Week 3 of the new life

So its week 3 or as easy to put as the 3rd week since arriving here on board the Africa Mercy. I can't believe its only been 3 weeks as time has felt like it passed a lot quicker.

This weekend I did not do anything truly worthy of writing about so yeah that means I just spent a day in bed.

I have had some time to reflect on what I'm doing here and why. For those who don't know this is much more than a simple desire to serve for me, this is me stepping out in faith although begrudgingly. My world consisted of Newcastle and the odd trip out of there and I was happy with that. God on the other hand was not and he started this process to have me come here, to a ship, to grow and be used in ways I never thought of.

You see you can go your whole life thinking this is it, I'm good with what I have - I love God and he loves me. God does not want to destroy my life and maybe that is true for you but not for me. God has been breaking down barriers in my life forcing me into situations where I have to be God focused. I honestly did not know what to expect when I came here, I knew it wasn't because Africa needed me. But I do need to be here right now in my life.

There is no safety net here, and ship is great at what it does and the people are some of the best I've met. The ship is not Africa she serves the nations and the people of Africa while maintaining the core beliefs that she works to;

• Love God
• Love and serve others
• Be people of integrity
• Be people of excellence in all we say and do

I love this place but real Africa is out side and we are still visitors to this land as we are visitors to this world.

This week has been interesting for me and I have been stretched in new and interesting ways.

On Friday I went and had my blood tested as the crew here are the blood bank and I now know my own blood type. It's still red :) I may be asked to give blood for one of the surgeries but I don't know when that may be or even if.

Just thinking about that has put something else in to prospective, the bible speaks about life being in the blood and that blood was the way in which life can be saved. I'm not saying by my blood someone will be saved spiritually, I know that is not true but it will help a person live who has need of it. Its so cool how a small thing like that can be used to teach and help.

On Monday nothing of any real note happened other than watching a sun set and having to spend time in pray over a couple situations in my life. I'm still seeking for confirmation from God about a few things but they will be in his time.

Tuesday well this has been interesting day of days I'm somehow getting involved in the sound team here, which is great. I spent the day trying to repair a speaker or a least find the fault with it. never did find the complete fault with it but managed to narrow it down to a particular part. It turns out these speakers that are liked so much by a few are very very good make (B&O make the amp). Making the repair to these has now become the most interesting part of the day. I had a meeting with the sound team and got to meet a few of them and worked out a few things. I'm only a servant in the team which is more than enough for me at this point of my life.

When I got home (to the cabin) there was a note on my door, inviting me to join the stretcher team as part of the EMT (Emergency Medical Team) for all drills and real life events. Nice to know that someone (God) is pushing me harder than before. Now I have to start working out a bit to build up some mussels, lol.

On Wednesday I spent the day doing my normal day to day work, this normally consists of changing at least 1 toner cartage in a printer.

Thursday - Well nothing really much apart from fire drill and waiting to see if I got a call from the hospital for a blood donation, turns out I was not need this time but it would have been great. On the evening I was shadowing on sound the desk here for the community meeting. I saw first hand some of the challenges of doing sound within this ship, but the community meeting went well and the talk was really good.

Friday - Long day at work, nah not really. It was a good day of work with something new learned. After work I went to help out with something called "the Jesus Film" from what I saw tonight it was a film based on one of the gospels about the life and death of Jesus. This is shown at a village\area away from the ship so we had to travel there in one of the land rovers. If you think British roads have a few pot holes in, you may want to consider the fact the only time we had any real road was for about 1Km the rest was make shift with deep holes in.
Anyway we made it to where we showed the film and we set up, I had the honour to pray before the start of the film, which got translated into the local lanuage - very cool and a little nerving.
Hearing the voice of God in another lanuage is quite sereal but good that the word is spread.

The 2nd week

This weekend gone (18th) I got to spend hanging out at the team house with some friends, we had a meal which was great to eat and filling. The cook said it would had been better if she was able to get all the ingredients, but hey this is Africa and you learn to make do. After the meal we got changed into swimming gear and had a swim in the pool.

Yes I know this is not the ship, trust me this pool was great. The water was clear and cool, not bad considering this is Sierra Leone. The place where the team house is located is part of a complex that other NGO's use. You even get a few visitors there like this little fella:

He was just looking for somewhere to hide from the heat. The view from the place was great (Internet here is slow and would take awhile to upload the pictures).

So that was Sunday daytime, not bad I would think. Sunday night was worship and a small teaching on board the ship. I would have enjoyed it better if my brain would get out of sound tech mode, but I'm not called to be doing any of that here.

Monday was a normal day at work catching up with any tickets from the weekend, Monday evening I had to go to HR induction meeting where we were given lots of information so as you can imagine my brain was mush after all that. But it provided the opportunity to have all the paperwork completed and to meet some new people.

I still can't quiet belief that my first missions trip is for 6 months here on the Africa Mercy - wow, God is certainly in control here.

On Tuesday night I went on deck to watch the sun set:

The sun set's here very quickly, but it is beutiful.

On Wednesday night there was a wicked lightning storm and it was awsome to watch, plus I got to hang out with some cool people watching Sci-Fy.

On Thursday day I had to resolve an issue with a printer that had me baffled for a full day, it came in for a repair to the rollers as it was not picking up paper properly all the time, so the rollers were replaced. This only made the problem worse :(

I went to our store room and found another printer that was the same make and model (we don't carry spare printers), there was no notes to the nature of the fault with this printer so I used it to replace the faulty one. This did not work out to well. I ended uptaking both printers apart and making one working printer from both. Its not like I can just ring up the manufacture and have them send out an engineer to come and fix the fault plus this is Africa if you can make it work any way possible then thats whats you do.

Thursday night was the community worship\teaching night this is normal on the Africa Mercy (or AFM for short), tonight was different as the worship and teaching was mixed together around the tabernacle. I really enjoyed this as it felt like I could worship in my way and not feel that I should be worshiping through service (a personal strugle). I never knew how much God would be speaking to me through this mission and even thinking back on this past year means times of weaping in both sorrow and happyness.

I miss my family in Newcastle nothing can replace them but for now in this season of my life here is where I'm called, so here I will be.

Space and Stuff

Well this is the size of my bed at night and its not the smallest bed I've slept in, before you think that not to bad I live on deck 2 which has no port hole (window). I'm not complaining as the view from where I work is great.

This the cubboard that I get to use for storage and its onlt the side that is open. So this is the total amount of space that I get to sleep in and store my gear.

At least its not bad just a big adjustment and being careful with what I have brought and it all fits. I'm so thankful that the choice to be here was Gods and that small things like this make such a big difference..

Wow its Friday

Oh My its Friday already, where has the time gone.

After boarding the Africa Mercy on Monday night and not knowing a single person on board I have managed to find some old friends and make some new one's. :)

Back in 2007 there was a small group of guys from the Africa Mercy that came to the church (Calvary Chapel Newcastle @ the community centre) and when they left a void was left within the church, I never thought I would see any of them again, never mind the fact that I would be doing any form of mission. But 4 years on and I'm here in Sierra Leone and here some of them are still here.

I made friends with a few UK people and apparently I should have brought tea bags and hob nobs with me, I think this needs to be made understood. I have managed to find a few like minded people who are both either nerds or geeks, it quiet easy here just mention Dr Who, Battle Star, SG1 and you will find some new friends.

So Tuesday night was good I got to hang out with a few people and get a bit more orientated to the ship. That is something that is fun to do, getting to find your way around. You would think shes only 153m long 7 out 8 desk you can get into and only 25m wide, so nice and easy not to get lost. Yeah right forward and aft when you can't see out of the port hole not easy. You get turned around so quickly here that I can just about find my way from the office to Starbucks 2 decks down and back a bit.

Thursdays are cool here every other Thursday there is a fire drill and you have to get off the ship and its warm outside. I spend most of my day inside with the air con and going outside no so much. But with the fire drill you have to go out there and stand in the sun for as long as it takes for the drill.

At night time we have a worship night this great and mandatory, Spending time with God and the crew. This weeks teaching was on the temptation of Christ and it was done in a different way from what you would expect.This was read out at first then acted out but this was done in the theme of a western - so so funny. I did get something from it so it was helpful.

Did I mention I have a great office that I work in, I get to see out to the sea which you think is a bad thing just open water but that's not whats its like here, I can see some more of the coast line on the other side and the boats going back forwards as this is a water way. this morning there was a tug going past using its water jets, pretty cool looking.

I still don't believe its a Friday, but its cool as its the weekend soon. I have one of the few roles that only work Monday to Friday unless theres and emergency.

Oh Starbucks here is great:

The range of drinks we have available include:

Cappuccino $0.75 (a hot foamy coffee generally served 1/3 espresso, 1/3 hot milk and 1/3 foam)
Latte $0.75 (a hot coffee with espresso, hot steamed milk and about 1cm of foam on top)
Americano $0.25 (a hot coffee with espresso and hot water)
Italian Soda $0.75 (a cold drink without coffee with ice, soda water, the syrup/s of your choice and a dash of cold milk in the top)
Iced Coffee $0.75 (a cold coffee drink with espresso, ice and cold milk)
Frappuccino $0.50no coffee $0.75with coffee (a cold drink that can be served with or without coffee that combines syrup, ice, milk and possibly coffee and then is blended into deliciousness)

All the prices listed above are for drinks with 1 shot of expresso. Additional shots of espresso can be ordered for $0.25 per shot.

All of these drinks are available with any flavour combination you want from our list of available flavours for an additional $0.25

Can you see there might be a problem with this and me.......... Coffeeeeeeeee :)

Arrival

Ok this morning (12th September) I felt like well no other word for it plain ill, fun! I got to the airport 3 hours early as the information said and guess what – yep you guessed it don’t need to be there until 2 hours before takeoff, ARHHHHHHHHHHHHHHL

I did get to however pick if I wanted isle or window so I took a window seat. I have not flown in a commercial jet since 1996 and that don’t count as it was to go to the states for a week. LOL. Yep I can already hear Tammy saying how dare you say the states is not a real place.

The flight out was great, I wish my cars had acceleration like that. Standing start to take off speed in 10 seconds or so. The view out of the plane window was great and helped put a few things into prospective or maybe I’m just suffering from Hay Fever (Emotional). The sky was a lovely red and blue as the sun was most defiantly coming up the clouds looked like a sea of pillows. Even the way the clouds where spread out it looked well like it was land with valleys and hills, flat spots even a few rivers.

(Brussels)

I’m so confused with time zone differences right now as my phone is telling me its 8:30am and the airport is advising its 9:30am...... What time is it. The nice lady at check in looked a bit confused at the bags and the passport picture while looking at me, I just laughed it off and said I was having a bad hair week. But she was nice enough to book me in to both flights and sort out a baggage transfer, we like stuff like this makes travel so much more fun.

To be honest although I’m sat in Brussels airport typing this it does not feel real, will it hit me when I land or when I see the boat. God is definitely in control of this situation, I pray that this will be a blessing to all.

Ok in Brussels the plane was meant to board at 10:10 their time, well let’s just say it was a 10:10 when the boarding happened but not in their time zone, my first lesson in patients. I hate to queue but somehow not give a care when I have to wait for something. I saw a few people with mercy ship tops on but was not sure if they were crew or just family of crew.

One the people came over and said hello, this is another trip out for her and it seems all the other people are used to this with mercy ships, so for once I’m the noob (new boy). So looking forward to being there.

The flight was long from Brussels but we had a stopover at a place called Banjul, the landing well was ruff, there is no other words for it just was. However the captain did manage to turn around the plane quite quickly. The views out of the window and bearing in mind I have a centre aisle seat on this flight, just stacker the imagination. Green follows by sea with tractors and houses dotted here there everywhere. It just seemed brighter and looked like a nice place.

From Banjul we fly to Lungi airport in Freetown this could be and interesting bit of the flight, but not being able to see much other then the wing and cloud, its going to be hard to tell.

Not even got to the Africa Mercy and still travelling but I love it so far.

Arrived in Lungi at about 5pm local time and got off the plane, I was still wearing my jacket from Newcastle but when I got to the top of the stairs on the plane I decided to change my mind and take it of. The temperature was hot, wow it really was bear in mind the in Newcastle it was probably raining and only about 16C this was 28 with rain. I got off the plane and arrived into the terminal and waited for the rest of the group.

We went through customs very quickly and then had to collect our luggage, from there we got in to a mini van and headed down to the ferry. The drive to the ferry was interesting to say the least, the sights, the sounds and the smell.

We got to the ferry and boarded, we pushed up some stairs and our luggae was there with us, completly effortless, afew of us headed out to the deck to watch the sun go down, the sun here sets at 7pm and its not a long slow thing like in Newcastle but very quick. we watched the sun go down and sailed past the Africa Mercy tied up at the dock. I wish I'd taken the camera out of the bag for a picture.

When we got to the other side a couple of Mercy Ships crew meet us and took us back to the ship, this took a while battleing through the traffic here. Once on the ship we had a bite to eat and did some paper work.

OK its taken me 3 days to start to write this blog and its a bit on the spardict side but this is my brain without the usual intake of coffee. hmmmm cofffffeeeeee time for starbucks $1.25 for cup.

Last week in Newcastle

Ok this is my last week in Newcastle and there has been a few things that need to be done also some stuff has been arranged for me to attend.

Monday night I was invited out to a meal by a couple of friends, it was a nice Italian restaurant in Heaton. The food was great and enjoyable but silly me ordered a chili based pizza, a little to spicey for me. Since giving up smoking the hot food has had to go.

Tuesday - nothing really planned.

Wednesday - meeting up a with a small number of people top say good bye, also because Wednesday night is the one night I like to hang out with a small number of people and just chat about stuff.

Thursday Night - The Davis are back and we're having a joint homegroup with them in the Basement, this will be great as we have not had chance to hang out with them since mid June.

Friday - Down the Basement all day just to hang out and attempt not to do the sound for the group that is in.

Saturday - a small dinner around my old land lords house with a few people to say bye and stuff.

Sunday - Church and lunch, this will be hard.

Monday morning get on a plane - OMG.

It’s been a good couple of days as I got to hang out with someone else I know who is off to east Africa for 3 months to do a diploma in Tropical Medicine, we both decided on Sunday at church we were not scared or worried but fine with our decisions.

The fact we are following what God has put on our hearts makes it a lot easier to just pick up our lives and condense them so that it fits into 2 bags. The fact that we’re going half way round the world to learn and serve people that we don’t even know is a testament to Gods work on our lives.

Every time I’m asked if I’m ok or how are you the answer is always been I’m fine because I’m so used to moving around the country, but this time it’s different it’s not like I’m moving down to London or even over to France, this is a move across to a small vessel moored in a different continent.

Every day I pray that God will provide the strength I need to cope with this move and the wisdom in what he has called me to do. I have no real idea on what to expect when I get there, like I said I’m used to moving around a bit. This is different; it has a different feel to it. It’s not a choice I would have made in fact it’s the opposite choice from what I would have made. Yes if you ask I will tell you its all ok and I’m good, this is so I don’t break down and cry. I’m scared of this trip and yet excited to see what God will do in my life, leaving what I know behind to move forward to the unknown; totally surrendered to God.

Please pray for me while I prepare for this trip and that I would walk in the footsteps of our God and Lord Jesus Christ.