I love the Swedish Chef. He's great. He doesn't speak Swedish. He doesn't cook. But he's a Muppet, and he's funny.
That has nothing to do with this blog entry. I just thought I'd add it in there.
Last time I wrote, I was excited about leaving the country again. It was the beginning of summer, and I was praising God every time I remembered that I would not have to re-take Foundations of Nursing Practice. Come to think of it, I still thank Him every time I think about that class. It was horribly difficult for me, but the Lord brought me through it, and even managed to teach me some valuable lessons about trust along the way.
I survived the semester and joyfully packed my suitcase and proceeded to flee the country. "Let us flee, said the fly." So I flew. There was some slight confusion about my flight, but everything got straightened out and I arrived in the sunny Caribbean. I had to wait a while at the airport, but I enjoyed writing in my journal.
It has been too long now for me to write in too much detail, but I can say it was a wonderful blessing for me to be able to spend time on the ship this summer. The Logos II was run by a skeleton crew. It was scary when I first got there, but you get used to fleshless sailors after a while. Ha ha, I know you're laughing. Or at least smiling. Hopefully you understood it was an attempt, however flat, at humor. To get back to the subject, the Logos II usually has about 200 crewmembers from 50 countries. This time, we were down to 100 (and towards the end the numbers ebbed towards 60) from 25 different countries. There weren't as many people to make messes, but there weren't as many to help clean up, so everyone had to pitch in and help in other departments at times. It was great.
I made many friends, many of whom I probably will not see again, except on Facebook. It was wonderful to come together with so many people from different backgrounds and experiences and see how we could work together. There were disagreements, of course. A ship can't always have smooth sailing. But on the whole, we tried to make allowances for each others' faults and help each other through the tough days. And many days were tough. I worked in the Book Hold. The Hold team restocks the ship's book shop at the end of the day (and beginning of the next one). When the bookshop has 5,600 visitors in one day, there is an overwhelming amount of restocking to do. We would take the books from the Hold, pack them into plastic tubs, then load them into the freight elevator to go up to the deck. Those things were heavy! I got a good workout loading and/or unloading the books.
In addition to restocking, the Hold team receives and processes all the books that we get sent to us. The books are sent in 40 foot shipping containers packed FULL. These have to be unloaded by hand and sent into the Hold via a roller conveyer belt thing. Some books went straight to the deck, and those had to be handed from person to person in a chain that stretched fromt the container to the deck. When not lifting plastic tubs or unloading boxes, we were lifting boxes and piles of books as we sorted them and entered them into our inventory.
It was very physical work; my ring grew too loose for my ring finger and had to move to my middle finger. My shorts got a little looser as I sweated in the Caribbean heat. And it was hot. Hot. The Book Hold did not have air conditioning, and most of the time we couldn't use the fans because they were too noisy. I spent most of the summer with sweat dripping off my nose and chin. Though I hate hot weather, I was there working and LOVING IT!
Added to all this nice work, I tried to go jogging at least two or three times a week (more often in the beginning, but for the last month I was jogging with other people so we didn't go as often). So I crammed a year's worth of exercise into eight short weeks.
We had worship services, youth conferences, kids programs, and prision ministry teams. I was privileged to get to help lead worship a couple of times. I was MC for a couple of youth conferences, and I enjoyed it immensely. Prison ministry was scary at first, but by the time I left I was surprised to find myself enjoying it. I was involved with the Logos II sports ministry, which meant I got to play soccer quite a bit. (I miss playing soccer!!!)
If you've never been to one of the Operation Mobilization ships, there's no way to explain it in one sitting. It is thrilling. There are new places and people and experiences every couple of weeks; there is always something new to discover and explore, whether it's a port city, a ministry, or a personal friendship with someone from another country. It is also draining. The work is hard, the hours are long, and the work never seems to get quite finished. But in it all there is a satisfaction that the work means something; the books that are getting loaded into the elevator could change someone's life tomorrow. Knowing that God will not let His word return void is encouraging, even in the hard days.
Everything seems faster than normal on board, though the ship's top speed is less than 20 miles an hour. The pace of life is faster. Deep friendships form faster. And yes, I dare say it, love blooms faster (though this one doesn't apply to me, I've seen it happen!). People mature faster.
I could go on and on. But it's time for bed already, since I have clincal courses tomorrow.
More to follow....
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