graduation

T-minus 3 days. Praise the Lord, I see a light at the end of the tunnel.

bear with me, as my computer is taking a sabbatical from life. Hopefully being here at LeTourneau will encourage it to revive itself. Until then, I might not be around too much... pole.

rude awakening

I like my snooze button. Anyone who has experienced me in the morning when I am required to awake at a predetermined time has witnessed my alarm going off a significant while before that time, me flailing to shut it off, and the alarm going off again. This phenomenon is often repeated up to three times each morning. Eventually I drag my lazy self out of bed, but am not usually fully conscious for about another half hour, only after an injection of coffee or some other source of caffeine.

I have discovered the last week of my life to closely parallel my morning habits. As you can mostly tell from previous blog entries, I was in Africa for almost 3 months. Maybe that time period represents a good night’s sleep. Maybe even a few pleasant dreams as I saw the way aviation works on the mission field; played with all sorts of fantastic animals; and relaxed at the beach. A few not so pleasant dreams as I trudged through the streets of Kibera; looked into the eyes of a child orphaned by aides; drove past camps of people displaced by the election violence last year. Before I knew it, my alarm started going off: I was getting on a plane to go home.

As is my habit, I flailed. I blindly sleepily reached for the button to turn off my alarm so I could return to the dream world. Of course, I am not getting any quality sleep at this point, I am just dozing back into the world I remember of Africa. I spent my first full day in the states alone, trying to adjust to being in America. Mostly I spent the day pining away after the people I left in Africa. But the reality is that I am done with that part of my life. Alan said it well: “Wherever you are, be all there.” I have to stop hitting the snooze button, I have to stop pretending I can go back.

Lucky for me, I haven’t ever needed a friend to come in with a bucket of cold water to wake me up. Unfortunately for this phase of life, I think I do. This morning I flew for the first time in 6 months. 6 months of not flying is a lot of time when you have only been flying for 3 years. I felt very overwhelmed, not knowing if I could really do it. After that, I went to visit professors under whom I am taking classes this semester. I have a ton of work I have to do to catch up. All the work and the flying hit me like a cold bucket of water in the early morning. Not a pleasant way to wake up, but I know its time to wake up and face the day.

I would love to go back to bed, to curl up and pretend I don’t have to do all of this. But let’s face it, my bed is kind of wet now. I can get up and face the responsibility, or I can curl up and ignore the fact that I am soaked. Either way, I can’t hit the snooze button. I can’t go back to Africa right now. I have to be in the present; I have to be here to finish what I started. It’s time to find some caffeine.

you gotta travel halfway around the world...

it took me three months of living in Nairobi to learn a few things...

1. I dont really like Dr. Pepper as much as I used to
2. American foods are incredibly over processed, gross, and FULLLLLLLLLL of things that are really bad for you.
3. Fruit and juice just isnt the same here. Fruit was picked before it got anywhere near ripe, and juice is glorified water.
4. I need to pay a lot more attention to what I spend money on.
5. I really need to work on my driving skills.
6. being in school is awful. I dont know how I sat through 4 years of classes.
7. I like getting up in the morning when I have somewhere to go, a schedule to keep.
8. Being an adult in the real world isn't going to be as bad as I thought. Sure beats homework...
9. As Amanda said, there are good people everywhere. But it does take time to get to know them.
10. I need to figure out who I am in order for people to get to know me.

There are many more that I will discover as I go along the next few weeks, but this is just a start.

I am back in the states, and severely jet lagged. I am going to try to take the next few days pretty easy, and take time to process everything. Just wanted to make sure everyone knows I am safe!

Goodnight!

only a few more days...

coast=awesome. I had a great time, it was so relaxing. Will write more later, but wanted to let everyone know I am still alive!! t-minus 4 days till my departure...

over and out

last week in the hangar and Kenyan infusion

This is my last week working in the hangar. Wow, my trip has gone so fast. I knew it would. But it is still hard to believe. On Monday, most of the staff found out that this is my last week. The chai schedule for Friday reads: kwaheri for Liz Vande Walle. (for those of you who don't know swahili, that means goodbye) Upon reading that, several of the Kenyans I work with in the hangar dedicated a song to me with a chorus that says something along the lines of "I wish there was some way I could convince you to stay another day."

Tuesday, Beth treated several of us to pizza inn. Tuesday is buy one get one free, and we went last week with Grace buying. I felt very honored to go with them, for pizza is not cheap for them. When Beth ordered pizzas, she got the biggest size possible. I have been sharing the calories of cinnamon rolls with them the past few weeks, so she wanted a little payback. As we were leaving, Linda, the other missionary, leaned over to me and said, "I hope you realize how loved you are." Its true. These people love me so much. I really don't deserve it.

Yesterday I got to go on a flight. Unfortunately the plane has the controls removed from the right side so I did not actually get to fly, but I still got off the ground. It was only a 45 minute flight, but it was an incredible breath of fresh air. I walked through the hangar right after chai with 4 bars on my shoulders, head held high. Several Kenyans saluted me, and others were just proud to call me captain. Again, I felt very loved by these people.

As much as they hate it, most of them have accepted the fact that I am leaving. But the only way they are ok with it is that they are convinced I am coming back. They tell me to come back as a pilot, which is my main plan! I dont want to be a mechanic the rest of my life... Even the missionaries are trying to figure out how long it will take me to come back. I am leaving it to the Lord's leading, but I get the feeling that it may be back here.

The hangar has been super busy this week. All three caravans were in, about 4 206s, the 210, and the DC-3 were down for maintenance. I would say they were all in the hangar, but they didn't all fit. The DC-3 takes half the hangar, and the caravans took most of the rest of the space. So I worked outside a bit this week, which was nice. Sunshine is always a little bit of a bonus.

on the non-work side of things...

Kate (roommate) and I have had an awesome week. On Saturday, we walked to Nakumatt, the Kenyan version of Walmart. After grocery shopping and picking out paint for the dining room, we hit up the mosaii market for some fun African stuff. Over the weekend we got the dining room and the living room painted, and it looks awesome. We have had a lot of fun cooking and enjoying our house this week. I am really going to miss her when I leave.

Ok, should PROBABLY go back to work now... A week and a half till I head home. I say goodbye to everyone at the hangar tomorrow, but I will say goodbye to the AIM AIR people next week on Thursday. Saturday through Wednesday I will be in Mombasa (read: beach!!!) Then Easter weekend, then back to the states. I can't believe its over already, but I am looking forward to coming back someday.