Here we are in month 3 already of The World Race!!!
My team, along with 2 other teams, are in Dragnasti, Romania for the month. We will be working with a local church on a few different outreach ministries that they participate it..but before we get into those details..I'd like to take just a minute and fill you in on how we arrived in Romania.
We started traveling on Sunday (March 11) around 7:30am Eastern Time from Haiti. Once arriving at the airport we discovered that our plane was delayed about 5 hours. We quickly took this time to relax and grab a few bites to eat and gather ourselves for the upcoming flight. As time passed our departure time kept getting delayed further and further. FInally after an 8 hour delay, we boarded the plane and headed for NYC. At this point we were told (and thought ourselves) that we were certainly not making the plane in NYC because we only originally had a 7 hour layover in New York. We had already discussed catching the next flight out of New York for Istanbul 18 hours later. Upon arriving to New York…we quickly realized that YES we were going to pull a Home Alone and RACE towards the checkin counters and baggage check. With 30 minutes allotted to get off our plane, grab our luggage, carry all of our bags to a bus, catch a bus tram to the other terminal, and finally check in and race to the plane… WE MADE IT!!
We were all relieved we had made the flight and once we were on the plane it was comforting to find that this was probably the nicest plane any of us had ever flown on in our lives. Personal touch screen tvs with every chair…a chef aboard the plane for 2 meals and a snack…an abundance of movies, music, and games to choose from while flying, and finally…a goodie bag fully of socks, eye mask, tooth-brush, lip balm, and toothpaste. Now for those of you who are back home shopping at Wal Mart..this may not seem awesome…but to a World Racer…getting this goodie bag meant we just hit the JACKPOT!!!
On the plane I sat next to a young man from Sudan named Muhammed. I wasn't sure at the beginning because he wouldn't speak to me and I thought to myself….I am stuck in the middle of two people who don't speak English..this is going to be a boring 10 hour flight. Upon overhearing me ask to switch seats with somebody..Muhammed said…'Ya know..this is going to be a long flight..maybe we can chat and get to know each other and I'm not that bad of a person'. He called me out for sure when he said this..and we both started laughing at the thought of the situation. The whole 10 hours I sat next to him talking about our lives, where we came from, our passions, why I am on this thing called The World Race, and many other things. No doubt about it..that was the best plane ride I have ever taken.
We parted ways when we arrived in Istanbul and in which we had about 15 minutes to reach our other flight…the final flight to Bucharest. With only an hour flight ahead of us we were all looking forward to setting foot in the country we would spend the next month.
FINALLY…arriving in Bucharest was a relief and a joy all in one…then that was quickly squished when we realized that our luggage was not coming for another 2 days possibly (100% because of barely catching our flight in NYC). So after a few minutes of deciding what to do from there..we reported our bags to the lost and found and were told they would be dropped off at our addresses in Romania as soon as they arrived.
With no luggage…and only the clothes on our backs (most in flip flops and chacos) we stepped out into 30 degree weather (still with snow on some of the ground) and caught a tram to the train station. I'll be honest…it was nice traveling through all these places without our big packs..but a new pair of underwear would be nice about right now.
Once we walked onto the platform at the train station…Rebekah,Meagan, and I immediately started quoting Harry Potter because we are geeks and that's what happens…and then we became even more excited once we realized that they had small rooms just like on Harry Potter..no we did not have chocolate frogs for treats but we did have Pringles.
Finally after so many hours of traveling and not changing clothes or brushing our teeth in 2 days..we arrived at our house in Romania and met with our contacts. I can already tell this month is going to be starting off with a good pace and a good attitude. God has been so good to us by getting us here safely and our teams are so excited to spend a month together and begin to dig into the word as friends.
I say all this to say…with no extra luggage..I should have jacked that extra pair of socks in first class.
Dumnezeu să vă binecuvânteze ÅŸi vă mulÅ£umesc pentru tot sprijinul acordat!
