Home Sweet Home

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On Wednesday around 3:00 local time our plane from Heathrow arrived in Toronto and our team made it home safe and sound...all but our luggage! Glad it was here that we didn't have our luggage and not in Zambia. I ended up getting my suitcase at 5:00pm on Thursday so it wasn't a huge deal!

So to recap our last days in Zambia...

On Thursday night we had 2 guests for dinner, the 2 guys from Lifesong came again and it was great spending some more time with them.

Friday was our last work day and there was much to do but it would be a short day as another group was going to visit Care and Compassion. Many of us spent our time but a mixture on the lumbar, this mixture was painted on to seal the wood and protect it from termites. The other group worked on filling in the man holes and covering the pipes with the dirt mixture that was delivered made up dirt, rocks and garbage. We found broken bottles, plastic bags and other things too. Around 2:00 we started to say our goodbyes as we weren't sure we'd be returning to the school before our flight home on Tuesday. This was bittersweet as we were all touched by these people! Later in the evening after dinner we did our debriefing of our work here and then began the task of packing. We decided it would be good to pack most of our things and have a separate bag ready for our safari. We went to bed earlier tonight so that we could get up at 4:30 to begin our journey to Lusaka.

It ended up taking us just over 6 hours to drive to Lusaka (not the 4 we heard it would be). We ended up having to contact our charter to let them know we were running late. The drive was long, but interesting to see the many little towns along the way. In every town there was a police as well as many speed bumps. We arrived at the Lusaka airport at 10:45 and were able to get onto our 12 passenger charter flight that would fly us 30 minutes over the mountains and into the area where we'd be staying for our safari. It was a neat flight but it felt much like being on a rollercoaster!

We arrived at the little airstrip and welcomed by the lodges where we were staying we had to divide into 2 groups as each lodge did not have enough room for all 12 of us since we booked last minute-the girls and 2 guys stayed at Kasaka and the other 6 guys stayed at Chongwe...they were about 5 kms from the airstrip. Kasaka lodge was right on the Zambezi River and Chongwe was along the Chongwe river near the Zambezi. The lodges were amazing and we were served very well...definitely a 5 star experience. After we arrived we had a short information session, then a lovely buffet lunch followed by some time to get settled in. At 3:00 we had afternoon tea and then headed out around 3:30 on our first game drive with Weston our driver, this lasted until 7:30 so we even got to do some night watching as well, since it gets dark here by 6:00. On the game drive we saw elephants, impala, leopards, monkeys, baboons and water bucks. It was so amazing. When we arrived back dinner was ready and it was a delicious meal. By the time it was finished we decided to head to our tents to get some sleep since it had been a long day and would be an early morning. We were delighted to find hot water bottles warming our beds which was a nice treat because the evening got quite chilly!

The morning wake up call was at 5:00am with breakfast at 5:30 and the morning game drive leaving at 6:00. We were up and about before the sun rose so it was very nice seeing the sunrise. On the drive today we saw most of the same animals as yesterday as well as water buffalo and hippos. We did not get to see zebras although they were in the area. Giraffes and Rhinos are not in this area. We had a lovely outdoor lunch along the drive and met up there with the other camp. It was again a delicious meal that was prepared and they set it up beautifully along a river where we could watch the elephants taking a drink as well as baboons!

In the afternoon we did a boat safari along the Zambezi River and saw lots of Hippos and an elephant who was carefully walking along a steep hill and eating off the shrubs! This boat ride went until sundown so we got to see a beautiful sunset. We came back and had some time to freshen up before dinner and we had another great meal and it was under the stars tonight by the camp fire. There were about 25 us representing Germany, Great Britain, US and Canada. It was nice chatting with them at dinner and around the campfire.

We had an even earlier morning, we got up at 4:30 and had a quick breakfast and started our last game drive at 5:00am. It was lovely...and we even got a short hike in to the Chongwe Waterfall. We returned just before 10:00 and had brunch and then packed up as our ride to the airstrip was just before 11:00 for our charter flight back to Lusaka and then our 6hr drive back to Kitwe. Long trip but so worth it!

On Tuesday morning we finished packing and by 8:15 we had the van and truck packed up and ready to head to the school to say our final goodbyes and see the progress on the washrooms while we were away. They had the roof on so that was exciting to see. It was hard to say goodbye as we had made some many new friends and connected so well with the people in Chipote Compound....they will be greatly missed!

After the 40 minute drive to Ndola we arrived at the airport and it took over an hour to get us all checked in. Then we learned our flight was delayed by 2hrs which wasn't a problem since we were going to have an 8hr layover in Nairobi anyway, it just meant that would be shorter. We finally took off around 2:00 and arrived in Nairobi around 4:30 (which was actually 3:30 since Nairobi is 1 hr. ahead of Zambia). We did some shopping in the airport in Nairobi and many of us purchase some special alcohol that we wanted to take home since it was very cheap compared to Canada. We were assured we could take it all the way to Toronto. We finally left Nairobi at 10:45pm heading to London Heathrow. It was a red eye and we ended up arriving in London just after 7:00 but our flight to Toronto was at 8:30. We then learned as we were going through security that we could not take the alcohol since it was not purchased in Europe. Our only option was to check a bag or loose it. We ended up trying to check the bag but saw that it would take too long and had it confiscated...we were all disappointed. By this time it was close to 8:00 and we were waiting in the line up to get our boarding passes. They would not let us have them since it was less than hour before our flight. We decided to try running to the gate to see if they would let us on...and they would not so we missed our flight. So we had some time to waste as the next flight to Toronto was at 12:00 or 3:00 so we decided to try to get our alcohol back and check a bag. Fortunately, we were able to get it back but it meant going through customs in England and out of the airport and then coming back in through Departures and back through security. Kyle and I were the ones to this and made it with time to spare. We were put on standby for the 12:00 flight and we all ended up getting on it. We arrived in Toronto around 3:00 but none of our bags arrived except the one bag with the alcohol that we checked in, in London. One bottle broke so it did make quite the mess in my suitcase!

Well to sum up this trip would be to say AMAZING, LIFE CHANGING and very INSPIRATIONAL! It's good to be home but I do hope and pray for another opportunity to return to Zambia one day!

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Photos

Church
On Sunday we had a service at the school. We invited the children to come with their families and we had a packed classroom!

My new friends
This is Jack and Joseph. They became my instant friends from the first day we came to the school. Every day they came and said hi, waved, smiled and gave me hugs. Joseph could speak better English so he tried to talk to me.

Walking to the River
The kids wanted to take us to the river so we all walked in a large caravan there. Each of us on the team had a following of children holding our hands, fingers and arms!

At the River
We lined up along the hillside for a group picture.

Margaret
This was a pretty special girl who loved our attention, loved getting her picture taken and tried so hard to talk to us each day. She often asked the same questions with her basic English. She said she loved us like a glass of milk, or banana...so cute!

Janet
This is Margaret's little sister Janet. She melted my heart during the church service when after smiling at her she slid of the lap of her sister and came to sit with me. From then on, she came to me often and even ran to me when she saw me for a hug! So special!

Couches for Sale
This is what we saw on a drive one day on the side of the road...no store, just all these couches!

Lifesong School
We went to visit another school called Lifesong. They have support from our sister church and are much more established than Harmony school. This is the vision for Harmony School.

Lifesong School
These are a couple of the school buildings. The one on the right was just constructed in the last few months and they are finishing the painting and tiling.

Computer Lab
Lifesong got a grant from the Rotary Club that covered the cost of this computer lab. It is brand new!

Library
This is the only school in Kitwe that has it's own library. Kitwe only has 1 public library and it is too expensive for most Zambians to get a library card. It costs K5000 (Kwatchas) which is equal to about $1usd. This is something I'm very passionate about helping to supply at the Harmony School.

The Gardens
Lifesong has 2 very large gardens when they grow much of their own food so that they are able to provide the children with 2 meals. The children that attend this school are much like the children at Harmony...many orphans.

Playing Games with the Kids
The boys started a game with the kids where they would give them rides. They had to organize lines so that all the kids could have equal turns.

Elijah
Elijah was one of the 2 boys that asked for my shoes. He had enclosed shoes so I decided to give my shoes to James. Elijah loved my sunglasses!

Sunglasses
I can't remember her name, but she wanted to try them on after Elijah!

Sunglasses
This is another little guy that couldn't tell me his name but I so fell in love with...He loved glasses and often tried to get glasses off of us. So I put mine on him for this picture. He loved seeing himself!

James
This is the boy (17 years) but very small for his age that I ended up giving my shoes to. Here he's taking his turn playing with my playbook. This with a novelty with the older boys and even the teachers.

Roy and I
This is Roy, one of the teachers. He had just finished playing with the playbook. He and I had some great chats about schooling in Zambia and schooling in Canada.