Why go to Homecoming when you can go to Africa?

By Koda Maguire Ft. Faith Conrad

If I told you that I traveled halfway across the globe for 10 days would you believe me? My name is Faith Conrad and I traveled from Princeville, Illinois to Freetown, Sierra Leone in Africa. The flights, boats, podas, and all other transportation combined for the travel there and back ended up being around 65 hours.

The group of girls from Princeville that got to experience this trip were Jen Conrad, Michelle Conrad, Grace Conrad and I. We left from Peoria International Airport on Saturday, October 5th and flew to Chicago O’Hare Airport excited for what was about to come. When we landed in Chicago we met up with four team members and then we flew out of Chicago and into Brussels, Belgium, where we met up with another team member who was meeting up with us from Paris. Finally, or so we thought, we flew from Belgium to Lungi, Sierra Leone. We then got on a poda, which is a shuttle type van that is formally known as a poda-poda, and went to a boat all the way to Freetown. When we got there we got on a second poda waiting for us, where we proceeded to our hotel, on Sunday, October 6th.

That Monday, we walked to the center for the first time and met Allie and Charles for orientation, who are Americans that live down there and help organize all the trips. We also met the native kids at the opening ceremony shortly following the orientation. We spent a majority of that day hanging out with kids and I made so many new friends. Later on that evening, while we were eating dinner in the hotel our final team member arrived.

The next morning, we went to a local school that held “blessing bags” which were filled with miscellaneous items that they tend to need. That evening we went to the Roots House, which is for all the people that aged out of adoption.

Wednesday was full of shopping as we made our way to the market, and we also spent time with the kids as well. This consumed most of our time that day, but was well worth it.

On Thursday we went to Pastor Daniel’s village and gave out more blessing bags to those in need and saw more of Freetown. That night we took some of the kids to the hotel for dinner.

The following day, we had a party with the kids and their friends, we served dinner and had music and dancing. On Saturday we went to the beach with some kids and it was the prettiest beach I’ve ever seen!

Finally, on Sunday we had a good-bye ceremony and church at the center then we went back to our hotel for lunch then we were going to leave. We were eating lunch and we started to double check flight info so that we knew what to do at the airport, and all the phones said different things, and this is when panic set in for most of us. We called Charles and he tried to help us out. We then got to the boat station and went to the airport just to see what was happening and figured it all out. After going to Accra, Ghana for a lay-over we came home smooth sailing on Monday, October 14th.

The most frequently asked question that I received was what church I was going with. I went with The Raining Season, which is a company that has an orphanage in Freetown, and not with a church.

The Raining Season is an amazing cause and you can learn more about them, their goals, mission, and the kids at their website, therainingseason.org or on their Instagram and Facebook which is, @therainingseason. This experience is something I’ll never forget and I’m so glad that I got to go on this amazing trip.