Cedsing I am setting up a 7 day caribbean cruise for December and you are welcome - August 17, 2009 add/view comments (0) |
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"Father, I know that I have broken your laws and my sins have separated me from you. I am truly sorry , and now I want to turn away from my past sinful life toward you. Please forgive me, and help me avoid sinning again. I believe that your son, Jesus Christ died for my sins, was resurrected from the dead, is alive, and hears my prayer. I invite Jesus to become the Lord of my life, to rule and reign in my heart from this day forward. Please send your Holy Spirit to help me obey You, and to do Your will for the rest of my life. In Jesus' name I pray, Amen. Welcome to my place. I am on the the Black Planet for the networking possibilities and not for dating. I feel fortunate to witness to all about my growing relationship with my Lord and Savior     Today I felt my heart fall from the place were it has rested all my life. Leaving the Cape Town airport I noticed to the side of the road some shacks. When exited the freeway I read a sign that said welcome to Crossroads. This was not the first township I had seen. The day before I went to one named Langa as a part of tour. We visited a small 2 bedroom apartment, 16 people lived there, no bathroom. I felt a little guilty I was a tourist stealing glimpses of a world that I would soon be leaving and these people probably would never leave this condition. When the tour was coming to a close the guide pointed out a section of Langa that she would not venture. She lived in Langa yet she would not go into this certain area. The next day, I found my way back to Langa for a better look. There they stood hundreds of shacks, no bigger than the smallest bedroom in my house. They were built of tin, wood, cardboard, plastic, rocks and whatever else could be found. They had no running water, no electricity and it smelled of sewage. Some tilted so, they might collapse at any moment. The first thing that ran through my mind was people can't be living like this, not in the richest country in Africa. Less than 10 miles from here, I witnessed beautiful beaches and mountains, with splendid homes on cliffs guarding the ocean. How could this be? I returned to my hotel a few miles away with this situation dominating my mind. The next day we need to change our airline tickets. This is when we saw the other townships. What I thought was one township, turned out be many. They had names like Khaylitsha, Kuwait, Nonqubela, and Nyanga. Most of them were larger and worst than what I had seen the day before. From an freeway overpass I could see a few miles. What I saw broke my heart. There were thousands of shacks, as far as I could see. Whenever I reached something that broke my line of sight, I hoped I had reached the end of this display of poverty. I was disappointed to find, I had not. I drove though township after township. The children I saw, surprisingly had not been beaten down by their circumstance. Their spirits and smiles shined brighter than the African sun. I wondered how long would it be, before the reality of their situation snuffs out these beacons. As returned to the freeway, my head and heart were more fractured than before. Why? What is wrong with us? Why are all the slums, townships, ghettos that I seen full of black faces? How did this happen? Who is at fault? What can be done to fix this? Are they aware of how bad they are living? Could things be worst? What can I do? What can we do? Do we really even care? Why has their lack of hope affected me like this? Where is God? Africa the beautiful, Africa the ugly.************************* ************************** Let me start by saying, this marathon the two oceans marathon was the toughest thing psychically I've ever done. 13.2 miles about half of it up hill. I trained for 62 days. I ran over 230 miles, ate right, lifted and even took a few yoga classes. Made it to South Africa. I planned on running as fast as I could to get into the lead for about 30 seconds so I could say I lead the race for a while. I wanted to know what it would be like to have 14,000 people chasing me. It didn't work out that way. Instead I ended up chasing 14,000 people. I need a computer chip to get an official time. I didn't have one. The officials told me I had go to the staging area to get one so I left not knowing it was 3 miles away. On my way back to the starting line the race started. I was the last person to start the race. 20 minutes late. At the start of the race I was already on my 6th mile. I started running into the night with 2pac's California Love on my Ipod. It took me about a mile to make contact with the 1st few stragglers. Mostly old or over weight. The more I ran the more people I caught most of them were already walking. Which made it difficult to pass them. I passed about 8600 people to finish 5420th place. The course took us uphill for 4 straight miles. From the bottom looking up all you could see was a sea of humanity moving up this monster. I prepared for hills this is when I passed most people. What I hadn't prepared for was the down hill side. It wore me out. I cover the 1st half in 56:30. The last 1.5 miles took me 19:00. I was struggling. When I heard the crowd near the finish line my energy picked up and I look good crossing the line. I failed to finish within 2 hours, my time was 2:19. I ran so slow towards the end I felt like I was walking. Old men and ladies were passing me. I felt defeated. Upon finishing my friend reminded me I had covered 19 miles not 13 and that I started 20 minutes behind. I'm forced to return next year to break the 2-hour mark. The winner was from Kenya he finished 1:03. ****************************** ****************************** **** I've been blessed from the moment of my first breath to the last one I take. From time to time its good to appreciate the sunshine as it falls upon us. To recognize the good in our lives. Acknowledging those that we love and the ones who love us. No matter what I face in this life failure, pain, loss and even victory I promise to never to let it to change my heart in a bad way. I am working on that. When I have fallen I've gotten up everytime, always will. I know that God love me. |
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