Thursday, Friday, and Other Ramblings

Ashford to Gatwick
Whew, I'm just about caught up! Now that it's Friday, we'll get you caught up on Thursday...

Thursday, yesterday, we decided to relocate to the London area near Gatwick Airport from which we'll depart for home tomorrow morning. The thought of my having to lead us on a ninety minute, mission critical train ride way early Saturday morning with bags and baggage from Ashford to Gatwick with one to two train changes (and no room for missed trains or else there's a missed plane) was more than I could handle. Instead, we checked out of our B&B two days early and made a leisurely day of our travel enjoying the continued process of learning how to get around in another country inside another culture. Thank you MAF, Facts N' Friction, and Pre-Field Orientation!

Cultural Considerations & Appreciation
Karen and I are constantly amazed at how different the British and American culture and languages are. It seems, at times, that everything is different to what we're accustomed: driving and walking on the left side, exit doors opening inward instead of out, traffic lights going from red to yellow to green instead of green to yellow to red, eating left handed with an inverted fork using the knife in our right hand to direct food under/on the fork, often finding the hot water handle on the right instead of the left, having to learn to turn each wall socket on for individual use, needing transformers/converters for some electrical things but not others, all leading to increased tension and stress. And coming from Coshocton, Ohio...England is such an internationally integrated country. It seems like we are surrounded by nearly every language on the planet. Sometimes it's hard to remember we're in England.

And just when we start to get the hang of hearing and understanding the "English" being spoken around us, we come across someone with a new accent, or we go to a different town, city, restaurant, shop, or store and instantly we're back at square zero feeling lost and confused and unable to communicate effectively. It's so challenging to speak the "same" language and yet have no idea what either of you is saying.

To all of our missionary friends out there in cross-cultural ministry...we now have a much better understanding (even if in such a small way) of what it's like to hear every language but your own and to be "hungry" to hear someone say anything in your heart language.

All in all, yesterday's trip from Ashford to Gatwick was uneventful, though we did get on the "wrong" right train at Tonbridge Station and had to rapidly disembark with all our gear even faster than we'd just gotten on, and we became totally disoriented inside the South Terminal of the airport trying to find our way out to the coaches...no worries.

In Summary
To sum it all up we've had a restful night and think we might head into central London in a little while to see what we can see before heading home in the morning. We've had a great trip, Karen's over her migraine (which hit on Wednesday) and the Lord has kept me vertigo free.

I can guarantee I'll be out of connectivity as of 5 PM this evening (that's when my purchased 24 hour on-line time "voucher" runs out) so this may be our last post before we (Lord willing) arrive back in Coshocton sometime tomorrow evening.

Thanks for all your prayers, thanks for going on this little trip with us, and again thanks to all the MAF personnel who have left such an impression on our lives and our ministry!

Tally-Ho! and Ta-Ta!