Week One

Well, to all of you wondering if i had made it alive, i did. I´ve spent the past five days in Argentina and love it! The rest of my plane ride went well, i met an elderly ´Mendozina´or someone from Mendoza who was also waiting for the same flight as myself. She spoke no english and i spoke no espanol but we ended up hanging out for two hours anyways. By the end of our time together we had breakfast together, she bought me a coffee, she tried to get the airport people to let me sit in first class with her, and she tried inviting me to visit her in my time in Argentina. She was sweet.



After leaving the plane customs was simple and I easily found the people waiting for me (Simon, one of our teachers and Martine, the base director). The first thing i noticed about Mendoza was the poverty. I mean, this isn´t a third world country but they are most certainly lacking. When i made it to the base it was a tiny bit different from what i expected, but not too much. It was once a farm and still has pigs, horses, goats, a donkey.. and similar animals. (and that was an incomplete sentence.) There are many trees and in the early morning with fog it looks very pretty. However one thing i was not expected is when they pulled up to this.... brick tower and told me it was where i would be staying. hahahaha. when you go in to this scary looking building, there is a cement floor, old table, a bed, a huge wooden dresser, a bathroom and stairs to the upstairs which is simply an open room with a bed and shelving unit. hehe, i´ll have to get a picture and post it because you can´t understand how ridiculous it looks. i really thought Simon was joking when he told me thats where i would be staying. Luckily enough though, it was only temporary and last night i moved out to a really nice cabin. I´m staying with three other girls in my bedroom and the other room is for Vive and her son. Then we have a living room and kitchen and nice big patio. Its really nice.



On the base there is another dts (Futbol dts) staff members and other random people involved with the base whom i have only begun to meet. In the Futbol dts (by the way.. i know how to spell football.. futbol is soccer) there are many people who speak english and even a handfull of americans. They´re all very sweet people, but they´re leaving for their outreach to South America in less than two weeks. Of the staff at least half of them speak spanish or can at least communicate. In my dts there are no americans, everyone speaks spanish but only two people speak english. haha. and neither are in my cabin. However, once again i´m giong to look at this, which would commonly be called inconvenient.. a good thing. in the past few days my spanish has increased significantly and i know that wouldn´t be possible without my inability to use english. Its quite wonderful, i have to say.

The schedule we have takes up just about every hour in our day except for our precious three free hours which are used by taking showers and doing homework. The weekends are open and are the only time we can go to the city, which is where i get internet. Basically what i´m attempting to imply is that i can only blog on weekends. And i´ve completely run out of time and theres so much more i want to tell you. But there is no time so it will wait until next week.

ps. i left the battery to my camera in america so im going to have to figure out a way to take pictures. i´ll get them up eventually.

...All liquids, gels and creams must be in 3 oz bottles. All 3 oz. bottles must be placed...

And so the travels have begun! :D (incase i haven't already bombarded my blog with smileys, most likely in an effort not to scare people off in the first few blogs, i'd like to make a disclaimer right now. I have a horrible habit of inserting smiley's at every possible opportunity, sometimes multiple times a sentence [ and when joint with my run-on sentences... that can be a lot of smileys :D :D ] Just thought i'd warn you before hand). Anyways, back to traveling..

Charlotte-ATL-MIA

Yesterday around four my parents and I jumped in my car and drove from our home to Atlanta, which should have taken only four hours, but with my dads love of circling in parking lots, my mom's indecision, and my stubborness over the issue of eating dinner at 7- mid trip instead of at 9- when we should have arrived in Atlanta... we ended up arriving at 11:00. After finding a hotel, making some last minute calls to my airline (hopefully my last for a long while) and rearranging my bags.. i finally made it to bed by 12:30.

At four the wake up call came and two hours later i was saying good-bye to my parents at the security check point. I'm going to miss them a bunch :( :/ (I love you two!). Since then I flew from ATL to MIA, where i am now waiting for my next flight. So far the lay-over is going fast, i've only got five more hours to go then i'm on my way to Bogota, Columbia. By the way, they play the same automated messages over the loud speaker over and over again. i may have them memorized before the day is out.

I'll keep you guys updated :D :D

Ps. I'M GOING TO ARGENTINA :D :D :D !!!

Pps. To all of you who would not believe me when i said that Mendoza is about as far from the equator as Charlotte, Mendoza is -32 degree and Charlotte is 35 degrees.

Bogota, Colombia

After meeting some very friendly people in the MIA-BOG gate my eight hour layover finally ended and I boarded my plane. (I wasn’t exaggerating when I said there would be many run on sentences… I warned you..) We waited at the gate for what seemed like ages, but it was all worth it! As the plane took flight I felt a rush like I’ve never had in an airplane, feeling the finality of my leaving America, in that very moment when we took to the air. (or perhaps the rush was because the plane lifted in quite an intense angle, one I’m really not used. It felt like the tail would bottom out before we got high enough.) But either way it was a wonderful moment and all the waiting I’ve been doing was completely worth it. On the plane I sat in front of a decidedly New Yorker. He not only was wearing a N1-H1?… what ever… mask (to keep from getting those Hispanic diseases, eh? Hahahaha) and his first comment to the guy who sat next to him was ‘Are you and English speaker? Or am I the only one?’ Haha, the man did in fact speak English, Australian to be exact. The lady who sat next to me was Hispanic and spoke no English, but was still a very sweet lady. And she didn’t monopolize the arm rest like the man sitting next to me on my ATL-MIA flight. I was quite thankful for someone who would share.

Ever since entering the BOG (Colombia) gate I’ve felt welcomed, even a sense of family. As tired as I am I’m really enjoying this trip. Plus, my layover in Colombia is only Two and a half hours and the flight is about the same. I’m almost three quarters of the way there :D (seventy percent to be exact.) Soon I’ll be in Argentina. Soon I’ll be at ywam. Soon I’ll be with the people I’m going to spend a good chunk of my life with.

Many times in the past few days I’ve wondered if this was really where the Lord is leading me. I kept doubting myself and the plan He has for me. Well right now I’m going to come in agreement with the Lord, He put this desire in my heart and I can’t see myself following any path besides this one. The Lord is so good and I love going on the adventures He plans for each and everyone of us. This is going to be great!!

Just a side note, my wisdom teeth have been bothering me for the past two years, but nothing serious enough to get them removed just yet. Except for occasional grinding of my teeth while I was sleeping I didn’t even know they were there.. Considering they are all four impacted. Well in the past day of traveling I’ve felt my teeth shift and now my bit is crooked. I’m trying hard to not grind my teeth during the day, but it happens whenever I’m not consciously thinking of it and my mouth is quite sore because of that. I know the Lord has the strength to fix my mouth without me having to go to a dentist by myself in a country where they don’t speak English. I have no intention of going that route and instead intend to pray my mouth back to normal. If you guys could join me in this I would more than grateful! Thank you so much!

Santiago, Chile

Well guys, i haven't run into any problems yet. We had a delay on the last plane but luckily i had a five hour lay-over scheduled. It is certainly a grace to have long lay-overs when your traveling with many connections, in airports you have never been to and where there is a language barrier. As obnoxious as thy can be... i think i'll save myself from some gray hairs because of them.

Well there's not much to report from this airport, its simply six in the morning and in the past two days i've totaled about 6 hours of sleep. Hence, i need something to do with myself so i dont fall asleep at the gate leaving my luggage as fair game to anyone who wants it. Basically what all of that equates to though... is that everything i'm about to write is completely worthless and will probably make no sense. I'll ramble about every which thing that catches my attention and follow every odd brain pattern my easily distracted mind can follow. So really, I'd suggest you to not read any further on this blog, there will be no finality in the end of it, my pronouns will all be switched around, i may use a random large word here or there to make myself feel like i'm actually writing something worth reading. hahaha. You know, now that i look around this gate (which isn't even my gate, mine is blocked off right now) there are many people sleeping all by themselves. Oh well, i still won't participate.

Oh i think the hallway to my gate finally opened, oh good. And yet, i'm too lazy to get up. (nothings changed, right? or as my mom would put it 'What's new?') .....so i'm really not sure how long i'm aloud to make these posts. If they tell me after i've typed it all out that its too long, i'm going to be... well... i guess i wont be mad, so i dont know why i said anything about it at all. Oh, and another random thought for all those Ted Dekker fans... when i was waiting in the atlanta airport there was a trailer for his new book on the tv at the gates. Random, eh?

So another random thought, hiking packs filled with (mostly) clothes, some books, and other random none breakable essentials make great back rests for when your sitting on the floor. Except you still have nothing to cushion under you and that is quite a downfall. I could just wait in the seating area like i was five minutes ago. However, five minutes ago there was a crowd of people waiting by the glass sliding doors the lead to my gate, i had my back to them because i was sitting in the chairs. When i turned around they were all gone so i assumed the doors were opened. Now when i look through the doors ( every few gates are sectioned off by sliding glass doors down this [extremely] long hallway.) Now when i went to try the doors they were locked.. but there is now a crowd of people, not in the section right next to me but the next section down. They werent there when i arrived an hour ago. I'm quite confused. ....hehe, i should be laughing about this but someone is locked in on the other side of the doors.. i really shouldn't be laughing. but considering my extreme lack of sleep and the hour that it is, i'm going to have some grace for myself. Besides, i dont think she's by herself.... Anyways (i use that word a lot) I'm not going to worry about it just yet, I've still got an hour and fifteen minutes till boarding and im just down the hallway.

For your sake i truly hope you're not still reading this. You must really be quite bored to be Still be interested. (sorry to offend, perhaps you're simply a truly kindhearted person who wanted to suffer through my last layover with me. hahaha, thats an exaggeration. i'm not suffering. i'm quite enjoying myself actually. except for the lack of food in this terminal. I'm really quite hungry right now but there is nothing to eat but candy and cookies. And i dont think theres food on this next plane. ugh now i'm not so content, thinking about that prospect. But oh well. i'm on my way to argentina and its not like i'm starving. i'm only hungry. hehe.. it may be interesting to see me carrying my forty lb of carry-on and dragging my two fifty (exactly fifty, i might add) lb suitcases on no sleep and little food. I'll probably trip once or twice. haha, i suppose thats what i get for not packing more food.

ok there must be another way around. i keep seeing random people waling around the hallway, but they're not going through this door. And the attendant guy told me they would open it before the flight. ugh. indecision. perhaps i'll go pester them again.. like a true american. (heh, i hope you heard the sarcasm in that. ) ...hehe, person numero dos to be stuck inside the hallway. oh but i really shouldn't laugh about her.. she genuinely looked worried and went running in the opposite direction. I hope she doesn't miss a connecting flight.

Accepted!

A few weeks ago I was routinely checking plane tickets and to my dismay prices had jumped up. Incase you've forgotten, i still hadn't received any form of acceptance into the school or even heard from them since i'd sent my application in. Immediately i was on the phone with my dad asking him for the best 'next step' in the ordeal; we decided i should call ywam Mendoza to see if i could find out what was going on. When i (finally) called them i was greeted by the same lady, Yanil whom i've been e-mailing back and forth. She was surprised to hear i hadn't received an e-mail from them and informed me she'd sent one. At the conclusion of our chat I learned that I am in fact accepted into the school and also that by applying to the dts i was also applying to the part two of the school, School of Frontier Missions. I was slightly confused and dismayed at the knowledge of our phone call not being a conclusive at all but instead opening my mind to a whole new world of decisions to make.

Being that i had already been interested in the school of frontier missions (henceforth known as sofm because the whole name is Much too long to type out) but had never truly looked into, i now had to decide what to do about plane tickets. The problem was, if i bought a non-economical (plane talk for: we will charge you for switching or canceling you return flight) flight but decided to do sofm there would be an issue. However buying an 'economical' flight is $800 more. To be quite honest after all my research i decided economical flights are a scam, most airlines still charge you anyways and the fee for buying a non-economical flight is usually less than what you pay for the economical flight without its 'smaller' fee. (just a disclaimer, this is only the truth of my situation and would not suggest someone in a different situation to do the same without first researching their options.) Anyways, all of that to say i finally bought my ticket after much deliberation and got it for a good price set for a five month trip. Incase you're curious the fee for switching my flight is only $75.

However my newest dilemma is the last leg of my travels. You see the flight i bought only flies as far as Santiago, Chile as i intended to take a bus across the border and over the mountains. However, to be accredited to my senselessness i bought the plane ticket with out thinking of how long i'd be waiting around before the bus left the station. You see, my flight lands in Chile at 9:30 pm. Most buses leave the next morning from the bus station at 7:30. I've been able to find some bus services that leave at 11 pm and even 12 pm but haven't been able to confirm that they have availability or how far away from the airport they are.

If you could pray all of this works out and that my travels are safe and easy I would be more than appreciative! And incase anyone is worried that all of my blogs will be about my dilemas- in two weeks i'll have already gone through all my flights, buses and taxis and be living on a farm in Mendoza, Argentina. Let me tell you, my blogs should be nothing less than my ecstatic joy and ramblings on how everyone should move to Argentina. ;)