Bagistan

     Missions Week. After an increibley rainy and relaxing week of lectures on what to expect on the missions field, the bomb was dropped. "We're going to Bagistan guys!". What? My thoughts exactly. After our gracious 15 minutes of packing time we arrived at the "airport". This is when I understood what was happening. We were about to endure 30 hours of missions simulation. This meant no bed, one outfit, no roof, no toothbrush...you get the picture.
     So after trucking through the airport being detained and questioned we walked outside to a sea of beggers. This was where I learned the valuable lesson of carrying my backpack on my front rather than my actual back. After that maddness our team headed to the markets. We had a few meals we had to prepare for ourselves so we chose some essentials, rice, oats, sausage, carrots, and of course curry sauce. We also had the rare pleasure of dried salted fish chips that we had to eat because it was a gift. Yum. Sense the tone.  While at the market we also picked up our housing resources for the next 30 hours. This meant a tarp and a rope. According to instructions, our "home" was basically under a set of stairs behind a dumpster area. Cool. Oh I forgot to mention that is had been raining for a solid two weeks prior and was continuing to rain all throughout this time, thus resulting in an obviously soaked ground.
     Next on the agenda was an English class. With 10 minutes of prep time we pulled off a surprisingly decent 2 hour lesson. After that we had a bit of time to cook and eat dinner, in the rain. Immediately following a very large dinner portion of sausage, rice and curry we were told we had to attend a house visit. No problem right? Wrong. A huge part of missions simulation is that you HAVE to eat whatever your host offers you. Now most of you reading this have no idea what Vegiemite is, but basically it is yeast exctract, a by-product of beer manufacturing made into paste form. Toughest thing I have ever had to eat. But it was definitely a learning and growing experience. Now it was finally time for bed. All 8 of Team Russia crammed under our tarp and attempted to get some rest. When we realized that was a pipe dream, we all just sat together in the rain and talked the rest of the night and into morning. It was actually a pretty awesome bonding time.
     The next day. Still raining. After an awesome prayer walk, we prepared to lead a 2 hour Bible study. In Russia we will actually be doing alot of this so it was really cool to see how we worked as a team and actually pulled together and led a suprisingly powerful Bible study. Things were beginnning to look up. Now it was time for our host meal. Every team went through a station where they had to eat some sort of the worst case scenario meal for the country. For instance, Team India has the hottest curry known to man and Team Saipan had mounds and mounds of rice and fish. Luckily, Russia is actually known for having really delicious food so we just had to stuff ourselves with a bad pot of boursch and sauerkraut. Now it was time to get a little cleaned up. And by that I mean learn to take a bucket shower. Soaked from the shower and dripping from the rain, it was time to lead kid's ministry. Good thing we won't be doing a ton of this in Russia because this was definitely not our strong point. Thank goodness I had ONE MILLION kids songs to pull out of my back pocket. Thanks Res. Finally, after some gutter cleaning and weed pulling, missions week was finished.
     Holy smokes. What a challenge. What a time of stretch and growth. I have never felt so close to my team, literally and otherwise. It was awful and wonderful all at the same time. It was so eye opening and really brought new perspective. I realized my limits and my strengths as well as all of my teams. It was exactly what we needed to understand how we functioned as a unit and what we can expect on outreach.
     I apologize for the length of this post but I figured it would provide some entertainment. TWO WEEKS TILL WE LEAVE FOR VLADIVOSTOK!!!!