As I am still at the beginning of this journey, I don't have lots of stories to tell as yet, but that is still my theme because that is what this trip is about...collecting stories about what God is doing around the Asian world. Although our first scheduled interview is not until later this afternoon, already I have collected at least three other stories that need to be told...but I'll get back to that.
First, I want to share in the fun of a 36-hour travel adventure. On Thursday morning, I had to be at the airport by 4:30 a.m., so I made the silly decision to NOT go to bed at all on Wed. night. I thought, it'll help me sleep better on the plane. Our first flight from Indy to Washington D.C. went without a hitch until landing...then, it seemed we had a bit of trouble stopping, but all was well. Once we deboarded, we found out our wheel had broken, so we'd need to be rerouted on another plane to NY. That didn't happen, so we ended up flying back to Detriot...yes, pretty much a little circle. We got to Detroit, no problem, then readied ourselves for the 13-hour (yes, you read that correctly,,,13 hours!) flight from Detroit to Tokyo, Japan. It felt like 13 hours. We were in a huge plane that sat 10 passengers across. My two traveling companions and I were unfortunately in 3 of the 4 middle seats in the center of the plane...right in front of the movie screen, which made for good viewing, but also did not make for great sleeping because the screen was so bright. The seats were so close together, I literally had to sit with my arms pulled in the whole time...can you say CRAMP!
I'm usually a person that never wants to wish my life away...even in the midst of tough times, I want to learn and grow in the midst of the experience, but it would have been fine with me if I could have blinked and the genie could have whisked me directly to Bangkok at that point.
Once we landed in Tokyo, there was NO time to kill...or stretch our legs before our next flight took off for Bangkok. This was another 6-hour flight! At least the plane was not so full, so we could stretch out a bit more. We finally landed in Bangkok, made it through customs, got our luggage and found a taxi to the missionary guest house where we're staying. Really things could not have got much more smoothly. I am grateful. Since then, my major issue has been with the heat--for me, that has been tougher to deal with than the jet lag, tiredness and the slight scare I had with eating some pizza on our first full night here that must have had some seafood on it because my throat got a bit tight, but not enough to use one of my precious 2 Epi pens. Still hoping I bought these for nothing, if you know what I mean!
It's been in the 90s with HIGH humidity. We don't get along well at all. I basically slept nothing last night because it's so hard to sleep when you are drenched in sweat. But today I began to hear the stories, and that makes me excited to be here. This one is from our field leader in Japan, Steve. He was in Tokyo when the earthquake and tsunami hit 3 weeks ago. This has rocked the world of him and his whole team, but he said that the team has never felt so close and worked so well together. Sometimes, I think, it takes challenges to face together to bring us truly together.
Steve went on to tell how he was going to fulfill his commitment to the senior class of CAJ, our MK school in Tokyo, by taking them on their senior class trip to Thailand. This is just 2 weeks from the devastating earthquake, but they felt it was important. Well, as many of you might have heard, there was another earthquake a few days ago on the borders of Myanmar and Thailand...just 6 miles from where Steve and the seniors were! Talk about traumatic experiences...to go through the huge one in Japan, with all its aftershocks as well, and then to experience it less than two weeks later again...in another country! But Steve said the students were calm and cool, and they were actually able to help others around them. I'll be writing this story out in full once we get home. Until then, I'm excited to hear dozens more about how God is working and using OMS people to change lives around the world every day. So honored to be able to tell the stories...
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