Thankfully Thankful

As the “Giving of Thanks” season is upon us some things have been brought to my attention. I realized after countless conversations with my teammates that there are many times when we “glamorize” the World Race. We tend to post the “nice” pictures of ourselves, or the pictures of us having a great time, or post Facebook statuses about how much fun we had last weekend and how much we are learning about ourselves! However, we fail to mention the times when… well life just sucks…funny thing is whether these moments are hilarious or heartbreaking they are the ones that stick with us and forever change our hearts. These are the moments that make our trip…the ones we don’t talk about. So I would like to take a few minutes of your Thanksgiving Day to share the unthinkable memories I am ever so thankful for. 
 

1. The day when we landed in India and traveled 55 hours to get to our ministry site…and all I could think about was my secret escape route back to the USA!
2. Doing laundry in a bucket for the first time
3. Showering out of a bucket for the first time
4. Getting pooped on by a child at the orphanage we worked at in India and only having a baby wipe to clean it up 
5. Peeing in a squatty potty for the first time (glorified hole in the ground in which you…yea)
6. Hiking 6 hours in the Nepalese mountains and literally almost falling to my death several times while our contact was pretty much running the trail and wondering why we were so slow.
7. Taking 4 buses in a row in Nepal that were so incredibly packed you could not move…literally people sitting on me and all around me..thoughts of suffocation entered my mind. A lady also threw up out the window over my squad leader during one of the rides.
8. Dropping my Iphone in poop water and catching it before it flushed!
9. Rats eating holes through two of my teammates backpacks
10. Finding a colony of ants infesting my big backpack…
11. Watching a 10 year old make dinner in a dirty pot for her two younger brothers and sisters because her mother and grandmother died of an illness and their father has to work for money.
12. Watching an 80 year old Cambodian woman work harder daily than a 20 year old in the USA.
13. Getting peed on by a small child at our kindergarten
14. Having our team cell phone stolen from my bare hands while talking on it right outside of our house by someone who was apparently incredibly desperate for money.
15. Crying countless tears
16. Learning how to live simply and out of two bags for a year
17. Taking many team members to the hospital for dehydration, cysts, stomach problems, etc.
18. Watching immobile children lie in their own filth while countless flies surround their mouths.
19. Watching 8 year olds praise God at 5:00 am.
20. Watching the same 8 year olds then do numerous chores and laundry all before most of us open our tired little eyes in the morning.
21. Hoeing a field for a month straight while laughing and telling jokes the entire time.
22. Wearing the same smelly clothes every day….all year
23. Waking up at 3am to my teammate screaming because a snake fell on her head
24. Watching people thirst and hunger with their hands wide open outstretched to the sky worshipping the same God we sit in a pew to worship on Sunday.
25. Getting eaten alive by mosquitoes
26. Sweating for literally the entire 5 months….I miss snow!
27. Giving praise for being cold at night
28. Living amongst rats, geckos,  flies, mosquitoes, pigs, dogs, cats, etc
29. Giving praise for the things I never thought I would like water boilers, sunsets, coffee and water.
30. Saying heartbreaking goodbyes to familes/orphanages/villages every month
31. Listening to the beautiful testimonies of people’s whose hearts are so incredibly big but live on nearly nothing.
32. Watching kids who where thrown into an orphanage for being born without a penis or who have one finger (but are fully functioning).
33. Falling into a squatty potty
34. Changing currencies and languages every month
35. Dealing with countless emotions while being half way across the world
36. Picking lice from my teammates heads and the heads of orphans.
37. Teaching eager children the ABC’s and how to sing “Jesus loves me”
38. Attempting to make over 11 new places my home this year, whether that is for just a couple days or a couple weeks
39. Declaring my identity from a mountain top in Nepal and feeling more alive than I have ever felt
40. Feeling torn in wishing I could be home, but knowing I am exactly where God wants me to be
41. Eating/seeing food I can’t even explain nor do I want to recreate in my mind
42. Watching a 75 year old man hike through the mountains with two 30 pound packs on his back in flip flops.
43. Wearing a skirt down to my ankles and a t-shirt every day in Asian heat
44. Watching teammates change in front of my eyes…
45. Feeling an incredible change in my own heart over the past five months and not being able to put that into words…now that is something to be thankful for.

                
 Thank you for reading! I hope you are all having a wonderful Thanksgiving…just know although things are going well my heart weighs heavy with the Holidays approaching. I miss you all so much and you have a special place in my heart. Thank you for all of your prayers and encouraging words, they are truly what gets me through my day…6 months left!