This past Friday, we packed up our family and planned for a weekend away--well, two of us anyway. Our friends, the Allens, offered to keep the girls for the weekend for Brad and I to have some time away. Olivia was awake at 6:30am standing at my bedside saying, "Go Jojo's house? Go Jojo's house?" She was awake and (in her viewpoint) ready to go. So a few hours later, I drop the girls off with no tears or looks back. I even had to track them down to get good-bye hugs. Then, Brad and I loaded up and set off on our own adventure.
And an adventure it turned out to be. Not exactly what we had hoped or planned for, but an adventure none the less. We finally hit the south side of town and were on our way around lunch time. We then drove about an hour and 15 minutes. About this time, the air conditioner seemed to not be working well. We smelled something not very pleasant but were unsure if it was coming from the car or the surrounding landscape. About the time the odor subsided and we decided it wasn't the car, all the lights along the bottom of the dash came on. We pull over and Brad gets out to check the fluids. Let me remind you that there aren't fuel stations, or cell towers that matter, every few miles. I check the cell phone again, knowing we are well out of cell range, but hopeful that I am wrong and that we have just happened upon a lone cell tower out in the bush. The fluids look fine as far as Brad can tell so we then wrestle with the decision of whether to ditch our weekend or travel on and pray that we don't end up on the side of the road.
We decided that the good Lord gave us brains to make wise decisions and reluctantly decided to turn back and pray that nothing happened before we could get back into cell coverage. As we drive, I check for cell service about every minute. Ten minutes into heading back, we receive cell service and call our mechanic in Lusaka. Brad pulls over just as the van is beginning to overheat. Our prayers were definitely answered. Our mechanic, "Baldy", said he would send his mechanic with a trailer to tow us back to town. This in itself is such a blessing because there are very few tow trucks or trailers in Lusaka. I felt very blessed that our mechanic had this ability. So Brad and I camped out in the back of the van for our 2 hour wait for the tow.
Here's the tow "truck" pulling our van onto a trailer with a wench. The guy in the red pants was just a passerby who decided to stop and watch. Once we were loaded, the mechanic hooked up the trailer to his van and we took off at a very slow speed. We were very thankful and happy to be on our way. The picture doesn't do the intensity of the African sun justice and it was good to be in a moving vehicle again. This feeling, unfortunately, was to be short lived. About 15 minutes into the second leg of this adventure, our ride starts to slow down and drive halfway off the road. Another minute passes and he pulls over entirely. Our driver then gets out and walks around to the passenger side. He lifts up the seat, detaches some sort of hose and begins to suck on it. This is followed by an overwhelming smell of diesel and he begins to spit deisel out right there in the van. For whatever reason, my initial shock turns to hysterics as I try to stifle my uncontrollable giggles. I turn my face away which happens to be toward Brad who is, himself, trying to hide a laugh--now whether his emotion is due to me or the scene before us, I was not sure. But it didn't really matter, it made it all the more difficult for me to control myself. As we are trying to get ourselves under control and not offend our driver, we look up and see......
Our mechanic walking off into.......apparently nowhere, with a local, to....... "find diesel". This began our 1.5 hour wait on the side of the road for our mechanic and the diesel to return. Just to make things more interesting, we found ourselves parked right beside a rural garbage dump. As soon as the van stopped, the inside was SWARMED with flies. They were so bad that I had to get out of the van. They were much better on the outside since there was a constant breeze along with gusts of wind from passing cars that kept the flies off me.
Brad getting some relief from the flies himself.
Any sign of diesel? Can't say as I see diesel, but I did see 1 bicycle with a motorcycle fuel tank and some sort of motor cruising down the road and 1 bicycle with a goat lying down in a basket bungee corded to the back of it. You can't buy this type of entertainment!
Making the best of our fly infested scenic view of the garbage dump.
OK....it's been over an hour, the sun is setting.....no sign of driver....# one rule is not to be out on foot after dark. So......Christie walk toward nearest town (can be seen on horizon in opposite direction the mechanic went)? No, not safe....Brad walk toward town and leave Christie with cars......no, not safe.....Both walk toward town and leave cars......no, not if you want to see either vehicle again.....OK--flag down a vehicle and ask them to bring us back diesel and we drive ourselves till we come across the mechanic.....well, maybe if we could find the ignition....any ideas? But then again, we'd probably never see that money, or diesel again.
Well, the Lord continued to look out for us and a gentleman stopped by and said he had a son that was a mechanic and had a tow trailer in that town on the horizon. He said he saw us and with the sun going down, he wanted to offer their services. We took his number and told him we would call if we needed him. So now we have the name of a mechanic in Kafue if we should ever have car trouble down that way again. But about 5 min. later, our mechanic arrived on a mini bus coming from the opposite direction he had walked away in, with a 5L water bottle full of fuel.
So he fuels up and we finally head on our way again....for 3 min anyways--at which point we pull to the side of the road again next to a mud hut village this time and our driver begins to honk. We are evidently here to return the "jerry can" (ie: water bottle) to it's owner. No one emerges so our driver hops out, leaving the van running and disappears into the village. At this point, we think nothing else can surprise us or make us feel uneasy about this trip, but then again....we are in Africa....where you think you've seen it all......but never have. :)
Finally on our way again...not a tent pitched by the side of the mighty Zambezi, or a sunset boat cruise, but we did get a sunset ride through the countryside with many a story to tell and an entire day of conversation uninterrupted by our 3 precious children. Our sweet friends, the Kanyangas, picked us up from the mechanic shop in town at 8pm and took us to their home and fed us and then returned us to ours.
We were not sure the Lord's reason for the way things turned out, but then the next morning, Steph called saying Olivia was sick-- along with her husband and one of her girls and she was overwhelmed. About 5 min after our girls were returned to us Saturday morning, I became sick with the same little bug everyone else seems to have and spent the entire day in bed asleep. We are all much better now, and I have to say, I think it was much better to be sick at home than in a tent....no matter how pretty the scenery. Had we been gone, I also wouldn't have received the beautiful nurturing from my 2 year old that came to my bedside, tucked her blankie in next to my cheek and told me...."Mommy sick, sick? Sossy (Sorry) mommy, yi yuv yoo" and then left with a parting kiss on my cheek, only to return every 1/2-1 hour and do the same thing. I'm sure that is the best medicine I could have had :)
So....it's been quite a weekend after all. The Lodge allowed us to push our deposit to another time, so we hope to maybe use it while my sister is here in November. We are thankful for the many blessings and engineerings we saw God perform before our eyes and Praise Him for His protection and provision during this adventure. We pray you all have a blessed week.
Zookeeper
1 comment:
yi yuv yoo too
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