Oh man. We've made it to Spain... and not short of stories.
Flight #1:
In between Nifer and I, sat a man from India; Shareeth*. He was a friendly man and we chatted about traveling, photography and work. This eventually led to what we do, and where we were headed for the conference. We asked him what he grew up believing, being from India. Since then, Shareeth has changed his belief to the concept of "picking-and-choosing"parts of religions to make his faith. Once we landed, we showed him a clip from the JESUS Film in his native language. He said he had seen it before! We gave him our business cards and information on how to download the app and films. Please pray for Shareeth that God would use our interaction to draw him into a relationship with God.
Flight #2:
Fairly uneventful. The 8 hours seemed like a blink of an eye compared to our 13.5 hour flight from Tokyo, which was miserable.
Flight #3:
After a 5 hour layover in Amsterdam, we flew the hour flight to Paris. I had my own row of seats to lay down. It was glorious. It was during this flight that I realized the only real meal I had eaten in the last 36 hours was some quesadillas we got in Atlanta. With all the timezone changes, my body wasn't sure if it was hungry, time for bed or preparing for another flight.
Flight #4:
We had to literally speed-walk/run through the huge Paris airport to get to our connecting flight, scheduled for 8:40 pm. I was anxious and so ready to be at the Spain MidYear after traveling (7 flights) since Thursday morning. I laid my head against the window and rested, anticipating taking off soon. Only we didn't. I awoke to an uproar in the back of the plane - all in Spanish and French. We had no idea what was going on FOR 2 HOURS. Eventually 13 men stormed off the plane and the intercom came on, first in Spanish, with responses of groans and frustration from Spanish passengers. Then it came on in hard-to-understand English... something about weapons illegally on the plane without proper paperwork. They continued again in French. The guy sitting next to me from Czech Republic translated the bits and pieces we'd both missed from the English version. Apparently, the paperwork had either not been properly filled out or miss placed by the airline, and the men's luggage had to be taken off the plane.
After about another hour, the airline changed their mind. The 13 men filed back on the plan and their luggage was put back on. Shaking of exhaustion, I was frustrated, hungry and not feeling well. I just wanted to be in a bed sleeping.
We landed in Malaga, Spain 3 hours late. Praise the Lord all of our luggage made it and we successfully found our arranged ride and made it the hour drive to the hotel. Reunited with our dear friend on STINT, Lauren Hays, with hugs and laughter of relief, we all eventually fell asleep by 3 am. Which felt like 9 am in Thailand, or ... 9 pm in Orlando.
TONIGHT at 6 pm - 7 pm (12pm-1pm EST) Jesus Film Media will have a information table at the "Resource Fair" for STINTers. Please pray we made some good connections with teams and people can think of ways to incorporate the JFM app in their ministry this next semester.
Sorry this blog was sorta long - hopefully entertaining and informative. More to come soon!
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| Ready to connect with the STINTers! |
In between Nifer and I, sat a man from India; Shareeth*. He was a friendly man and we chatted about traveling, photography and work. This eventually led to what we do, and where we were headed for the conference. We asked him what he grew up believing, being from India. Since then, Shareeth has changed his belief to the concept of "picking-and-choosing"parts of religions to make his faith. Once we landed, we showed him a clip from the JESUS Film in his native language. He said he had seen it before! We gave him our business cards and information on how to download the app and films. Please pray for Shareeth that God would use our interaction to draw him into a relationship with God.
Flight #2:
Fairly uneventful. The 8 hours seemed like a blink of an eye compared to our 13.5 hour flight from Tokyo, which was miserable.
Flight #3:
After a 5 hour layover in Amsterdam, we flew the hour flight to Paris. I had my own row of seats to lay down. It was glorious. It was during this flight that I realized the only real meal I had eaten in the last 36 hours was some quesadillas we got in Atlanta. With all the timezone changes, my body wasn't sure if it was hungry, time for bed or preparing for another flight.
Flight #4:
We had to literally speed-walk/run through the huge Paris airport to get to our connecting flight, scheduled for 8:40 pm. I was anxious and so ready to be at the Spain MidYear after traveling (7 flights) since Thursday morning. I laid my head against the window and rested, anticipating taking off soon. Only we didn't. I awoke to an uproar in the back of the plane - all in Spanish and French. We had no idea what was going on FOR 2 HOURS. Eventually 13 men stormed off the plane and the intercom came on, first in Spanish, with responses of groans and frustration from Spanish passengers. Then it came on in hard-to-understand English... something about weapons illegally on the plane without proper paperwork. They continued again in French. The guy sitting next to me from Czech Republic translated the bits and pieces we'd both missed from the English version. Apparently, the paperwork had either not been properly filled out or miss placed by the airline, and the men's luggage had to be taken off the plane.
After about another hour, the airline changed their mind. The 13 men filed back on the plan and their luggage was put back on. Shaking of exhaustion, I was frustrated, hungry and not feeling well. I just wanted to be in a bed sleeping.
We landed in Malaga, Spain 3 hours late. Praise the Lord all of our luggage made it and we successfully found our arranged ride and made it the hour drive to the hotel. Reunited with our dear friend on STINT, Lauren Hays, with hugs and laughter of relief, we all eventually fell asleep by 3 am. Which felt like 9 am in Thailand, or ... 9 pm in Orlando.
TONIGHT at 6 pm - 7 pm (12pm-1pm EST) Jesus Film Media will have a information table at the "Resource Fair" for STINTers. Please pray we made some good connections with teams and people can think of ways to incorporate the JFM app in their ministry this next semester.
Sorry this blog was sorta long - hopefully entertaining and informative. More to come soon!
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