I feel like I am in a time-worp. It is currently 3:00 am Thursday in Thailand, and we on a charter bus to Pauw, which will be a our new home for six of us for the next two months. We have been traveling since last Saturday with speratic rest spread through out. 

            Two Tuesdays ago we left Nueva Vida in Jinotepe after 3 days of tearful goodbyes. It was weird to say goodbye, and I am awful at goodbyes. I have had so many different seasons in my life that I have become numb to goodbyes. When I want tears, they don’t come till hours or days later when it all just cracks. I never know the words to say – to tell people how much I learned from them, how much they mean to me, how much I love them. So my natural reaction is a long hug, besos on the cheek, and saying “te quiero much.” Maybe this will be something Jesus helps me get better at.

            We spent our last 4 days in Nicaragua in San Juan del Sur for debrief. It started out time of transition from Nica to Thailand. I was enable to enjoy a day of surfing, time at the pool, reading in a hammock, a run all by myself (which has not happened in months), yogurt and granola, skype dates, and announcing our new teams and ministry in Thailand. On Saturday morning at 8 am, we all 21 of us with all our lugged rolled out in a crammed short yellow school bus.

Our travel journeys began there as we made our way to the Managua airport. A popped tire briefly interrupted our travels, and our flight to Miami followed shortly thereafter. From Miami we went to LA for about a 12 hour lay over. While we were there, we were blessed with two things – a hotel and packages. It was like Christmas. One of our squad mates’ friends arranged to bring us packages from family and friends. It was wonderful. I know have a few more things of home to bring comfort. While staying the night in LA, I thought I wisely chose my roommates as I thought they would be the girls to sleep. Oh, how I was mistaken. I did not on moment of shuteye. But I guess that is what all the flights are for. We began our journey again at 7:30 am to catch our 14 hour flight to Beijing. So I can now say that I have been to China…well all of the one hour that we were there. Our last flight brought us to Bangkok some time around midnight on Monday night.

For the past two days, we have been “resting” at the YWAM headquarters in Bangkok. I use the term resting loosely as most of us are suffering from major jetlag. For me personally, this is the worst jetlag I have ever experienced due to the accumulation of multiple days of travel and trying to sleep sitting up. When I have not been trying to attempt to recover from jetlag, I have explored the streets around the hostel when we have not been in orientation or meetings. I must say…I already love it here. It reminds me so much of India. India is the only other place I have been in Asia so that makes sense, but it makes me really excited to be able to live here for three months!

I have lost count of the number of times I have already spoken Spanish here. I completely tired to order a drink in Spanish. Let me just say that didn’t go so well. Now I am getting to experience what a lot of my teammates felt like in Nicaragua. This helps me realize even more how extremely blessed we are to have a translator. The translator that will be with our team for the next 2 months is Oy, and I can’t wait to get to know her.

Like I said earlier our new home is in Pauw as our ministry will be House of Grace. It is a YWAM base that focuses on sex trafficking prevention. This is my understanding of our ministry so far but I guess I will find out more soon as we will arrive there within a few hours. As our squad transitions to Thailand, we are not only transitioning to a new country and ministries but new teams as well. I am going to continue to be a team leader but the team I am leading is different than in Nicaragua. My new team includes Kyle, Ryan, Brittany, Hannah, and Roni. These team transitions have been something we have all had to walk through, but it definitely all hit us about 10 hours ago. Our team, which we named The Current, hopped on a separate bus than the two other teams. We will be about a 9-hour bus ride way from the two other teams who will be in Chiang Mia at two separate ministries.

The feeling I had as the six of us and Oy said bye to the rest of our teammates and Squad leaders is like we are little birds being pushed out a nest. It is time for us to learn how to fly. I have no clue what that looks like; I would like to say that I do so I could comfort my team in that. But I don’t. All I know is that the name for our team, The Current, is quite ironic. Our Father has a current that is strong and mighty that He yearns for us to jump into, and the six of us like to know about the depth, temperature, and swiftness of the water before we jump. But God doesn’t want us to know these things. So my prayer is that we are continued to be pushed out of the nest. 

[Written on the bus ride to Pauw]