Di Dennis and I have become best travel buddies these past 4 travel days. We have been splitting every exciting American fast food meal together and treating ourselves to Starbucks in all the airports we’ve stopped at. We’ve also made it tradition that we spray on perfume at every airport to mask our lovely missionary travel smells. I remember the first time I sprayed on my perfume that I normally wear at home and it was the first time I actually felt like myself on the race. What a comforting smell that was!
I sat in between Zack and Benny on the flight from LA to Tokyo. The poor guys…I ended up falling asleep mid-sentence about 5 minutes after we boarded the plane, before we ever took off. I woke up SIX hrs later to these gentleman…Zack on my left holding out a bag of Harvest Cheddar Sunchips [my favorite!] and Benny on my right holding out a pink and red starburst…saying “Goodmorning sunshine!” and “Dang gurl, you can sleep!!” Thanks to the Dramamine pill I took before we left, I brought peace and boredom to seats 54H 54J and 54K. haha. I do remember Zack waking me up asking me if I wanted dinner which was beef stroganoff. I remember thinking “mmmm that sounds sooo good” but my body would not physically react or wake up so I mumbled some words to Zack and instantly fell back asleep. I was also later informed that my head kept bobbing to the left so the guys put a pillow under my head, then it would bob to the right so the guys then put another pillow under my head. So when I woke up I was sandwiched between 2 pillows. lol the boys on my squad sure do know how to take care of us girls!
Zack and I have made up a number of songs throughout our travels and our time spent together on planes. Since I love to sing so much [as Mom is very well aware, lol] we have been putting our talent to use and we made up about 4 songs so far in our travels. Im hoping to record them so we can look back on our insane sillyness someday.
Zack & I eating noodles for breakfast on the bus ride to Cambodia!
Once we got to the border, it took us awhile to exit Thailand and enter Cambodia with getting our visas and everything. So in the meantime we all ate at this fancy restaurant inside a casino. It was an ‘all you can eat’ buffet – praise God! I tried some interesting new desserts and local food! We then got on 2 different busses and headed to the YWAM base in Phnom Penh where most of us are staying this month. On the way there we stopped at this place to eat dinner and go to the bathroom. It was my first time using a squatty potty! I think this will become very common as the months go on, especially in Africa.
Thailand and Cambodia are probably the hottest places I have ever been to or maybe a close second to Las Vegas. Let’s just say that I’m having to consciously drink gallons of water to keep myself hydrated and to keep myself from being nauseated and not getting migraines. This heat is a killer on my body, but I’m sure in time I will adjust.
I have decided that I love traveling! I love airplanes. Even though the flights are long, the bathrooms on the planes are quite nice [compared to what we’ve been having to use for bathrooms].
I have realized that I don’t think I will ever know what time it is back home. I can only comprehend time in the time zone that I am in at the time lol. I think Michigan/Florida is around 12 hours behind me, making Hawaii about 17 hrs behind me. Either way, I am always a day ahead. Kinda makes life interesting, especially when we lost an entire day [March 5th] when traveling out here. It so happened to be Benny’s birthday on March 5th, in which we celebrated for about 5 min when we crossed the international dateline. And then we again celebrated at the airport in Tokyo. This concept of time and days is extremely amusing and interesting when traveling around the world.
I’m so excited to be in Asia for the next 3 months. I think this country [well, currently Phnom Penh] offers a lot of comforts from home [i.e. the grocery stores, the big city, a house, a bed, a kitchen to use, a bathroom, internet cafes, restaurants, gas stations, etc]. The only bizarre thing for me is the currency here. There are 4,000 riel to the American dollar. So, when it costs me 2,000 riel to get online for one hour, it might sound like a lot, when really it is only costing me 50 cents! Sweet deal!
I went to the market the other day and you have to realize that when you go to the market, you have to barter for prices of things. It is quite interesting and can be fun sometimes. We got some really good deals on things.
So the most important part, we start our “Tree of Life” ministry on Tuesday, March 10, 2009. It isn’t the specific “Rubbish Mountain” ministry we were originally going to do. However, Rubbish mountain is in the same slum so we will be working around rubbish mountain. I will blog later on this week or next week more about our specific ministry once we start it!
Until next time…!
