wednesday. june 27 2oo7

i'm currently in southaven, mississippi. i mentioned to some of you that i flew to memphis. the orientation i'm attending is located in southaven on the border right outside of memphis. after finishing a devotional, i figured i'd update yall on the past few days i've experienced back at home. [ 06.21.07 ] - on this particular day, i was blessed by a family who loves me. they treated me out to a nice restaurant on the 24th floor of the hilton in downtown houston. "luxurious" is probably the best word to describe the place. i enjoyed spending time with them. actually i always enjoy spending time with them. it's always nice to be able to share experiences with each other. i liked the cool fold-out menu we sat at the best table in the restaurant because it was in the corner where you could look out and get two views of the city. the windows were so clean! i ordered the special. it was called "the three little pigs". basically they prepared pork in three different ways. my favorite was the one in its own separate container. it's the fanciest macaroni and cheese i've ever eaten, but man was it good! i'm glad we stayed long enough to get a night view also. a chocolate cake with a banana button on top =] [ 06.22.07 ] - i had the opportunity to eat a really nice chinese dinner with my aunt, my cousin, her husband, her baby son (lucas), and other people. when i say "nice chinese" food, i'm talking about stuff that's genuinely chinese and not cheap. i'm blessed to be born in a culture that prides itself on the quality of food. i believe that's frog you're looking at. it tastes like chicken, and it's got weird bones. [ 06.23.07 ] - saturday is the day most people schedule to hang out with me. in the morning i met up with my aunt and uncle to eat breakfast at la madeline's. i had an omelette but forgot to bring my camera. once again, i enjoyed sharing my kenyan experiences. and of course, i love hearing stories about ansley. i can't wait to see that baby girl. we're gonna have loooooong conversations. then i met up with johnny, emily, tim, and daniel for lunch at earl of sandwich. since i typically don't eat breakfast, i was too full to eat lucnh. but it's all good because i ordered a baked potato soup. it totally hit the spot. then i got home, passed out, and was woken up by jonathan. the two of us and my brother picked up joyce and headed to jamba juice because they have buy one, get one free coupons. yea coupons! we also walked over to chipotle afterwards, but once again i forgot to take a picture of my food. it's ok because i'm sure i've shown you enough pictures of food by now =] in the evening, i headed to church to check out the uganda/kenya mission team presentation. they had recently come back and put together a slideshow and video of their experience. i was especially interested in their individual experiences during the sharing time. oh btw, there's more of them. this is the only picture i got =P [ 06.25.07 ] - this is the best story out of all the pics you've seen, so i hope you've made it this far. i left on monday to take a flight to memphis to attend an orientation held by my missionary organization. here's a rundown of what was supposed to happen that day: - wake up at 9:00am - leave house at 10:00am - arrive at airport at 11:00am - flight leaves at 12:07 - arrive in memphis at 1:45pm here's what really happened: - at noon as we're about to board the plane, a lady gets on the intercom and announces that the flight is cancelled due to maintenance problems. in my entire life of flying, i've never been booked for a flight that cancelled. so instantly, i tried to rebook another flight to get me to memphis as soon as possible because people were waiting to pick me up there. because of the delay, they gave me $10 compensation for food. i bought lasagna and peach snapple from a place called UNO. the flight i rebooked would leave for shreveport, lousiana at 2:15pm and arrive at 3:20pm. then a connecting flight would leave at 4:15 from shreveport and land in memphis at 5:20pm. i figured that's not so bad. i only lost about two hours, right? so i arrive at the gate around 2:15pm only to find out that due to weather the flight is delayed and will depart around 3:30pm! that means i'd arrive in shreveport at 4:35pm, which would make me miss the connecting flight to memphis. so i went back to the counter and the coolest lady there helped me with the next nonstop flight to memphis. i ended up waiting on standby for a flight that was leaving at 4:15pm. there was no guarantee i'd get on, but it was worth a shot. for another two hours delayed, she gave me another $10 comp for food. i bought hot chocolate and cheetos. in the end, the flight ended up leaving at 5:00pm, and i arrived in memphis around 7:45pm. to sum it all up, i woke up at 9:00am in order to arrive in a city about an hour and half away at 7:45pm. and i thought africa would have more trouble in the airport =P whew that was alot of pics. i'm glad i got that updated. i'll keep you posted on my experience out here in southaven. so far, i've met all the new teachers. they seem pretty cool so far. peace out! ::: :::

thursday. june 14 2oo7

ok less words and more pictures. here we go... it's been tough buying stuff around here because i think i'm internally comparing prices with stuff on toy market. i finally came across a shirt that costs less than a mcdonald's extra value meal. yesterday it was jeremy's 22nd bday. we took him to d&b's, and here's a picture just to remind him what he looked like that night. here are some nice blurry pics of people who showed up. after a couple hours of playing and years worth of tickets accumulated, stanley decides to drop 6950 tix on this bad boy. you see those wheels? well this is a serious car. it even came with spare "drifting" tires. it comes with a little wrench to remove the wheels too. also, i should mention that jeremy and my brother work together at church, which means they have a nice long hallway to race. so naturally, jeremy requested that we take him to walmart at midnight to purchase his own speed racer. he ended up getting a black celica. i need to remember to take pics of that too. i'm sure those two are racing in fbcc hallways at this very moment...*ahem*...i mean...working on this upcoming week's fellowship activities. ::: :::

monday. june 11 2oo7

man it's sooooo hot and humid here in houston. recap time... [ 06.06.07 ] - wednesday afternoon my dad picked me up from the airport. i drove for the first time in 10 months to surprise my brother at church. i started driving on the left side of the road. good thing i was still in my subdivision. it's crazy to think that my brother is the youth intern, and jeremy is the college intern. after hanging out with them alittle, my parents took me out to pappadeux's for dinner. right after dinner, i met up with jason at star snow. i haven't had boba in soooo long! jason ended up coming over and playing darts with stanley. the whole day was full of people back-to-back. it was great. good thing i don't really suffer from jetlag. [ 06.07.07 ] - thursday i took care of laundry and started unpacking stuff. after lunch, i went over to my aunt's house to visit my cousin and my new baby nephew. he looks really different from the picture i received from his mother. he's got crazy hair that stands up on its own. since i was nearby, i decided to drop by the mall to check out the new changes. nothing really surprised me because i've seen other malls develop over the years, except for this one machine i found in macy's. it was the giant vending machine. when i walked over to look inside, i noticed that it wasn't selling chips or candy. every item in the vending machine was ipod-related. it sold a bunch of ipod accessories. it even sold ipod nanos and ipod shuffles. what is the world coming to?!?! they might as well sell cellphones out of a vending machine too. i need to go back and take a picture of it. after the mall, i met up with my brother and friends for basketball out at whcc. it felt great running up and down the court. to wrap up the day, sonic happened to give out FREE root beer floats that night. it was perfect right after ball. [ 06.08.07 ] - friday morning tak calls me up to take me out to lunch at old place cafe. it was a good time of sitting and sharing about my experience in kenya. he got me thinking about the future. afterwards, i headed over to starbucks to remind my tastebuds of what it was like. turns out that yvette is now the store manager! it was fun seeing her and getting a free drink =] now that all the hillcroft partners are spread out, it'll be tough trying to find everyone. ah well. i'm sure i'll run into them somehow. jason met up with me at sb and drove me out to chipotle to meet up with parnali. i had already eaten, so i just sat there and shared my experiences again. i hope parnali's able to reach her goals. it's nice to meet people who want to make a difference, instead of sitting around and letting the world turn. afterwards, i drove home just at the right time because omar and vincent dropped by to hang out. even though it was brief, it was good seeing them. i still can't believe they're going to college next year. after they left, my cousin from dallas shows up. we ate at johnny rockets and caught up on the past year. i need to visit his kids up in dallas. they grow so much in one year. after stuffing myself with a yummy chili burger, fries, and oreo cookie shake, jason and i played ball from 10:45-12:00 at swcbc. i got to see jeffrey and doulos there. those two ballers grew up pretty fast too. after you've balled till midnight, you gotta call it a night. [ 06.09.07 ] - saturday was a good time spent with my parents. we first went out to kim son to yum-cha. that's definitely something i'll never get in kenya, or even africa. then i joined them to watch ocean's 13. it was just as clever as the first two, but i don't think any sequel can compare to the first one. there was a nice surprise at the end of the first one. now we've come to expect it, so it's just not the same. after the movie, i headed home because jonlai, je, and jeremy came over to visit. i dunno if it's because i've been walking alot in nairobi, but even though it was hot and humid outside i felt like walking home. everyone thought i was crazy for walking. i think i covered at least a quarter of a mile, but it was nice for me to just walk. it's such a simple thing, and i enjoy it sometimes. after hanging out with friends, we went out to church because i wanted to see some of the high school kids at fellowship. during the summer, everyone is gone, either on vacation or mission trips. but it was still good seeing some of them. i also had jack in the box. one day fastfood will kill me. when i eat it, i'm fully aware of how gross it is. but my mouth just can't resist sometimes. later on that evening, it was a brooding lan party...if you know what i mean..har har. [ 06.10.07 ] - coincidentally enough, my brother spoke for the first time in FOCUS on sunday. since sam and cynthia are both on mission trips, the intern has the honorary task of preparing a sermon. i think he did pretty well. his thoughts were clear and organized. i didn't know that he also had to take care of communion. it's a simple thing, but i would've never imagined him doing that. after church, we played ball with the hsers. i've been back for 5 days, and i've already played ball 3 times! i'd be lying if i said that my body was not sore right now. but it's a good sore. after taking almost a ritualistic sunday nap, i got up just in time to eat some nice juicy steak that my mom prepared. and of course, people came over for game2 of the nba finals. there was a brief moment of hope for the cavs in the 4th quarter when they brought the spurs' lead down to a single digit. but in the end, tony parker owned. alright, i'm probably just as tired of writing all this text as you are of reading it. i need to take pics, huh? ::: :::