First Day Back and More Stories

OK, so I borrowed a few of these pics from the official Passion blog, but they used a few of my pictures so I figured turnabout was fair play.

Well today was my first day back at work and it actually went really smoothly, no real effects of jet lag, go figure. My feet and body feel pretty good. I guess that's just as the song goes, "Amazing Grace." Today I sort of feel like Jack from the show LOST in last year's season finale, "We have to go back!" Note, I am a huge LOST fan, I didn't watch it the first 2 years, but am hooked now and am watching season 1 and 2 on DVD now. If I could watch 1 hour of TV a week, that would be it. I just can't wait to be involved in another Passion event either on another stop on the world tour or in the next US event.

It's amazing how a trip to Africa changes your perspective. I rode MARTA from the airport to downtown through south Atlanta and remember thinking, "Wow, this is a pretty nice neighborhood." I don't think I ever thought I'd feel that way about that section of track and, although I know Atlanta is building, I don't think it changed as much as I did. I'm sure over time some details and memories will fade, but some changes will be forever. We had such an great group of volunteers that worked so hard and gave so much, but I know we all received back more than we gave.

Passion Kampala still seems almost surreal. Some fun stories. So it's the last night and I'm sitting in volunteer central on a chair and there are maybe 4 other people off in the distance. This huge Ugandan man comes up to me and totally straight-faced says, "Get Up!" I was like, "I'm sorry?" and he said again, "Get Up!" I was a slight bit worried and got up slowly and he proceeded to wrap me in a bear hug and thank me for coming to Kampala, an amazing moment.

Final story for the day, driving. Speed limits, lanes...mere suggestions. The ride to the airport is a 2 lane road and there are some slow cars in Uganda and tight turns, making passing interesting. We were riding in a bus back to the airport and we were 4 hours early for our flight and our driver was passing like crazy, sometimes too close for comfort. Matt was screaming, "Patrick (our driver) I want to see my mom again!" or "We're 4 hours early!" We put our hands up like on a roller coaster for one picture. Sometimes we'd be in the straddling the middle line with a car on each side going in opposite directions. I expected a NASCAR announcer or someone from the movie Cars to be screaming, "Three Wide! Three Wide!"

Well more stories to come and I'll also be uploading all my pics soon.