Mad Jack

This is the story of how I know God is perfect.

I bought a pair of Tevas for this trip. Nice brown ones to wear as really good African water shoes. Good, solid, thick soled, cover your whole foot, hip, comfortable sandals.

They have come in handy here and there, but I really haven't needed them much. A couple weeks ago, I went back and forth on whether or not to bring them to my final project on the Indian Ocean, because they are pretty heavy and take up valuable space. I finally decided, that yes I had better take them along. Though sure enough, two weeks later and I hadn't put them on once.

I went to pack them to come home tonight and decided I just couldn't be bothered to take them any further in my travels. So, I gave them to Jo to take to her adult computer class this evening and give them to Pumla, the preschool teacher, who is a great link to the community of Chintsa.

Turns out, Pumla was late tonight, but Mad Jack, was perfectly on time.

Mad Jack, is mad, and named by the locals after the crazy funnyness of Jack Russells. Mad Jack does not usually hang out near the school, but he is seen within a 10 mile radius often shuffling through the streets, singing to himself. Tonight though, there he was and he asked Jo for a cigarette, like he does everytime he sees her, and she told him she doesn't smoke just like every other time he had asked.

As he shuffled away though, she remembered the shoes and said "but Jack, I do have a pair of shoes." He turned around. She said "what size do you wear?" and Jack told her a 7 which in America would be an 8. My exact size.

He saw the shoes and his eyes lit up, and his smile widened. He quickly dropped his plastic bag that he was carrying which contained a piece of wood, and a pair of loafers that had two soles that were 3/4 of the way peeled off and broken. He ran barefoot to the shoes, sat down, and tried them on.
They were a perfect fit.

When Jo gives volunteers things away to Pumla like most of the time, she says that while they are grateful they dont say much, just pick out a couple of things and leave...

But Jo said that she has never seen a person so happy in her entire life. She said that Mad Jack walks miles and miles everyday on hard, hot rocky roads, that demolish car tires let alone feet. Roads that aren't fit for a horse to walk down.

He stood up in his new shoes and began to dance. He shuffled down the street across to the right and then back across the street to his left. He said "thank you sisi!" and the children laughed and began to follow him down the street as he knocked on strangers doors to show them his new shoes.

Jo, who has seen alot, alot of poverty, disease, hard times, misfortune, pain, death, everything, she told me this story with tears in her eyes. You can bet that they welled up in mine as well.

She said "Amy, you made a man very happy tonight with your giving."

Friends, this is not my story. It is too beautiful and too perfect. This is God's story.

He put the shoes in my life, he put the high quality long lasting Tevas in my bag for Africa, and just as I was about to leave them in Capetown, he put them again into my bag for Cintsa. Then, he made me leave them there.

God knew that Mad Jack wore a size 8, just like me, long before I bought those shoes.
This happened on the very last night of my 90 days of volunteering.
I stayed exactly this long, for this reason.

This story is perfect.

-amy