Look out world.... Here I come

Well it's official. I am a real-live-honest-to-goodness-adult. I started working full-time, got a new desk, ordered business cards and had the "now-that-you-are-working-full-time" talk with my boss. (Which by the way went really well. I'll be focusing on program management, product development and business development. Doesn't that sound so important? I wish I knew what I was doing!)

Tonight, as the cherry to top it all off, I bought a PDA. And we all know that aside from nerdy business majors who think that their papers are so pressing they have to have a PDA to organize them all, that adults own PDAs. So by virtue of my PDA ownership, I am an adult. Nevermind that the service I got at Circuit City and Best Buy proved that I still look 15. Really, who's going to buy a PDA that the sales person can't turn on? No, just explaining what it does is not enough. Hurray for the folks at Franklin Covey who will help you once you ask and look completely confused and lost.

So now with a college degree and a PDA I am poised to TAKE OVER THE WORLD!

Can I retire now? These 40 hours a week are really cutting into my life.

Stand Today.

At a meeting at work today our accountant came in from his smoke break smelling very much like a cigarette. The ironic thing was that he was wearing a t-shirt that read, "Stand Today. Join the fight against tobacco."

It made me laugh.

Indus River, Plastic Explosives and a Pastor

The village in India that my team worked in was on the Indus River. The Indus River is owned by Pakistan as India and Pakistan set up this agreement that Pakistan would own all the water rights to the Indus River. Which means that India can't do anything with the river without first asking permission from Pakistan. Mexico totally should have done that with the Rio Grande. Anyway, here's a picture of from when we went rafting down the Indus.

So I'm sure you have all heard about the tensions between India and Pakistan. There have been some agreements made between the two countries, but they all may come undone by a local pastor who fishes in the Indus River with plastic explosives.

Yep. He fishes in the protected river with plastic explosives. One of the workers in Ladakh went fishing with him once and the instructions he got were, "After I light this we have to run and duck behind a rock and cover our heads just in case."

The pastor still mocks them for being afraid. I would be afraid too if my pastor was lighting a homemade bomb and throwing it in a river; a river protected by a country who's army is on the border not too far from my house.

But I still think it's great and wished I could have gone fishing with him.

TP

A house I pass on the way to work got TPed last night (rolled for some of you). That house used to get TPed all the time. Their kids were on the swim team and every night before a swim meet all the team member's houses would get TPed. It turns out that their mom was one of the people TPing the houses. She didn't want her kids to feel left out so she would TP her own house.

That's right. Once a month she would cover her trees with toilet paper and then clean it up the next morning after her kids saw it. Eventually she had to stop because some parents were getting upset that they constantly had TP in their trees. Understandable. Especially since their 10 year old kid on the swim team didn't own the house.

So today as I drove past the TP house, I had to wonder if they TPed it themselves. And if they did was it just for old time's sake or were they celebrating something?

People are interesting.

Post India

I learned in India that a lot of things are relative. Like the definition of dirty. I showered 6 times while I was in India; three of those times being in the last 4 days we were there. Yet I wouldn't have considered myself to be extremely dirty because everyone else bathed that often. Something about being in a desert and how getting water to bathe with was a lot of work. My definition of looking nice changed too. Everyone on my team looked nice in spite of the 5-day-old clothes they wore and the lack of bathing.

My adjustment to the living conditions in India didn't surprise me. It was pretty much like camping. However, the ease that I returned to a "normal" American life has surprised me. I am still concerned with how I look, what I wear and in general comfort. I had expected to be "cured" of these preoccupations. I know there are so many better things to think about. I had hoped that I would stop thinking like this after I got back from India. Apparently mission trips don't solve everything. And I didn't come back married. What a failure of a trip.

I was showing my 5 year old cousin, Evan, some of my pictures. We got to this one:


And Evan asked what those things were. I explained that the people there didn't believe in Jesus and they worshipped a false god and they built those things for their god. He paused and asked, "Well, what does their god do for them?"

I just looked at him and said, "Absolutely nothing. They have to do a lot of things for him, but he doesn't do anything for them."

Evan looked at the picture again and said, "Well that's just silly." and walked away. I agree with Evan which is why Ladakh needs Jesus.

Trip Pictures

If you want to see pictures from the India trip, you can check out our team's on-line photo album. As of right now only some of my pictures are posted but the whole team is supposed to be uploading their pictures too.

Long Time

So after weeks of no posting I should post a really good story or something. But I'm not going to. India was great, but this whole jet lag thing is killing me. I would be in bed right now, except I am on hold with Delta to see if they found my luggage or not.

So the trip to India was good. I saw God do a lot of really cool things. After moving through culture shock, I really began to enjoy learning a new culture. Some of the things we did were:

• Teach in village schools
• Hike through the Himalayas to a remote village
• Prayer walk
• Visit with families and learn more about them
• Go white water rafting through the Himalayas
• Learn a lot about Buddhism
• Prayer walk some more
• Bring in the Sabbath with some Jews
  

And sooooo much more. I'll write more when I am more awake.