Rotten Bananas

Last weekend, I went to Tamu (the market) after church with two of my friends.  We had dropped two of the boys off to buy shoes, and while we waited for them, we walked through Tamu.  While there is a market everyday in town, the Sunday market is my favorite.  As we walked, we sipped fresh sugar cane juice and I asked questions.   We didn’t buy much, as we eat most of our meals at Jireh Home, but my housemate bought some really brown bananas.  I smiled and laughed to myself.  Sometimes people here do the strangest things. 

That afternoon, my housemate left to spend the night with her sister.  So the bananas sat, getting older and older by the second.  I was honestly a little afraid to touch them, assuming they were too soft to open.  I didn’t really want to deal with the mess of squished banana all over the table.  But come Monday morning, I knew I should at least eat one.  My housemate clearly intended to share the bananas, and I had clearly spent the last 12 hours not eating them.  

So I grabbed one off the bunch before walking to work.  And as I peeled back the nasty brown skin, there was not a single bruise on the inside.  Of course it was perfectly sweet and delicious.  This time I laughed out loud.  Who am I to question the local fruit? Since when do I know anything about buying fresh things from the market?  Of course my housemate knew what she was doing.

The rest of the day, I couldn’t help but contemplate the problem of the seemingly rotten bananas and my inability to trust my housemate’s judgment.   Easter has come and gone with little celebration.  Our Easter church service was nothing special.  Nobody dressed up.  There was no extra music, no extra food, no family gatherings.  While we didn’t celebrate, I have been thinking a lot about transformation.  About the transformation of death into life, of the hopeless people into people of hope, of all things ugly into unique beauty.  And I thought I understood.  I thought I was making progress.  The list of things I am thankful for grows daily, filling itself with the moments I smile and the moments I sigh with frustration.  I trust that God is using all things for his plan, and that His grace is in all things, especially the moments where I feel I am in over my head.

But then I avoided the bananas because they were ugly, because they looked bruised and brown, inedible.  Because I didn’t trust that my housemate would pick out good things for us to eat.  Sometimes reality checks come from unexpected places.  And I am thankful that as I continue to grow here, learning to trust in thanksgiving, I am walking with a community who constantly reminds me how valued I am and a God who always gives incredible gifts of grace.  

Bopping through Sabah

Mt. Kinabalu over the rice paddies in Kota Belud on the road north to Kudat

One of my favorite things to do here is ride along with my friends to go places.  In most places, you would say, “go for a drive.”  But here I like to think of it as bopping through Sabah.  For me, driving evokes images of mostly up-kept, two lane highways, and a consistent speed.   But even the main roads between major cities in Sabah, the roads are mostly two lanes of questionable condition through the mountains.    And the road is lined with little Kampungs (villages) every now and then, which means groups of school children walk home; pick up trucks full of people stop like buses; and large farm animals graze the grass next to the road.  But it also means that semi-trucks with gas, or other materials are trucking slowly up and down the hills.

And so yesterday, I bopped north through Sabah to take one of my friends and her niece and nephew to the boat launch in Kudat to return to Kampung for a funeral.  We were in a hurry, trying to get them there before the last ferry left.  But you can’t really bop through the mountains of Sabah quickly.  There was the jam at one major roundabout, the line of cars behind the semi attempting to make it up the mountain, the seemingly endless spots of broken road that forced us to slow down.  And at some points, Sufiana, one of our youngest girls, and I were literally bopping.  Sitting just in front of the back wheels, every time we hit any sort of pothole, we flew.   We didn't make the ferry, but some other family members where there to greet us and spend the night to wait for the next morning's early ferry. 

We took our time on our way home.  And sitting in the front seat, it was amazing how much smoother the ride was.  But part of the beauty of bopping through Sabah is the time spent together in the car.  It took us around 6 hours to get to Kudat and back, and sitting with the same people in the car for that long forces conversation.  I gained courage as time past, asking more meaningful questions, learning more and more about life here and sharing more and more about life in the States.   Perhaps there is something holy about time separated from the rest of the world?  Something holy about broken people driving along broken roads, healing together in real, honest and challenging conversations.