It. Is. So. Hot. For most of the month our windowless bedroom was uncomfortably cold, until the AC broke five days before we moved out. Now we’re in a hostel with the rest of the squad, with no AC and open windows. It feels like South Carolina in late July.
It sounds like I’m complaining, but really I say all of that just to lead up to this: everyone told me that I’d wish for South America’s 30 degree weather when I got to battling 90 degrees with 100% humidity. I insisted that I wouldn’t, and no one believed me, but I won: this truly is still ten times better than the nights in Bolivia in my 45 degree sleeping bag plus four heavy blankets and still shivering myself to sleep.
Debriefs are hard. I used to say I preferred when we have them at the end of one country and then travel…but no. Once I see the end coming, I just want it to get here. I’m realizing that culture shock is my drug, and I get antsy when my next fix is postponed. I should think about that and write a whole blog on it.
At the beginning of this month, when I was first saying this was my second favorite month so far, I was bracing myself for a hard goodbye. But I realized a week or so ago that what I really loved about this month was having my whole team to myself(I shared them with Team Kairos in Japan) and living under the same roof(rather than split up in host homes).
I love my team. I say this in probably over half my Facebook statuses but maybe I haven’t written it quite so many times on my blog. We get each other. We laugh together but I don’t mind crying with them either. We absolutely love each other, and I don’t just mean we like being together all the time; I mean we tell each other hard things even though it’s terrifying and maybe the other person won’t like us for a couple days afterwards. I mean we’ll hear someone call us on our crap and be glad for it because we know said someone just wants us to be even awesomer than our already awesome selves. I mean I’ll share my Oreos with them(if I share food of any kind with you, you should feel pretty special, but if I share OREOS, you’d better know I adore you). I mean we can talk about our deepest darkest struggles and still be loved just the same.
So the best part of my month is the part I get to take with me, because we get to be by ourselves in Thailand too.
Which means that even though I’d still say this is my second favorite, it’s another fairly easy goodbye. I used to be sad about those, but now I prefer them. I don’t want another Bolivia or Colombia(where I practically danced across the border at the end), but I also can’t handle more like Ecuador(where I cried for all of debrief and the whole first week of the next month). I like feeling good about what God did here while still being excited for where I’m going.
So…
Goodbye noodles and naan and 60 cent 8-packs of Oreos,
goodbye sweet singing homeless man,
goodbye DTS family,
goodbye Auntie Anne’s and A&W root beer(I haven’t seen you in any other countries, so my hopes aren’t up)
goodbye crazy children who need so much love,
goodbye workers at all the restaurants who recognize us every day,
goodbye food court showing the National Geographic channel 24/7,
goodbye Indian pancakes,
goodbye mopeds who don’t follow traffic laws
goodbye mind-numbingly loud motorcycles interrupting our conversations in the daytime and waking us up at night…
Goodbye Malaysia.
