Speaking of Falls.

My stomach felt weird the moment I woke up.

Bungee Jumping.

I knew there had been a reason for me telling the group that I was going to do it the day before. I was already thinking about chickening out and it wasn't even 8:00 in the morning yet.

I counted my money. I would be cutting it close for the rest of the trip. I would be cutting it really close.

So I debated not doing it under the pretense that I was merely being fiscally responsible.

But when the desk opened at 10:00, I marched up to the front and made my reservation before I could change my mind again.

Jeff signed up too. That was pretty cool.

We got on the shuttle, which took us to the border. The Victoria Falls Bridge borders both Zambia and Zimbabwe. 

Zimbabwe, baby.

We decided to watch the first person of the day jump off before we went in and actually paid.

The bungee cord had snapped on a girl a month ago. She survived, but still, I had heard that there were crocodiles down there. Death by crocodile is pretty high up on my list of ten worst ways to die. I thought about backing out again.

The first person of the day was actually an employee. He did a back flip off the platform. Of course he did. He was fine. Of course he was.

So I went in and paid instead.

And then we had to wait for ages. I was number 13. Lucky number. Anyways, I got to watch twelve other people jump off before me. Some were graceful, and some were a little less so. I already knew I was going to scream, no helping that. Still, I hoped it would be a good scream and not a gurgle or something ridiculous like that.

My biggest fear was throwing up. I didn't want to throw up. Not when I was falling, not when I was hanging at the bottom, and not when I got back on solid ground.

Then it was my turn.

I thought, "You're wrapping towels around my legs. Towels.
I'm going to die."

They wrapped towels around your feet. They wrapped the rope around the towels. I watched twelve other people jump off safely before me, and I still thought, "How does this even work? Who thought this would be a good idea?"

oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh. 

Five. Four. Three. Two. One. 

BUNGEE.

Flopping around at the bottom after I stopped free-falling. 

When you're standing at the edge of the platform, and they start counting down--that feeling. It's indescribable.

It was "Five, four, three, two, one, BUNGEE!"

And I didn't jump.

They yelled out, "JUMP!"

I thought- I can either jump or be pushed off.

Big life decision, really.

I thought- I'm a jumper, and

I jumped off.

They say the ride doesn't last very long. All I know is that it felt like an eternity. Falling did. There was a roar in my ears and I couldn't hear myself screaming, but I knew that I was, and

in that eternity of a moment I wasn't scared at all.

Nothing like some good ol' Evanescence to intensify the mood.

When I got back onto the bridge, they clipped me to a wire, and said, "Okay, you can walk back now."

My legs were shaking. But I didn't throw up.

Jeff and I paid for the combo deal. It meant we got to do the swing as well.

I got back up to the platform and thought, "Oh, jeez. This is scarier the second time around."

On the platform for the second time.

swingin.

down by the water, waiting to get pulled back up.

The swing was scarier than the bungee-jump, to be completely honest. The free-fall was longer. But the view was beautiful. Because you're not hanging upside down by your feet, you can really take it all in. Lot of little waterfalls trickling down the sides of the ravine. Lush greenery. Rocks. Crevices. The mist from Victoria Falls. Wonder.

oh HAI.
coming back up.

I couldn't be happier I decided to do it.

I still don't know if I would do it again. It would have to be somewhere pretty cool.

Like, even cooler than Livingstone, Zambia.

The ravine.

Victoria Falls Bridge from a distance.

Olga's

Olga's was an Italian restaurant in Livingstone-a non-profit organization, staffed by some of the disadvantaged youth of the city, I believe.

We went there our first night in Livingstone on a recommendation from a girl in our hostel. It was the second-best meal I ate in all of Africa.

Mhmm Italian food. It never lets you down.

All of the food on that table was absolutely devoured. Casserole dishes were scraped that night.

Eating nothing but clif bars for lunch will do that to ya.

We went there our second night in Livingstone as well.

It is very possible that some would think that the Americans pictured above should have taken every opportunity available to ingest some more of the native cuisine.

No worries, plenty of nshima and cassava and sweet potato leaves were enjoyed in due time. But in Livingstone? Alas, pasta it was.

being mormon.

Being Mormon is an interesting thing. 

One can't ever just "be" Mormon.

A friend of mine in Minneapolis came up to me the other day. "Did you know that the dude on The Bachelorette used to be Mormon?"

I did, incidentally. Word travels fast in the Mormon world about things like that, believe it or not. "Yeah, I don't think he's an active member though."

"I just never thought that a Mormon would be on the show. The girl's not Mormon, you know."

"Yeah, I know."

"His family wouldn't disown him or anything, right?"

"No, they won't. Or at least they shouldn't. Mine wouldn't."

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If you're Mormon, and you live outside of Utah or Arizona, you're used to close-mindedness. You're used to constantly having to defend yourself, having to justify why your religion doesn't automatically make you a total nutcase, having to prove to people that you're still a cool, relatively normal person.

Sometimes, it's not even that. Sometimes it's "Oh, I used to know some Mormons. Sweet, sweet, naive people."

Ooh, I hate that. That's way worse.

So maybe I'm being slightly theatrical. But in all honesty, being completely forward about being Mormon to the typical evangelical Christian is hard. Some people are really good at it- I'm not.

Part of it is because I know what's going on in their heads. I wasn't always Mormon, after all. 1) I know that an "understanding nod" doesn't always signify an open mind. 2) I've given enough "Oh, that's cute" smiles to be able to recognize one when I see one. 3) I know that the chance of them thinking exactly what I used to think are probably somewhere around 90%, all of the above which, but especially that one, make me cringe.

Moving out to Utah was weird because there Mormonism seemed to make perfect sense to everybody. What, people think modern day revelation is weird? So weird. Book of Mormon was translated from golden plates, duh. Moroni? You don't know who Moroni is? Polygamy is so 1800s-hello, we don't do that anymore. It's all good, peeps. Obvs need to stay worthy to get a temple recommend. Just go talk to the bishop.

All of that stuff--doctrine, vernacular, all of it--that I was so used to having to explain to everybody suddenly didn't need to be justified anymore.

It just was.

And it was really nice at first. It was a break.

But after a while, it was unsettling.

I feel like I've always had growing pains as far as religion goes. I've been changing religions and churches all my life. I think that the past six years I've spent as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints is the longest period of time I've ever spent in a single church.

Religion is never comfortable. I don't think it's meant to be.

Religion filters down into every facet of your life.

In talking to the Samaritan woman, Christ said, "If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink ; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water."

But living water wouldn't have let the Samaritan woman just settle.

Living water isn't stagnant water.

I've asked God, "Give me to drink" before.

And that living water. It changes and challenges you in every way possible. Living water takes faith to drink. It takes faith, because it's so much easier to just walk away, gift of God or no.

I said before that religion wasn't comfortable.

Mormonism is no exception. There's a lot to it. It's been picked apart by both those who despise it and those who love it. I don't pretend to understand everything about Mormonism. I don't pretend to know how to answer all your questions about the doctrines and past of the church. I don't even know how to answer all my own questions. I do know that it is extremely complex. To pretend that it is not would be naive.

It's easy to sweep it- all the questions- under the rug. It's easy to do in Michigan, in Minnesota, in Europe.

For me, it is easiest of all to do in Utah.

There's not a lot of people who really talk about it all in Utah. It's just the way things are. It's nice for a while, until you begin to forget why you are the way you are, why you believe the things that you do, in spite of the things that you hear.

When you're a Mormon, you're used to close-mindedness. Except for most of the time, you're used to it coming from people who aren't Mormon. It's possible to be close-minded about your own religion. To decide that this is it- and nothing else matters. To be purposely naive. Especially if everybody else is doing it.

To not ask- why?

I get it. I really do.

But I think that's the problem.

Because when you get out of Utah and back into the real world, everything comes back, and that's when you have to go to Christ and ask- What the heck is going on here because shoot. Who am I and what is this?

You have to ask- why? Even though it's difficult.

And I think that's the pivotal moment. That's where my testimony in what I believe really began.

Living water takes faith to drink. It also gives you the faith to keep drinking. Even when you don't understand.

Joanna Brooks wrote a thought-provoking blogpost: http://askmormongirl.wordpress.com/2012/07/23/ask-mormon-girl-how-do-you-deal-with-the-real-history-on-joseph-smith/

I recommend it. It's not a comfortable read, especially if you're Mormon. Again, I don't pretend to get all that. I don't understand it. I don't know if I ever will, fully.

But I'd like to quote something she said.

But it’s up to me to decide how these facts of written history shape my faith practice. A Mormon friend recently gave me a book by Annie Dillard, who quotes the Catholic priest and philosopher Thomas Merton, writing in 1968, a few days after leaving a Buddhist monastery and a few days before his death: “Suddenly there is a point where religion becomes laughable. Then you decide that you are nevertheless religious.”

Nevertheless. For the religious, everything turns on the nevertheless. The word that offers merciful refuge to the human complexity in ourselves and the human complexity in our faith traditions. 

Nevertheless. I am a religious person. I love a merciful God. And the religious movement Smith founded has given me some of the most intense and meaningful experiences of my life. That wide-open answer is the only way I know how to respond to the emails both hurtful and heartfelt that the legacy of Joseph Smith channels into my inbox.

That word- nevertheless.

I don't think you can rationalize Mormonism. I don't think you can fully rationalize any kind of religion really. If you could, I don't think there would be room for a God within it.

But I continue to ask- why? And God hasn't left my side yet.

I don't think you can ever stop asking questions. I don't think you ever should. To me, it is the only way in which humanity learns and the only environment in which humanity thrives. It's the only way in which I have been able to move forward in life.

I am a fairly logical person; technically, religion is not a logical pathway. Still, I don't walk away.

While I refuse to have blind faith, I also refuse to live a life without faith. 

I am a Christian.

It doesn't make sense. But somehow, at the same time, to me, it makes perfect sense. 

So I go into life with my eyes wide open, and I think that somehow, it will all work out.

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I have a good friend here who is an atheist. It's refreshing to talk to her about being Mormon because we both can be brutally honest. Her take on it is kind of "Oh, how quaint." But she thinks all religion is equally quaint, so at least I'm on an even playing ground with the rest of the religious world. At any rate, she challenges me to think about why I think and live my life the way I do. Why any Christian would choose to live life the way they do. 

As I talk to her, I realize more and more how much my religion has shaped me into the person that I am today. I'm not the most conventional Mormon--I'm the first to admit that. But I'm a Mormon, nonetheless.

Remember that story about the Mormon dude who won The Bachelorette at the very beginning?

Everybody knows he used to be shhh- Mormon.

Sometimes that's frustrating.  

On the other hand, sometimes it's okay- that larger-than-life "be" of being Mormon.

Jolly Boys- and my two cents on hostels.

When our bus finally pulled into Livingstone that first night, I was ecstatic. Twelve hours on an African bus is no pleasure cruise.

We piled off, slung our backpacks on, and found a place to sleep for the duration of our stay in Livingstone. I was quite pleased with what we ended up with.

Jolly Boys. It was a hostel/campsite place that offered cheap, decent accommodations and rather expensive (considering what it cost to eat outside of the hostel) but delicious breakfasts. I think I ordered the french toast twice, and I wasn't ever disappointed. I slept in a bed in a co-ed dorm-style room the first night, camped the next two nights. Slept great for all three. 

They did a nice job of keeping the place looking nice. Plus, it had a lot of great spaces where you could just relax.

The Commons Area--
i.e. where I finished The Help (great book).

Spent a lot of time on these stools too. 

I actually really enjoyed staying there. I've never minded staying in hostels. To be completely honest, I kind of like hostels. Obviously, some are better than others--do your research and you'll almost always end up at a semi-decent place.

Here's why hostels are so cool. I like the kind of people who stay in hostels. Obviously, there's always going to be a few nutjobs, but usually, hostels are full of friendly, adventurous people. They also tend to be budget-conscious and practical. And they're never hesitant to give you tips on what to do/what not to do/what to watch out for/where to prioritize. It's easy to exchange stories, make friends. It's nice-- makes traveling a lot more interesting and fun.

Sharing a room with ten to twenty other people is honestly not that bad. For the most part, I've found that people are very considerate. It probably doesn't hurt though that I have no problem falling asleep and staying asleep. Headphones are nice, if you've got them.

Bathrooms are always an interesting factor. Some are pretty nice, others are pretty gross-I just try to get in and get out as fast as possible. Whatever. If you have flip flops and hand sanitizer you'll probably feel better about everything bathroom related.

I've never had anything stolen while in a hostel. I usually lock my luggage shut and then lock my pack to the bedframe, especially if I'm leaving it and there aren't any lockers. I sleep with valuables in my sleeping bag. I don't flaunt anything. You know, the basics. It's fine. If you're staying in a hostel, you're probably not carrying a lot that's super valuable to begin with anyways.

Hostels are simple. Not fussy. But they've got the basics. And that's all you're paying for, which I like. Who cares about the coffeemaker and the blowdryer anyways?

As far as I'm concerned, hostels are great- it's the kind of stuff cheap travel is made of. Even in Livingstone, Africa.

I know, I know.
It's cheesy, I'm cheesy- it's true.

To be quite honest, I wish there were more of them here in the States. 

Victoria Falls.

Livingstone, Zambia- home of Victoria Falls, one of the seven natural wonders of the world.

We took the free shuttle from our hostel to the national park. We paid for the expensive foreigner ticket. And then we walked into the park.

el grupo in front of part of the falls.
Nick, me, Sam, Sean, and Jeff.

The walk started out pretty tame. See above? Yeah, pretty tame.

But we kept walking. And then life got good.

The Bridge. Or
That Pivotal Moment When You Decide You Wanted to Get Wet Anyways.

My god, those falls were something else.

I don't think I've ever seen anything that powerful in my life.

It was so loud. It was so big. It was so wet. It was exhilarating.

The mist was insane- it just pelted you with little bullets of water.

Part of the falls through the mist.

There were two trails--one that was closer to the falls and one that was a bit further away from the water. I took the closer one.

I got soaked. And I loved it. You can barely see anything--but you get to experience everything. You just keep wiping your face off with your hand--and every once in a while, the mist will clear for two seconds, and you can see the falls. Like, really see the falls. 

There was this one time I stood on a rock behind a wooden fence in front of the falls and screamed. And nobody could hear me. In a way, it was incredibly liberating. There's really no hypocrisy in that kind of alone-ness. You say whatever you want to say. In a way, it was also pretty unnerving. You fall off the ledge--you. are. toast. Good news: nobody can hear what you say. Bad news: nobody can hear what you say.

Somewhere between that and wringing my shirt out in a deserted little grove of trees, I decided that I was going to bungee-jump off of the Victoria Falls bridge the next day.

I had lost the rest of the group, so I went on a little run through one of the trails to find them. I said, "I'm going to go bungee-jumping tomorrow."

Mostly, I said it so that I wouldn't chicken out once tomorrow came. You go back on a statement like that, you feel like an idiot and a scaredy-cat.

Then I got to work on getting Jeff to do it with me. He said, "Maybe."

I thought, "Uh-oh. I might be on my own on this one."

soaked.
out of the water for a bit.  

Part of the ravine.

Sam and I.
Victoria Falls Bridge in the background.

We explored the top part of the falls as well. I know there has got to be a technical term for that. I just can't remember it right now. Dang it.

There were a ton of baboons, just chilling out up there.

When I was a little girl, my dad used to take my brother and me to the zoo. Anyways, ever since that one time I watched some ill-fated baboons pick each other's butts in the John Ball Zoo, I've found them rather eughhh. Just like that. And honestly, real-life African baboons are no exception. I stayed as far away as possible.

Baboons.
Okay, so maybe the baby ones aren't quite as ugly.
But let's get real here, a baby anything is hardly ever that repulsive.

David Livingstone walked right up to the edge of the falls and peered down. It's kind of a cool idea at first--and then you realize that you're not quite ready to die just yet.

There was this picture there (Maybe in the museum? A sign? I can't remember where I saw it) of some random dude who stuck half his body over the falls. First of all, who does that? And secondly, who does that?!? Maybe he did it when the water level was low or something.

I am not an idiot and so I did not stick half of my body over the falls.

Edge of the falls.
Please note my absence in this photo.

Right before the edge of the Falls.
Pretty calm, ay?

It was a pretty epic little jaunt, to say the least. Absolutely unbelievable. We walked around the park some more, I got soaked again, and then we headed out of the gates.

There was this outdoors market right next to the little museum. Jeff and Sean just went to town in this market. They wanted souvenirs and gifts, and plus, they like bartering. 

I tried looking around for all of ten seconds before I gave up and just sat outside on the curb. 

The Market from Afar. Or
The Market as Observed by a Wary American Girl.

Why? I guess first of all, I  hardly ever buy souvenir-y type stuff, especially if I have to pack it around. Plus, I was trying to not spend money. And finally, I hate bartering. I won't do it unless it's something I really really want. And that really doesn't happen too often, all things considered.

If you know you're not going to buy something, browsing merchandise is far more of a hassle than it's worth. Here's the thing, you can't just browse merchandise in a market like that in Africa. People will try desperately to make you buy something. And if you shake your head and keep walking, you will feel...well, I guess it's different for everybody. 

But as a second-week newbie in Africa, I felt somewhat like a heartless child killer with a soul of stone. Not worth it. 

I decided I would rather just sit on the curb. So that's exactly what I did, while my clothes slowly finished drying off in the sun. It wasn't bad, not bad at all.

blogging is hard.

It's almost August. I have four weeks left of my internship.

And I still haven't even gotten through my second weekend in Africa. I've put it off and put it off and put it off because there's this huge conglomeration of things to say, pictures to post, and memories to think about floating around in my head. 

It takes time to write about all that. This is why I have never successfully kept a handwritten journal (okay, or any kind of journal at all) for any length of time. Thankfully, typing is a lot faster than the alternative, or I'd just give up right now. 

The anal, OCD part of me wants to go in chronological order. That's why I haven't breathed a word about Minnesota yet. 

Anyways, I'm going to try posting a little something everyday about something that happened in Africa. Get it done and get it outta here. I will finish Africa before I start on Minneapolis, so help me. But it probably won't all be in order. It's kind of a compromise. 

I guess the bad thing about having adventures is that blogging about them is such a drag. But if you don't have some way to read about them when you're ninety years old and losing your mind, I think that you've got some wasted utility going on--and I'm all about maximization.

Utility. Where did that even come from? Thank you, econ friends.  

literature and mr. david livingstone.

My family has always been big on reading. Even as a little kid, I could spend hours and hours reading in the library--and we would go at least once or twice a week, especially when we lived in downtown Holland. Even then, my mom had to put a limit of 10 books per library trip that I could borrow. Thankfully, my brother could also borrow 10 books, so between the two of us, we usually had between 15-20 books to last us until the next library trip.

Jon and I went through a couple of different phases. He read The Lord of the Rings trilogy when he was probably nine years old, and got me to read it when I was probably somewhere around 11. We went through a Boxcar Children phase, and I think that we both read every single Hardy Boys book our library had. He got into Star Wars--I started reading Jane Austen. The Scarlet Pimpernel, Harry Potter, Ragged Dick, The Atonement, The Count of Monte Cristo, King Solomon's Mines, The Last of the Mohicans. All of them make me think of being a kid. 

I wish I could say it was all because we both loved literature. Honestly though, I think that that just came with time and continued exposure. At the very beginning, we both loved reading... mostly because for the majority of my childhood, we didn't have a TV or a computer. When entertainment's limited, you do with what you got. When your options are weed the garden or read a book, the book starts looking pretty darn good. I remember that sometimes, if we were really into a book, we got out of drying the dishes too. 

Needless to say, we were pretty huge nerds at the time. At least now we're both really fast readers. 

Anyways, when I was around 8 or 9, I went through this phase where I just loved biographies. I read a ridiculous number of them. Almost all of the presidents, presidents' wives, inventors, astronauts, pioneers, activists, noble prize winners, missionaries, doctors--I was obsessed. It was a genre of literature that I had never read before. Fresh meat for the ravenous little girl sitting on the library floor in front of the bookshelf.

My family owned a David Livingstone biography at the time, and it didn't take me long to find it. I believe we still have it now. Of course I read it multiple times. It was one of my first exposures to Africa in a context other than the shape of the continent on the globe.

Between that David Livingstone biography and a set of travel books that my Dad owned (black covers, engraved fronts), Africa was a place of mystique, of adventure, of danger. It was a bizarre combination of long-necked women (picture in the travel book) and malaria and slave-drivers (David Livingstone biography). It was a place where Masai warriors drank cow blood (travel book) and a place where Europeans had once never stepped foot (D.L.  bio).

Africa was the location of Victoria Falls. David Livingstone discovered Victoria Falls. I remember reading that chapter in the book, no joke. He went to the edge and looked down, crazy fellow. I remember thinking that I wanted to go there and see what he described as a scene "gazed upon by angels in their flight."

When I realized that Victoria Falls was in Zambia, I really really wanted to go. It would bring my Africa adventure full circle. However, the fact that it was so far away from Kasama and that it would cost a significant sum of money made me decide to leave it up to fate. If we made it, I would be thrilled. If we didn't have the time to travel all the way there, it wasn't meant to be anyways. 

But our container was delayed. So we decided to go to Livingstone, Africa. T'was momentous.

Chilling with Livingstone, like a boss.
second weekend in Africa.