Appalachian Trail

So here I sit in the middle of Virginia with a bunch of SEC fans while Texas Tech is playing their first game and only one other person here cares. At least there's one other Red Raider here with me! But seriously, it's so lame not being around other TTU fans, especially when it's football season. At least we won against Texas State 50-10!

 Last Saturday we had a hurricane so this weekend Emily and I decided to make up for it and go to Shenandoah National Park. It's not too far away and this flat West Texas girl needs some hills in her life! The park entrance is only about an hour away from where we live, then we drove about an hour into the park to get to the Loft Mountain area.

We left late and aren't serious hikers (understatement!) so we did a moderate 3.2 mile hike that took us to a few trickles waterfalls.

The first half was great because it was all downhill! Coming back was a different story. But overall it was really fun and I'm so glad we went!

Hey Irene

So, Irene has been a total dud. I mean, I know I shouldn't say that because it would actually be terrible if things were really crazy in our part of Virginia. But still. If we're gonna have an earthquake AND a hurricane in the SAME WEEK, we may as well go all out. All we've gotten so far is rain for literally 12 hours straight, plus wind. The power has gone out about 6 times but we've got generators so NBD.

What does the Sub-Saharan Africa affinity group do when we are stuck inside all day? We make bread and beef jerky. Duh. Our affinity leaders are awesome and they are trying to teach us everyday practical things that we could possibly use on the field. We were supposed to incorporate some chicken killing/plucking today, but we have postponed that for another time without hurricanes.

Start out with some basic ingredients. As in, five ingredients plus stuff to mix it in.

Invite all your closest friends who are also experiencing a hurricane.

Next we moved on to meat drying. Get ready.

Lots of meat, lots of seasonings.

I've never been very enthusiastic about eating meat so most of this kind of grossed me out, but the whole process was just so ridiculous that I kind of enjoyed it. We used paper clips to hang meat strips on a hanger. This stuff has to dry for days, so I think some people have it hanging up on their shower curtain rod in their bathroom, or maybe over the dryer.

So, I probably wouldn't rank Hurricane Irene as one of the highlights of my weekend, but we still managed to have fun!

Running

One of the things that I really enjoy doing is working out. I'm not obsessed, but I do feel like exercise is a good stress reliever for me, plus I just feel better when I'm active. My access to the gym ended when I came to training, but there are plenty of things to do for exercise at FPO. I'm used to using cardio machines with TVs attached, and weight rooms with matts, free weights, and machines. Now it's a really new combination of Jillian Michaels workout DVDs (that girl is no joke!) and running.
A few times in my life I've been able to get over the 3-mile hump but it's been like 4 years since that happened. I've dabbled, but I think I get bored too easily. For whatever reason I actually really like running here. I've gone from flat/dry to hilly/humid, which would normally trap me indoors. I hate humidity. And that is not an understatement. Anyways, most of the girls in my house go running every night at 9pm. Our off day is Friday because who wants to spend Friday night running, and then usually everybody picks their other lazy day to not go, but overall everyone has been pretty committed. Running is more fun when there are 4 or 5 of you sweating to death instead of just you!
Tonight I'm back up to running 3 miles straight. Not super impressive, but more than I've done in a long time. I'm guessing I won't be doing a ton of running (for fun anyway) in South Sudan so I'm going to enjoy this while I can!

Earthquake!

So just when I was starting to think that FPO needed a little excitement...we had an earthquake! At 5.9 magnitude, apparently it's the biggest earthquake in these parts since 1897. We were sitting in our session right after lunch (which is really the worst time to have 200 people sit and listen to a speaker) and everything starts rumbling. At first I thought it was thunder, then I thought it was our contingency training starting early, then I realized that no we were not in a simulator and the floor shouldn't be moving. We all ran out the door, appropriately using the emergency exit doors, and stood outside waiting for everything to stop moving. It only lasted about 30 seconds but it was intense! Nobody was hurt and as far as I know there wasn't any damage to any buildings on our campus, and the internet/phone connections were only messed up for a few hours. There was a 4.2 magnitude aftershock about 7 hours later, but nothing happened, just a little freaky.

I know 5.9 isn't the biggest deal ever, but for a girl from Texas it's pretty exciting! Good to know that I don't have to be in South Sudan for the action to start!

Oh, and Hurricane Irene is headed our way. Bring it.

African Hospitality

Shot day number two is over. Whew. I've been around my share of hospitals and clinics but these immunization days are no joke. 3.5 hours, 195 people, and 566 vaccinations later...we are all one step closer to being invincible against yellow fever, typhoid, TB, and rabies!

Last night the Journeymen in our Sub-Saharan Africa affinity group went to our leaders' house for some authentic African bonding time. Shoes left at the door, wrap skirts and head wraps for the girls, and eating on the floor with no silverware make for a fun evening. It seems like every time I would tip my head back to eat the rice off my fingers my head wrap would fall off! I've been to West Africa five times so I was fairly familiar with the differences between American and African mealtimes, but I still had a new experience with the no silverware. The food was a very odd and very delicious mix of rice, beef, tomato sauce, mangoes, pineapple, bananas and peanuts. Never had beef with banana before, but it was good!

The whole head wrap, sitting on the floor thing was pretty entertaining. I feel like I have a lot to learn in the way of fabric tying so things stay where they're supposed to but give me time and I bet I'll get it totally right!

Coffee and dessert? Yes. Always.

Shot Day

Everyone at training (close to 200 of us) goes through three rounds of vaccinations before moving overseas. Today was the first of those three days and it was actually more enjoyable than I was thinking it would be. Misery really does love company...and fun Snoopy bandaids. Some only had to get one shot and one poor girl had to get six! I was right in the middle and am now well on my way to being invincible against rabies, polio and hepatitis A.

One of the things that our Sub-Saharan Africa group has to do while we are here is cook a meal from scratch. We made a feast last night! There are 32 adults in our group, plus 18 children...which equals a LOT of food. It's amazing what a potlock will bring out in a bunch of Baptist people. I love the family feel that our affinity has. As much as I hope to communicate with friends from home I know that there are some things that will happen on the field that only my affinity family will understand. I'm thankful for the wide variety of ages, experiences and personalities that make up our group and I am double thankful when there is a buffet of homemade food involved!

Is this real life?

Hopefully all of you got the "David goes to the dentist" reference from the title of the post. If not, YouTube it.

I'm currently in a "how to homeschool on the mission field" workshop. This is the LAST place I ever thought I'd be. Therefore, I'm trying to negate the fact that I'm here by blogging :)

This whole training thing was supposed to help me feel more prepared and if it's possible, I feel like I'm less prepared than when I got here! I should rephrase that. I'm just more aware of how much I don't know and how much I have left to learn. We've been going over doctrine, prayer, legal issues, anthropology, and currently...homeschooling. Some sessions are interesting, some are not, but it's encouraging to see how information is starting to come together and I'm catching a glimpse of the "big picture."

So I am horrible at crafts. I hate crafts. One time I tried to make an origami frog and ended up with a wad of green paper that went into the trash can. BUT I have taken up sewing! There are some very patient women who volunteer their time to teach us how to sew and quilt so I'm trying to broaden my creative horizons by doing something with my hands. Not only am I a missionary, but now I'm homeschooling and sewing? Uh oh..