Well, it’s over folks. “11 in 11”, “the world race”, “franks journey”, “WR”… whatever you’ve referred to it as, it’s now come to a close.
I wanna start off by saying thank you to everyone from the bottom of my heart! I didn’t have any life threatening experiences on the WR, and for the most part remained healthy. I maintained my energy for the most part, and had an overall great attitude and outlook. There were easy times and there were hard times, but through all times, God remained faithful and brought me through with a life experience few will ever have!
I credit all of this to the faithful prayers of supporters, family, and friends! I give God the glory for carrying me through, and I’m almost moved to tears by how faithful He has remained.
This was truly a life changing adventure, and I can’t wait to get back and put what I’ve learned into action. But for now, I’ll fill you in on how I spent my last day on the field.
Monday, June 4th:
With every Squad that goes out on the World Race, it’s recognized that once you complete the race, you’ve actually performed quite the task. So there’s a bit of a celebration that’s planned. A get-away of sorts, to celebrate our accomplishments and give us an opportunity to hang out as friends outside of a ministry setting.
With this in mind, the Squad leaders wanted us to have a fun beach BBQ/Bonfire day. I was asked to cook something delicious and was given a budget. So with our last day of ministry, I planned, prepped and cooked all day, but in between cooking I was able to sneak away to do some others things.
7:00am wake up call -planned on going out with the local cooks to buy ingredients, such as fresh fruits and veggies from a local market; I was struggling to stay awake, because i only had 5 hours of sleep the night before and 4 the night before that…
7:15am – two cups of coffee down = ready to go.
7:20am – learn that the market the cooks want to go is actually a moving market, that drives thru all the communities and will be at the house around 4pm… three hip-hip-hooray’s for poor communication in the Philippines! 🙂
7:30am – return to bed, try to sleep.
8:00am – not sleeping, too much coffee – lets wake up and pack.
Because it was our last day, I needed to pack. Well, packing 11months worth of weird smelling clothes, souvenirs and memories can be quite challenging.
10:00am – all packed, and room cleaned.
10:05am – head upstairs to start organizing all the food bought the day before (such as beef and a few veggies that wouldn’t be available at the fresh markets, chicken, pasta, etc)
10:25am – start chopping 4 roasted chickens for ‘chicken caesar salad wraps’ for the lunch.
11:45am – collect laundry and make sure it gets put in line (yes.. there is a line up for laundry on every “last day”… haha I wonder why?)
12 noon – eat lunch
12:30pm – head over to the children's home to finish basketball backboard project:
Earlier in the week, I had hung some basketball backboards that a squad member painted up “all pretty like”. The only problem was half way thru tightening down all bolts, it started to pour rain! So I returned to finish assembling and fastening all the hardware. They turned out great!
1:30pm – return to prepping marinaded beef/veggies for kabobs.
I planned on doing a greek night so I made three different marinades: Spicy BBQ, Sweet Honey glazed pepper, Tangy Tomato. Now all i had to do was chop everything up and put it all together.
1:55pm – short intermission to play around with some of the kids hanging around the house.
2:10pm – head over to the shop (where I built all the shelves) to make sure everything was coming along that needed to be finished.
2:40pm – meet with the cooks to remind them I need fruit and veggies.
2:45pm – back to the kitchen to prep: homemade tortillas/ punch/ fruit kabobs/ macaroni pasta/ hotdogs.
4:00pm – head to the local veggie market with Maryloo, the head cook.
Insert laughter, and lots of it! Anytime you hang out with Maryloo it’s a great time. All Filipino people love to laugh!
4:30pm – head back to the house to drop off veggies,
4:35pm – down the street to the local fruit stands for fruit.
5:00pm – return home and cut TONS of fruit and Veggies
5:15pm – head out to buy oil for the 3rd time today because of excessive tortilla making! pick up coke-in-a-bag… delicious and convenient!
5:30pm – stop for dinner
6:00pm – back to the kitchen to eat, err… I mean cook tortillas… They were SO good.
Start organizing and labeling everything for easy beach day, and continue to cut fruit… yowza!
7:08pm – impromptu water fight… kitchens can get exhausting, so we spruced things up a bit by throwing water everywhere.
7:12pm – mop up water that ended up EVERYWHERE.
7:30pm – head out to grocery shop for last minute items (marshmallows were a must have as well as chocolate and more punch ingredients!)
8:40pm – attempt to drive home, get in vehicle, car wont start.. plan B: public transportation.
8:43pm – dodge traffic while heading out of parking lot, run across road and flag down a jeepney, the public transportation here.
9:05pm – transition from jeepney to trike and head up to the ministry home.
9:15pm – arrive home to inform the staff that the car won’t start. Realize I have 2 keys for different vehicles in my pocket… nothing was wrong with the car, I was just too tired to realize that I mixed up the keys…
9:20pm – Head to the kitchen to wallow in my unbelief of being so foolish, and finnish prepping last minute sauces, (two different cheese sauces for our pasta)
9:40pm – after filling up coolers full of ice, head downstairs to get my last massage from the local business. plan to relax and digress.
11:00pm – wake up by lady nudging me… “wake up sir, massage all done.”
11:10pm – head upstairs to reunite with the rest of the squad who was down south, plan to say a quick hello, then head to bed.
11:25pm – run around looking for pepto bismol and ear ache medication for the “sickos” that just arrived.. hah.
11:40pm – informed that a squad member has a bad ear infection.. needs to go to the hospital.
12:10am – Drive two squad members to the hospital.
12:25am – Drop squad mates at front door, head down to park. Find parking, walk around public parking parkade trying to find the entrance to the hospital, head upstairs to ER, realize that I don’t need to stay (they can take a taxi home) get back into car and head home.
1:00am return home, hit the sack… day’s done. Cheers World Race.
Needles to say, everything turned out delicious, and now we’re all at the beach, enjoying our “final-debrief”.
thanks for reading!
