The Worst Part

Do you ever feel like you’ve become the worst version of yourself?

I came to the conclusion that so far, South Africa has done nothing but bring out the worst in me. It makes me feel like even more of a failure.

When we were in Chicago, we took this personality test called the Enneagram. (Those faithful blog followers may remember me talking about this before). After taking the test, it concluded that I am a “number four” or a romantic/individualist. And actually it’s right on the money. Here’s what this paper says about being a type 4.

“The Romantic: expressive, dramatic, self-absorbed, and individualistic. Fours are motivated by the need to experience their feelings and to be understood, to search for meaning of life, and avoid being ordinary. At their best fours are warm, compassionate, introspective, expressive, creative, intuitive, supportive and refined.”

However, get this…

“At their worst fours are depressed, self-conscious, guilt-ridden, moralistic, withdrawn, stubborn, moody, and self-absorbed.”

Yeah.

I realized on Friday that I’ve become the worst version of myself here. It’s really discouraging – or should I say depressing since I think that would fit right into that list.

Weekends are when this side of me undeniable comes out for the entire world to see, especially yesterday. Friday was a ridiculously hard day. I woke up with a lot of unexpected things ( for example, church people searching for me in the early hours of the morning), among other things. So already being grumpy, I was not ready to face the insane world of BCI weekends. No way. Plus, my allergies/sinuses are really bad. Really bad. I feel I am getting a cold again but I am pretty sure it’s just sinus problems…ugh. Hooray for living in a bowl of pollution).

Friday was also the day of the “love meal,” which the mission members of BCI host for foreigners here. And I had to cook all the rice for it, which would’ve been fine. I like cooking right? Yeah, I’ve never made that much rice before. Ever. It was pretty much a disaster, but I guess it was still edible.

The love meal definitely wasn’t what I thought it was going to be either. I was kind of looking forward to it since it sounded great. Well, it was a meal – but it was definitely a church service with food involved. So that was a little disappointing (although it wasn’t surprising since it is BCI after all) especially since I was already grumpy because of the rice disaster. I did not feel like jumping around, singing to songs on a DVD with a roomful of hungry people. It was even more frustrating when half way through the first song, they turned it off because people weren’t praising God “correctly” or enough and made us start over. Oh man. I was officially frustrated at this point.

I am not sure what to do on days when I hate South Africa –especially on days like Friday when I did not want to be here especially since I couldn’t breathe and apparently wasn’t worshiping God the right way. I find it extremely difficult to live in a world where church, home, and work are all the same thing. I am not sure how to function here at all.

Eventually, as the evening wore on, I began to lose my grumpiness, especially after the RJ team had to do this ridiculous skit. But still, as I walked back to the manse with a big pile of dishes to wash, with night sky above my head, and the sound of tons of youth kids from the youth service yelling “Go Jesus Go,” I was glad when the day was over.

This is still real part of me. And I have no idea how to deal with that Anna. Nor do I think anyone else does either.

Oh my goodness