And now it’s time for… Ridiculous, hilarious, crazy, scary moments from: Panama. (Drum roll please).
- I saw a tarantula and about peed my pants. I couldn’t decided if I wanted to run, or go take a picture. I then had a nightmare about said tarantula and about peed my pants AGAIN, this time in my sleep. He was chasing me. And it was terrifying. Next thing I knew, I was pulling weeds in the same garden we saw the friendly fella in, and I had visions of him coming out of some dark mysterious hole and eating me. This is an experience I may never recover from.
- There are three cats on base. Some days they decide to find themselves some friendly playmates… aka cockroaches. They toss their toys around for about a half hour, and then when the lil roaches are pretty much dead (but not quite) they decide to chomp on their delicious legs, one by one. And then these cute little cats want to come snuggle with us on the chairs. After playing with their cockroaches?… I. Don’t. Think. So.
- Jarin and I were enjoying a leisurely run on the shoulder of the road when we looked ahead of us to see crazy Panamanian drivers coming straight for us. One time it was a huge metro bus, one time it was a semi, and one time it was a little baby taxi. I can’t say I was too thrilled to see any of them coming straight for me. If you think you’re safe running/walking on the shoulder, you’re wrong. That’s actually a third lane when they want it to be.I ate an octopus. It was a baby… but still, it counts.
- It rained every single day, and there were multiple times I thought I had been struck by lighting. It was literally that close to us, no joke.
- Pastor Bill is the coolest dude you’ll ever meet. You probably won’t meet him actually, but one day… in heaven 😉 Maybe he’ll like you enough to bring free T-shirts and… if you’re really luck, he’ll tell you a cool story.
- I got eaten alive by aunts. Well maybe not quite, but I’m tellin ya, it was a close call. They were about to cary me off to their little aunt world.
- I’ve cooked more food than I ever have in my entire life. I can’t say I like it any more than before. I’m trying, future husband. Really… I am.
- Kenia, one of the DTS students at YWAM, is the daughter of the head chief of an indigenous Panamanian tribe. One time she took us to spend the afternoon visiting her village. Between boat rides through marshes, eating cake with her family in their hut, learning about different medicinal plants, watching crazy long lizards chase each other through the jungle, playing “hair salon” and tickle monster with her 4 nieces, and buying awesome jewelry, it was probably one of the spotlight moments of the entire month. So cool.
- I’m officially a pro at NOT finding good wifi. You know, the kind where you have so many bars of service you’re practically sitting on the router?… haha jokes on you, it actually doesn’t work. #worldraceprobs
- There was this one time my team and I were interviewed by Pastor Bill on his radio show. Talk about instant celebrity status!
- I think my team and I have been honked at 801987529384759870934217394871235 times this month. They must have heard our radio interview with P. Bill. I’m tellin ya… celebrities`!
- Cold showers are fantastic. I don’t even miss hot water, not even a little. Ok, ok… that’s a lie. I’ve learned to pretend I’m in a warm sauna or some other warm place. Don’t worry, it doesn’t work.
- I had this really fun week, and it was definitely the best week of my entire month. Yeah it was that time I got the flu/stomach virus. It was great, I promise. Ok, ok… that’s a lie too. But, it was great that I had awesome teammates who kept nursing me back to health!
- Maybe my favorite moment is when we ran out of water on base and used rain water to take showers with. The hose had better water pressure anyway.
- There was this one time when my teammate, Nicole, was taking a shower and she had a friendly lizard fall on her head. Nicole calmly says “Guys, a lizard just fell on my head.” I can’t say my response would have been the same… I woulda ran outta that shower butt naked in fear of it being THE TARANTULA that fell on my head!
- Nicole loves little lizard surprises. Like that one time when there was a dead one right next to her pillow on her bed. That was probably her favorite.It was BLISTERING hot one day, and Nicole and I had to make the dreadful walk to the restaurant so I could get wifi in order to research hostels for debrief in Costa Rica (yeah, cool logistics stuff). Now, I’m not kidding, this day was really hot, so Nicole decided she was just going to pray for our long hike to the restaurant. Pray for safety, and that it won’t be too miserable and hot, and that the internet will work when we get there etc. Well, as we walk out of the driveway, this cop car pulls in the driveway, turns around, and pulls off the road right ahead of us. The policemen gets out, asks if we speak English or Spanish, and proceeds to say that it’s dangerous for two white girls to be walking on the side of the road. Too risky, he said, so he gave us a ride to the restaurant. Now I don’t know about you, but that’s never happened to anyone else on base before, and we JUST prayed that prayer, and next thing we know we’re riding in the safety of an air conditioned cop car with a nice fella who lived in High Point, NC for a couple years. Our long walk all the sudden turned into five lovely minutes. Yeah, tell me God doesn’t care about details.
- I think I’ve officially given myself a UTI. Shoot, there’s no way I’m getting out of bed at night to walk down the huge, exhausting hill to the bathroom. There’s tarantula’s out there!!! There’s no telling what they’ll do at this time of night. (I’m currently writing this blog at 1am, and have to pee really bad).Sometimes we like to fit 17 adult people into an 11 passenger van, begin driving to church to find we need to turn around, get stuck in a Panamanian parade, stop to get gas, pick up 5 more passengers, almost run over 6 bicyclists, and still make it to church on time with 5 minutes to spear. I had never been so excited to step foot on dry land.
- I like to throw dance parties in junior children’s church. Dancing will always be the universal language!
- I’m officially obsessed with tarantulas. If you haven’t caught on yet, it comes up in my conversations rather frequently. Trust me, you’ll learn to love it.
Here’s a quick highlight video of my month… Enjoy!!
Hope ya’ll enjoyed!! Until next month,
Jaz
