Travel and Back

These last few weeks have been filled with new and different things.  

First of all, I got the chance to go back to my old home: Perth, Australia.  I use to work there as a volunteer.  Asia is great and all but not for dermatologists.  Due to some skins concerns I decided to invest a little extra to be safe.  When my visa expired, I headed to the best place to get skin checks: Australia (I'm heppy to report all is well).  

While there, I was able to relax, pray a lot, and see many old friends....some of whom I was surprised by.  Unfortunately, I was too relaxed to take many pictures.  This is the only I got: 

While in Perth, I did a training school.  The 2 guys were part of the that school and I hadn't seen them in over 3 years.  I thought they were in other countries so was stoked to see them!

My next trip kept me in Indonesia.  I went to see my friend up north and helped her with some English teaching stuff.  

She had planned a big English spelling bee and asked me to be a judge.  For the record.....I almost failed spelling and suffered greatly until "auto correct" came out :)  

Dont' worry! I was truthful with her so she suggest I teach the kids how to make something "bule" (meaning "Western").  So, I taught 200 kids how to make pancakes.  There was no order....I had a small table and gas burner to use.  They all crowded around me as I struggled to help them learn some English cooking words while making the pancakes (I say "struggle" because unlike most women......multi-tasking is NOT a strength of mine.....ESPECIALLY in the kitchen)

                                   

The kids, however, seemed to like it and many wanted to volunteer to help.  

Other things that happened while there was that a church asked me to preach......a few hours before the service started.  Yup!!! If I've learned anything, it's how to be flexible and get good on thinking on my feet.  When I arrived, they slapped a formal preaching ribbon thingy on me.  Wow!  I felt official! First time I've worn one of those....it felt weird and too formal for the likes of me :)   The preaching went great I think (hope)

Afterwards, I went to the Pastor's house where I was happy to see these people never loose the spirit of Christmas.  

....and where I got to enjoy a local sweet fruit

.......and where I got to also enjoy fried fish (yes....I even eat the head...it's not bad if fried)

Story time! since my hosts wanted to fry some fish for us, they invited me to their fish pond.  The husband got down into the water and scooped up 5 large fish.  Upon entering the kitchen, I stood, listening joyfully to the wife's conversation as she grabbed one the fish (still alive).  She took a good hold of it and WHAM!! WHAM! WHAM!........continued to talk as she casually beat the fish's head in with a stone pestle.  After that, I left the kitchen :)

After all was said and done, the chicken greeted us :)

I leave with you a few random pictures

I see this every morning as I run on the beach: cows hanging out (which means I have to watch where I'm running)

To remember that I AM a little crazy :)

To remember that even in Indonesian, there are rednecks (this was parked in the grocery store's parking lot)

Thank you all for stopping by!