The race

Forgetting what is behind and straining toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
Phil 3:13 – 14

I'm still reminiscing about the good times I had in Uganda this past summer and the MTN Kampala marathon certainly fits the description.

One event I didn’t want to miss while at home was the MTN marathon. Being a former employee and having lots of friends working there, it was certainly one of those things on my to-do list. For months I reminded myself of the need to get in shape, but until the last week that was only a thought.
I got into panic mode and decided to do a jog around the Ntinda neighborhood two days before the big day – bad idea on many fronts.
For some reason I seemed to look pretty odd jogging on the streets, maybe because it was 9 am on a Friday morning. People stopped to stare, traffic jams started out of no where, I over heard one chapatti vendor saying something like “it’s these Tanzanians who are going to disturb us”. Ok, so now I look like a Tanzanian??
The next day I was so sore, my muscles were aching and threatening to go on strike and yet the marathon was a day away.
I was determined to run the 10 kilometers so nothing was going to get in my way even if that meant limping to the finish line (talk about determination).
We were scheduled to arrive at the starting point at 6am Sunday morning , I was up by 5, got dressed, fastened the running chip to my shoe and carried my water bottle.
We had also been advised against having heavy meals that morning so I drunk a glass of water and that was it.
When I got to Garden City (starting point) people were jogging back and forth and scaring the rest of us, trying to show how fit they were. I decided I wouldn’t be bothered by them, walked around a bit, met friends here and there and waited.
It looked like the whole of Kampala was there, the sound went off to start the race, while some begun to run others were still talking away and only realized later that the race had begun.

My goal was to get to a fairly steady pace, not too fast just comfortable. I set off, running the race before me (literally pressing on because the crowd was large and people were pushing). We begun at Game, run down to Jinja road roundabout, up past Garden city, on to Fairway Hotel, to Kyadondo road, then down to Kitante road joining the Mulago roundabout, passed the Uganda Museum, to Kira road police station and back to Game.

It was fun, some people walked the entire journey, some others made it a point to scream really loud, startling those in front of them only to use the opportunity to get a head. It was certainly a race for all. I saw a kid who looked 11 years old or there about, then there were the wazeeyi, the skinny, the not so skinny, the short, the not so short, black, white, the disabled name it.

Friends were sticking together, encouraging each other to keep moving, not to get tempted to take short cuts or get into taxis and that sort of thing.

I had my own struggle, there was one lady who really bothered me, she looked the chubby-cute-fragile-I-will-drop-any-minute kind of girl but she had amazing stamina, she jogged past me, then I passed her, then she passed me, eh!. Now I had extra inspiration, there was no way this lady was going to beat me to the finish line. She proved a hard one to tackle, but I eventually passed her, woohoo!
My lesson? - don’t judge a book by its cover.

Above and beyond all that, the marathon had a spiritual connotation for me. I pictured it like I would life, it requires discipline, training and perseverance.

- ‘Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us’. Heb 12:1
- ‘You were running a good race. Who cut in on you and kept you from obeying the truth?’ Galatians 5:7
- ‘Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.
Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air. No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize’. I Cor 9:24 - 27

I run the marathon in an hour and 14 minutes, came in the 416th position yeeeeeey!!!. The number of people that run that day? Over 10,000.

And now I continue to run the race of life.