Wednesday 23 July 2008

I have been renamed...!

Yesterday I spent the day with our HIV team (much more on that in another post!). It was another of my most enjoyable days off ship. We went to a place in Upper Caldwall to a smaller more rural village area. The journey there was the bumpiest I have ever had, no opportunity for dosing! we spent the day with 22 pastors/leaders of nearby churches, and it was fanatastic. There was one moment that stuck out for me a little more than the rest on a personal level and taht was during lunch.
We were eating a traditional African meal of rice and 'meat' (!!) in spicy sauce (and I mean spicy...in the blazing sunshine that was around today!). Debbie one of the pastors wives looked at me quite deeply and asked my name again. A few minutes later after she had been sitting in thought, she said to me I am going to give you your Liberian name in Pele (a West African dialect/language). It is 'Lelah'. She smiled profusley and knowingly...We all continued to chat and relax and that seemed to be the end of it.
Before we left she shook my hand and said 'Don't forget your Liberian name...Lelah'. 'Remind me what it means' I asked: and there it was plain and bold as day
"I am satisfied" She said as she looked right into my eyes, with a look that felt like she was seeing inside my heart!
Kind of took the wind out of my sails and made me stop in my tracks. Satisfied. Am I, will I be, have I been? Questions tha have been running through my mind since she said the words.
I don't know why she gave me that name but it certainly fits in with a lot of my thought processes recently.
Where am I looking for my satisfaction and is it enough?
Well I am not there yet, but one thing I know for sure, particularly whenI am working and being in a place like Liberia, my satisfaction is not coming from any earthly thing.

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