Ana

By one o’clock in the afternoon the heat in the city wipes all the energy from you. Which is why most of our friends stay up long after the sun sets. Energy is renewed and tea is brewed, and life-filled conversations begin.

One late afternoon as the sun set and mosquitos began to emerge from the bushes, my friend and I made our way into the kitchen and closed the doors to continue our conversation. She told me how she came from a lower-class system in her island nation. Once the princess and daughter of a chief, she was now not even considered high enough status to dine where her husband and his family ate. Her husband was from the main island, but because she was an “islander” (or from outside the capital), it did not matter that her father and mother were the island chiefs as were the generations before them. Ana said that sometimes even the servants were treated better than her. I remember looking at this downcast woman and feeling pity for her. She rarely looked me in the eyes, and she was often embarrassed of her lack of English, though she was one of the smartest people I had ever met.

Months had passed, and her husband was now bed ridden. I had asked her to teach me some of the language, but it was not until his family was out of the house that she felt comfortable giving me lessons. She became my language tutor for the dialect of the outside islands. Our friendship grew, and many times we found ourselves laughing and crying together. Her husband Moses noticed and wanted to join our conversations as well. I eventually gained the courage to start sharing stories from God’s word with the family. Moses listened but often lost interest. Ana, on the other hand, asked for more and more stories from the Bible. In her broken English she said, “God is light. He is love. I want to know Him more.”

A year into our friendship, on one of those hot days that sapped all my energy, I was winding down and ready for bed when she invited me over for some tea. It was odd. I felt that something was wrong. I found her weeping on her balcony as I came up to her house at midnight. She told me a good friend of hers died suddenly at the age of 40 from a brain aneurysm. She looked me in the eyes and said, “Life is short, and eternity is forever. I want you to know that I believe in Jesus. Will you get a Bible for me? I used to have one, but I had to get rid of it.” I cried with her, held her, and told her, “Yes!” I had a copy of the Gospel of John in her language with me. I gave it to her, and I know she shares it with her friends.

Her husband has since passed away. Ana now lives with her daughter and a good friend in the big city, and she’s a translator and tester for the Bible translation work happening in the islands.