Finally packed and ready to go! The left roller has all the supplies/gifts I’im taking to the people we’ll be in contact with in Africa. The backpack on the right contains everything I need for the trip. I’ll be leaving LAX today at 3:30pm!
Thank you so much for reading the blog and staying updated and also supporting me through! Keep our team in your prayers! I will post as soon as I can in Africa! WOOOOOHOOOOOO!!!
Paul, Preston, Annie, Alexi, Kiana, Abe, Edwin
Here is a pic of our team going in July! We had a great time today at the Kim’s place over lunch! The Kim’s are a great family. We got to hear about how Annie caught Paul’s eye in college and hear the amazing story of Alexi and Preston’s miracle births! Being with a family makes the team feel like family. It’s a great dynamic and I’m so grateful for each person on the team. We’re going to have a good time together!
A couple of fun things for my sponsor child and his siblings.
Jungle Juice from REI. Almost pure Deet.
I heard somewhere that Deet is actually bad for you. Can’t be as bad as Malaria.
I got to chatting with one of the workers there at REI and he just got back from a trip to Cameroon, Africa (homeland of my favorite soccer player Samuel Eto’o). Turned out he was there for a service trip with his church too. He gave me some great info in terms of what gear is effective out there and what isn’t. When I asked him the name of his church, he said, “Uh, Calvary, Community, Christian… No, no. Calvary, Lutheran, Church, uh, Calvary something.” I’m glad the name of my church is simple, Newsong.
Man, I woke up this morning feeling extremely tired! Yesterday, I had dreams from ditching school and getting caught, having friends on the Oprah show, people telling me that they’re not getting paid any more to do their job, and talking to animals that were going into war. There were so many weird, disjointed pieces to my dreams. The Oprah portion was very emotional as someone I knew was sharing the many difficult events in their life. They had Oprah crying, the crowd crying and me crying in my dream. My alarm was set this morning to 5:30am but I didn’t hear anything until I woke up at 7:30am!
Anyhow, I’m never scared of my dreams. Sometimes, even the really bad ones are sobering to something that I’ve been neglecting in my life. For example, when people in my dream die, or I die, it puts in to perspective again death which may come at any moment for any one of us.
Here are some interesting quotes I read about “dreams” in a different sense:
“When we are dreaming alone it is only a dream. When we are dreaming with others, it is the beginning of reality.” –Dom Helder Camara
“The most pitiful among men is he who turns his dreams into silver and gold.” –Khalil Gibran
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” –Mark Twain
I just got my Malaria medication today. It’s called Mefloquine (250MG). I must take this medicine every Tuesday for the next 6 weeks.
Side effects include dizziness, mood changes, new or worsening feelings of sadness, depression, fear.
My doctor also says that you’ll have vivid, crazy dreams, and oftentimes horrible nightmares. I’m kind of excited to sleep tonight. I wonder what dreams/nightmares I’ll have tonight.
Please keep us in your prayers. I hope our dreams are pleasantly vivid and imaginative.
Check out this documentary on Malawi. Madonna gives a foreword and I believe she also narrates it.
After I agreed to saying YES to the trip to Malawi in April w/ the team of 7 others from Newsong, I was asked to go on another trip in July to help lead some others out there to serve alongside Y-Malawi! So now I’m going on TWO trips to Malawi
Trip 1: April 14th – 25th, 2009
Trip 2: July 20th – August 3rd, 2009
Both teams are filled with AWESOME people!
Trip 1: April Diaz, Adriane Jung, Cami Jung, Kat Yeung, Brian Diaz, Abe Park and Ted Tanuoye
Trip 2: Edwin Chiu, Kiana Perez, Paul Kim, Annie Kim, Preston Kim, Alexi Kim
What have I gotten myself into?! I feel privileged to be able to go!
I’ve always had a curiosity of Africa ever since those commercials when I was young. You know those commercials. They ask for money to help feed and clothe a starving kid in Africa for only $20/month. Usually they showed kids without any shoes or clothes on, skinny to the bone with stomaches protuding from their bodies, flies buzzing around their nostrils and mouths…I remember as a kid watching those at first and thinking, “WOW, these kids have it bad.” In college, when I started to travel, I wondered what it was like to be in Africa, to be able see and experience these conditions first hand (but, I’d also see those nature shows with lions, hippos, giraffes, etc. and think how awesome to be like the Croc Hunter and see these animals upclose).
Post college, I had a very different experience that rocked me. I came across a video that touched me deeply but also haunted me (check it out if you haven’t already, it’s called Invisible Children). The video helped me to tune in a bit more to the issues of gross injustice in Africa like children soldiers, hunger, AIDS, clean water…
A few months ago, I was approached by April Diaz and asked if I would consider going on a trip with some Newsong staff to Malawi. Newsong had just started a 10-15 year partnership w/ Y-Malawi an awesome organization down there doing holistic development and this would be the pioneering team to experience what’s going on down there first hand. HERE’S A CRAZY COINCIDENCE. I’ve been sponsoring a child in Malawi through World Vision for 2 years+ now! He’s actually in the Area Development Project that we’ll be going to (Nkhoma)! I’ve dreamt about meeting my sponsor child Daniel! Without needing to think about it too much I said YES!
Here’s my child sponsor friend Daniel M.
Thanks for visiting my site! Hopefully through this site, we can share in the adventure together!
Abe in Malawi 2009 