You know you are a missionary when…

You know you’re a missionary when….

I have been asked how I like being a missionary.  The short answer is… “I love it!”   My life has changed dramatically in the last few years.  I went from living in a small town in Arkansas to living in rural East Africa, from working in a photography studio to working for the King, from thinking the bottom line was a dollar figure to knowing the bottom line is salvation.  So when a friend asked me recently how my life has changed it sparked the following list.  Most of these are from my own experience, but some were suggested by friends who are missionaries.  Most of these I think are comical but mom calls them gross.  Read and laugh with me!

You know you’re a missionary when….

Your idea of what is ok to eat changes.

• You open a new bag of flour and find bugs, and instead of being surprised and throwing it all away, you sift out the bugs and use it anyway since it’s the only flour available. (Please tell me I’m not the only one…) 🙂
• Dried minnows (better known in East Africa as dagaa) is a good meal.
• Freeze things to kill ants then eat anyway.
• You boil your cornmeal instead of baking into cornbread.
• All water HAS to be filtered or boiled before you will even think about using it.

Your idea of what is “clean” changes.

A good hotel simply has to have a towel and water.  If it has hot water it gets an extra star.

Your best friend is 8 time zones away.

You routinely “go off the grid” and think nothing of it.  Meaning you have no electricity, water, cell phone, internet or all of the above.

You sleep in your truck because you are stuck in a mud hole and there is a hungry lion on the prowl.

Your idea of being “tucked in” at bedtime is more like a tent than being snuggled in warm covers.  (a mosquito net can feel like a tent.)

A machete is kept handy because there could be a snake hiding in the door frame when you step out.

• You chop the head off a black mamba in your bathroom…
• When you see a snake in the bush outside the window you look it up to see if it is a green mamba.  (and it was)

Sweeping the grass is “good housekeeping.”

‎…when you ride in a minibus for 2+ hours to your destination and still have to walk several miles through ankle deep mud to get to where you are staying…and you love it!!!

Your idea of a pet and how they are kept changes.

• You buy your daughter a donkey as a pet.
• Dogs are not man’s best friend they are guards.
• Cats are great outdoors, because they are good hunters of both snakes and rats.

The “traffic jam” is because an elephant decided to rest in the middle of the road.

A game of tag involves a baboon.

On a drive “home” you see zebra, impala, wildebeest, giraffe and other assorted exotic animals.

You routinely dodge goats downtown.

When you pull out of your driveway you honk at the cattle grazing in your ditch.  (ok, maybe that one is universal.)

The dala dala you are on (a 15 passenger minivan used for public transport) has no less than 27 people, you are standing on some else’s foot and have your behind in another person’s face, but that too is normal.

You arrive for church 10 minutes late only to find you are the first one there.

Your top of the line stove has 2 burners that are electric and 2 that are gas because you never know when one or the other might be out.

You keep a jiko (a small stove like a hibachi charcoal grill) for cooking on charcoal just in case both the power and gas are both out.

You see someone who is obviously American in a public place and want to run over to them and hear all about exactly where they’re from and why they’re in town if only so that you can speak in English for a little while.

You catch the rain water so that you have water to flush the toilet.

And my personal favorite (hat tip: to my dear friend Jackie Guccione)…When someone is touched by something you have done or said.