Camping in a Rainstorm

“Oh no!” cried one of the girls, “Its starting to rain!, and we haven’t even found Enjoli yet!”

All us girls: Brianna, Kiel (a missionary kid who lives here, though their whole family will be leaving soon), Twalisa (Uncle Jason and Aunt Antionette’s oldest daughter), Helena (another girl who lives on campus), Livia (she’s the same age as me), Alission ( a student missionary), and myself were camping this weekend. We had just about finished setting up camp but Kiel realized she forgot her coat, the bread, some eggs, and a few coconut creams. They volunteered me to go back and get them. We were somewhere in the middle of the forest behind their house.

“Just go to those tall acacia trees over there and the back of the house is right in front of it.” Kiel had explained.

I looked where she was pointing and noticed a lot of acacia trees. Although I did see a few that were a little taller than the others. Soon I was heading back to the house for the forgotten items. I started walking through the trees and tried to keep an eye on the tall trees. I quickly found out that the trees ahead of me were tall as well and blocked the view of the taller acacia trees she told me to follow. So, I just walked in the direction I thought the house was. It had taken only about 5 - 10 minutes to get to the campsite but 20 minutes later I was still aimlessly walking in the midst of the African forest. Finally, I came upon a little dirt path so I followed it. Eventually it lead to a road I had never seen. I knew that there wasn’t a road between our campsite and the backyard of Kiel’s house but I had no clue what to do, so I just followed the road. I just trotted down the road hoping it would end up somewhere that was familiar. A half hour after I had left I was still walking in the middle of nowhere. 

While I was randomly walking around Kibidula (at least I hoped I was in Kibidula still) The girls at camp started getting worried.

“It’s been a half hour since Enjoli left.” Allission exclaimed. “Do you think she got to your house but just lost her way back?”

“She probably didn’t even make it to the house.” sighed Kiel.

Meanwhile, I was still walking on the same road. I probably walked at least 2 miles and still was totally clueless where I was. I had come into some sort of clearing but I had had enough. I knelt down in the middle of the road and prayed.

“God! I’m so lost and have no clue where I am! I’m lost in the middle of Tanzania, Africa and no one knows where I am!  What if I don’t make it by dark? I could be eaten by a lion or bit by a snake or something! God, please help me to find the way back and just get back alive!” I pleaded.

“Ok, Enjoli.” I said to myself. “Calm down! You are over-reacting. You’ll be just fine and you know it.”

I decided turn around and walk/run back and try a different way. When I finally got back to where I had turned on to the road, I started to walk on the road, but the other direction. As I walked, I just happened to glance to the left and saw something green. 

“Kiel’s house!!!” I shouted as I quickly turned in that direction. “Thank you Jesus!” I breathed silently. I ended up arriving at the front of the house an hour later. As soon as I collected the requested items I started back, hoping that I would find the way. 

By now the girls were getting more frantic.

“ENJOLI!” “ENJOLI! WHERE ARE YOU!?”

About half way there is when I heard their yells.

“ENJOLI! ENJOLI?” 

I tried to follow their voice but they were quiet again. A few seconds later, when I was pretty close to camp, Kiel showed up. 

“Enjoli! Your here! We were all worried about you! Come on, your almost there.” cried Kiel.

That's when it started to rain. I looked up at the black clouds above and hastily grabbed my sleeping bag and backpack, stuffed them in the tarp, and ran back to help get the food covered. You see, Kiel and Livia insisted that we didn’t bring a tent. They finally agreed on bringing a tarp just in case. Of course, that’s exactly what happened.  

 We scrambled around to gather are stuff that was laying all over the ground. The drizzling rain became giant drops of water. Soon, all of us were safe under the tarp, except Kiel and Livia, they were cooking -or attempting to cook- ramen over the dying fire. After about an hour, they finished cooking. Two very wet girls and some unseasoned ramen arrived at our tarp. We were very thankful for the ramen, even without the seasonings they had forgotten to add. Soon it was time to settle down so we snuggled in our warm sleeping bags as the rain pelted on the short “roof” above us. But, sleep would not come, so we started singing songs with the ukelele. It was raining very hard by now, the thunder was vibrating the earth, the lighting flashing across the sky, and the wind was howling in the dark.  We were camping in a storm! Nether the least, we were having a great time. Soon we started to get really tired though. The girls on the edge were getting wet as the wind carried the rain through the open sides. Water started to leak through the holes in the tarp and we were worried that if we went to sleep, we would wake up in a miniature lake. The sleeping bags were getting drenched and soon we started evacuating sleeping bags. All seven of us girls had our own sleeping bags packed very close to each other but by the end of the night we had seven girls in four sleeping bags. And the "dry" ones we were sharing were semi-wet. For a while, I had my own sleeping bag, but Kiel was soaked as well as her sleeping bag.

“You could sleep in Enjoli’s sleeping bag.” volunteered Alission who already had a ‘sleeping buddy.’ 

“Yeah” I thought to myself, “Kiel could sleep in here but that would mean I won’t sleep a wink tonight, being a light sleeper in all.” I thought silently.

“Well, do you want me to sleep with you in your sleeping bag? Tell me the truth.” asked Kiel.

Of course I’d rather sleep in my own sleeping bag.  Then I realized how selfish I was thinking. Poor Kiel was really wet and I knew I would much rather her sleep with me so she get be warm. 

“Of course!” I exclaimed. “Come on over, it”ll be fun.” which it was ... sorta. 

The sleeping bag was only meant for one person but we managed to squeeze her in. Neither of us could move though, if you just re-positioned your hand it was a big ordeal. Of course, both of us were light sleepers and didn’t get a bit of sleep that night. Okay, I guess I was in and out of sleep for about an hour but that’s literally all the sleep I got that night. It was one of the longest nights I ever had, minus trip here on the plane. :)  We were so happy when it was morning. It had stopped raining just a half hour before! We got up and quickly made a fire to make some breakfast. It was a great Sabbath even with it raining off and on through out the day. We had a nice worship/church service and were able to rest.  

A few of us took a little walk in the woods. On the way back I was ahead and almost stepped on a snake! I was too surprised to even scream, I just quickly walked back and told the others. "Snake! There's a snake over here!"

Of course they came running and went to investigate. The snake was not there though! It had just evaporated! It was green and black so we think it was probably a Boomslang. 

I also sat on a beehive unawares. As some of you know, I am very nervous around bees. I've never been stung before but scared to death that it will happen.  I was just walking around and saw a clove of trees. As I came nearer I saw a log hanging in the tree. 

"Well that's interesting. That log is just hanging there.  It looks kinda like a swing!" I thought as I swung up onto it.

"Hey Brianna!" I called. "Look at this!" 

Brianna and Kiel came over. As soon as Kiel saw me she shouted, "Enjoli! You're sitting on a beehive!" I  instantly slid off, "A BEEHIVE?!" 

"Ya!" 

"I wondered why there isn't any bees coming out."  We bent to look at the whole in the log and found it empty."I'm so glad there wasn't any bees in here!" I sighed with relief.

That evening we ate cooked chocolate bananas. I thought it was a little weird to eat cooked bananas, but was surprised at how good they were. We also had some hot chocolate but soon it started to you-know-what. Yes, it started to rain … again. It was fun to experience it once but I wasn't sure I wanted to repeat last night. We ran for cover in the tarp and spent the rest of the evening in our tarp. They were persistent that they would not give up and go home. The rain wasn’t as bad that night and we had fixed our tent up a little. We had also dried our sleeping bags outside so most of them weren’t too wet. Everything was a lot better the second night, except for the mosquitoes. Brianna and I were convinced we had a swarm in the tarp. We tried to hide but ended up with tons of mosquitoes bites anyway. 

However awful it sounded, we really did have a lot of fun! I mean, have YOU ever camped without a tent in a rainstorm, in the jungle, and in the middle of Tanzania, Africa? It's a once-in-a-lifetime experience. It was a great bonding time as well. We really got to know each other. I learned that I  can’t just keep thinking about myself. There are others around you who are struggling as well, with the same things sometimes. I loved getting to know each of the girls a little better and I’m so glad I decided to go camping… even if it was in a storm. And, I'm definitely glad God promises to be with us always!