blistering, blazing, boiling and sweltering.

I feel better after writing this… maybe I just needed to let off some steam…

It has done me good to be somewhat parched by the heat
and drenched by the rain of life.
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

reflections from the field

My head is still spinning from spending the first week of June out in the field. I’m working to make sense of all I got to see and do, but as someone famous enough to be quoted once said, “If I could think, then I wouldn’t write”. In lieu of having my thoughts sorted out and packaged up to properly to share, here are some very random snippets from my journal along the way...



…Driving into the field. The color of the sandy landscape has mutated to look like bread in its early stages of being covered with mold. The green fuzz is grass and it is hard to believe that this is the same sandy barren landscape that I had crossed days before. It is a wonder what one little rain can do to the desert. Today’s little drive included a tour of a huge IDP camp, sitting on a camel, my first spotting of Arab nomads, one flat tire, and one goat accidentally sacrificed under the wheels of our new LandCruiser on its inaugural field voyage. We actually didn’t kill this goat, just maimed and traumatized it- broke 2 of its legs, and paid the little girl who was herding the flock 5,000 Dinar. About 20$, what we paid for the price of our recklessness, was more than the animal’s value I was told by one of our local guys- especially since it will live… But the goat was pregnant and the people who owned the animal were displaced and very bad off, and it was a way we could help, he told me. I left the crime scene thinking about how these people really do care for one another. There is a lot of generosity and hospitality, and even joy, I might add, in the midst of the life-snatching poverty all around. It made me think of the beatitude ‘blessed are the poor in heart, for they shall see God.’ I wonder if the poor don’t get a better view of God than we do sometimes because they have so little to block their vision.

…I am ushered into the base and introduced to Zum Zum, an old woman with strong creases in her face and a half dozen fetish charms perfectly circling her neck. Her head is wrapped in a black chiffon like scarf- the sun radiating through its sheerness and elegantly framing her national geographic like features. If I could speak, I’d ask her story.



… We spent the afternoon after arriving in the village of Kamoon just across the wadi from Um Tagouk. Already the wadis are starting to fill with water and soon our trucks won’t be able to cross the rushing rivers. How can this actually be? Our nutrition team is working to set up a new feeding center in this village because many people walk a few hours to our other center to receive rations. We spend hours there weighing children in a scale that hangs from a branch in the shade of a tree. The organized, disorganized fashion of the whole operation reminds me a little bit of screening day. I have no translator, but I manage to entertain myself for the hours that I can’t be of much help. I have mastered in Arabic the friendly phrases “is mak manu” (what is your name), “umra come” (how old are you), “sakin wen” (where do you live) and “e-tal come” (how many children do you have). These provide a few minutes of entertainment, generally followed another longer period of my use of the phrase “dee-shanu” (what is this) in pointing to everything imaginable. A lackluster village trip turned into a friendly vocabulary lesson for me and a comedy show for the people gathered around me laughing as I attempt name everything in site flip flop, earring, braid, bracelet, watch, tree. I am certainly acquiring the most random of Arabic vocabularies.

… I just got the best night of sleep ever since arriving in Sudan. Um Tagouk is cold and the stars are incredible- almost like being at sea. I woke up somewhere in the middle of the night and realized that I was curled up in my sleeping bag. I think I must have smiled in my sleep. In Geneina I usually wake up in the middle of the night soaked in my own sweat- feeling like I have malaria again. I can’t wait to go to sleep again tonight.



…It is Monday morning, and I am on the “Um Tagouk Toilet Tour” as I call it for lack of something better to refer to my mission du jour. Today I am tasked with visiting villages which have built pit latrines and finding some creative way to express this to the rest of the world which doesn’t frequently include the phrase ‘open defecation’ in their daily discussions.
I’m traveling with our sanitation project manager Ananias, a 62 year old amazing southern Sudanese man who knows this ‘crap’ (bad pun intended). He talks about human excrement with an eloquence and dignity that reminds me of Ken Hilton, super-plumber of the Anastasis. He’s nearing completion of his task to oversee the construction of 1725 latrines in our 3 project areas. Digging a hole is just the start of the task I learn- the greatest dimension of the project is guiding the people through the change in their belief system. I think about it for a minute. People have been taught their whole life to “go” far away from their compounds and villages in the open area, and then suddenly someone tells them to dig a hole in their house and crap in it. Leaving my own knowledge behind, from their point of view it does seem preposterous. Its truly an amazing project I see as I continue my tour with the team, taking pictures of holes in the ground, avoiding the flies, and all the time wondering what words I will possibly use to share this adventure.



… I’ve moved on to Kera Village, another tiny place on the outskirts of Um Tagouk. There are about 250 people gathered around a square in the clearing. Although the space is immense, they are clustered together under a few spaces where there is any shade from a tree or a little thatched awning. Men in one place, women in another. They have been here all day and waiting for their name to be called, have their finger stamped purple, and to walk away with a bucket, 2 big jugs, 10 bars of soap, 2 blankets and one tarp. This is the first distribution of about 10 that our hygiene team is doing this week. My mind is wandering in 1,000 different directions. It is hot and hard to be engaged because I’ve been sitting here a long time, the show is all going on in Arabic and my camera battery is dead. Apart from reading body language, without a translator, all I can do is sit here and make observations… Observation #1. There are many reasons that I wouldn’t want to be a woman born in Sudan (thoughts on the harsh life of women to follow another day). The sole benefit of being a woman here is the amount of color that women to have. Men wear all white all the time. The women live in a vivid world. The vibrant colors that hide them from the world are beautiful and energetic, clashing with such elegance that even normal oranges could never attain. Does color compensate for oppression though? Do they know they are oppressed? …Observation #2 The blankets and tarps that we are distributing are stamped in an enormous poster size font “A GIFT TO YOU FROM THE AMERICAN PEOPLE”. I ponder the purpose of this declaration. Is it written there like a big to/from gift tag so the illiterate beneficiaries can decipher the blankets origin upon completing their literacy program? Is it written in an aid organization staking your territory sort of way? Perhaps it is just written there so hot and bored and cynical aid workers like me can see where all the money they paid in taxes went last year. It isn’t just America though, everyone stamps their stuff, but today I’m wondering why. Thanks to all my fellow Americans for the blankets from the people of Kera Village- they can’t read, but they carried their goods away with smiles, and they’ll be thankful to be covered up when the rains come.



… The days in the field are long and hot, but they are truly precious. The evenings get so cool and the sun is falling so delicately right now on the mud brick walls that mark our compound. The sky is so blue and the thatched roof of the tukul (mud hut) looks as elegant as any thatched roof ever could in the golden glow.

… I feel like I’m in a zoo. I’m sitting in the back of the new LandCruiser Buffalo which is windows all around, and there are dozens of faces pressed against the window staring in at me. Literally, on all 4 sides. I’m in Karda village in Um Tagouk. I’m with the nutrition team again and they are frantically rushing from village to village to see how many people they can possibly register for the expansion of their supplementary feeding program before the rains turn things in Darfur to chaos. In my opinion, this morning is already chaos which is why I’ve abandoned the crowd and sought refuge away from the masses here in my little fishbowl. One of the nice faces banged on the window and handed in a pot of super sweet tea, I’m trapped inside getting my sugar fix for the morning.



… Halima Mohammed Abdulai (the middle one). She is 9 ½ months pregnant according to her calculations. Her smile when she laughs as I try to say her name is almost as big as her belly which some of her local friends assess could possibly contain twins due to its enormity. Although you can't see her size hidden under her billowing tobe,I can’t imagine being as pregnant as Halima is in this unbearable heat. I can also not fathom that the reason she claims she doesn’t know if she’s having twins is because she has never seen a doctor in her whole pregnancy. I think of my friends with their 3D ultrasound pictures of their unborn babies on their fridges, and the contrast of Halima growing bigger by the day in her village where there is no accessibility to prenatal checkups of any type. Halima Mohammed Abdulai, I say her name again and again. I want to remember it so when I return to her village I can meet her new born baby, or two…



… The drive home I managed to land in the only vehicle without AC. There is enough wind to keep me cool as our convoy moves across the open road, but I am slowly completely covered by dust. The only casualty of the trip was yet another sheep- this one not so lucky to make it out of the meeting alive. It did make for an interesting pit stop however, as the animal was owned by a nomadic family who we had to go visit in order to make restitution. Despite all that I’ve seen and all that I know, I am still amazed that there are people who exist as nomads in the day and age of our starbucks world. Back to Geneina- our little primitive town that seems like a bustling big city coming from out there. Just a few more weeks until I get to go back out- the place will probably be as green as a city park by then, and I’m already looking forward to it!

Is 32:16 - Justice will dwell in the desert, and righteousness live in the fertile field. The fruit of righteousness will be peace, the effect of righteousness will be quietness and confidence forever. My people will live in peaceful dwelling places, in secure homes, in undisturbed places of rest.

hope of sudan

Saturday June 4 is the 10th annual Worldwide Day of Prayer for Children at Risk. Join us to pray for the Children of Darfur and see what World Relief is doing in Darfur to invest in the hope for a better future in Sudan.

Arise, cry out in the night, as the watches of the night begin; pour out your heart like water in the presence of the Lord. Lift up your hands to him for the lives of your children, who faint from hunger at the head of every street. - Lamentations 2:19

hometown views

the view from the hill with the dry riverbed behind

Sudanese Showers

The rains came last night. Big rain. (ma-ta-ra kateer).

The rainy season follows the hot season, and it definitely qualifies as hot here. This week I saw the little electronic weather station in our compound hit 140.6 degrees. I’m not sure if it can actually be that hot, but if not, it was certainly hot enough to throw the thermometer completely out of whack. What I do know however, is that while the mercury doesn’t seem to be climbing any higher than its normal craziness, the humidity level is rising rapidly which makes 110+ temperatures feel like someone has mistakenly thrown you into the pit of Hades in the middle of the night when there is no electricity to power the motionless fan to stir the hot air.

It was one of these hot and sweaty nights when I first met the Sudanese rain. I had just fallen asleep when the wind arrived, slamming open and shut the metal shutters and doors to my impenetrable concrete block dwelling, waking me to the sort of racket that a child might create while improvising a drum set with pots and pans.

The wind brought with it a dust storm messy enough to leave sand in my sheets and make my pajamas look like I’d been out playing in the dirt. I tried to be still, ignore the dust and noise and enjoy the breeze, only to wake up again when I realized that it was raining in my room. I had a sudden Anastasis flash back moment as I jumped out of bed, climbed up on the headboard to shut my windows which are about 10 feet off the ground and covered everything that I didn’t want to be wet and dirty.

The fast, hard and cold rain cooled the night and washed the intensely dusty sky. I woke up in the morning to the aftermath of the rain. Our compound was all messy and wet with things blown over and broken. Even my floor was wet from the rain that had run through the metal shutters and gathered in puddles under the bed. I didn’t want to get up after another half sleepless night of chaos, but I crawled out of bed and climbed back up to open my windows to let in the cool fresh air.

Balanced on my tip toes, the action on the other side of the screen captured my attention and I lingered a moment peering through the window into my neighbors compound. They were scurrying about picking up the pieces of part of their 'home' that had been completely blown away in the night. I was overwhelmed with feeling and I suddenly realized that in a strange way the rains had also washed away the self-centered haze that’s been clouding my vision since arriving in Darfur.

The dust was gone and I could finally see how much I have here and how thousands of people surrounding me have nothing. I’ve been so focused on all that I’ve given up to be here, that I’ve lost sight of the true abundance of blessings that I possess.

I walked through town today and up to the top of the small hill that overlooks Geneina where hundreds of little straw shelters have been built by people who have been forced out of their own villages. I wondered how they fared the rains? I try to imagine what these people do when rain beats down on their heads in the night? Do they crouch in the corner and hover over their children to try to keep them dry? Do they shiver? Can they even count the hours to sunrise like I do on my sweaty sleepless nights when they have no watch or timex indiglo alarm clock? How will they cope when the rains come to stay for the next few months?

Perhaps tonight as I lie awake again in my hot and sweaty room, instead of counting sleepless minutes, I’ll count the things I’m thankful for… the walls around me… the ceiling over my head… and the amazing opportunity that I have to be living among the people of Sudan.

The best thing one can do when it's raining is to let it rain.
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

a curious self portrait

Beginning

So far my posts about Sudan seem to be all about me- but I guess that is the way it is when you are settling in. I've been thinking about beginnings this week as I process all the 'new' things around me. However, I think I may have overloaded my sense of discovery and as a result I have the song from the Sound of Music stuck in my short-circuited brain. "Let’s start at the very beginning, it’s a very good place to start...to sing you begin with Doe..Re..Me…”

Anyway, beginning is all about learning. It is about finding the way, acclimating, redefining your reality and staking the boundaries of your new comfort zone. Beginnings have the benefit of the being a “new leaf,” “clean slate”, “empty book” and all the exhilarating and optimistic metaphors of “newness.” Yet, beginnings can also have the frustrating flip side staring at the hundreds of empty pages and realizing that your daunting task ahead is to fill it.

I looked to the wise philosophers of old for advice and Plato said, “The beginning is the most important part of the work.” I wonder if he learned that from Julie Andrews and the singing children?

So here I am at the beginning, attempting to stake my ground. Even though I feel like I've been here for a long time already some days, I am also constantly reminded by my newcomer naivety that I have just arrived.

I so much want to understand this world around me. I want to be able to reply to the mango ladies in the market and ask how much the oranges cost. I want to respond to the children who wave at me and shout Kahwajha (white person) with something more than a smile. I want to be able to communicate with the people, but even the smallest transaction and interaction begin at the beginning. I have to start small with hellos and thank you and counting to 10 and learning all of these throaty sounds that make German seem normal. Yes, it is coming, but there is still so much more to go.

My job is a little bit in the beginning too. I’m navigating through the start of it and beginning to understand nomadic and agriculture patterns, which crops get planted in the rainy season, and the number of people that an open well can provide clean drinking water for. I'm beginning to decipher all kinds of relief lingo, recognize the names of places like Azirni, Habila, and Um Tagouk, and grasp some of the reasons why West Darfur is a mess.

It is all that initial climbing up the learning curve that I feel like I’m still in. Sort of like the ladder up to the high dive. You have to take the steps in order to jump off into the pool where everyone else seems to be already swimming.

For those of you who’ve been tracking with me since my ship departure months ago, you may remember a song called Painting Pictures of Egypt by Sarah Groves that I shared during my betwixt time of not wanting to leave and not wanting to stay. This song was playing the other day and the last words of it caught my attention in a whole new way as I slowly progress through this new Sudanese season of beginning again.

“If it comes to quick, I may not appreciate it, is that the reason behind all this time and sand.”

'Begin at the beginning,' the King said, very gravely, 'and go on till you come to the end: then stop.'
Alice in Wonderland Chapter 12

Destinations

“Destinations are the places where we begin again,” I was so wisely reminded this week by one of my guardian angels.

It has been 10 days now since I arrived at this new destination. Ten days since I unpacked my bag in my new little place . Ten days into my new beginning.

I’ve always thought that 10 years made a decade, but in Sudan time, I think 10 days may qualify.

I don’t mean that 10 days here is an eternity and each one is exceptionally long and difficult. In contrast however, my decade feeling is only a positive one. The sand is soft in Genenia, and I feel like I’m gently sinking in. The place has easily become home in the days I’ve been here so far, and that makes it seem like I’ve been here longer than the number of days marked off on the calendar.

I bought a yellow curtain for my window and found an orange cloth to cover my desk. I’ve discovered the perfect place to hang my hammock, and today I finally hung up some photographs- staking my territory in sort of rite-of-passage way to call this new place home.

Two local women, Fatiah and Fatma are the cooks in the compound and double as my new friends and Arabic teachers. In the midst of my home-making today I showed them a picture of the beach in Florida which I was sticking to the wall. They pondered over it momentarily, I assumed they were admiring the beautiful blue sea, and then they pointed at the sand, and asked “Is this the road?”

Beautiful people in a very hot and dusty, but beautiful destination. Welcome Home.

"Faith is a process of leaping into the abyss not on the basis of any certainty about ‘where’ we shall land, but rather on the belief that we ‘shall’ land."
- Carter Heyward

Safe Landing

This entry comes a little late, but I have an excuse, I’m back on African time.

I’m happy to report that I’ve survived the final steps of the transit and I’ve made it here to Genenia, my final stopping place on this journey.

My little stop-over in Khartoum was nice, but it couldn’t last forever and I was eager to actually be in this place that I’d been anticipating for the past weeks- ready to get a glimpse of what my next 6 months were really going to be like.

In the early hours of Monday morning I lugged myself and my stuff into yet another airport to board my final flight. Despite delays, a luggage crisis, being on the standby list, and the usual challenges of living in a logic-free zone, I eventually was on a plane. I had imagined myself watching out my window, as the scenes of this new county unfolded 18,000 feet under me, however the exhaustion of waking up at 4:30 am to figh a crowded African airport won, and I slept most of the way.

As far as scenery on the journey goes, I’m told that I didn’t miss much. To get to El Genenia, you fly west from Khartoum for about 3 hours over nothing but sand. In between naps I noticed the patterns of the dry riverbeds in the sand, and in some places the migratory paths carved into the desert floor (so I was told). The plane stops in 2 other small towns en route let people off and refuel, but these towns are bigger than Genenia and even have some roads. “You will know that you are in the right place when you land on a dirt runway and see nothing but sand and donkeys and 2 crashed Aeroflot planes in the desert,” I was told. And so it was.

It took 7 days and 9 airports, but I’m glad to report that I have safely landed. A new adventure has begun.

God promises a safe landing, but not a calm passage.
-Bulgarian Proverb

First peeks at Khartoum

room with a view

Touch Down

Well, I know you are all waiting on pins and needles to know if I made it here alive or not... and despite my lack of sleep, I am here and doing well, and already loving it.. well, what I’'ve seen so far of Khartoum at least.  Africa, even on this new side is still Africa- I feel at home again in the insanity, and already the beautiful Sudanese colors in the dusty sky are amazing me.  My flight went without hassles and the only surprise was that my direct flight from London-Khartoum went via Beruit. Unfortunately we couldn’t get off the plane in Lebanon, but I longingly looked out the little window for 45 minutes at a strange land that my feet have not yet touched.

 

Just about 1:30 am we touched down in Sudan. I’m still finding it a little hard to believe that I’m really here. Without much complication I got some Arabic looking stamps in my passport and moved on through baggage and customs. The funniest part was that the only cart I could find for my luggage had broken wheels and was a bit stubborn in moving- but at 2am with little sleep and a great desire to just finally be somewhere, I was determined. I pushed the thing sideways and backwards and in circles with people looking at me like I was part of a comedy show.  The people I will be working were waiting at the arrivals to rescue me from my luggage disaster, and I was thankful. Within an hour I was in the apartment in Khartoum struggling to make my over-exhausted self fall asleep.

 

This morning I got up for a little gathering that they hold here on Fridays. Apparently Friday is our day of rest, so I timed it well for a good start to my new job with a day off.  Ironically, at this little gathering, I met up with someone that I knew from Sierra Leone and wound up spending the day at the International Club by the pool. Since I imagined myself landing my first day in the desert in 200 degrees, thus far the beginning of the adventure has exceeded my expectations. Hopefully I will continue to be pleasantly surprised.  It looks like this little touch down in Khartoum will last until Monday and then I shall be traveling onward again…

 

The Initial Approach

I got stuck in a holding pattern again today, but this time it was a real one. Groggy from a night of sleeping upright in seat 28F and suffering with dry-mouth from a Tylenol PM hangover, I listened as the pilot announced that there was too much traffic at London Heathrow to land, so we would begin circling. I didn’t mind circles because I wanted 25 more minutes to nap. Oddly, however, it seemed to me to be one of those moments when God captured my attention in a strangely normal, unusual way. I’ve been in what I’ve called my holding pattern for awhile now, and it was almost as if these circles about LHR were a little reminder for me of where I’ve been walking these past 6 months and a nudge from my pilot saying, “Get ready now Stephanie, we are making our initial approach into this new season.”

In preparation for embarking on my Sudan adventure, I’ve spent the last 2 days in Baltimore, being oriented to my new job at the World Relief Headquarters. In these 2 days of pre-flight preparations I learned that moving to Sudan is enough to make you bi-polar. One minute you are very excited and full of anticipation and the next minute wondering why in the world you would ever do such a thing. I caught myself asking God again why I can’t just be normal and settled and want to stay home where it could be easy and safe. He answered again in his usual, unusual way.

One morning I stopped at Starbucks on the way to the office. Minding my own business and drinking a latte in a big fluffy purple chair, I looked up to find an Asian man standing in front of me looking panicked. “DO YOU SPEAK ENGLISH?” he asked.

I thought maybe he needed help ordering a cappuccino, but he quickly solved the mystery of his presence. “Could you look at a letter for me? My English is no good and I must send a very important letter.” He worked in the gift shop next store, and knowing how it feels to be linguistically helpless in a foreign tongue, I complied. The letter of course was written with nearly perfect grammar- the only mistake I found was in a sentence that seemed to be jumping out at me anyway, “Everything from the beginning is difficult and there is no gain without pain in this world.” I see a Korean gift shop worker, but I hear God’s still small voice telling me that it will all be alright although there will inevitably be growing pains.

So here I sit in the Terminal 4 Starbucks. A few more hours left in London to enjoy my last latte and then another long flight. Tonight I’m Khartoum bound. Crazy.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have begun our initial approach into this new season. Please make sure your seatbacks and tray tables are in their upright and locked position. We will be landing shortly.

Great ideas need landing gear as well as wings.
- C.D. Jackson

Wandering On

for those of you who didn't get my latest news in the mail....

I should have known that the minute the newsletter of my future uncertainties hit your mailbox I was bound to get a revelation for what I’m doing next. For months I’ve been without a plan, sowing seeds of hope and interest and wandering in what has felt like a thick fog. I’m happy to report, however, that the cloud has finally moved and it seems that I’ve found some firm footing for the next step.

Yes, my friends, for all of you who’ve been waiting to hear… I know where I’m going next! I have a job! I have a plan! Wandering Zito shall be wandering on.

I’ve accepted a contract job with an organization called World Relief to work in the county of Sudan for 6 months in the position of communications officer. While this isn’t exactly a lifelong plan in our perspective, living among the people of West Darfur could be a once in a lifetime experience.

Things are moving fast, and I will be leaving the country on April 27. So without further ado, here’s a little primer on what I’ll be doing in Sudn and how you can keep in touch with me while I’m away.

For the geographically challenged, Sudan is Africa’s largest country, equivalent in landmass to the entirety of Western Europe, and located just south of Egypt. Topping off the superlative-ness of its size, it is no secret that the country has been home to one of the longest running and most complicated civil wars which has produced one of the greatest population of refugees.

If you’ve managed to catch a glimpse of Sudan in the news lately somewhere between the Michael Jackson hearing, the semi-royal wedding, and the last days of Terri Schaivo, you may be aware that it is still a pretty crazy place. A simple google search of "Darfur Sudan" will give you more information than you could ever possibly comprehend about all the complex things going on in this region.

World Relief is a relief and development organization based in Baltimore ( www.wr.org) which does some amazing work around the world. I’m mostly familiar with World Relief from my visit to one of their project sites in Sierra Leone. In Sudan, World Relief is working in a coalition with 5 other humanitarian aid agencies to work with refugees who have been displaced from this crisis.

Based in a town in West Darfur approximately 30 km from the border of the country of Chad The World Relief/DRC team is working to provide relief services to benefit 35,000 people in 3 areas. The projects include working to supply food and nutritional care to children, nursing and pregnant women, to provide clean drinking water, to prevent disease through improved sanitation, health and hygiene, and to help the refugees survive through agricultural and livelihood assistance.

My job on the team will be to serve as the Communication Officer. While I’m not exactly sure of all that will entail, my primary responsibilities will include communicating. Of course, flexibility and adaptability are the primary job responsibilities of anyone working in Africa, and I’m quite certain that I will learn a lot more about what I will actually be doing when I get there.

What I expect for the advenuter resonates in the words I repeat to myself as I plan for my departure “figure on the worst, and hope for the best.” From the pre-departure information I’ve gathered, the conditions I’ll be living in have been best described as “primitive”. Last week in Khartoum, Sudan’s capital, the temperature climbed to 106 f- a temperature that makes you want to take your clothes off, in a culture that demands as much of you be covered as possible.

Although many organizations are working in the area where I’ll be based, I’ve been warned that there is little social life, practically no fellowship, only a few other westerners, tight security restraints, and little independence. Moving to the desert with a handful of others after 5 years on the sea with a ship full of people couldn’t be more polar opposites. Yet despite all this, I’m excited to go, and know that it will be an amazing opportunity for this short season.

Going into this difficult situation, my need for my time in Sudan is your prayer! I will be sending out news and updates of how you ca n pray for me, and all you have to do is
email pray4zito@gmail.comand you will receive all of the details. (Be sure email even if you are someone I email all the time because this list is being created from scratch by someone else for me- and send your name as well if you have a wierd email). If you do not have email , then you are probably not reading this blog, but never fear, you can also get all of this by snail mail if you so desire.

You can still contact me through my email addresses as usual, and I will check them periodically when I have internet access- the frequency of which has yet to be determined. And of course, I will also continue to try to post things on my blog which you obviously have already discovered.

Holding Pattern

This week I flew on a plane. Normally for me that isn't unusual, but lately I've been working on setting a new land-based record to see how long I could go with my feet out of the sky.

59 days. It was 59 days without crossing a border. 59 days since I got patted down in airport security. 59 days since I looked out a plane window. When I boarded a flight to Colorado the other day, the familiar feel of a boarding pass in my possession was a big deal for me.

But I really did do it. I spent 59 consecutive days in the sunshine state and I'm happy to say that there was nothing too terrible about it. I even have a great tan to prove it.

After 59 days I'm happy to report that my vital signs are fine and my life has actually fashioned itself into a routine of sorts. I've made some connections, fostered some predictability, and safe to say, I think I've even enjoyed a little bit of the consistency in staying put.

Although this all feels secure and nice, my mind struggles, because I know it can't be permanent. All of this being and doing in some ways doesn't collaborate with my heart. There isn't anything wrong with this life or those who are living it, but for me, I feel like I'm flying in circles in someone else’s air space. Stuck in a holding pattern. Waiting for the air control tower to tell me it is time to leave this routine and land where my heart is.

I've been thinking about holding patterns lately. Maybe it was just in anticipation of my coming departure and end to the travel fast, or maybe it is that much of my Florida life has taken the form of driving in circles between 2 different cities.

Holding Pattern: The flight path, usually circular, maintained by an aircraft that is awaiting permission to land.

The pilot always seems to announce that you are going to enter a holding pattern only on those flights when you just can't wait to arrive. You are delayed, stuck in the sky and going in circles. Life is below. You are up here. You want to be down there and are resisting this undesired cultivation of patience.

There is wisdom in holding patterns though. Going in circles isn't just a fancy idea of the pilot. Waiting is a command from the control center, wisdom direct from the people who can see the things that you can't see from miles above: traffic on landing strip, choppy weather patterns and other planes on a collision course.

The truth in flying is, you have to have permission to land and you have to know where it is you are going down or you will crash. You must keep moving, you can’t just stop and wait or you will fall out of the sky.

And so I continue in my holding pattern. I talk to the pilot a lot lately, asking him when will I ever get to land, but all I keep hearing back is patience. Enjoy the view out the window, have another apple juice and a bag of honey roasted pretzels. We will be landing shortly.

"When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return."

- Leonardo da Vinci

wandering words- first steps

J.R.R. Tolkien said it, “Not all who wander are lost.” I claim his words as my own mantra of sorts because they resonate with something inside of me. I don't know where he was wandering, nor am I sure where I am wandering these days either. What I am sure of though is that wandering isn’t just geographic. Our minds wander, our hearts wander, and our feet wander along the dirty and dusty paths we trod. There is beauty in this wandering- the mystery, the innocence, the precipice of discovery.

I’m a wanderer of sorts. My wandering spirit has taken me a lot of places- high and low and in circles around the world. I've seen lots of things, and juggle many realities in my wandering mind as a consequence. For now my wandering has landed me in Florida. Geographically I’m not wandering so much lately, but my heart is doing enough wandering to make up for my planted feet.

Lots of you who will actually discover this page and read these words have been journeying vicariously with me for the past years. I hope that this little journal of sorts will become a place where we can continue along the journey together. Stay tuned to watch tales of new adventures unfold, reflect on memories of past misadventures, and to get a small glimpse into the parallel realities of my wandering thoughts.

'Roads go ever ever on
Under cloud and under star
Yet feet that wandering have gone
Turn at last to home afar.

The Hobbit, Tolkien

wandering toes