With only 12 days left on the Race, I have inevitably been taking a stroll down "memory lane." My teammates and I have been in serious story telling mode. We are all preparing to be able to answer the questions that all of you, our friends and family back home, will ask us…very soon.
There have been so many awesome, odd, terrible and crazy things that have happened in the past 11 months. In fact, crazy is now just pretty normal.
　
Here are a few of my favorite new "norms" :
1) Finding squid tentacles in your "chicken" fried rice.
2) Having multiple ants frozen into your iced beverages.
3) Having everything on an ENTIRE restaurant menu being "finished" (which means sold out).
4) Riding with tuk-tuk drivers that drive you around the city for an hour… because they refuse to admit to you that they can't read a map.
5) Seeing people's legs grow out during healing prayer services in Northern Ireland.
6) Having a 48 hour African bus ride that turns into an over 100 hour travel week.
7) Being stung by a scorpion and then being rushed to a sketchy clinic in the bush of Mozambique.
8) Having the Lord clearly speak to you through the book of Jeremiah in a coffee shop in Cambodia.
9) Walking 36+ kilometers in below freezing weather in Nepal.
10) Drinking 13 cups of black pepper tea in one afternoon during hut to hut ministry (on multiple occasions).
11) Having small children, wearing nothing but eyeliner, make a home for their naked bums in your vacated shoes.
12) Talking about digestive tract malfunctions with the ministry contact immediately upon arrival to the ministry site.
13) Getting love letters from God in your beautiful teammate's handwriting.
14) Listening to the entire squad speak with a new "world race" accent, accompanied by the ever endearing head bobble, whenever a past event or story is retold.
15) Finding yourself feeling the need to keep your "goodies" (knees and shoulders) covered at all times after months of being required to keep those bad boys under wraps.
16) Falling totally in love with a child that you can't even communicate with, because of the love you know that the Father has for them is overwhelming.
17) Having new foreign friends (with no "politically correct American filter") comment on Facebook pictures saying things like: "This can't be you, you don't look as good as her."
18) Teaching alongside of English teachers who don't speak any English.
19) Talking openly with your teammates about the conversation that you had with God earlier that day.
20) Being asked to preach in the Malaysian jungle, to Indonesian believers, with absolutely no advanced warning or time to prepare a message… and having God show up and miraculously give you the words to speak.
21) Participating in "Lice checking parties", which are a nightly team activity. And genuinely being excited when your teammate assures you that you only have dandruff, not lice.
22) Never knowing what day it is, what month it is, or where you are on the planet.
23) Choosing where to go on your off day based on whether or not a place has wifi and air conditioning.
24) Being asked by the Lord to step out in a crazy act of faith.
25) Having to decide between sweating profusely through your sleeping bag liner or waking up to 40 new mosquito bites.
26) Hearing a popular song for the first time….six months after it was actually popular.
27) Being joined in church services, restaurants, and classrooms by all sorts of various wildlife.
28) "Feed-backing" your teammate for leaving a dish on the table, because you know that it isn't in her character to do so.
29) Writing songs and learning guitar in your free time since there is only 2 hours of ministry per day.
30) Realizing that you just attempted to have a conversation in the wrong language for the country that you are currently in (it gets confusing after 11 months).
31) Receiving emails from the recovering drug addict in Moldova who has now given his life to the Lord and sings in the church choir.
32) Cutting the hair of 3 different missionaries, that you just met, on the rooftop of a hotel in Chiang Mai.
33) Facebook chatting with friends from Kenya, Thailand, Ukraine and America…all at the same time.
All of these things (awesome, terrible, or indifferent) just seem pretty normal now.
I can't wait to share my stories and experiences with all of you when I get home. If I seem strange or different to you….it's because I probably am. It's partially because I haven't been able to color my hair in 9 months and partially because God has used all of these experiences (and many more) over the past 11 months to radically change my perspective. I have learned to have expectancy for God to move, but not to have expectations (things rarely go as planned). I've learned to try to find the blessing in every messy situation, there is usually always something that is worth laughing about. I have learned that relationships are the most incredible gift that God blesses us with as His children.
I pray that God never stops changing my perspective. That I never stop finding the joy in or adjusting to new "norms."
Life is good, laugh a little and let God show you how it can be even better!
Love you all!
<3 Cassie
　
　
　
　
　
　
　
　
　
　
　
　
　
