The words I post on these pages are raw; directly from my journal that I've maintained since deciding at the end of May to go on this trip. Since the middle of the trip one of my team mates - Jeremy - was joking about how he would not be the least bit surprised if he were to come across my journal "on the New York Times best seller list within a year." Once or twice I understated what he was saying, and then, when we got back, I literally had friends all the way down in Argentina asking me about my new two week adventure! The second I mentioned that I was keeping a journal they were saying "Ohhh! Tell me when you get it published!" So, this is my "instant publication" of the journal.
I am not going to post my packing list or my notes from the meetings we had before leaving because it is just my list of financial contributors, dates, promos, & fundraiser information and posting all that would be silly.
There were some funky team dynamics, but hey - you can't expect to go on a trip for 2 weeks with 13 strangers and come back being best friends with all (or any) of them, right? Therefore, any pages in the journal where I had to vent are not being published as a courtesy to everyone.
I am not planning on changing any names and will involve as much visual aid as possible :)
Here we go: I left my heart in South Africa...
Meet the Team
"Captains":
Chris - team leader
Jenny - assistant team leader
"Crew":
Cathy - nurse, our "mama bear", cooking beast
Janelle - mother of 1, digging/cooking beast
Deb - I don't know what she does, but she is generally awesome! Kinda "tom-boy"ish, but in a good way... gardening beast
Jon - graduated from Columbine & works at Coors Field in the press boxes, gardening beast
Taylor - dancer, & she is good at staying focused on her projects with the photography days
Dave Sonner (referred to as either) - musician who generally keeps to himself... kinda, shack construction mastermind
Kristy- teaches deaf children/works in public Denver schools
Kristie - engaged and getting married in September, my bunkmate, determined.
Sean - funny punkface, garden "team leader", coke~a~cola adict
Charles - is studying pre-med at CSU, shack building monster
Jeremy - sells reality, shopping/cooking/building beast
Johannes - the head gardener at the Lighthouse Shelter where we are staying, our translator, one stand-up man...
The Smith Family - Lincoln & Jenny, Maddison, Kyler, Kendi, and Isabel (except add almost a year to all the kids). They were our AMAZING host family who told us where everything was and the best way to do stuff!
Team Dynamics :
*Chris & Charles have been BFFs for years
*Taylor & Kristie are BFFs
*Jenny & Sonner are BFFs
*Kristy & Deb got real tight
*Kristie & Sean are siblings
*Sean & Jon were referred to as "the odd couple" by the end of the first week, but it was funny.
*Jeremy seemed to get pretty tight with Jenny and Sonner
*and I tried to slide in where ever... typically ended up with either Kristy & Deb OR Jenny & Dave
Charles & Jeremy were our two drivers -- and considering the part about where they were driving stick shifts on the opposite side of the car on the opposite side of the road and only backed into one person (who happened to know Lincoln, thank the Lord), drove into oncoming traffic once or twice, and drove into the shelter gate once... I think they did pretty good! :) haha
Chris, Kristie, Taylor, Sonner, & Jenny all went on the trip in 2009 so they were already acquainted/friends and had built great friendships before this trip...
My means of staying awake on the flights at the right times, as you're about to find out, was to just write everything. It may seem obsessive, but I figured as long as my pen was moving on my paper and the product was comprehensible, it didn't matter that I was going on about silly bands or the flight crews' accents.
Enjoy & take nothing with a grain of salt!
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