Preparing for a Mission Trip to Africa (10 Useful Tips)

Africa has, for many years, hosted thousands of missionaries and Non profits who seek to improve the outcomes of many underprivileged people in the continent. One of the first things you would need to do when preparing to come to Africa for a mission is to preparing a list of things you need to do before embarking on your mission trip.

Planning ahead of time is critical to the success of the mission trip to Africa. Poor planning can cause a lot of frustration and introduce a myriad of challenges so it’s best to plan ahead.

Below, I have prepared a list of ten critical things that you will need to have in place before embarking on your missionary trip to  Africa. It is by no means an exhaustive list but it is a good place to start as you plan.

1. Pack Appropriate Clothing

When coming to kenya for missions, how you dress will greatly influence how effective you will be. It is therefore important to follow a few basic rules:

1. Avoid revealing clothing. Anything that exposes your thighs and chest should be avoided.
2. Avoid wearing very flashy jewellery. Anything that makes you seem as if you’re flaunting your wealth may make your message ineffective.
3. Consider the weather the location you will be travelling to. Africa has a wide range of climates and it is important to know exactly what kind of temperatures you will be expecting and what kind of clothing would be good for that kind of weather.
4. Keep in mind that laundry is usually done on a weekly basis that you will need enough clothes to last you a week and a half to leave room for the washed laundry to dry.

2. Get immunization

Different countries have different requirements for immunization and you will need to know which immunizations you are required and advised to have before travelling. The CDC website>> https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel provides a good guide for the immunizations you need to have before travelling.

Travelling to a foreign country exposes you to diseases that many locals are immune to and this places you at greater risk of getting ill than people from that region. I have missionary friends who constantly fell ill in their first year of coming to Kenya and most of us would not fall ill even though we were in the same environment with them.

3. Pack a Sanitation Kit

What I mean by a ‘Sanitation Kit” is carrying with you a kit that will help you keep your hands and environment clean as a way of keeping you safe from waterborne diseases like typhoid and cholera which are common in Africa. These include

1. A travel sized pack of Kleenex
2. Portable antiseptic wet wipes
3. Portable hand wash that you can put in your bag
4. Hand sanitizer that you can carry in your bag

These will help you stay clean even when clean running water is not available to wash your hands before meals.

5. Find a Good Water Bottle

Clean drinking water is sometimes hard to come by when you are away from your mission base/home and carrying your own water with you will help you guard against drinking contaminated water. A 1-litre bottle would be adequate for this.

4. Make copies of your passport and credit cards

Before starting your trip, make 2 copies of your passport and credit cards and place one in your check-in luggage and the other in your carry on luggage. This will prove crucial in case you lose your passport or credit card and you need to report them as stolen. You constantly hope that this will not happen but its important to be prepared in case it does.

5. Refill your prescription

If you are under medication, you need to get a full prescription that will last you the entirety of your mission trip including travel days. African hospitals may not have your particular prescription and even when they do, it might be really expensive to get it over here.

In addition to the full prescription, ask your doctor to write out a prescription for you in case you will need to get the medicine over here. This is because you will have to pay a doctor’s consultation fee to get a prescription refilled

6. Buy a power adapter for your devices

Kenya and other African countries us the 220-240V in our electricity compared to the 110V in the USA. To ensure that you don’t fry your devices, get a power adapter that will convert the power to 110V before it gets to your devices. I found the following adapter on Amazon and it has some great reviews. Check out the Adapter on Amazon

7. Aquatint yourself with the culture of the local people you will be serving

8. Find An Affordable Flight

Booking your flight several months ahead of time will help you save on your travel costs so take some time and check what flights are available.

9. Find a local contact

The success of your mission will depend on finding a good local contact who will help you navigate through the challenges that you will surely face when you come for your mission trip. If you are coming as part of an organized group, it’s most likely that the organizers already have local networks on the ground who will prepare most of what will be needed before the missionaries arrive.

If you are going it alone, you will need to reach out to contacts in the places you are going to and cultivate a good relationship with them months ahead of your arrival. This can be a particularly daunting task since there are many cons who take advantage of unsuspecting foreigners online.

If you are coming to Africa for the first time,  use an organized mission program. Alternatively, if you have a connection with an established missionary, you can come to visit them and do your mission work from their place. This will help protect you from any scammers and prevent you from getting stranded.

10. Plan to do touristy things

If you’ve come all the way, you might as well check out some local attractions like national parks and beaches. If you are coming to Kenya, the Maasai Mara should be on your list of places you need to visit when you come for safari.

With advanced planning a short African Safari can be quite affordable and there is an abundance of options to choose from that, many times, are not very far from where you will be stationed.