Answered prayers
I always knew the trip to Senegal for the YWAM West Africa conference was going to be tough but I was still looking forward to it. I was keen to meet other YWAMers working in the region and to get to know some of my fellow Malian YWAMers better. A couple of weeks ago I asked God to show me concrete answers to my prayers and I was looking forward to see what He would do.
What I hadn’t really thought too much about was just how many hours we would be spending in the bus. We left Koutiala at 4:00am Monday morning and what should have been a 6 hour drive to the capital to pick up other team members turned into an 8 hour one. We then had to wait 3 hrs in Bamako while the driver took the bus in for a service – which should have been done days before we started the trip. So we were running late but finally underway, we were all looking forward to getting to Kai a town about half way to our destination, where we were going to sleep the night. But the night dragged on and we didn’t get to the town till 4am, so we grabbed the food they prepared for us and took it on the bus and continued. The rest of the trip was fairly uneventful apart from some rather ummm... African... toilet stops behind bushes and even ‘not bushes!’ I played a few games with my neighbour like eye spy and the alphabet game – my neighbour is roughly the same age as me but let’s just pretend she was a kid, it makes me feel better that way.
So after close to 40 hrs after we left Koutiala we arrived at our hotel near Dakar. After the meal and orientation I went straight into the swimming pool, even though it was 11:30pm. It was soo nice to be the cool water and it did wonders for my massively swollen feet. The conference itself was pretty good, it was great to meet lots of new people and hear what YWAM is doing in the rest of West Africa. We were right next to one of the most visited tourist spots in Senegal, le Lac Rose (the Pink Lake) and also within walking distance to the ocean. As well as swimming in the pool and ocean I went on a camel ride, spent time in a hammock and listened to teachings. All in all pretty good.
At the beach 
Then came the trip home... we left the hotel at 11:00pm already tired from the travel there and then 4 days of conference. A few hours into the trip we stopped at a small town to buy water and all seemed fine until I looked out the window and saw our driver begin grabbed by the shirt and pushed along by two police officers. He was put into the police car but managed to talk his way out but he was still being man-handled by the young cops and it was quite a tense ‘discussion’ they were having. I prayed that God’s peace would come into the situation and literally 10 seconds after I prayed the whole situation just dissolved and everyone walked away. I have no idea how it was resolved or how it went from shirt pulling to walking away in so short a time but I do know God’s hand was at work (I wasn’t the only one praying by the way).
So, in the bus again, with our driver ... when day light came and we were getting close to the Mali border we saw miles and miles (not an exaggeration) of trucks parked on the side of the road. When we found the reason for this it was a big delay for us too. There had been some major flooding and in one place the road was totally covered in at least knee deep water. To either side of the raised road the water was up to the roofs of the houses and shops. Where the road was flooded a truck had fallen of the road and was on its side half covered by the water and there were many other busses and trucks who decided not to try and cross the road. Our driver however thought we could make it. We had 3 people walking in front of the bus to find the road and make sure it wasn’t washed away and we went forward very slowly. Water started coming in the front and back doors and I had images of our luggage floating around in the compartments. But we did get through the flood.
After that we had to cross a loooong bridge but the traffic in going in our direction (all heavy laden trucks) was at a complete standstill. So our brave and possibly stupid drive, decides to go across the bridge in the lane of the oncoming traffic which was fairly light. We get maybe halfway across the bridge before we come face to face with a big truck going the opposite direction, the drive of which was pretty mad about now being stuck on the bridge by a bus (the ones behind us) and I thought he was going to get out and beat up our driver, but he didn’t. So now we were really stuck but by grace we managed to sneak in the lane going in our direction when a small gap appeared. But we were stills tuck in the traffic.
One of our team members got out and walked the length of the bridge and came back and said we had a wait of at least several hours and he suggested we get of the buss and walk of the bridge as it wasn’t designed to hold a load of parked, full, trucks. One look at the swirling, muddy, flooded river told me that we would have no change if the bridge did collapse, not to mention there were only 4 people on the bus who could swim. But before we went to get off someone suggested we pray. So pray we did and, I am no kidding, within about 2 minutes we started moving and got all the way off the bridge! Straight after the bridge we got stuck in more traffic and it took another hour or two to get out but then we were on the home stretch. The rest of the trip was fairly uneventful but very loooonnnnggg and I can say I was very happy to get off the bus after 40 hours of travel!
Well done if you managed to read this whole story, it got a bit longer than I was thinking but I can’t seem to tell the story in fewer words. I guess what I got out of it all was seeing really cool and FAST answers to prayer and I give God the glory for bringing us all safe back to Mali.
