the exorcist...

isnt' she beautiful? her name is nolipher and she was a part of my time in africa...she and her husband have six daughters together...they are precious people and nolipher is working on her phd in AIDS education for africa...

she is the first woman i have ever met who is known in her community to be an exorcist...she is the best story-teller i have ever known...she is funny and compassionate- and most of all she cares about the world and what is happening in it...

one night, on our way to livingstone, our bus broke down for the last time...we had spent all day repairing, driving along, running into more trouble, stopping in remote areas...the night sets in about 6pm and it gets DARK...we were about 10-15k away from livingstone when the "luxury coach- as bill put it" had finally pooped out the battery...we had been struggling with the fuel filter for hours...we were trying to get up some of the hills that were between us and our final destination...a 7 hour trip had turned into 15 by then...

it was a full moon that night and as the bus breathed its last breath i had officially gone hysterical...the day had been filled with women with baskets on their head trying to sell fruit, fanta, markets, rabbits in the window, zambian football against the congo, no meals other than wafers from the side of the road, and laughter...lots and lots of laughter...

one of the girls on the trip asked nolipher if it would be okay to get out of the bus...we were not that far from a city, but remote nonetheless...nolipher, in her beautiful african accent, said "i don't know...i'm not sure if we are in animal territory or not..." of course claire, being the inquisitive young woman she is replied with: "you mean, like lions?" and nolipher replied, "well...maybe, just a bit............probably"....at that point, all i could picture is after 15 hours on the "luxury coach (abpi)" the only thing that could have made the day more spectacular is being approached by a lion on the side of the road...i think i laughed for at least 15 minutes at nolipher's response..."yeah, maybe just a bit..." she knew exactly what that meant to an american... :)

needless to say, after about an hour, we decided to descend and take our chances...i used the bathroom more in the brush in africa than i ever plan to or think i will even have a possibility to do in the states...allen started a small fire on the side of the road out of some brush...kim and shelby sang hymns of deliverance...i learned how to clean out a fuel filter...and decided that when we make plans, we often get annoyed when the plans take us elsewhere...i concluded that it just may be that our plan was wrong- and the plan helped us get to the right place...then again, it could have been the full moon intruding on my rational...or, it might just have been nolipher's exorcist skills working on my presumptions...