You’re Hot Then You’re Cold
At 3am on Friday the 27th, my team and all the other teams staying in our house in San Jaun, DR loaded 2 buses headed for the airport in Santo Domingo, DR. We arrived at the airport at about 6am and flew out at about 10am to go to Ireland!! woohoo! We were all so excited but not just to go to Ireland, we were all super excited that we would have a 6 hour layover in Orlando, FL!! This meant that we would have a chance to venture out on American soil!! yay! We were all making plans to go to Target, Walmart, ect. but a lot of plans changed because our flight into the DR was delayed and we ended up only having about 1hour to leave the airport. Luckily, Kendra had a super sweet friend who has just moved to a town really close to Orlando and earlier in the month she had told us we could get packages sent to her house and she would bring them to us:) We were so excited! So of course, my mom, dad, and best friend Dakota all sent me packages- which pretty much saved me once we found out that we probably didnt have time to leave the airport.
So the second we landed in Orlando most of us scattered our seperate ways.Kendra and I found her friend and it was like Christmas morning:) My dad had sent me a new sleeping pad- since mine never fully recovered after the hole in Haiti, compression sacks to pack my clothes, a lightweight day bag, and fresh socks. My mom had sent me footie socks, cupcake pebbles, fresh earplugs, an itch stick for all my bites, and maybe some more things I’m just forgetting. Then I broke into Dakota’s package. I needed new TOMS because they are lightweight and the ones I had brought I had deemed infected after being in Gautupita and my bugbites were getting gross (this was very smart, you’ll see in my later blogs about my feet) and I needed some winter clothes. I love how well she knows me. Dakota had gone to my mom’s house and picked out my favorite scarf and some of my winter clothes like my favorite pair of jeans and 2shirts and a cartigan- so I wouldn’t freeze in Ireland. See, some of you reading this may already know this but I’m traveling out of a backpack and a lightweight day pack. My packback has to weight under 50 lbs and hold everything from a mess kit to clothes to tent and even my toilletries for a whole year. So obviously when the majority of the places I’m going are hot, I didnt bring any cold weater clothes except a pull over.
Anyways, Dakota did awesome. Don’t get me wrong- I sooo appreciate and enjoy the things from my parents too! They rushed around last minute to get me everything I needed which I thank them for! It was just awesome to open a package so personal from Dakota. She had even picked out a I pair of TOMS for me that I told her to get whatever style she liked and they are the cutest ones I couldve ever picked out and they match the winter clothes tnhat I have:)
So enough about my gifts. The probably excite me waay more than anyone reading this.
After rushing around the airport and buying somethings that my parents didnt get to send me and way too much American food and Starbucks tall skinny vanilla latte, we loaded up the plane to Ireland!! ahh so crazy! It was so exciting! I’m not going to lie, if I was leaving the USA on a flight to somewhere I wasn’t soo soo excited about- it would have been soooo hard to leave. But God knows that, and HE is soo gentle and good to me that HE planned for my flight into the states to be followed by one of the places I’ve always dreamed of going-IRELAND!
We left Orlando for our 8 hour flight to Dublin at about 6pm. Our arrival time in Dublin should have been about 9-10am. On the world race we have learned to always follow the schedule and be on time but always know that more than likely that schedule won’t do the same. This travel day was no exception. On the way there we had a short in one of the lights in the cockpit of the plane so we landed in Boston to make sure that everything was okay. It was-Praise God!
On our flight I sat beside my sweet teammates Laura and Leah. It was a lot of fun! We we blessed to play with all our new things from the states,watch movies, play games, and listen to music/have dance parties on the flight to Dublin which ended up being about 10-11hours. Needless to say to the ones who know me, I was pretty loopy after being trapped on a plane for that long but it made for good laughs 🙂
Another little thing to mention, while I was on the plane my feet started swelling like little baby blimps and itching again from all the bites. I was not very happy about it but I took some meds and was sure that the swelling would go down- more about that in another blog.
Arrival in Dublin was very exciting! Not only were we arriving in Ireland (wooohooo!!) we were also reuniting our squad which is becoming out family! Because our squad has soo many people, we have a lot of teams, and because we haven’t had enough contacts in each country, 4 teams started out in Haiti and 7 teams started out in the DR and then we flip-flopped. Meaning: we hadn’t seen 7 teams that we consider family in 2 months and we were finally reuniting!! yyayy!
But of course, our plans are not our own and God had something else in mind. As a huge group of Americans claiming to not have any money (other than maybe a couple $100 of spending money) entering Ireland was difficult. They actually stopped us (the 4 teams from the DR) in a holding room because they were very confused about why we were there and why we didn’t know where we were staying the whole time we were there. Not many Americans understand AIM and the way the world race is run, so of course its hard for other countries to get it. After prayer and some awesome work from our legistics team (Stacey Compton, Juilette Steele, and Blake Rushing) there was a change of heart and a grace and understanding for what we were doing and we were allowed through to meet our friends and then head to our camp ground.
We arrived at our camp ground in Dublin just in time. Once we unloaded to bus it started sprinkling and everyone rushed around and assembled their tents just before it really rained.
Sorry I’m just now explaining but the reason we were in Dublin was for the Awakening WR conference. Every year the WR has about 4-5 days where the WR staff, alumni, and current racers come together for this conference. Its a time to wake up- physically and more importantly spiritually. Its a time of encouragement, classes, worship, and teachings.
There are a lot of people that help make the Awakening happen and I was honored to be asked to be a part of that. Joshua Maisoner and I were the 2 people from P squad that were asked to be on a hospitality team which meant we were the”go to” person for some of the speakers of the conference. I knew I could do it but I of course was nervous. Our first meeting was at 5pm on the day we arrived so Joshua and I walked down to the hotel (about a 10min walk) where the conference was being held to meet the people we would be helping out and get the info on the week.
The next day the conference began, as well as my job on hospitality team, and I woke up with really infected and painful feet. So instead of heading to worship like I wanted to, I had to head to the doctor..(to be continued)
Sorry this blog is so random I’m trying to rush all that I haven’t filled everyone in on and a lot has happened. But pretty much:
It was really hard for me to leave Guatupita, especially leaving DIanna, but I feel God will call me back there one day after the race.
We were able to do the Lifehouse Everything skit our last night (which God really put heavy on my heart). It went great and I’ll post the video later and a blog about it.
Travel Days are Crazy. and my packages were super sweeet and fun!
And I thought my feet were freed from the bites when I left the DR but the infection followed me. I am wonderful now- so, NO ONE WORRY PLEEEASE:) but last week my world was pretty much revolving around swollen infected feet hospitals and doctors!
I love you all and I have so much more blogging to do! Don’t worry I’ll do it:) expect about 5 more blogs this week! Thank you all for the prayers with my feet! Last week was sooo hard for me but I know Gods hand was in it and I want you all to know your prayers were heard and were part of my healing:) Thank you again! BE BLESSED!
through [HIS] love,
Rach
