We're back on the river. There are a couple hundred kilometers yet to go to get to Kabalo. The current is with us. The 25 horse Yamaha outboard is barely breathing. We're headed north, but downstream. My head tells me that a river should flow south. But the Congo makes a long coil around the Equator. I read somewhere that there is an equal volume of water in the Congo north of the Equator as is south. Physics of a spinning planet or coincidence? or made up?
It's March of 2011, but this trip began back in February of 2010. Well, actually, the beginning is in September of 1991, but that's too much to tell.
For now, let's do London, Lusaka and Lubumbashi, 2010.
Brought by Faithful hands
over Land and Sea
Here Rests
DAVID LIVINGSTONE,
Missionary,
Traveller,
Philanthropist,
Born March 19, 1813,
AT BLANTYRE, LANARKSHIRE,
Died May 1, 1873,
AT CHITAMBO’S VILLAGE, ULALA.
For 30 years his life was spent
In unwearied effort
to evangelize the native races,
to explore the undiscovered secrets,
to abolish the desolating slave trade,
of CENTRAL AFRICA,
where with his last words he wrote,
“All I can add in my solitude, is,
may heaven’s rich blessing come down
on everyone, American, English, or Turk,
who will help to heal
this open sore of the world.”
London
When traveling alone, my favorite route to Africa is British Airways from Chicago to London, London to Lusaka. Back in the 90’s it meant a packed Boeing 747, sitting in the back of the plane on a ticket called "missionary class." It’s just forward of steerage.
In London, I will go to Westminster Abbey to see David Livingstone. If it’s not Sunday, I’ll stop in at Harrod’s to buy Teri a gift and if it’s not Saturday night, I’ll have lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe. It’s also the last chance for a MacDonald’s. (Don’t hate.)
On the plane, we’ll see British TV shows, “Mr. Bean” and “Absolutely Fabulous,” and for a movie, it will be whatever Hugh Grant is in that week. And I read big books, like Dominic Crossen’s The Historical Jesus and Peter Senge’s The Fifth Discipline and Jarrod Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel.
In February of 2010, I retraced my old route, but this time in a more comfortable 777 with an individual entertainment screen with too many choices. I found an old Hugh Grant movie to watch and read Erhard Gerstenberger’s Theologies in the Old Testament.
London was cool and foggy this time. (That must sound cliche, but I've usually enjoyed sunshine when visiting London. Just God's favorite, I guess.) It was not great weather, but it was comfortable. Riding the underground into the city felt so familiar, as if I were simply a commuter off to work. I had enough time to give the Abbey a long visit, but not enough to do anything else. At the airport I had exchanged a $50 bill for pounds sterling. That was enough for the tube ticket, the entrance fee for the Abbey, and a hot dog and Coke from a rolling stand on the street. Money well spent.
All the other tourists in the Abbey seem to be listening to a recorded tour on headsets and looking up. I look up. The room is impressive, too much to take in. I have no idea what they’re being told. I’m looking down at the markers on the floor. And delighted when I see a name I recognize: Wilburforce, Gladstone, Capt. Cooke. I walk slowly, reverently, prayerfully. There is an order to the parade of visitors, like walking a labyrinth. I stay in line mostly, and am careful not to disturb others. But they are interested in royalty, stopping frequently at the giant ornate tombs. I’m interested in the more common folk who happened to have made some mostly forgotten mark in history. Their small plaques are in the small niches or on the floor. By following the given order, I’ll find David Livingstone at the end of the tour. No need to rush. Before the nave, Poet’s Corner. A new find: Rudyard Kipling. As a prayer, I repeat the lines of If that I can remember, “If you can meet with triumph and disaster and treat those two imposters just the same. . .”
Finally, moving into the open nave, I find him where I left him last. On the marble floor, in the middle of the nave, among the poor and honest folk who got there by some curious act of Parliament when the Church and the Crown weren’t paying enough attention, there he is. David Livingstone, Missionary, Traveler, Philanthropist. His heart is buried in Chitambo’s Village in what is now Zambia. Been there. His body brought back here.
Why do I keep coming here? I’m drawn to him. There is a connection. I must learn what that is. The secret to understanding my call is somehow hidden in the life of this African explorer/missionary.
No one else seems to see in him what I see. Progressives now reject him because he is the prototype colonial missionary. Evangelicals reject him for his heterodoxy. But the paradox of his fighting slavery while enjoying the safe passage of Portuguese and Arab slave traders has the feel of our pastors' preaching peace and befriending warlords. There is something here to learn that is being ignored by modern historians and theologians. My brain is bubbling with a full seminar on David Livingstone and his complicated missiology.
Before leaving the Abbey, I light a couple candles. One for Teri’s Dad. The other, for pastors in the Congo.
The tour is over. I walk out the front doors of the Abbey and turn to see the 20th Century Martyrs, King, Romero, Bonhoeffer among them. I was here on that day twelve years before when these statues were unveiled.Then a hot dog and Coke from a street vendor.
Lusaka
15 minutes out of Lusaka the sun is coming up. We’re still at 37,000 feet and the cloud layer looks to be at about 25,000. To the east, bright oranges and blue greys paint over the black and white world in stripes. Out of the west side of the plane, the light is slowly over taking the darkness in shades of blue, white, and grey. The day is dawning and I’ve moved now from cold wintery Indiana to hot rainy Zambia.
Like the underground in London, the tarmac at the Lusaka airport is familiar. The heat and humidity are familiar. The routine of customs and immigration is familiar.
All my bags made the trip. They had all been opened and searched by TSA and British Air. I was carrying my new Cannondale touring bike in an oversized hard shell sports case. In another hard shell case, I had racks and panniers, two laptop computers for a pastor at Mulungwishi, and a prop governor for the aviation program. A sigh of relief when all bags were accounted for.
Taylor and Stuart picked me up at the airport. It’s comforting to know that the vice consul at the U.S. Embassy is your son-in-law. Taylor is my partner in our new venture, Friendly Planet Missiology, an attempt to redefine how the Church does missions.
The weekend was spent visiting an environmental park and Sunday we went to church in the township of Matero. As worship began, the pastor asked if I could preach. This is not unusual and as Mr. Wesley ordered his preachers, “Be prepared to preach, pray, or die at a moment’s notice,” I was ready.
I preached on the text Revelation 2:8-11: “I know of your poverty, but you are rich!” This is the text we have been using in the Congo since 1995, but for the Zambian congregation, I needed to switch illustrating stories to match their social/economic setting. I told the duck story that I ripped off of Kierkegaard and 8 young adults responded by coming forward for a special blessing. I laid hands on each of them as I pled with God for something good to happen in their young lives.
Monday, Jeff and Ellen Hoover, missionaries in Lubumbashi, who were in Lusaka to pick up David and Lori Persons, missionaries in Mulungwishi, arriving from the States, offered me a ride to Lubumbashi. Having no better plan, I took them up on the offer.
On the way north we overnighted with Delbert and Sandy Groves in Kitwe and dropped some luggage off at John Enright’s in Ndola. Without planning to do so, I managed to touch base with almost all the United Methodist missionaries in Zambia and Southern Congo.
We crossed the border at Kasumbalesa. The crossing went without major incident. One of the border guards is a prominent United Methodist lay leader who ensures that we are not unnecessarily hassled. Although travel in and out of the DRC, and within the country, can be confusing, intimidating, and at times, dangerous, we have United Methodist friends everywhere, who step up to speak for us and smooth the way.
What is overwhelming at the border now, though, is the number of transports. Huge double trailer tractor/trailers crowd the road for ten kilometers either side. Cars snake their way through the stalled line of trucks. Goods of all kinds are moving from South Africa into the DRC.
The road from the border to Lubumbashi is all new blacktop. Chinese built. Along the way Jeff complains that the signs for towns are all misspelled. Jeff picks up a police officer at the border who has asked for a ride to Lubumbashi. The speed limit along this new road is 40 KPH. Jeff was stopped and ticketed last trip, so this time he obeys the speed limit. The police officer asks why he is driving so slowly. Probably the speed limit is meant to be 40 KPH through towns and higher on the open road, but the signage is so confusing, the enforcement so random, and the fines so high ($300) that Jeff just feels he can’t risk it. Jeff and Ellen have been here through all the regime changes and appear to have taken on as their personal battle the inconsistencies of the laws and law enforcement, a game they seldom win at.
Lubumbashi
I have grown to hate Lubumbashi.
Not like my wife hates it.
Teri hates it for its rudeness. In the villages people are polite. Hospitality is the rule. In Lubumbashi young women in blue jeans make contemptuous remarks to her face.
And not like our daughter hates it.
Taylor hates it because it is noisy and dangerous with traffic. Even we can remember when there were few cars and the town was quiet. It’s also expensive. Room and board can eat up all your reserves as you wait for the train or plane to go north.
I hate Lubumbashi for what it means to the young adults trying to get ahead. People are flocking to the city from the villages with their dreams of making big money. It’s our local brain drain. But in the city they find that renting a place to live is beyond their means, $50 a month for a small room in a slum. No money for transportation. No paying jobs. School fees they can’t afford. The system of relatives that sustains them in the village becomes the system of relatives that scams them in the city.
On the positive side, there are plenty of friends in town and I can usually find them downtown at the Methodist Center, an office building that houses both the Southern Congo Conference offices and the dislocated offices for the North Katanga Conference. Although the conference center for North Katanga is in Kamina, the lack of a working banking system means that an office in Lubumbashi continues to be necessary.
While at the Methodist Center, it is a treat to be greeted by Mama Louise, a 90-year-old Swiss missionary who is content to finish her days in Lubumbashi. She runs the restaurant there, and even at 90 is pretty spry. Teri and I remember her from the road trip that we all shared with Ntambo, driving from Kolwesi to Lubumbashi back in 1996. She was old then, and thought that that trip would be her last up country.
I want to spend as little time as possible in Lubumbashi. Our Congolese hosts do not understand this and seem to conspire against me on this point. This is why we have made Tenke our base of operations. It is accessible by road. The hospitality is the kind that makes one feel welcome with no strings attached. We stay in the home of the district superintendent, a house built with money provided by churches in Indiana. There is electricity and a nearby cell tower. There’s no running water, but the outhouse has a cement floor and is always clean.
I want to get to Tenke as soon as possible, but must wait for travel documents. In the DRC you must travel with your passport and a document from immigration that states your whole itineration. If a town is not on the document, you don’t go there. Getting this paper may take several days.
The days and nights in Lubumbashi are spent at the Methodist Guest House. I've been staying here since 1991. Mama Odia is a gracious host. She keeps Cokes and Fantas in the refrigerator and makes fresh beignets. Sabana shows up with his brother Prospere. They are set to accompany me on this yet to be defined adventure. The three of us go shopping for bicycles for the team and arrange for bus transportation for ourselves and the bicycles to Tenke.
Bob
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