Walking between Two Worlds

I walk between two worlds now. Not fully belonging to one or the other, just hovering somewhere in the middle, in this strange, sacred liminal space that I never quite expected to become my reality. One foot on the ship, one foot off. Half in the shiny, air-conditioned world of floating steel and structure where things feel comfortable and safe, and half in the hot, heavy, beautiful chaos of Connaught Hospital and the vibrant, unfiltered rhythm of Salone.

It’s not always easy. On the ship, there’s comfort. There’s order. We eat three full meals a day, sleep in cool rooms with clean sheets, we have electricity that always runs and we are surrounded by a rhythm of routine and community that feels sacred. There’s safety in it. Predictability. The ship has a heartbeat of its own, and when you live there, you move to its pulse without even thinking.

But just outside that bubble, life beats to a very different rhythm. At Connaught, the air hangs thick with humidity and exhaustion. Resources are scarce, emotions are raw, and the work is relentless. And yet… it is also alive with colour and culture and a kind of sacred grit. The beauty here isn’t polished, it’s wild and worn and impossibly resilient. It grabs you by the heart and doesn’t let go.

I find myself straddling both of these worlds, not quite rooted in either. Sometimes I step back onto the ship and feel like a foreigner in my own home. The conversations around me are the same as they’ve always been, the talk of the patients and nurses on the wards, but now I don’t always know how to speak into them. How do I talk about the weight of my day when I’ve just come from a ward where my patient died because they couldn’t afford their medicine? Where the nurses work with broken equipment and sheer determination?

Before I was part of the on-ship crew, a team, a family. And yet, now that I work off-ship, there are moments when I feel forgotten. Unseen. Like I’ve quietly slipped out of view. But off-ship, I’m not entirely at home either. I don’t live in the crowded, colourful neighbourhoods. And when the ship sails, I sail too, leaving behind my colleagues who have made Sierra Leone their long-term home. I’m here… but not here. I’m there… but not quite there either.

It’s a strange place, the in-between. Some days it feels like a bridge, strong and sure. Other days it feels like a tightrope. I’m learning to navigate it with grace, but it’s not without its ache. Still, I believe that maybe this space, this tension, is where some of the most meaningful transformation happens. Where empathy is born. Where humility grows. Where faith stretches.

I’m learning that I don’t have to fully belong to either world to live purposefully in both. God is in the middle ground, too. And for now, that’s where I’ll keep walking.