Good-Bye America!

Brief stops in Denver, Detroit, Toledo, and New York.

 

Photowalking Toledo

One of the highlights of perhaps the whole trip was taking my little cousins to the Denver Art museum...they aren't quite as into art as I am, but they liked the room full of foxes and my "guided tour of downtown Denver."  :D  Repacked my things and realized that there are many things I want to take back to Kyrgyzstan that I can't.  So I have two big chests of my belongings in Colorado still.  It was great to see my Aunt again and from there I went to Ann Arbor, met an old high school friend, had some great conversations, and even went to a poetry reading!  That was fun.  In Toledo I met with Krista, a girl who I met in Mexico as the super-impressive 15-year old high school graduate who took over piano teaching much more capably soon after I left.  She's now a college student and a pretty awesome photographer, so we did the art museums and photo-walked and photo-shot each other in Detroit and Toledo.  It was super-fun, and also involved some life/ministry coaching as well.  It's no secret that I'm trying to convince her and her Mexican "special friend" to come work with me in Kyrgyzstan.  :)   Of course, God knows best. 

Krista had fun with the pics

In New York I met with four friends.  I recorded Marissa and Shanay.  They are both amazing musicians who were involved in Covenant House Faith Community and I can't wait to share more, gotta get to the nitty-gritty of editing all these things I've captured.

Sharing in Flushing

And I also got to share with the youth at a Korean church in Queens, thanks to my friend Gintare, who is a Lithuanian YWAM missionary I support who does cool stuff like ministering to ladies who work in the massage parlors.  It was pretty cool and pretty different!  Their community was really inspiring, and I felt honored to be a part of it.  They hung out almost all day Sunday between church, lunch, games, and bible study.  It was a pleasure to tell them about how South Koreans have been the most effective in Central Asia, and why, and to encourage them to be the men and women God has called them to be. 

And then the America leg of my journey was over!   Just like that.  It seemed so long and so short, lifetimes packed in the span of a few months.  I felt both a foreigner and at home, and tried to be a missionary to my home country with mixed, but overall, good, results.  I may not have shared with 1000 youth, but I definitely got up around 700, and I think for many of them what I had to say was different, encouraging and hopefully important.  God waters and grows.  For now, I'm just excited to be on my way back towards home and hopefully some rest.