Arrival - June 2nd,
Saturday, 2012
Well we had a week of training
beforehand and it was the last day. The guys slept in the freedom barn at Team
Expansion headquarters. We started the day early while some had already left:
Andrew left at 3 a.m. and had a flight at about 5 a.m., while Rick and Rebecca
left at 5:30 a.m. The rest of us woke up between 6 and 7 and packed up, weighed
our suitcases and cleaned up where we had been staying and the downstairs room
at Emerald Hills where we had been trained all week from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m.,
Saturday to Friday. Long Days.
We said farewell to everyone and
headed to the airport. It was weird saying goodbye to people that you see for
about 14 hours a day every day for just a week. A lot can happen in a week.
Well we were well on our way and it had just hit me and a I got some weird
feeling In my stomach that I wasn’t going to see any of my friends or family
for two months, I was fine with that
before, didn’t even have a second thought really, and because of this I was
surprised that I could have any feelings at all about it.
Well we got through the airport
and I was trying to get through, there was a bit of anxiety getting through the
security, I just didn’t want to create a hassle. Well I didn’t hear the part
about laptops not being in a suitcase, so they took it out and checked it, and
made me repack everything in that suitcase, I understand, they’re just doing
their job.
So we had about an hour wait and I
was people watching, learned a lot about people like that. We boarded the
plane. I haven’t rode a plane in a long time and it wasn’t a long trip. This
plane was tiny, three seats, two on one side, and one on the other. You could
feel everything, makes for a very shaky and bumpy plane. Turbulence is no fun
in something that size. So our plane took us from Louisville to D.C. airport.
We were stuck in the D.C. airport for about four hours, two hours longer that
we had to because of lightning storms. So we finally boarded and headed
overseas. It was a very long and uncomfortable flight. No leg room, which was
rough for being tall. They served us food, which was surprisingly decent
portions, but it made me feel lazy, after a week of not being able to go for a
run, not play ultimate Frisbee or anything else active, sitting on a plane
being served food for 9 hours with a small television screen really got under
my skin. Well I didn’t get any sleep, I think I passed out for small 5 to 10
minute increments about 2 or 3 times. Insufficient sleep basically. Well we
finally arrived and I was just happy to use my legs again. Because of our first
delay, our second plane left about 10 minutes before we had arrived. So we had
to reschedule with Lufthansa, which is apparently one of the best airlines in
the world, related to service anyways. So we tacked on an extra 6 hours to our
trip, all to be spent in the airport. We were now in Munich and I wanted to
take the time to learn some German and experience a little bit of that. Restaurants
were set up so differently, they were hard to navigate, I ended up getting a
small whole chicken and some fries, a muffin, and a German cola drink called
“Mezzo”. It tasted like Coke or Dr. Pepper with some orange squeezed in it. It
was much better than American soda because the carbonation content was down and
it wasn’t near as acidic. Also did I mention that the Airport in Munich is
massive? It had like a hundred gates. And the run way spanned like a four to
five mile area, so they have plenty of space for the airplanes to land. So I
people watched some more, read a newspaper and eavesdropped, all to try and
learn some more German. We finally boarded, headed over, quick flight, flew
over the alps, amazing. Then we came over the Adriatic and circled near Ancona,
and went in for a landing. The guy was coming in too hot to the strip, but he
still made it, after bumping off of the ground a few times. Scared me with all
the tipping and bumping. We landed, got our luggage after about thirty minutes,
talked with an Italian man, and met Francesa and Luca as well as Heidi’s
husband Brian. We got in the cars and started the journey to the church, where
we saw one of the best views of the city. We arrived at the church and met
several Italian families, friends of the missionaries.
The missionaries are the Roterts:
Hedi and Brian and their four children Lance, Cloe, Trey, Francesca (Oldest to
youngest) , Marcus Van Dorn and Kyle Koval.
We met Francesca who will be our
language teacher, Massimo and his wife, and Andrea and his wife and daughter.
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