But it was cool. We finally got done with our Culture Project and presented it to everyone - we had a song about the town, a video (with me and another girl as the reporters) of us exploring the tiny town, and then a photo presentation. It was so interesting to see everyone's presentation about their towns, their ministries, and their prayer requests. And just as I was thanking God the huge assignment was over (I wrote the entire report 'cause the rest of my team was either non-native English speakers or just plain lazy), we got new huge assignments. Ugh. So much for graduating from college.
Although... if given a choice between homework and physical exertion, I'd take homework any day. We woke up at the unearthly hour of 5am and drove 4 hours to Wales on Wednesday in cramped vans and started our torturous mountain hike at Snowdon Mountain. They scared us by telling us the weather would be below zero celsius, and that we would need tons of energy and sugar to climb the mountain, so I was prepared. Boy, I was more than prepared. I had on 3 pairs of socks, waterproof hiking boots, 2 leggings and 1 sweatpants, 1 t-shirt, 1 long-sleeved shirt, 1 woolen long-sleeved shirt, 1 thick hoodie, 1 huge jacket (borrowed from the base), and 1 waterproof jacket over everything. By the time I got everything on, I looked like an enormous dumpling, especially since all the waterproof stuff was borrowed and hence, too big. So yeah, I was totally overprepared.
My hideous, ginormous jacket is from the donation closet at the base. But hey, keeping warm is more important than looking nice - Tip #1 for mountain climbing.
As soon as we started climbing the never ending mountain, I started sweating and took off 2 layers. And then I had to carry my heavy bag stuffed with jackets and lots of water and sandwiches and chocolate (for energy) all the way up the mountain. It was awful. I've never eaten so much in my life. Seriously, climbing a mountain just sucks all the energy out of your body.
I was faking this exhausted face, but it wasn't too far from the truth - most of the time, I probably looked like that.
But not all of it was bad. We had fun times talking and laughing when I wasn't panting in exhaustion or busy concentrating on the rocks so I wouldn't fall off the edge. I was stuck at the back of the group with some other girls, and we took our time hiking. The tour guide showed us the railway track where they filmed a Harry Potter movie, and some pipeline where they filmed a scene from James Bond, so that was cool.
Heart-shaped lake at the bottom of the mountain
He also showed us a pole with coins stuck in it in memory of the people who died climbing the mountain! Naturally, we all freaked out and begged him to bring us down so we wouldn't face the same fate as these unfortunate (or foolish) souls. But he was one stubborn man. So we continued the climb with fear in our hearts. Okay, I wasn't that scared; I'm not afraid of heights. I was just annoyed at having to climb the mountain to 'challenge myself and push myself to the limit so I can discover new things about myself' - as said by our leaders. Um, news flash, I can 'discover new things about myself' in other situations, such as taking a quiz or a survey or something.
Anyway, after 4 hours, we finally got to the summit, where the view was breathtaking. There was a little bit of snow, but hardly enough to make snowballs or snow angels. So... it really wasn't worth the climb for me. I could've admired the view from a postcard and still be as happy. But whatever. I was just glad the climb was over. And then we spotted a train coming up the mountain with passengers. And we all just about fainted with anger, because why climb an entire mountain when you can simply take the train???
The pathetic white lumps are snow.
But no, we had to continue 'pushing ourselves' and so we climbed down the mountain, which was possibly worse than going up, because it started to hail (sort of like snow but harder and hence more dangerous). So all the rocks were slippery and it was steep, and our genius tour guide decided to lead us back the long way. I didn't fall, because my eyes were glued to the ground the entire time (I don't think I even looked at the view on the way down), but others slipped and fell many times and got bruises everywhere. Oh well. At least we saw sheep eating grass on steep slopes and laughed when my friend tried to pet one and it rolled down the hill because it was scared and lost its footing. So cute.
When we finally reached the bottom (I was not last, YES!), I sat down in the van and couldn't move. And the next day and the day after, my legs hurt like never before. My shoulders, too. Basically every part of my body, even my head, because I was probably dehydrated. I didn't drink much water for fear of having to pee on the mountain in clear view of all the people and the sheep.
But I did muster up what little energy I had left to shower, because my clothes were disgustingly damp from all the sweat. Gross. And then, after dinner, we still had to go out and 'rescue' people with a map and a compass in the dark and creepy jungle. It was the most pointless game in the world.
I thought I would go straight to sleep when my head finally hit the pillow after the longest day in the world, but I didn't sleep much. I always have trouble sleeping in a foreign place on the first day, don't know why. So the next day, they brought us to another national park/jungle place, where we split into teams and played team-building games. Oh how I hate those games. We had to 'cross the dangerous river filled with crocodiles and other man-eating creatures' (i.e. the road) with 2 tires and 2 planks of wood and 1 rope. We did it successfully so many times, but every time they would tell us, do it faster! It was really annoying.
And then we had to build a stretcher and carry someone who had 'broken their back' to another location. Oh boy. This one took forever. We were only given a few minutes to plan and build, and each time we failed to build the stretcher by the time limit, we had to start over. I thought we would never complete the activity. But finally we got all the sticks and tied them together, and the lightest girl lay in it and we carried her up the muddy hill to the 'final location.' It was horrible. Our team was just weak physically, so I nearly died trying to carry her. One girl hurt her back, another hurt her arm... there were injuries everywhere. Everyone was exhausted except the 'injured' person happily lying in the stretcher. Actually, she was pale with fear because we nearly dropped her a couple of times. After that, we eased our pain by eating tons of chocolate. Seriously, they feed us chocolate like nobody's business.
Building our stretcher
The last activity my team did was to build a bridge with pointed planks of wood where the wood could only touch 2 sides of the 'river.' We sat around and thought about ideas until our heads hurt. We tried building different bridges but to no avail. I just wanted to stab the person who thought of this game with one of the planks. It was impossible. I'm a writer, not an architect or engineer. So finally we gave up, also because one girl hurt her head from another game and she had to go to the hospital. It was scary. But she turned out to be fine, thank God.
Then at night, we gathered in the lounge to play another game. The team-building games just keep on comin'. This was better though, because it required more mental effort as we sat comfortably on chairs in the warmth of the house. We had to rank different professions in terms of their importance to ourselves, and then we had to come together as a group and ALL AGREE on each ranking. It was like asking pigs to fly. The task was impossible from the start. People started getting very passionate about why priests are more important than doctors or whatever, and you could sense the tension in the room building. Some people cried, some people yelled, some people had steam coming out of their heads. It was intense, to say the least. Plus we all came from different countries, so the cultural and background differences gave us all different perspectives on each profession. We were stuck in the room for about 4 hours. I was like, whatever. It's just a ranking. It's really not life and death, people. No need to kill each other over this.
So finally, after all the drama, I came up with a solution and people listened to me because we were all tired of arguing. I defined each profession specifically, and purposely made some professions better than others, so everyone agreed, and we finally got to go to bed. Some people were hugging me with tears in their eyes, thanking me for putting a stop to this nonsense so we could all get some sleep. Some people didn't like the solution because they wanted to continue arguing. It was kind of funny and yet really annoying, the entire activity.
Our solution
The next day was filled with debriefs. Then we had SOLO time - they dropped us in the wilderness of the national park with nothing but tons of clothes, waterproof stuff, food, and water. No bible, no phone, no watch, nothing. We were supposed to spend solo time with God, to allow Him to speak to us. Good idea... in theory. Not so much in reality.
It was pouring rain, so not only was it freezing cold, it was wet, muddy, and completely miserable. AND they left us there for 3 whole hours. I was by a rushing stream, so I was in total agony the entire time, as the sound of water flowing kept making me want to go pee even worse. But I refused to pee in the jungle. Too uncivilized.
That's kind of what my spot looked like - beautiful but miserable.
At first I tried to approach the situation with a good attitude - I prayed and asked God to speak to me and tell me whatever He wanted to say, but after hearing nothing for a long time, and after losing feeling in both hands due to the cold, I gave up. I started praying for God to send someone to save me, to change the minds of the leaders and make them stop this insane activity, to do something at the very least. But nothing happened for a long time. It was awful. I don't even know how long it was because I didn't have a watch to stare at and count the seconds!
I tried standing up, but the sloshy mud got into my boots. I tried sitting down, but the water soaked through my lousy water proof pants. I tried lying down to sleep (so I could drift off to a happy warm place), but I was too concerned with getting bitten to death by insects and snakes. So for 3 entire hours I was stuck in my 3 metre perimeter circle, unable to move for fear that the leaders would not find me and I would be lost forever in the national park. I think I finally know what it feels like to be homeless. And I hope I never get that feeling ever again. When we all got back to the van, we joked about how we just successfully endured our 'persecution,' but none of us were really joking. I just think it was stupid, because God can totally speak to me in the comfort of my bed. He doesn't need me to go out into the middle of nowhere for Him to tell me something.
My face was pretty much like this angry puppy's, except not as cute.
Finally, finally, finally, after that, we made our way home. But then, would you know it, one of the vans broke down, so we were stuck for another 2 hours (and I had to continue holding my pee in). Later, we had dinner from a fish & chips place (they're everywhere in England - but they don't just have fish; they have kebab & chips, sausage & chips, burger & chips... and it's all pretty bland, just like every other British food).
Funny moment - one girl hopped into a pub to use the restroom with a sleeping bag wrapped around her as a substitute for pants because hers was wet from the rain. How often do you see that in a pub??
When we got home at midnight, I was exhausted and so ready for bed. Oh home, sweet home.
No comments:
Post a Comment