Over the past 4 days our team has been getting to know each other. And while I’ve made many wonderful discoveries about my 7 teammates, I’ve noticed that we all feel pretty passionate about food. Here at training camp our meals have been a little different than what we’re used to. The portions have been a bit smaller than our American size portions. We’ve had to share. We’ve been eating dishes that are served in all the different countries that teams are traveling to. (There are 5 teams leaving tomorrow to go to the nations of Kenya, Swaziland, Brazil, India, and Thailand.) I believe a few of us have been on the verge of hungry for the better part of 4 days. Most of us didn’t bring food with us and there has been no snacking between meals. So it’s different.
We have spent time talking about every type of dessert, all our favorite restaurants, and foods. We have been counting down the hours til we arrive at the airport and can eat all we want at Wendy’s or wherever along with a large Dr. Pepper (for myself, at least). Well yesterday Jesse told us him and Amanda, our leaders, had a surprise for us that night. We later found out that upon hearing about the surprise every one of us immediately thought some type of dessert, or chocolate. We were up late and kinda forgot about it so we didn’t get it until tonight. Jesse reminded us and went to retrieve our surprise and we started chattering about our hopes for the surprise…despite the conversations we’ve had about expectations this week. At least we were all on the same page. All together we were thinking “please be food.” Jesse returns and dropped a plastic bag in front of our circle. I think Kristina and Missy were the quickest to get to it, and ripped the bag open to find a bag of MINI CANDY BARS. We absolutely erupted with screams of gratitude and “OH MY GOSH!!!” and “THIS IS THE BEST THING EVER!” and “THANK YOU SO MUCH!” and “EVERYBODY COME GET SOME CANDY!” The 3 lb bag of chocolate was ripped and destroyed in about 3 minutes. Haha, who knew 4 days ago that those mini candy bars would bring us all such joy. Really. We were so excited. Looking back it was a little pitiful…I wonder what kind of candy they have in Thailand…
Anyway, training camp has been very cool. But we are all so excited to be leaving tomorrow. The Lord has been moving like crazy just in our short time together and I am very excited to see what all He has in store for our team, and the people of Thailand.
