{Day 1} July 22, 2012

The Spirit of Adventure!!

     I am going to Haiti. Today I flew out of Sky Harbor [airport] with Gart Wright and his little sister Bethany. Our first flight was to Dallas, Texas. That is where we met up with 2 other girls -> Hilary & Becky. They both go to BYU. Well Hilary actually just graduated.
     In Dallas we got on a flight to Florida. It is now 1:30am and we are sleeping in the airport. Well the girls are. Gart and I are still up. I don't think I'll get any sleep tonight.

Becky, Hilary and Bethany sleeping in the airport.

Gart and I at way too early in the morning

     Gart and I were talking and this crazy Haitian lady started talking to us. We don't speak Haitian Creole and she doesn't speak any English. I feel like she was lecturing us about something and I slowly felt the reality hit me. I am going to Haiti. I don't know anything about Haiti. I don't even know if I could find it on a map to be honest and now I'm planning on being there for 4 weeks. Really? Smart move Katie.
     Before this experience, I was all smiles and excitement. Now I'm just thinking of a way to get out of this. A few months ago I decided I wanted to do a service trip. The idea of going to a third world country kind of scared me so I decided I would pray about this desire and I would look for answer at conference. One of the first talks were about the importance of service and then he [the speaker] spoke about an example of people in Haiti. I felt like this was a good sign.
      I applied and was accepted to serve with an organization called Sustain Haiti. We will be teaching English, going to orphanagesm helping with gardens, teaching public health classes and anything else they need us to do. I'm excited but so scared.




Extras:

Gart and I studied Haitian Creole in the airport. The crazy Haitian lady's son taught some to us. 

At the top of every page of my journal, I wrote a random story or memory or quote. I will call these Snippets:

Becky and I got hot chocolate and doughnuts in the airport at 3am. the worker lady was grumpy. Becky got a bagel and hot chocolate for like $4.65. I got hot chocolate, a bagel and a doughnut (that was supposed to be 99 cents) for $4.85. I tried explaining to the worker lady but she was grumpy. I think she spit in the hot chocolate cause it tasted disgusting. haha. We were so slap happy. We giggled about it for hours