First of all, what a blessing it was to wake up refreshed! Just a restful peaceful sleep. In anticipation of not sleeping well, even drugged, I only took one sleeping pill. Previous nights I'd taken two and still been up by 3 or 4 am and felt drugged. I didn't get up this morning until my alarm went off! Thank you for your prayers!
Took Andrew to school this morning. Our intent was to pick him up at the end of 4th period (10:30ish) and head straight to the airport. Michael slept in and I ran to WalMart to get a power adapter so I can charge my MP3 player and whatever else I would need it for. I also stopped at Walgreens for a few last minute items and it was almost time to get Andrew!
About 10:20 as we were packing the car I couldn't find my camera. Yesterday it was my passport and stuff - today it was my camera. We looked for about 15 minutes - I didn't want to leave without it! Finally I found it in the trunk of Michael's car and we left to get Andrew - already 10 minutes behind!
I was trying not to get anxious on the way to the airport - trying to be calm. Michael dropped Andrew and I off near our entrance with the luggage and tried to find a parking spot. That was a bear! My friend Angie (Hi Angie!) met us at the airport as we were checking my luggage. That was another issue! No, not Angie, my luggage! My suitcase was 54 pounds. So I took out something I KNEW was 8 pounds and suddenly it was 49.5 pounds. Something wasn't right. Anyhow, after some sorting of luggage I checked my two big bags and we went to the food court to wait.
Andrew had pizza, I had Qdoba (Ha! That is funny now that I think about it...you'll see why later!) and Michael had a Chinese or Japanese place. Angie just had Starbucks and waited with us.
My flight was scheduled to leave at 1:20 - we waiting around until about 12:30 when it was time to say goodbye. Angie left just before that so we could have some family time to say goodbye. Saying goodbye to the boys was SO HARD! I tried hard not to cry, but that didn't last long. As I was at the first security station just past the food court the officer was asking me something as he was reaching for some tissues. I waved goodbye as long as I could until I finally had to go. Saying goodbye - even for such a short time - was so hard.
I met up with Lori and we were looking for Betty, Ellen and Amy. Amy was running late - she couldn't find her passport and didn't realize it was with her. The rest of the gang catches up to us
just prior to boarding. What a way for her to start her trip! The 5 of us took off from Indy to Detroit.
The landing gear was down and we were coming in for a landing in Detroit when suddenly we went BACK up and the landing gear came back up! We circled twice (I think) and then finally landed in Detroit. I was in the second seat from the window.
It was time to meet up with the rest of the team!
Let me introduce you to most of our team:
Christine is sitting at the far end in the black shirt with her feet up on the red bag. Ellen (our trip director) is next to her in the red shirt and then in all black is Betty!
Valerie is all the way at the end on the phone, Steve has the white baseball cap and Lori is closest in the yellow jacket. Apparently I missed Amy - she is sitting on the ground right in front of Lori.
We went to get a bite to eat - we found a table that we kinda fit around - 1/2 of us went to get our food while the rest watched our stuff. Amy, Steve and I sat down and as Amy opened her coke - yes, someone more addicted than I was - (apparently it was rather shook up) it exploded on her, her food, on Steve and well, just about all over the place! It was a nice "ice-breaker" for the team. Let's just say she'll be known for that from the team!
Oh, the Detroit airport has tram in it!
After a bit more of a wait it was time to go!
This plane was a bit bigger - if I remember right it was two at the window, 4 in the middle and two on the other window. I had seat two in the middle. Drat. =) At first there was no one next to me (whoot!) - then someone comes down the other aisle - looks at the seat and was CRANKY! She reaches across the guy in seat 4 - drops her bag in her seat and puts her overhead bag up. Apparently she paid for 1st class and was bumped back to us in coach. It's gonna be a L O N G flight! He lets her in and she is HOT. I can't blame her - she paid $8,000 for her ticket. Well, later she changed it to $6,000 -but still! I giggled (to myself of course) when she said, "How do you people do this?" My thought was "Welcome to the real world" - but she mostly watched movies the entire time and picked at her food.
If you have never been on a long flight - the seat in front of you had a personal TV screen on the back of it. You have a remote in your armrest. You can watch movies, taped TV shows, play games and even see flight information. I watched "Letters from Julia" on the way over - CUTE movie! But I had it on the flight information channel most of the time. Here we are ready to take off:
What is airplane food like? Take a look!
On the way to Amsterdam - Amy and I each got different items and shared!
Dinner:
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| Chicken, stuffing carrots, greens and a salad! Oh, and a blondie brownie! |
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| Somesort of a cheesepasta dish, salad.... |
I can't find my picture of breakfast - it was an omlet of some sort - when I find it I'll put it here!
So then we make it to Amsterdam!
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| FULL body pat down to get on the plane! |
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Our plane from Amsterdam to Kenya!
I think the seats on this one was 3, 5 in the center and then 3 |
On the way to Kenya:
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| Pesto Pasta, Chicken Salad and Cheesecake thingie for lunch! |
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| Snack before landing - apple coffee cake, apples, salad with potato salad underneath |
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| Pizza pocket |
Not bad at all! It seemed like they were always bringing us something. I think it helped make each of the 8 hour flights go fast! We were glad to have something before we landed. My TV from Amsterdam to Kenya was broke - I dozed when I could. Mostly I watched the screen in front of me that followed had our flight information.
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| It's a little cold outside! |
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| We'd been in the air for over 3 hours when I took this! |
It is now 7:20 pm Kenya time (1:20 pm Indy time) on Wednesday - We'd been traveling for almost 24 hours. We still had to get our luggage, our Visas, go through customs, and get to where we were staying!
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| Getting our luggage |
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| Luggage area and customs to the left |
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WELCOME TO KENYA!
Customs is right under the sign! |
It took us almost 2 hours to get our Visas. We could have done it before we got the, but the price would have gone up about $200.00 more per person. It gave us a chance to mingle since it was hard on the plane.
After we all got through Customs we were met by Justine and 2 drivers. Justine is like a liaison between the short term mission teams and Missions of Hope. She was wonderful!
We gathered our stuff and headed to the vans. One van for us, one for our luggage. I asked our driver how long would it take to get to where we were staying and he replied "It depends on the traffic" - I had NO IDEA how honest that statement was!! I'll get into the traffic a little later! The weather was beautiful. T-shirt weather for us. Although the Kenyan's were bundled up - coats, snow hats...it was like that the entire trip!
We stayed at "Grace House" - it is a gated community that most of them mission teams working in the valley stay at. We were there, White River (Indy) was there, Trader's Point (Indy) and even a group from Habitat for Humanity was there and other teams from elsewhere. I still have trouble thinking of us staying in a nice place compared to where we were working. Nothing fancy - no heat/air and there were bugs in the bathroom - but it was a mansion compared to the valley. More on that later.
Here is our room (taken that night) - see all the suitcases of medicine on our beds?
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| Amy, Lori and I all stayed in one room. Notice the mosquito netting above our beds. |
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| Our bathroom. I'll explain how the shower worked later. |
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| I took this picture the next morning. |
I don't think we did devotions that night. We were one pooped gang. We were encouraged to get to bed - we had to be ready to go at 8am to head into the valley.
