Proving That I Am Not a Wimp

A few years ago, I got a brochure in the mail about an Alliance Women Mission vision trip going to China and Mongolia. I was active in our local group and thought "I think I could do that" so I was immediately interested. When our daughter Katie heard about it, she didn't think it likely because she knew (somewhat truthfully) that "I was too much of a wimp" to handle it. I had gone to Mexico with a youth group and barely survived the heat, grumbling often to myself (and out loud at times too:), though I did enjoy the people I went with and the wonderful people we met there. Now, I was doubly motivated.
The first step was the preparation - taking only 44 pounds in my suitcase. I barely made it. I also tried unsuccessfully to take along an adaptor plug for my hair dryer and curling iron (which melted my first day there) and an international phone card, which only worked once. So much for trying.
Bev Lynch, a friend from church, gave me her frequent flyer miles to get to California. Church friends helped me in various ways too. From California, we flew over 14 hours to Hong Kong. It felt like eternity but we made it. We also started to bond as a small group of about 20 ladies.
Yes, I walked on the Great Wall of China. Amazing. I knew little about it before I went. We saw a few other sights too. The main part though was meeting some orphans out in the boondocks of China and a youth group in Mongolia. I also got to visit a home/yurt, which is a tent shaped uniquely sort of like an igloo, and also used in this case, as a place of worship. I would love to have taken a twelve year old girl home, who kept putting eye like food on my plate as we ate with the orphans buffet style. In the youth group, we heard of a young man who had sold his guitar to get his brother out of prison. He also was a translator for the missionaries. When asked what pay he wanted, he said that he wanted to look more and more like His true heavenly Father. Some of us chipped in, without him asking, to get a replacement for his guitar. In the yurt, around a rusty wood stove on a very cold day, people in the church got up one after another praising God for the most minute things. I asked the missionary if they were trying to impress us. He said they did this every week.
It really was a trip of a lifetime. I am the only person in the group who made it through the whole trip never using their form of a bathroom (squatty potties). On the way back, it only took 11 plus hours to fly from Hong Kong to California. Anyone who has been away from America knows the gratitude you feel being back on native soil. I made some new friends and proved that I am not quite as much of a wimp as some, including myself, may have previously thought.