Day 1...

The adventure has begun!!  Hehehe!  Drama galore already i'm telling ya peeps!!  Soooo after only an hour's kip I woke up at 3am feeling groggy to the max!  I get my brother to check my weight to find that I’m about 20 kilo's over.  So I’m flinging out whatever I can at the speed of lightening I’m shoving stuff out tryna somehow get my luggage sorted before I miss my flight...but then throwing the very same things back in refusing to leave them behind!  I finally relent and get rid of the silly amounts of candy I intended to give to the children at the orphanage...I get rid of about 50 pairs of socks...a bottle of shower gel and my coat...weird!

Anyhoo so off I go to Heathrow only to be told that I’m 7 kilos overweight and that I need to pay 87 squids if I intend to get on the flight!  Noooooooooo!!  I said to the poor woman, I can't do that - I just don't have that kind of money (or stupidity) so you have ta help me and give me another solution I told her!!  So she said if you can get all your excess into hand luggage then it can go through.  But I don’t have anything to carry it in I tell her so she directs me to the Excess Baggage Shop (seriously that’s what it was called - what a money maker!) but it wasn't even open yet cause it was the crack of dawn.  So off I went to buy a holdall...oh my gosh - I’m thinking my flight leaves in less than an hour, haven't even checked in yet but I need to find a holdall to put all my excess luggage in before I can check in and get through security and boarding...wow...how typically Indian...in fact I think that this is the most Indian thing I've ever done!!  Apart from buying the  holdall of course, cause if it was a typical Indian then I would have just flung it all in a saree and carried it on my head.

So I hang around the corner of the shop looking like a call girl – no…not cool girl…call girl…waiting with baited breathe til it opens at 5.30am and then yay the dude turns up...before he's even pulled up the shutters I've barged in and I say 'mate give me your cheapest bag and he says 45 pounds'...I say 'okay that's lovely but that’s just not gonna work'...I ask him to inspire me with a solution but he didn't have one.  But then I suggested taking the extra 7 kilo's in a carrier bag  (I know...what a tramp but with 45 quid at stake I would have even carried it on my head -clearly I'm far more Indian than I presumed!). So he suggests going next door to WH Smiths to get a carrier bag.  I go marching into Smiths praying that someone will give me a decent bag that will get me to India.  I get to the counter and explain me lil dilema to the nice man...but then the woman who just got served tells me she has a bag I can have...Yay...thank you Lord!!  So I follow her to her luggage and get given this lovely large polyester bonded fibre shoe bag thingy...so I grab it gratefully, run back to my Indian mate at the baggage shop whose practically family by this stage and say "mate will this do?"...he tells me "very good!".

So I fill it up with everything I possibly can!  I was seriously like a madwoman - no word of lie - sweaty betty - at the repack area throwing things out (oh my gosh - groundhog day!) and wacking whatever I can in me new shoe bag...in another race against time.  My suitcase is shamelessly open - exposed for everyone to see my underwear and tampax...nice...but who cares because I make it to check ten minutes before boarding and I've managed to pull it off!  Whoop whoop!  Or at least I think I have, until the dude at security tells me that I’ve got too many bags and that he doubts they'll let me through.  I say thanks for the advice mate but I'll just pray my way through...and with 2 pieces of hand luggage and a laptop no one bats an eyelid!!  Lol!  (I did have to take my boots off though and get a pretty indecent frisk but anyhoo)!  So I finally get on the plane with all my luggage in tact – almost passing out from the sheer weight of all my excess baggage wrapped around me!! But happy happy happy!

Oh yeah, then they gave me a free French Vogue and I’m like yay!! Until I had a butchers and the thing was more pornographic than Playboy, trust me – they had fashion editorials with 10 year old girls dressed like big women with full make up and get this…chest exposed, striking a sexy pose…yuk yuk yuk…and then they had fashion adverts with elderly women topless having their boobs fondled and even some editorials with necrophilia…what the frick?! I’m sorry but that stuff was vile!! So I closed that magazine quick time before I threw up and made note to self “never ever look at a French Vogue again, as long as I live!” Another note to self…to, hurry up and publish a magazine that edifies, encourages and promotes real beauty, so no one has to look at such gross kak!! Magazine closed, I sip on my Champagne, take a breathe and reflect on all that’s been going on of late…

It’s so nuts because I’d been pretty darn anxious about coming out to India for nearly 5 weeks wondering how I would cope without the luxury of comfort. Where would I run to when I’d had enough of the curry, village and children? I’d wondered what in the world I was even thinking when I set myself the challenge of serving at the orphanage for more than a month! Somehow as I got my knickers in a twist about it all I’d forgotten what it feels like to be around the precious little darlings at the orphanage or what joy it brings when untold numbers respond to an altar call for salvation after God anoints you to preach with power, not to mention the overwhelming brokenness that rises up in you like a flood as you compassionately pray for the sick…the demonised…the poor…or as you weep in lamentation embracing siblings that have been infected with the HIV virus through no fault of their own – all these just a few of my past experiences of being at the orphanage.

Yet Sunday night - dinner with my best friend who also thankfully is my mentor…whoop whoop for good counsel…reminded me of all of that! Soooooooo since then the anointing’s been stirred up again and the fire’s been burning baybee…to go out there and bless bless bless…to cherish the honour of loving on the kids…to use my gifts to be creative around the building…to teach, preach and minister…to raise the dead…pray for the sick…bring deliverance to the bound!!! Yerrrrrrrr...as I sit on the plane...trust me I'm excited! I GOT MY HEAVENLY MOJO BACK!!! I’m ready to rock and roll…India…my precious homeland…I can’t wait to see you!!

 The Arctic adventure continues...