Mission Trip

My Mother followed and supported home and foreign missions. We had missionaries staying at our home to speak to local churches in Eastern Kentucky. I met people who lived all over the world. I wrote to many of them for years. I wanted to be a missionary when I grew up. As I grew older and started taking flying lessons from my Father. My focus changed from mission work to flying for a living. The mission thing has always been there in the back of my brain. Every time I heard about a mission trip I wanted to attend but I couldn't commit for some reason. Finally, I decided to find a way to make it work to go with my church on a trip to Puerto Rico. I used to fly to San Juan in 2001 and stay in a fancy Hotel. But I didn't know anything about the camp on the other side of the Island. Campamento del caribe is a camp where Christians from all denominations get together and celebrate God's love and the beauty of the ocean he created. They bring people in who build churches, houses and volunteer at the camp. It took some major work to get to go because it was spring break. AA had just announced 179 furloughs the month before. I had the weekends off but I had this Mon-Wed trip that I could not drop. I called the flight office and told them why I needed off and they allowed me to drop the trip. Next, I had to get there on American Airlines flights that were oversold. I was able to get the jumpseat on the 757 both ways. San Juan is an American Eagle base and I just knew that some Eagle pilot would get bumped and I would feel terrible that they didn't get to work. Fortunately, that didn't happen. The direct flights took me there a day early to catch up with my Church group. So I left on Saturday and I planned to get a Hotel room when I got there. By the time I got on the plane and called to get a reservation there were no rooms left in SJU. Out in the terminal a guy came to introduce himself to me as one of my friends husband. He was a Eagle pilot and so is my friend Paula. They lived in SJU for another few weeks (until April 1st). Turns out I stayed with them overnight and had breakfast with them. It is amazing how in my life the Lord has always provided me with everything I need. And I did need a place to stay. While waiting for the Delta flight to arrive I watched the UK vs Miss St. game and UK won the SEC tournament. After the game I met up with 18 of my new friends in baggage claim. Some of them I knew fairly well, but I didn't even know everyone's name. We drove across the Island to Juanna Diaz and ate at the local KFC (that was rocking) before entering the camp. The camp wasn't anything special as far as accommodations but it was located beside the ocean. You could hear the waves crashing from our dorm. There were cots and showers with a roof. No air conditioning or luxury's to be found. Monday morning we had a good look at the camp. I would say it reminded me of the Darma village on Lost if you watch that show. Kind of Dated (70's ) and interesting looking. The ocean was beautiful but the beach was made of rocks instead of sand. The food was not the best and I looked forward to losing some weight. We had pork, hamburgers, spaghetti, pizza pockets, and many different versions of rice and bean dishes. Our main job was to lay tiles in the dining hall. We ended up doing lots of other jobs such as cutting down trees, bushes, clearing some land, doing dishes, cleaning dorms, windows, bathrooms, painting, and building concrete forms for a seating area close to the ocean. The work was hard and continuous but we did stop for devotions in the morning and evening. We also had Frappes (fruit smoothies), ice cream and one nice meal out in the town of Adjuntas. We spent a half day in the rain forest jumping off of a cliff into some cold and deep water. The cliffs were about 20 to 30 feet off of the water and the scramble up to the cliff was probably more dangerous than the jump itself. It was a blast except for the smacking of the skin at the speeds we were traveling. That part of the trip really was beautiful and is the kind of thing that brings me close to God. When I see something so beautiful, I know that it was God not some random event that created it. The bamboo was as big around as a normal tree in Texas. The waterfalls were as beautiful as the ones you see in Maui. The rock was especially exciting to me because of our rock climbing background. Mike would have loved to spend a few days climbing in that place. We had one night of music with a local church member playing guitar. We went to visit the church that our group worked on a year and a half ago. It was beautiful and the people who run the church were such wonderful people. I hope to do another mission trip in the future. I worked hard and I am still tired from lack of sleep. I am not sure that I did anything life changing for anyone in particular. I went there to serve the Lord. I enjoyed meeting the groups from other states. Especially, the friendships and bonding with my group of 18 people. The most inspiring thing about the trip was watching our young people serve the Lord. They didn't complain while they were working so hard. They made me realize that I need to have more fun serving the Lord, everyday.