I'm Leaving On a Jet Plane

Post 2 and I am already relying on cliche song titles for Blog post titles. But I have had that song stuck in my head the last few days. I have packing, repacked, and packed again (just for good measure). As to what I have forgotten to pack, I am sure that is a post for a later date. As I finished packing today I was surrounded by family who were supposed to help me weed through what I didn't really need. We took out one hoodie and replaced it with a blanket, a swimsuit, and a few more odds and ends just in case! My family is a bunch of enablers.

There is one thing I should make clear before we start this journey together. I am not a writer, I have great respect for the English language but grammar and spelling are not my friend. I will do my best to proof read but I have a tendency to read what I meant to write not actually what is written. -ing, -ed, -s are very commonly left off the end of words, get used to it, embrace it, try to understand what I meant to write. Please don't give me too hard a time for it, I have always been this way and making fun of me for it will only get me to stop writing.

That being said...

The past few months, I have done a lot of preparing and packing! Reading up on Korean culture and what to expect as a missionary. Moving all my digital media to my netbook, making sure all my accounts are aware of my traveling, cleaning my room at my parents house. Speaking of, anyone who will be visiting my parents in the next year and staying in my room... Make yourself at home. Just know that opening the closet should be done at your own risk, and it isn't pretty. Also looking around my room, it looks like I still live there, what can I say I can cram a lot of stuff into my suitcases but they are not Mary Poppin's bag. Mom I promise, one day I will move out and you will have a real guest bedroom.

I have also been getting used to the phrase, see you in August of 2011. So long bed, later DVD collection, goodbye netflix, not to mention family and friends. To be honest though, it really hasn't hit me yet. Perhaps tomorrow at the airport, but even now staring at my two (huge) suitcases that I will be living from for the next 11 months it is hard to grasp exactly what I have gotten myself into. I know it will be the adventure of a lifetime, that I will be learning a new language, a new culture, not to mention a new diet. But I suspect until I am actually there doing exactly those things, there is just no knowing what God has in store for me or exactly how he will use me.

I am most nervous about the language barrier, learning languages has never been my strength. But the food... sure I have eaten at a few Korean restaurants, the waitress assured me what I was eating was authentic and I liked it. She then also informed me that I should add the red sauce it made it better. I told her that I tried it and it was too spicy. Then she looked at me with concern, as though I was either crazy or that I was going to starve. Great Good news is today Keith brought me a big bag of Starburst, that might even make it to South Korea!!

Regardless of whether I am ready or not, my preparations must now end because tomorrow I board a plane to New York. I am so excited for the next week I will be in Stony Point, New York with all the YAVs from all the cites for orientation. Then August 30th the real adventure begins! Thank you to everyone for all their patience and support over the past few months, I would not be doing this without it!!