YOUR ONE STOP SHOP

Where is the place you go to buy anything you need in Zambia? The bus of course! Sitting on a bus in Zambia can be quite an experience. Once you get a ticket and get yourself and your luggage on to the bus, you sit back and watch while any and everything comes past for sale. Local vendors bring in goods from DVDs to gumboots, face clothes to radios, ties, rolls of cloth, school books, watches, perfume, phone cards, shoes, hot foods, cold foods, fresh fruit, drinks of every sort; you get the picture. The funny thing is that they will wander on and off the buses at the depot, one, two, three, ten times.

But speaking of bus experiences, Here's a lesson I didn't learn so well. I arrived at the station at Kitwe around 8am and was immediately surrounded. After beating off my would be 'helpers' by pretending I knew where I was going, I eventually discovered there is no such thing as a ticket office. I found out where the buses to Kabwe were and bought a ticket and hopped on. I then realised that the bus was rather empty - I could be here for a while. I also realised that I had done the last half hour on my own - with out asking God for any help or guidance. After asking God to remind me to talk to Him first, I got out my MP3 and started listening to a sermon by John Piper entitled, Battling the Unbelief of Impatience. It was a great challenging sermon. Well I'm not an impatient person anyhow, easy to listen to those less convicting sermons. Somewhere around midday, when the bus still hadn't left, I quietly went to enquire. I was told, very soon, 45 mins max, we just need a few more passengers. Time passes. A couple more times I ask and each time I'm told just four more passengers. Well a lot more than four more passengers later and after 1:30pm I finally lost it and went and told this bunch of people what lying scumbags they were and that all Zambians were liars and this is what I'd remember Zambia for, and tell all my friends that Zambians can't keep their word. Feeling righteously vindicated, I climbed back on the bus to remember that only a few hours earlier I'd been listening to a cracking sermon on Impatience - thanking God that I was a patient person.

Humble pie is often not that pallatable!

So enjoy your bus trips everyone!! I've had two more since then but those stories can wait for another day.