Ninja vs Penguin

Penguin August 3rd, 2008

Half the trip is over. This is if you don’t count our 2 days worth of vacation at the end.

Woke up this morning a little after 7. I wanted to take a shower, but my clothes weren’t back from being washed yet. So I’ll wait and see if I’ll get them later. I’ve been sweating, but it’s mainly been around my neck, which I’ve been washing. A lot.

For breakfast, I had oatmeal porridge with a bit of yogurt. It was a nice light meal. The oatmeal came in a bath of milk, which I thought would be a little hard on the stomach, so I didn’t drink too much of it.

I did my devos as I waited for Marcia. When she came, she looked a little out of it. She said that she wasn’t feeling well from last night. I gave her her book back and asked her what it meant to be a Christian. We talked about it for a little bit and it was a nice conversation.

Afterwards, Elena came over and asked us what our plans would be for the rest of the week. I really wanted to meet with Larisa and told her that were trying to contact her. Then Kostya came over and asked the same thing.

I understand that they only have so much transportation and they have to plan and organize it all, but I felt really strongly that this was something that needed to be recorded. We needed to at least try to.

So, I prayed a lot. And then prayed some more.

While we waited for Larisa to return our calls, Marcia and I started doing some translation. It was hard for her, because she had a headache. But we pushed through it.

Around 10, we were supposed to let Elena know our plans. Larisa still hadn’t called us back yet, so Marcia tried calling her and got through. She was in Tokmok and would stop by in half an hour. Elated, we went back to translating.

Larisa arrived, and I talked to her a little bit. I shared with her what I wanted to do and she seemed on board. The village she had talked about was supposed to get water in the next few days. They had the pump installed, but were having some problems with it. This was a great opportunity so I suggested we do some shooting on Friday. She said that this would be fine so we went down to talk to Elena.

Elena said that Friday might be a little hard because the rest of the team was going to Kara-balta. It would be hard for me to find transportation. I suggested maybe we do the shoot on Saturday, and Larisa said that that was fine. And since there wasn’t much stuff going on on Saturday anyway, it wouldn’t be a big deal.

Amazing how everything just sort of worked out.

Marcia and I went back to translating and almost finished, but Marcia was feeling really sick. We stopped for lunch and I told her to drink plenty of water and get some rest. She went home and I sat and talked to Pastor David’s wife for a little bit.

For lunch, we had this beef tomato American dumpling soup. It was kind of salty and oily, but it was good otherwise.

After lunch, I had some time to kill, so I went to my room to rest. As much as I tried to sleep, it was too hot and loud. I got up around 1:30, rinsed off real quick and played NDS while I waited for Tanya.

We went to the orphanage to do some interviews. We were lucky to get two of the parents. Then we talked to their kids and spent a lot of time talking to the principal. We got lucky and she was also a “victim” of bride-kidnapping. She went into pretty detailed explanation of the whole process and experience.

On the way back from the orphanage, Tanya and I talked a bit about the project and how long it would take to put together. Even though I have the translation and some timecodes, it’s still going to be really hard to edit everything. First, my handwriting is pretty poor, so I’ll probably have to type it all up first. Secondly, I don’t know how accurate the timecodes are. In either case, I’m still going to have to find someone who speaks Russian and has the time available to work on the project. Hopefully, I’ll be able to find someone in the area that’s free.

We got back to the office and I rinsed off again. I still didn’t have my clothes, but I think I’m going to shower anyway. There’s like invisible mosquitos or something. I don’t feel the bite or hear them buzzing around. I just feel myself getting itchy all over the place. I probably have a good 20 bites already. I imagine I get a lot of them at night.

For dinner, I had a cabbage with green and red pepper salad and a beef with something kind of like American dumpling soup.

After dinner, James came and chilled with me. We talked a bit about Android and other wireless stuff. Then I asked him about his background. It was really interesting.

After graduating, he started at Seagate. Then shortly after, he went to what would become Verizon Wireless. He served in church and eventually went to Fuller. Afterwards, he joined an entreprenual missions organization.

I went upstairs and I realized that there was no one else was in the building. I put on my iPod and rocked out and then spent some time worshipping. It was really nice to have the wind blowing through the window across my body. It was like the kiss of God. As the night progressed, I moved from joy and excitement to something else. I was struck by the price that Jesus paid and how special this one person was. It’s been some time since I’ve been moved to the point of tears and weeping just through music. It was definitely a blessing.

Tomorrow, I go to the mountain camp and relax a little bit. I’ll try to finish up some translation from these last few days, but we’ll see what happens. In either case, it’ll be a nice change of scenary.

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Tags: Documentaries, Kyrgyzstan, Larisa, Missions, Trips

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