The end of the year is always a good time to "count" your blessings, and as I started contemplating this concept, I decided to come up with some numbers for 2009.
To begin, one of my biggest "numbers" is nine. Including America (which would be Texas, California, Hawaii and Alaska) this year I went to a total of nine countries. America, Thailand, New Zealand, Japan, England, Italy, Tunisia, Malta and Greece. I still can't quite believe it. Plus Samoa and Guam, which aren't countries or states.
Amid those nine countries, I also slept in a total of 30 different beds! I think that may be a record for me, considering my family doesn't allow sleepovers. And those 30 different wonderful places and homes I was able to visit were all an incredible blessing, each in their own way.
Even more of a blessing than the countries I have been able to visit, have been the friends I have made. And for me, when it comes to friendship, I like the real thing. A shallow aquaintence based on the amount of fun people have with each other doesn't cut it. If I had to pick my top five I have made this year, it would be my sister, Ashlee, Rachael, Rosie and Hannah. :)
More this year than ever before I've been able to become friends with my sister, not just sisters who have to love each other no matter what. My prayer is that this upcoming year will really help solidify the relationship that we are building day by day.
Ashlee... You were an answer to prayer. It's that simple. I have learned so much from watching you, and have been so spiritually encouraged spending time with you. We didn't get to spend near as much time together as we would have wished, BUT, the sweet times we did have will forever be imprinted in my memory. :)
Rachael--I LOVE YOU! Though we've known each other before, living life with you in Hawaii was so amazing. I miss you so much, and look forward to spending time with you again, whenever God may grant me that much wanted wish. Thank you so much for loving me through the good bad and the ugly. I know you've seen it all.
Rosie!! Haha, how can I even begin to describe my friendship with you??? You are so much fun to be around, and so incredibly talented and optimistic. I know that if I acted more like you at times, our house would be more pleasent. =P I am so glad you are having such a marvelous time in D.C., I sure do miss you though! Feel free to hop across the pond. ;)
Last, but most certainly not least, Hannah! I am so glad that I got to see you again. And I really value the conversations we've been able to have, both on facebook and over the phone. I hope that we're able to spend more time talking once I get more settled into London. I'm sorry I'm always so busy! But I am so blessed to have you as a friend! Happy New Year, dear! :D
In 2009, I was also given a lot of wonderful experiences. And for these I can generally thank my mother! :) I learned how to sail, play tennis, french braid (Hey, I've failed at this for YEARS... though I still have a long way to go.) and... run... Running was more my father and best friend than my mother. She wouldn't do such a thing to me. lol. I dislike running to a great extent, but slowly and surely I'm getting better at it. Though I must say, I started running in Hawaii, where the weather was almost always perfect. Now I'm in London. I'll let you know how it goes...
Most importantly though this year, I've obtained four things: grace, peace, forgiveness and joy. All from my Savior of course. I will try my best to explain this, it's been something I've been contemplating this whole Christmas season, but it still isn't completely clear in my own mind... So bear with me.
I wish I could say that in 2009, I messed up the least I ever have. But naturally that would be lying, and would add yet another offence to my 2009 offense list. Thankfully, I don't actually have a list, since I'm forgiven for everything I've done. God's grace has continued to be so abundant and prevelant and visible in my life. And though I sin, and I do fall, I have a peace that I haven't had before. The reason for this I believe is because I'm not afraid of myself any longer. Because I know I can rely on my Savior and trust Him, no matter what. And that where I am weak, He is strong. And when I can't walk, He will carry me. Before I tried to resist temptation on my own, and I've found this year, often, I don't even have the strength to ask for help in my moments of weakness. So how could I expect to suceed? And yet somehow I did expect to, and thus became afraid when I found I couldn't. (An easy way to sum this up would be stupidity.) It seemed hopeless. And God has shown me this year, through a slow and continual process, that I am not alone, I do not need to be afraid, and that I can suceed in resisting temptation, because of Christ's strength, not my own.
And this knowledge and assurence has brought great joy into my heart and life.
God is good.
To conclude, I will say that I have made a New Years Resolution this year. I haven't really ever made one before... And this year, I am going to read through the bible completely.
I have read the whole bible, but not in one year, on a consistent, daily basis of being in the word.
Like everything in my life, I know I am going to need the Lord's help. But I am so thankful that He is more than happy to extend it. :) I just need to ask.
I wish you all a very Happy New Year! May God do wonderful things in your life in 2010, just as I know He is waiting to do in mine!
Caroline Ann
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Monday, December 28, 2009
12 Days of Christmas
I’m back! :) Our cruise and trip to Rome was incredible. We made memories that we’ll have forever… Being gone a total of 12 days gives me a lot to write about—in fact, I could write a whole blog post for each day! But, as I don’t have that kind of time, and eventually you’d be sick of reading everything, I’ll just try to write a paragraph for each day. It’ll still be kind of long, but I’ll try to be concise and short without losing too many details. :)
On the first day of Christmas, Jefferson threw up on my knee… All over my knee. This was while we were squeezed into the back of a taxi on the way to the airport… Listening to our driver talk about Afghanistan—that’s where he is from. Originally he was a policeman and then a professor, but since he had to leave the country, he now drives cabs in London. His story was amazing. And it made me so incredibly grateful to be an American. God has blessed our country so much.
Once we arrived in Rome we took another taxi to our apartment my mom had found via the internet… (Which turned out to be GREAT by the way!) On the way we kept seeing these “American Circus” signs. The joke was that it had arrived. ;)
On the second day of Christmas we saw the Coliseum. The architecture and engineering was remarkable. I couldn’t get over it. On our tour, we found out that after people were done using it for entertainment the Coliseum served as: a fortress for several different families, a botanical garden, a tobacco factory, and generally, the city quarry.
It was very eye opening though, seeing and standing in a place where so many human lives have been lost, and simply for the form of entertainment. And as horrible as it sounds—people still seemed to be entertained by that today. Whether in countries with crumbling governments and evil people pervading in authority, or in America, when people watch the “news”. Not that the news is completely bad, but often it’s the horror stories that are covered, because it’s the horror stories that people tend to watch the most.
On a lighter note, the third day of Christmas we saw the forum. And went to a huge museum, (I’m blanking on the name of it right now) who’s specialty seemed to be naked statues. My brothers got a kick out of those though… In one particular section, certain, em, areas were covered with a leaf. Which looked extremely comical. The question of the day was, “What did it take, to rate a leaf?” :)
I also didn’t bring the right shoes to walk on cobble stone streets. Whoops. By the end of the day I was limping… That evening I wore tennis shoes.
On the fourth day of Christmas we met up with the Shaws!! =) God was really good too, because their first train leaving from Florence got delayed, and we all ended up on the same train together. Then we all walked (in the rain) to our cruise ship—no need to take the free shuttle that was offered. =P
We had an amazing time with them though, no matter what we did. Both Rachel and Tim are getting so grown up, it’s kind of weird for them not to be little any more. Rachel is HILARIOUS. So it Kate on that note. So usually someone was laughing on account of one of those two. : )
This was also the day I earned my nickname from Rachel—cruise mommy. Yes. Mommy. The Italians running the ships teen zone had seen Rachel and I together, and when they asked how old she was (I thought they were asking the both of us) and I replied, “I’m fifteen” the cracked up (for quite a long time) and informed us through fits of giggles, “We thought you were her mother!!!” Cruise Mother indeed.
On the fifth day of Christmas we got off at Savona Italy. The daddies bought matching hats (on accident), we toured a fortress, and sipped hot chocolate in a café. And it was real hot chocolate too—sludgy, thick, creamy hot chocolate… So good! We sat there for over and hour, the girls played nertz, the parents talked, and the boys… well, they entertained themselves with toothpicks. Toothpicks of war rather. A lot can be done with empty sugar packets, a straw and toothpicks. : )
Oh, and at the end of the day, once again, I was voted a mother by the Italians…
On the sixth day of Christmas we sailed and pretty much just relaxed, it was really nice. I also learned how to play football-tennis. It’s tennis, with a lot of the same rules, except with your legs. I was one of like two girls who played, and of course was the only American, and I needed a lot of practice. But the kids were gracious. :)
On the seventh day of Christmas we went to Tunisia. This was probably my favorite place we toured. I could have spent days there… A couple hours barely did the country justice. =) We took a cruise excursion though, and they bused us out to Carpathian ruins. We were actually able to go down into them and walk around, not just look down into them. I could have spent a whole day wandering around down there… Instead of the twenty minutes we had. But it was wonderful, even though short.
Afterwards we went down into the city and went to the market and several different shops. And there, we got to do one of my favorite things ever—haggle and barter. :D I got some good deals on some silver jewelry, in fact, I got it for almost nothing. The man who I was bartering with, kind of got carried away and just wanted to sell it. I ended up paying 15 dollars for something priced at 65 Euros. Which would be 104 dollars. :) Originally I had told him 10 dollars, but he had thought I meant Euros, which would have been 18 dollars, so technically, I paid less than the original price he laughed at me for offering. :D
On the eighth day of Christmas we went to Malta. And there, I bought a beautiful painting from a local artist. Something I’ll have forever. Well, at least forever on earth anyway. : ) Malta was so beautiful, and all the buildings so old. Yet most of them were very well kept up—so that was very neat to see.
When we got back on board we still have most of the afternoon ahead of ourselves, so Kate, Rachel and I decided to play nertz. Enter the Italians. We had barely started our game when two Italian boys walked up, wanting to know if we could teach them (right after we had sat down, a whole group of kids walked into the room talking). Haha, we did indeed teach them, it was hilarious, but it worked. After a game or two they wanted to learn to play “Go feesh”. Apparently they had heard of this American game, but had never been able to play it for themselves. Believe it or not, it was easier to teach the Italians Nertz, than it was to teach them Go Fish. Certainly something I never expected.
Before we knew it though we had the attention of the whole room and, oh probably 10 or so boys playing cards with us. The Italian girls stayed on the other side of the room and stared at us for quite some time, but after much waving and smiling on our part, decided to at least walk over and say hi. :) It was a lot of fun trying to communicate with them, quite a few of the boys knew SOME English, and we used a whole lot of hand motions, and any Italian words we knew. Later two kids joined us who knew more and were able to translate a whole lot.
On the ninth day of Christmas we went to Olympia Greece. It was beyond beautiful. The area surrounding the ruins was such an eye feast… I can’t even begin to describe it.
Also, on this day, I realized I had no clue what day of the week it was. That had never happened before! It wasn’t until I was able to look at the ships itinerary for the day that I realized it was Thursday… I’d forgotten by the next day though. It was such an odd feeling.
As this was Christmas Eve, we all dressed up (it was a gala night) and went to dinner, read the Christmas story, and then later went to Mass. I’d never been to mass before… Especially a Mass that had things being said in sixth different languages. It was kind of neat though, because the priest spoke a lot of Latin, and we were able to pick out phrases and words we knew from what we’d learned in school. :)
On the tenth day of Christmas we actually celebrated Christmas. It was cold and wet that day, but we ended up having a great time. Not near as many people were out and about on account of the weather and the holiday, so we pretty much had Corfu to ourselves. A couple shops were open though, and I was able to purchase two Christmas ornaments to add to my collection. (I’m collecting Christmas ornaments from around the world). One of them was carved out of Olive wood, so that was exciting. :)
God was also really good, because we decided to get something small for Yuri, one of the teen leaders. Earlier in the week the girls and I were able to talk to him about Jesus for forty-five minutes or so… I think it was a good conversation, you never know what God is going to do. And because of that we thought we needed to get him something. Mrs. Shaw had the great idea of getting him a card, but as we were looking all the cards were in Greek. A language neither us nor Yuri spoke. Back to my God being good statement though, we were able to find a card in English, that had a message which echoed what we had been talking to him about. So we wrote a nice note thanking him, and put chocolate in the card. When we gave it to him, his response was very positive. For which we were grateful. :)
On the eleventh day of Christmas we sailed back towards Italy… This was probably one of my favorite days though, because the main thing we did was play games with our Italian friends. Over the course of the week we had taught them nertz, go fish, speed and spoons. All of which were generally a pretty good hit. It was fun to watch how much we could communicate with people who didn’t really speak our language.
After our group had grown huge, and we had gotten kicked off the floor where we’d been playing spoons, we searched for a table to accommodate us all. And in the process decided to play a board game. A couple of the guys left, and game back with Risk. Which I had never played before, and certainly hadn’t read the directions in Italian… lol. We only played for so long, but it was a lot of fun.
Actually, the reason we didn’t play for all that long, is because it took a really long time to set up (and explain), and by the time we started playing, my parents said Rachel and I had to go run.
We ran. The Italian boys ran with us. Lol. Twenty minutes of running has never gone so quickly. The guy who ran the most was our friend Luca, and he was in flip flops! Afterwards Rachel and I agreed to go to the pool with them, which is where we taught them Marco Polo. Haha. It was quite funny actually, just because it’d be like them trying to teach us to play George Washington or something…
On the twelfth day of Christmas we traveled back.
Honestly, it was hard leaving. Right now, I’m in moving mode, which means that I’m ready to settle down and make friends in a new place. And we did settle down and make friends… We just had to leave them after nine amazing days. :\ Some of those kids were just acquaintances, but others, I think I could be really good friends with for a long time. So that was hard.
I’m back in London though, after taking a ship, train, plane, tube and walking to get there. : )
And that conclude my twelve days of Christmas. If you read it all, thanks! Sorry it was so long… So much to say… I could have written ten times as much as I did. =P
I hope you have all had a very Merry Christmas!
In Christ,
Caroline Ann
On the first day of Christmas, Jefferson threw up on my knee… All over my knee. This was while we were squeezed into the back of a taxi on the way to the airport… Listening to our driver talk about Afghanistan—that’s where he is from. Originally he was a policeman and then a professor, but since he had to leave the country, he now drives cabs in London. His story was amazing. And it made me so incredibly grateful to be an American. God has blessed our country so much.
Once we arrived in Rome we took another taxi to our apartment my mom had found via the internet… (Which turned out to be GREAT by the way!) On the way we kept seeing these “American Circus” signs. The joke was that it had arrived. ;)
On the second day of Christmas we saw the Coliseum. The architecture and engineering was remarkable. I couldn’t get over it. On our tour, we found out that after people were done using it for entertainment the Coliseum served as: a fortress for several different families, a botanical garden, a tobacco factory, and generally, the city quarry.
It was very eye opening though, seeing and standing in a place where so many human lives have been lost, and simply for the form of entertainment. And as horrible as it sounds—people still seemed to be entertained by that today. Whether in countries with crumbling governments and evil people pervading in authority, or in America, when people watch the “news”. Not that the news is completely bad, but often it’s the horror stories that are covered, because it’s the horror stories that people tend to watch the most.
On a lighter note, the third day of Christmas we saw the forum. And went to a huge museum, (I’m blanking on the name of it right now) who’s specialty seemed to be naked statues. My brothers got a kick out of those though… In one particular section, certain, em, areas were covered with a leaf. Which looked extremely comical. The question of the day was, “What did it take, to rate a leaf?” :)
I also didn’t bring the right shoes to walk on cobble stone streets. Whoops. By the end of the day I was limping… That evening I wore tennis shoes.
On the fourth day of Christmas we met up with the Shaws!! =) God was really good too, because their first train leaving from Florence got delayed, and we all ended up on the same train together. Then we all walked (in the rain) to our cruise ship—no need to take the free shuttle that was offered. =P
We had an amazing time with them though, no matter what we did. Both Rachel and Tim are getting so grown up, it’s kind of weird for them not to be little any more. Rachel is HILARIOUS. So it Kate on that note. So usually someone was laughing on account of one of those two. : )
This was also the day I earned my nickname from Rachel—cruise mommy. Yes. Mommy. The Italians running the ships teen zone had seen Rachel and I together, and when they asked how old she was (I thought they were asking the both of us) and I replied, “I’m fifteen” the cracked up (for quite a long time) and informed us through fits of giggles, “We thought you were her mother!!!” Cruise Mother indeed.
On the fifth day of Christmas we got off at Savona Italy. The daddies bought matching hats (on accident), we toured a fortress, and sipped hot chocolate in a café. And it was real hot chocolate too—sludgy, thick, creamy hot chocolate… So good! We sat there for over and hour, the girls played nertz, the parents talked, and the boys… well, they entertained themselves with toothpicks. Toothpicks of war rather. A lot can be done with empty sugar packets, a straw and toothpicks. : )
Oh, and at the end of the day, once again, I was voted a mother by the Italians…
On the sixth day of Christmas we sailed and pretty much just relaxed, it was really nice. I also learned how to play football-tennis. It’s tennis, with a lot of the same rules, except with your legs. I was one of like two girls who played, and of course was the only American, and I needed a lot of practice. But the kids were gracious. :)
On the seventh day of Christmas we went to Tunisia. This was probably my favorite place we toured. I could have spent days there… A couple hours barely did the country justice. =) We took a cruise excursion though, and they bused us out to Carpathian ruins. We were actually able to go down into them and walk around, not just look down into them. I could have spent a whole day wandering around down there… Instead of the twenty minutes we had. But it was wonderful, even though short.
Afterwards we went down into the city and went to the market and several different shops. And there, we got to do one of my favorite things ever—haggle and barter. :D I got some good deals on some silver jewelry, in fact, I got it for almost nothing. The man who I was bartering with, kind of got carried away and just wanted to sell it. I ended up paying 15 dollars for something priced at 65 Euros. Which would be 104 dollars. :) Originally I had told him 10 dollars, but he had thought I meant Euros, which would have been 18 dollars, so technically, I paid less than the original price he laughed at me for offering. :D
On the eighth day of Christmas we went to Malta. And there, I bought a beautiful painting from a local artist. Something I’ll have forever. Well, at least forever on earth anyway. : ) Malta was so beautiful, and all the buildings so old. Yet most of them were very well kept up—so that was very neat to see.
When we got back on board we still have most of the afternoon ahead of ourselves, so Kate, Rachel and I decided to play nertz. Enter the Italians. We had barely started our game when two Italian boys walked up, wanting to know if we could teach them (right after we had sat down, a whole group of kids walked into the room talking). Haha, we did indeed teach them, it was hilarious, but it worked. After a game or two they wanted to learn to play “Go feesh”. Apparently they had heard of this American game, but had never been able to play it for themselves. Believe it or not, it was easier to teach the Italians Nertz, than it was to teach them Go Fish. Certainly something I never expected.
Before we knew it though we had the attention of the whole room and, oh probably 10 or so boys playing cards with us. The Italian girls stayed on the other side of the room and stared at us for quite some time, but after much waving and smiling on our part, decided to at least walk over and say hi. :) It was a lot of fun trying to communicate with them, quite a few of the boys knew SOME English, and we used a whole lot of hand motions, and any Italian words we knew. Later two kids joined us who knew more and were able to translate a whole lot.
On the ninth day of Christmas we went to Olympia Greece. It was beyond beautiful. The area surrounding the ruins was such an eye feast… I can’t even begin to describe it.
Also, on this day, I realized I had no clue what day of the week it was. That had never happened before! It wasn’t until I was able to look at the ships itinerary for the day that I realized it was Thursday… I’d forgotten by the next day though. It was such an odd feeling.
As this was Christmas Eve, we all dressed up (it was a gala night) and went to dinner, read the Christmas story, and then later went to Mass. I’d never been to mass before… Especially a Mass that had things being said in sixth different languages. It was kind of neat though, because the priest spoke a lot of Latin, and we were able to pick out phrases and words we knew from what we’d learned in school. :)
On the tenth day of Christmas we actually celebrated Christmas. It was cold and wet that day, but we ended up having a great time. Not near as many people were out and about on account of the weather and the holiday, so we pretty much had Corfu to ourselves. A couple shops were open though, and I was able to purchase two Christmas ornaments to add to my collection. (I’m collecting Christmas ornaments from around the world). One of them was carved out of Olive wood, so that was exciting. :)
God was also really good, because we decided to get something small for Yuri, one of the teen leaders. Earlier in the week the girls and I were able to talk to him about Jesus for forty-five minutes or so… I think it was a good conversation, you never know what God is going to do. And because of that we thought we needed to get him something. Mrs. Shaw had the great idea of getting him a card, but as we were looking all the cards were in Greek. A language neither us nor Yuri spoke. Back to my God being good statement though, we were able to find a card in English, that had a message which echoed what we had been talking to him about. So we wrote a nice note thanking him, and put chocolate in the card. When we gave it to him, his response was very positive. For which we were grateful. :)
On the eleventh day of Christmas we sailed back towards Italy… This was probably one of my favorite days though, because the main thing we did was play games with our Italian friends. Over the course of the week we had taught them nertz, go fish, speed and spoons. All of which were generally a pretty good hit. It was fun to watch how much we could communicate with people who didn’t really speak our language.
After our group had grown huge, and we had gotten kicked off the floor where we’d been playing spoons, we searched for a table to accommodate us all. And in the process decided to play a board game. A couple of the guys left, and game back with Risk. Which I had never played before, and certainly hadn’t read the directions in Italian… lol. We only played for so long, but it was a lot of fun.
Actually, the reason we didn’t play for all that long, is because it took a really long time to set up (and explain), and by the time we started playing, my parents said Rachel and I had to go run.
We ran. The Italian boys ran with us. Lol. Twenty minutes of running has never gone so quickly. The guy who ran the most was our friend Luca, and he was in flip flops! Afterwards Rachel and I agreed to go to the pool with them, which is where we taught them Marco Polo. Haha. It was quite funny actually, just because it’d be like them trying to teach us to play George Washington or something…
On the twelfth day of Christmas we traveled back.
Honestly, it was hard leaving. Right now, I’m in moving mode, which means that I’m ready to settle down and make friends in a new place. And we did settle down and make friends… We just had to leave them after nine amazing days. :\ Some of those kids were just acquaintances, but others, I think I could be really good friends with for a long time. So that was hard.
I’m back in London though, after taking a ship, train, plane, tube and walking to get there. : )
And that conclude my twelve days of Christmas. If you read it all, thanks! Sorry it was so long… So much to say… I could have written ten times as much as I did. =P
I hope you have all had a very Merry Christmas!
In Christ,
Caroline Ann
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
London--First Impressions
See, it's only been two days, and I'm blogging again! I really am going to blog. :)
We are leaving for Rome early tomorrow morning, so I thought I'd blog a couple of my thoughts on London before I leave. Since we've been here four days now, I've had plenty of time to form my "first impressions"... A lot of them are things I was surprised about actually.
London is what a lot of people say it is when talking about the weather--it IS very dark, cold, and wet. But I will say, to me anyway, it isn't dreary. There is SO much going on, so much life and business, that it doesn't come off gloomy. If maybe I was somewhere all by myself on a deserted street it might be, but I have yet to come upon that situation. I will also add, with my family, things are never dreary or gloomy. I mean, when you have a mother who marches up and down the empty metro car--singing. It really can't be. :)
The typical, "London" things are all here, as promised... Double-Decker buses, red telephone booths, lots of people wearing black (although they often have colorful scarves or hats on...). But, aside from that... There are quite a few things that I haven't expected.
I had heard that London was international, but when I heard international, I thought "this side of the world international"... But it really is literal! There were Chinese and Japanese people at church! (And we've seen them everywhere). It just kind of through me for a loop. It was so fantastic though on Sunday morning in church, praising my Lord, with people of every nation! Literally. As a side note, the building was old and BEAUTIFUL... I'm sure I'll take pictures of it and post it here eventually. The service was wonderful as well, and the church may very well be the one we go to. Which would be a first, as we tend to pick a church, oh, half a year after we start looking for one.
And speaking of the beautiful church reminds me of the architecture... It's fabulous! Hardly an ugly building in the city. I knew there were old and beautiful buildings in certain parts of the city, but I had not expected the whole city to made up in them! I'm not sure exactly why I'm surprised, considering how old London is.
And the rumour that food is bad in London is completely untrue. We've eaten three meals out, and though eating out isn't cheap, the food has been fantastic thus far. We've had Italian pizza (pietsa ;) at a place called Pizza Express (it's a chain apparently) and it was WONDERFUL! We also ate Burgers and Chips (well, my parents got Nachos and pork loin) at a local pub, which was quite tasty as well. At this particular pub, children were allowed, but parties with children under fourteen have to eat in a certain part of the restaurant away from the bar. Speaking of the bar--that's where you order! The menus are on the table, and then once you know what you want, you walk up to the bar to give them your order. The bar tender then hands you a tin pail with silverware and condiments, and some sort of marker with a number on it, so they know which table to deliver the order too. I wonder how long they've had that sort of system.
And while I'm onto food, I really like Tesco! It's a grocery store here, we've seen both big and small ones. They're prices are very reasonable, and they have lots of fresh food, whether it be produce, fruit, or bread. :) This evening I grabbed an delicious Gala apple and a small French baguette for 61 pence. (The "penny" for the pound).
A couple small bits and pieces and then I'll wrap up... :)
It has gotten dark very early, but four the light is dimming, by 4:30 it is gone.
I've heard Ambulance sirens constantly... Probably an average of five or six a day. I hadn't expected that at all. Good chance to pray for people though.
The people have been extremely nice. Often they are very busy, but if you stop them to ask a question, they are more than happy to help. Tonight when I was purchasing some groceries at Tesco with Kate, I was short two pence due to tax... I wanted to use a debt card, and had to explain that I was an American, and didn't have any more change as I had just arrived in the city. The man smiled and said, "No, no, it's fine, I'm sure you'll come back to the store. I'll take care of it, because you are an American." (He said this with an Indian/British accent).
Oh, and we found out yesterday, that in the tube tunnels, if you feel a sharp turn, it's because of the Plague pits from the 1300's. When they were originally digging the tunnels, they had to dig around them as to not to disturb them. Kind of a weird thought that they are still there, but yet they are.
Anyway, that's my "first impressions" of London. Hope you enjoyed, or at least endured them. :) As I said at the beginning, I'm leaving for Rome in the morning. Which means that I won't have internet access for at least the next couple days. Which means no blogging. But it doesn't mean I've forgotten. =P I'm not sure whether or not I'll have internet on the cruise. We shall see. But even if I do, there won't be a huge amount of time to write, as we will be with our friends the Shaws! :)
I hope you all have a very merry Christmas! Remember that JESUS is the reason for the season. AND that it's a great time of year to share with people about Him. People seem to be in a better mood at Christmas in general. :)
We get back to London on the 27th, so you CAN expect to hear from me sometime after that.
Merry CHRISTmas!
Caroline Ann
We are leaving for Rome early tomorrow morning, so I thought I'd blog a couple of my thoughts on London before I leave. Since we've been here four days now, I've had plenty of time to form my "first impressions"... A lot of them are things I was surprised about actually.
London is what a lot of people say it is when talking about the weather--it IS very dark, cold, and wet. But I will say, to me anyway, it isn't dreary. There is SO much going on, so much life and business, that it doesn't come off gloomy. If maybe I was somewhere all by myself on a deserted street it might be, but I have yet to come upon that situation. I will also add, with my family, things are never dreary or gloomy. I mean, when you have a mother who marches up and down the empty metro car--singing. It really can't be. :)
The typical, "London" things are all here, as promised... Double-Decker buses, red telephone booths, lots of people wearing black (although they often have colorful scarves or hats on...). But, aside from that... There are quite a few things that I haven't expected.
I had heard that London was international, but when I heard international, I thought "this side of the world international"... But it really is literal! There were Chinese and Japanese people at church! (And we've seen them everywhere). It just kind of through me for a loop. It was so fantastic though on Sunday morning in church, praising my Lord, with people of every nation! Literally. As a side note, the building was old and BEAUTIFUL... I'm sure I'll take pictures of it and post it here eventually. The service was wonderful as well, and the church may very well be the one we go to. Which would be a first, as we tend to pick a church, oh, half a year after we start looking for one.
And speaking of the beautiful church reminds me of the architecture... It's fabulous! Hardly an ugly building in the city. I knew there were old and beautiful buildings in certain parts of the city, but I had not expected the whole city to made up in them! I'm not sure exactly why I'm surprised, considering how old London is.
And the rumour that food is bad in London is completely untrue. We've eaten three meals out, and though eating out isn't cheap, the food has been fantastic thus far. We've had Italian pizza (pietsa ;) at a place called Pizza Express (it's a chain apparently) and it was WONDERFUL! We also ate Burgers and Chips (well, my parents got Nachos and pork loin) at a local pub, which was quite tasty as well. At this particular pub, children were allowed, but parties with children under fourteen have to eat in a certain part of the restaurant away from the bar. Speaking of the bar--that's where you order! The menus are on the table, and then once you know what you want, you walk up to the bar to give them your order. The bar tender then hands you a tin pail with silverware and condiments, and some sort of marker with a number on it, so they know which table to deliver the order too. I wonder how long they've had that sort of system.
And while I'm onto food, I really like Tesco! It's a grocery store here, we've seen both big and small ones. They're prices are very reasonable, and they have lots of fresh food, whether it be produce, fruit, or bread. :) This evening I grabbed an delicious Gala apple and a small French baguette for 61 pence. (The "penny" for the pound).
A couple small bits and pieces and then I'll wrap up... :)
It has gotten dark very early, but four the light is dimming, by 4:30 it is gone.
I've heard Ambulance sirens constantly... Probably an average of five or six a day. I hadn't expected that at all. Good chance to pray for people though.
The people have been extremely nice. Often they are very busy, but if you stop them to ask a question, they are more than happy to help. Tonight when I was purchasing some groceries at Tesco with Kate, I was short two pence due to tax... I wanted to use a debt card, and had to explain that I was an American, and didn't have any more change as I had just arrived in the city. The man smiled and said, "No, no, it's fine, I'm sure you'll come back to the store. I'll take care of it, because you are an American." (He said this with an Indian/British accent).
Oh, and we found out yesterday, that in the tube tunnels, if you feel a sharp turn, it's because of the Plague pits from the 1300's. When they were originally digging the tunnels, they had to dig around them as to not to disturb them. Kind of a weird thought that they are still there, but yet they are.
Anyway, that's my "first impressions" of London. Hope you enjoyed, or at least endured them. :) As I said at the beginning, I'm leaving for Rome in the morning. Which means that I won't have internet access for at least the next couple days. Which means no blogging. But it doesn't mean I've forgotten. =P I'm not sure whether or not I'll have internet on the cruise. We shall see. But even if I do, there won't be a huge amount of time to write, as we will be with our friends the Shaws! :)
I hope you all have a very merry Christmas! Remember that JESUS is the reason for the season. AND that it's a great time of year to share with people about Him. People seem to be in a better mood at Christmas in general. :)
We get back to London on the 27th, so you CAN expect to hear from me sometime after that.
Merry CHRISTmas!
Caroline Ann
Sunday, December 13, 2009
The Big and the Little
First of all, I am really officially blogging again. Things were kind of crazy in Hawaii, and I just didn't have the time I suppose. Not that we aren't going to be busy here--we are. But living in London I believe will induce me to just HAVE to write about all the wonderful things I experience. :)
Now that my little announcement is out of the way, let me share my thoughts on a subject that came to my awareness yesterday. I'll begin with a short story...
So, we had landed in London at about 10:15 in the morning. It had taken quite a long time to actually get off the plane due to the large amount of people on board... So many people in fact that it was quite difficult to even obtain my coat which was in the overhead compartment. (On a side note... When I did finally get to it, and started to pull the coat down, my tennis rackets came toppling down upon the young man's head behind me. I didn't know they were on top of the coat. Oops. He was very gracious though.)
All that said, I was rather tired and jet lagged, and just ready to collect our baggage. All thirteen pieces of it... And thus I was walking rather briskly through the airport, with a mission. Jefferson had been walking beside me, but suddenly stopped. A moment later he came running into me, stopping the progress of the both us. He was visibly excited about something.
"Caroline, Caroline! Guess what??"
"What Jefferson?" I replied, as I picked up my pace again.
"That lady back there... Caroline, that lady, she was speaking... ITALIAN!" He's jumping along beside me for joy at point.
"Oh, that's nice, Jefferson." As I say this I'm thinking, ummm, Italian?? That's why you just about knocked the both of us down on the airport floor?? WHICH is probably germ infested!? Probably. (Mostly it just sounded like good justification.)
"Yeah! She said, (he goes into an Italian accent) "le pasa porte." Which means she was speaking Italian! Can you believe it?"
"Cool Jefferson."
End of story.
Anyway though, as I got to thinking about it, I realized that Jefferson hadn't been to Italy... Sometimes I forget we didn't always have him... So no wonder he was excited. He hadn't heard a "real-live" Italian speak Italian.
And then as I pondered the episode some more, I realized that most American seven year-olds haven't been to Italy... Or fifteen year-olds for that matter. And that maybe I had taken it for granted a little bit, that I had that amazing experience of living in Northern Italy for three years. I mean, that was a big part of the younger years of my childhood. Sometimes it's easy to take the big things for granted.
Satisfied that I had thoroughly contemplated this event, I went on through the rest of my day.
Later... I was trying to get ready for bed and was about to take a MUCH needed shower (the floors of the airport may only be so germ-infested... But all the seats and doorknobs and restrooms... You name it, probably are. Not to mention the planes themselves...). Unfortunately... the hot water was gone. ALL of it. I decided it wasn't that big of a deal and I would just wait. An hour later, it had warmed up to maybe a little bit above freezing... Great. What a way to get sick right before you travel to Rome... And with how hard it is for me to keep warm... That would do it.
HOWEVER, my ever resourceful mother saved the day! (Again). We, or rather she, decided to run the water from the bath, but heat up water in a water heater-something-or-other, provided in our apartment. Then pour the hot water into my bath. After a couple of those, it would be warm enough to bath in. And that is what she did.
I will say, the drain of the bathtub wasn't working quite properly... So by the time the water wasn't frigid, there wasn't but probably three inches or so left in the tub. At that point though, I wasn't picky, I was grateful. VERY grateful.
And as I went to bed last night, I once again realized that I had taken something for granted. A little thing like water is easy to take for granted... Because, well, it's water. And it's EVERYWHERE. But not everyone has it. Or if they do it might not be clean. In fact, it could be poisonous. So I have much to be grateful for. Don't I?
And then I realized, that in comparison, Italy isn't so big after all. It has been something God has GIVEN me. Memories that he has allowed me to make and remember. But Italy is extra, it is little when you're talking about water, something that keeps our bodies alive and clean. So it was really the other way around I suppose.
And I use Italy only as an example in my life, that I was reminded of yesterday. But there are many other things that we have that others don't, such as going out to eat, whether for special or because we feel like it, going see movies on the big screen, having access to multiple stores where we can buy clothes... We, as Americans, are very blessed. And I pray we remember it, and not take it as something we deserve, but something we've been given.
Anyway, to wrap this up... I now live in London. And I'm not going to take a day of it for granted... I am extremely blessed to have this unique opportunity.... Haha, someday I may never even be able to afford visiting here... Much less living. God is good. :)
AND, I look forward to keeping you updated, via my now active blog ;), on all my adventures.
In Christ, (the greatest travel agent)
Caroline Ann
Now that my little announcement is out of the way, let me share my thoughts on a subject that came to my awareness yesterday. I'll begin with a short story...
So, we had landed in London at about 10:15 in the morning. It had taken quite a long time to actually get off the plane due to the large amount of people on board... So many people in fact that it was quite difficult to even obtain my coat which was in the overhead compartment. (On a side note... When I did finally get to it, and started to pull the coat down, my tennis rackets came toppling down upon the young man's head behind me. I didn't know they were on top of the coat. Oops. He was very gracious though.)
All that said, I was rather tired and jet lagged, and just ready to collect our baggage. All thirteen pieces of it... And thus I was walking rather briskly through the airport, with a mission. Jefferson had been walking beside me, but suddenly stopped. A moment later he came running into me, stopping the progress of the both us. He was visibly excited about something.
"Caroline, Caroline! Guess what??"
"What Jefferson?" I replied, as I picked up my pace again.
"That lady back there... Caroline, that lady, she was speaking... ITALIAN!" He's jumping along beside me for joy at point.
"Oh, that's nice, Jefferson." As I say this I'm thinking, ummm, Italian?? That's why you just about knocked the both of us down on the airport floor?? WHICH is probably germ infested!? Probably. (Mostly it just sounded like good justification.)
"Yeah! She said, (he goes into an Italian accent) "le pasa porte." Which means she was speaking Italian! Can you believe it?"
"Cool Jefferson."
End of story.
Anyway though, as I got to thinking about it, I realized that Jefferson hadn't been to Italy... Sometimes I forget we didn't always have him... So no wonder he was excited. He hadn't heard a "real-live" Italian speak Italian.
And then as I pondered the episode some more, I realized that most American seven year-olds haven't been to Italy... Or fifteen year-olds for that matter. And that maybe I had taken it for granted a little bit, that I had that amazing experience of living in Northern Italy for three years. I mean, that was a big part of the younger years of my childhood. Sometimes it's easy to take the big things for granted.
Satisfied that I had thoroughly contemplated this event, I went on through the rest of my day.
Later... I was trying to get ready for bed and was about to take a MUCH needed shower (the floors of the airport may only be so germ-infested... But all the seats and doorknobs and restrooms... You name it, probably are. Not to mention the planes themselves...). Unfortunately... the hot water was gone. ALL of it. I decided it wasn't that big of a deal and I would just wait. An hour later, it had warmed up to maybe a little bit above freezing... Great. What a way to get sick right before you travel to Rome... And with how hard it is for me to keep warm... That would do it.
HOWEVER, my ever resourceful mother saved the day! (Again). We, or rather she, decided to run the water from the bath, but heat up water in a water heater-something-or-other, provided in our apartment. Then pour the hot water into my bath. After a couple of those, it would be warm enough to bath in. And that is what she did.
I will say, the drain of the bathtub wasn't working quite properly... So by the time the water wasn't frigid, there wasn't but probably three inches or so left in the tub. At that point though, I wasn't picky, I was grateful. VERY grateful.
And as I went to bed last night, I once again realized that I had taken something for granted. A little thing like water is easy to take for granted... Because, well, it's water. And it's EVERYWHERE. But not everyone has it. Or if they do it might not be clean. In fact, it could be poisonous. So I have much to be grateful for. Don't I?
And then I realized, that in comparison, Italy isn't so big after all. It has been something God has GIVEN me. Memories that he has allowed me to make and remember. But Italy is extra, it is little when you're talking about water, something that keeps our bodies alive and clean. So it was really the other way around I suppose.
And I use Italy only as an example in my life, that I was reminded of yesterday. But there are many other things that we have that others don't, such as going out to eat, whether for special or because we feel like it, going see movies on the big screen, having access to multiple stores where we can buy clothes... We, as Americans, are very blessed. And I pray we remember it, and not take it as something we deserve, but something we've been given.
Anyway, to wrap this up... I now live in London. And I'm not going to take a day of it for granted... I am extremely blessed to have this unique opportunity.... Haha, someday I may never even be able to afford visiting here... Much less living. God is good. :)
AND, I look forward to keeping you updated, via my now active blog ;), on all my adventures.
In Christ, (the greatest travel agent)
Caroline Ann
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