Catching Up

Ok, here's Day3 and 4. The blog delay is due to ongoing technical problems with my tablet, busyness, and exhaustion. Also, I don't have access to all my photos, and I haven't taken many of the ministry work we've been doing - hopefully I'll get copies from others at some point - so photos are limited at this point. To quickly sum up the last couple days, I need to explain that this trip is different from what a lot of people expect a missions trip to be. It's less about service and more about relationships and showing God's love. As Eric Simpson, the missionary we're supporting, said, "The people of Rossington believe that no one cares about them, so just the fact that people came specifically for them means a lot to them." So though we are doing some service projects, we're focusing more on getting to know people and stuff. As such, we've done some things like taking people to the zoo, though that doesn't immediately seem like a missionary thing to do.

Anywho, for me, the last couple days have been trying.

First, the good news: I'm doing much better with driving that behemoth of a van. We named her Big Bertha. I've also been a bit validated by some locals who were shocked at how big it was, and said it just wouldn't fit on some roads without hitting the curb and such. So. Yay.

The rest of the news: On Sunday, we did church at Eric's church - helped with worship and did a drama to the song, "Oceans." And then we had a long lunch with the church family. For the record, egg mayonaise is the same as egg salad. I like egg salad. After that Eric and his family wanted to take us to Gainesborough Old Hall, which is where many of the pilgrims originated. I knew the Henry VIII history, and I knew the American history, but I hadn't really combined them in my mind, so that was very interesting. On Monday, we took several car loads of people to a local wildlife park. My van had about 9 people in it, a mix of our team and people from the local area. One child threw up in my van on the way there. This caused me all sorts of problems. But I did find out I can keep driving while having a panic attack. The wildlife park is basically a zoo, but the enclosures were much larger and nicer than I've seen before. I always feel a bit sorry for the animals in a zoo, but it is fun to see them. I love me some otters. The park also had a number of awesome playgrounds and play areas and much of the zoo time was spent at those places. One awesome playground featured slides and rope nets and tunnels and such. I spent about an hour running around chasing the kids before I could no longer breathe and had to stop. Because the place was built for people slighty smaller than me, I am covered in brusies. But it was fun, and it was cool to see the kids playing together. The park also had a slide room. One of the slides starts in a vertical drop. Seriously, straight down. Scary as crap when at the top looking down. But I did it. Three times. Less proud of myself after seeing the kids fearlessly doing it over and over again. Then more vomiting happened. Same family but different kid as the first time. So my freaking out renewd itself. I ended up driving a different car back to the church, and from what I hear, it was a good thing. We had fish and chips from the "best fish and chips place," for dinner and then went home. At home, we slathered up in "Thieves Oil" that Emily had brought and prayed we wouldn't get sick. And I continued to freak out.

Next day was the start of the "all-in church" (an off-shoot of "Messy Church"), which was where we were doing our skits, VBS, women's ministry and dinner with the community. Before that started, though, another team member, Amy, and I, drove to some local schools and such to take pictures for a community mosaic mural. We got yelled at a few times for being on private property. My companion lacked my ninja skills. 😉 We did the first skit I wrote at the beginning of the "all-in" service. People said they liked it, but it felt like the crowd really wasn't paying attention; they were talking and distracted. Other than the skit, I didn't really have a place in the afternoon. We had a drama camp that I was excited about, but was unable to really contribute to. Then there was VBS and Women's Ministry, which I had no part in. Since there were 2 of us that morning taking pictures, which was overkill, I really began to feel very useless and un-needed. And my pride was damaged from being passed over in the drama camp. So it's all self-centered thinking, and though I have no one but myself to blame (though I could easily share it 😉 ), it made for a miserable day. I'm still not sure why I'm here, nor convinced I'm supposed to be.

We were all on the verge of collapsing from exhaustion, so we slept in today and are getting ready to leave for the 2nd day of "all-in" church.

So far, my favorite parts of the trip haven't been missions-related. We've had some fun at night - a lip-sync dance party, a hysterical bedtime story some of us told a visiting kid by doing one line per person at a time - I was laughing so hard I nearly peed my pants - and late-night talks with my roommate, and joking with my co-pilots. Probably not what I'm supposed to say about a missions trip but there it is.