The Sunday before I left I had a break down. "I can't do this!" "I can't leave my family!" Many friends were there to reassure me that they would be fine and this was something I was called to do. I cried more and more the closer I got to leaving when I thought about being away from the boys. My incredible friends came over Tuesday night to hang out with me and say good-bye before I left. Little did I know, they were up to something! The next morning Jonathan told me to walk out to the driveway and this is what I saw...
There I was standing on my driveway in my pjs, hair all a mess and just crying. They had even done research for the Zambian flag!
Jonathan and the boys drove me to Weatherford to meet up with my mom. We had an early dinner then I had to say good-bye. I did fine saying bye to Luke and Parker and even managed to get them into their car seats. But when I hugged Jonathan I lost it. He held me for a few seconds like a good husband and then said, "Calm down." Haha
Mom and I got back to Palestine that night and then it was time to distribute all the donations and supplies in with our clothes. Each of us had three 50 pound bags included with our ticket. Jacob would weigh our bags and then move some weight around to other bags if needed.
Thursday (6/21) morning, my dad and brother went to rent a Uhaul for our 18 suitcases and 5 carry-ons so we could all fit in the car! And then we were off to the Houston airport.
We left Houston around 7 PM and flew through the night (10 hours) to London. Mom, Jacob and I were not able to sleep at all on this first leg of the trip, but thankfully British Airways had TV screens in each headrest and had movies, music and games to entertain us. We landed in London on Friday (6/22) at 7 AM on my 27th birthday. We went through customs and headed out to explore London! We saw the London Eye, Buckingham Palace, the Tower Bridge, Westminister Abbey and Big Ben.
We ate at The Clarence for lunch. And I got fish and chips. We also found out that "lemonade" in London is not lemonade here... it's more like Sprite. The food was great but everything is VERY expensive there!
We headed back to the airport and waited for our flight to Lusaka at 7 PM. We flew through the night again and we were all able to sleep a little on the plane. We arrived in Lusaka at 6 AM and unloaded from the plane right on the runway. We headed in to go through customs. This was the part I was most nervous about! We were bringing in supplies, donations and packages from Family Legacy's office. Plus, we were supposed to say we were there for BUSINESS. If they asked what we were going to be doing we were supposed to say PLAYING WITH KIDS. Um, what? That doesn't even make sense to me! They asked when we went through and laughed at us, but they let us through!
When we all got through, we went to get all 18 pieces of luggage. Soon 4 Zambians came up to us with 4 carts to hold our luggage. They started pulling our luggage and loaded them up for us. When we got outside they asked my dad for payment. He was unsure if we were supposed to pay them and didn't think they were with Family Legacy. He didn't have 4 - $5 bills, only $10. They do not split or share money in Zambia so dad handed out $40. When dad talked to someone from Family Legacy they said that we weren't supposed to pay them anything and that they knew they were not supposed to be paid. Oops! Swindled in the first hour in Zambia! haha
Family Legacy had an 18-wheeler ready to be loaded with all of our luggage and they took it took Mulungushi Housing Village where we were staying. We got our villa assignments and loaded up on buses to head over. We got to our villa, Villa 75, and our luggage was waiting in the driveway for us. We shared the 5 bedroom villa with five other people.
We unloaded our luggage and rested as long as we could before dinner. I got my first cold shower of the trip and we headed out to the new Legacy Center for dinner. This facility was amazing! It was neat for Bek and Dad to get to see the finished product because last year it was just a cinder block structure. They will eventually be able to rent out this facility for business meetings and conferences. Which is pretty cool when you think about it... the wealthiest will be funding camp for the poorest!
We had dinner and then introduced ourselves to the rest of the group. We had a short share time from first timers about any concerns or expectations and watched some videos of past Camp LIFE activities. We headed back to our villas to get some rest. We had to take some medicine to help us sleep through the night (Tylenol PM is a controlled substance in Zambia so we needed prescriptions!). I took Ambien for the first time and apparently it made me crazy. :) I told my family that the walls were moving and called Mom's jacket a black mamba....my family has since banned me from taking that ever again! haha
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