Just put one foot in front of the other - You'll get through this

When we first arrived at the village, it began with the biting insects. Before we were completely settled in, I had spots and swellings all over my body from what they referred to as “sun flies”.

I didn't fully understand what it was or why it singled me out to unleash its anger on but I had to devise a coping mechanism for it. I could only go on long sleeves and full-length trousers, whether it was hot or not.

Just when I was about to adjust to that, I realized that my network had been reading ‘3G’ since I landed in the village. Thankfully, I wasn't the only one who was facing this unfortunate situation. My other coursemates who were in my group couldn't make calls or send messages as well.

I couldn't even inform my parents when I got to the village. This meant big trouble for me because of work but I decided not to panic yet, there definitely had to be a way around it.

After consulting the village chairman and talking to him about possible problems we could encounter, I spoke to him about the network situation as well and all he could do was laugh.

“There is no network in this village o” he began, my coursemates and I exchanged looks of horror, “But I've heard people say that if you walk towards the main road then you can make calls and even use the internet”

The main road was almost a 40-minute trek from the compound we were given to stay. The severity of the situation still didn't strike me until I started finding it difficult to keep up with the submission of the stories I was writing.

Sometimes I had to stand at the junction for close to an hour before being able to send even a message, not to talk of a document.

By the fourth day, I was already having issues with one of my clients. He kept threatening to cancel the contract we had together even after I had explained how difficult it was to get documents across to him.

I even proposed to pause the writing project and start again once I was done with the intervention, submitting 2,000 words every morning and evening to make up for lost time but he would not hear of it.

As if that was not enough, my family tried several times to reach out to me but they couldn't and it got my mother both worried and upset.

“You should have found a way to reach out to us even if it meant going to town for one day!”

I've never been under so much pressure in my life. When my documents eventually began to send, they took time to deliver one at a time making some documents to be sent the day after I actually sent them.

Not to mention the pressure of bringing the villagers out to interact with them and making sure that my group members were being carried along, on some of those days, I had to leave the rehearsal ground to go after my group members who had gone in search of food or network.

On the 6th day, I felt like I was losing my mind.

It was then that I decided to start plugging my ears with music and it was ‘You’re Going to be Okay’ by Brian and Jenn Johnson that kept ringing in my head.

The project is not over yet and it won't be over any time soon either but whenever I feel pressured or whenever I want to relax, I plug my ears and just allow the lyrics of the song sink into my being, then I get the motivation to go on, knowing that just as the song says, I'm going to be okay.