OK I'm next on the assigned list to Blog so officially I shouldn't be doing this until tomorrow, but ever keen and enthusiastic and extremely short of time tomorrow here I go.
I am now officially on countdown to Thailand last night I did my second triathlon and somehow in my head that was always the watershed point between just getting stuff sorted out and the trip proper. I did fine thanks for asking, and felt it went much better than the last one. I guess there is something in doing something for the first time which is always uneasy, the second time I think you feel more confident in what you'll encounter. That was certainly the case for me yesterday and I think that is perhaps something we should all remember on our trip to Thailand. I have never been there before as most of us haven't so we should all remember that an uneasy feelings therefore is really normal. In that way we are all lucky to have Jill and Simon and a number of others who have had the experience of Thailand in particular or trip travel in general to help us along the way.
I have a question. Is intending to pack packing or not? We have our cases out at home and my floor is filled with a stuff that I pulled out from my wardrobe on Friday night last week. But that is as far as I've got. That must count for something eh! I think the emotional energy that goes with having those sorts of things hanging around should definitely be credited as packing!
I met with my boss from work today, he has just come back from 3 weeks helping Wateraid in Bangladesh and really enjoyed the experience. I met with him specifically to get his perspective on what he saw out there and him being also a person of generous years I wanted to get some advice on how he approached it. I was really glad I did and as he spoke it was amazing how the things he said resonated so much with the stuff Alice and Rosie talked about when they returned 3 years ago. He described a shock at the state of living and yet a recognition that despite the circumstance some of the joy and happiness he observed far exceeded that that he had generally seem amongst people young and old in the west. It made me reflect that despite all our comforts do we sometimes miss the human contact and interaction with one another for which God designed us. Something of what I had hoped to get from this trip was a resetting of my priorities / perspectives.
The final bit of advice he gave I also thought was worth passing along. He said so into it with a truly open mind, don't go there trying to save the world and don't carry too much guilt about circumstance. He said that he had come back with great feelings of waste and disillusionment with how we lived, but having had time to reflect that too much of that would prevent you encountering the true experience of the trip. Anyway I found those to be good pieces of advice so I thought I'd pass them along.
Examinees, good luck, soon be over now. Finishees well done, best feeling in the world. Life changees I pray for you every day, I'm sure you'll both do great. So 8 days!! Exciting huh!
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