Over Christmas break, senior Grace Bender and sophomore Anna Bender embarked on a journey to Africa for a mission trip. They were gone from Dec. 27 to Jan. 11. This was a mission trip with the Methodist church, and some members of the Belle Plaine Methodist church also came. Members flew to a village called Arnoldine Mission to drill three wells so the people in that village could have fresh water. Arnoldine Mission was the village the pastor of the Methodist church, Jacob Maforo, grew up in. Unfortunately, Maforo could not travel with the group because of an injury.
“Our pastor was in a car wreck in June or July and broke his back,” Anna said. “He was supposed to go for a check up before he went on the trip, and the doctor didn’t clear him and said he needed to wait six months for recovery before any major traveling.”
Grace and Anna stayed with host families while they were there.
“The family I stayed with was super welcoming,” Grace said. “They wanted us to call them mom and dad and they called us their daughters.”
Grace and Anna got to spend time with the children in the village. They played games and watched a traditional African dance.
“Out of all the mission work that we did in the village, my favorite part was getting to help at the clinic,” Grace said. “I helped do some charting and give shots to the babies and young kids.”
Anna said that some parts of the trip were a bit overwhelming.
“It was scary being in the city because there were a lot of pickpockets around,” she said. “There were a lot of creepy men that tried to touch us, talk to us, and get in our faces.”
Anna said seeing the gratitude of the women made it all worth it.
“[The most meaningful part was] seeing how grateful and excited the women were when we helped them sew reusable feminine products,” she said, “[as well as] seeing how truly impactful the donations we bought were going to be.”
