1 Year Ago...

1 year ago, I arrive in the beautiful nation of New Zealand to begin a YWAM DTS, which unsurprisingly ended-up becoming the biggest adventure of my life to date. In the 7 months total that I was away, God really gave me a new and refreshed heart for missions on a scale that I could have never imagined before. I am so eager to see what is He has for me next!

Interested In Medical Missions?

As some of you may know, I got the chance to volunteer on board a medical mission ship called the M/V Pacific Hope. I got my first chance to board the ship for my DTS's Outreach Phase, then after graduation I came back due to an invitation. However, an invitation is not needed to get on board. If you are interested in volunteering you can simply use the contact information provided below in the brochure below.

(CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE)

Not a "Health Professional?" Well, I was not either... other than some basic first-aid training from my DTS. There are plenty of positions available from helping with deck maintenance to praying for people, or from dispensing out glasses to assisting in the dental clinic. So, aside from positions listed in the brochure above there are plenty of other jobs to do, you just need a heart for service.

While the outreach season for 2016 is over, the ship will be right back to its' mission once the regional cyclone seasons ends. I am sure that they will need more people to fill slots for the 2017 outreach season.

This is an AMAZING cause, bringing health care and the Gospel to the isolated peoples of the South Pacific Islands. If you don't think you can make it on board, please consider donating to this ministry. Remember that EVERYONE on board is volunteer, from the cooks and deck hands to the doctors and captain(s), so your donations have more impact to the actual mission.

Disclaimer: While I have served on this ship, I nor my blog are affiliated with Marine Reach Ministries. My personal views and opinions on this blog are my own and do not reflect the ministry. Also, I have not been compensated or requested to post this information to my blog.

Flight Statistics From My 7-Month YWAM Journey

I did some flight calculations from my big 7 month YWAM journey.

All in all, I flew with 7 different airlines, on 13 separate flights (legs), covering approximately 25,778mi (42,480km), spending about 53.5hrs (2.25 days) in the air. Don't get me started on layovers...

Airlines I Flew With:

United Airlines

Hawaiian Airlines

Air New Zealand

Air Vanuatu

Fiji Airways

Quantas

American Airlines

Flights Taken:

-Getting to Tauranga, New Zealand-

Orlando, Florida to San Francisco, California

San Francisco, Califonia to Honolulu, Hawaii

Honolulu, Hawaii to Auckland, New Zealand

Auckland, New Zealand to Tauranga, New Zealand

-Coming back from Outreach in Vanuatu (took a 5 day sail going to)-

Port Vila, Vanuatu to Auckland, New Zealand

-Going back to Vanuatu-

Tauranga, New Zealand to Auckland, New Zealand

(had an 18 hour layover... the longest in my life)

Auckland, New Zeland to Nadi, Fiji

Nadi, Fiji to Port Vila, Vanuatu

-Back to New Zealand-

Port Vila, Vanuatu to Auckland, New Zealand

-Heading home-

Auckland, New Zealand to Melbourne, Australia

Melbourne, Australia to Sydney, Australia

Sydney, Australia to Dallas, Texas

Dallas, Texas to Orlando, Florida

Longest Flight (EVER!): Sydney, Australia to Dallas, Texas - 15.5hrs - 8,580mi (13,800km)

Shortest Flight: Auckland, New Zealand to Tauranga, New Zealand - 0.5hrs - 90mi (145km)

WHEW!!! What a trip! :D

"I Am A Missionary"

Yes, I think the missions bug has bit me. I am ready for the next adventure that God sends me on. How about you?

Check-out this really inspirational video about missionaries:

Why No Pics?

If you have been wondering why I have not been posting pictures of my travels on my blog, its because my Blogger app on my phone wouldn't let me and I did not take a computer with me on my trip. I am not sure why, even when I had REALLY good internet connection it would not post.

So, until I can get some pics from my trip posted, here is the official Outreach Video of my YWAM DTS Outreach Team. Most of the video is from he Island of Tanna, Vanuatu however, the beginning shows some shots of us on the medical ship, the M/V Pacific Hope.

Credits:

Videography - Althea Patrabla

Music - "Relentless" Hillsong United (No Infringement Intended)

Vanuatu Update #3

My time is Vanuatu, at least for the foreseeable future has come to an end. After to 3 months of DTS Lecture Phase, 2 months of DTS Outreach Phase and 2 months of serving on the M/V Pacific Hope, I am making my way home.

I arrived in Auckland on the 25th but, did not get to my hotel until after mid-night. I have a total of 5 nights here in Auckland before contenuing on my journy home. The 25th, happened to be the cheapest day to fly back to NZ from Vanuatu... at least prior to my August 30th flight back to the States.

I will have layovers in Melbourne, Sydney and Dallas respectively before arriving back in Orlando. The Sydney to Dallas flight will be my longest yet at just over 15.5 hours of flying time.

So far, I have been having an amazing time back in Auckland. God has blessed me with some really good friends here who have gone out of their way to make me feel at home.

Vanuatu Update #2

Arrived safely back in Port Vila very early on Friday morning, thanks be to God. Though tiring and very unpredictable, we had another successful medical outreach on the M/V Pacific Hope, the 2nd outreach for the year.

For this outreach, I got placed on the Dental Team doing registration. In total we helped more than 300 people by removing and fixing close to 700 teeth.

I am really eager for the next 2 week  outreach. We leave Port Vila this Saturday and will be serving N.E. Malakula... that is the plan at least.

So many things on this adventure have been uncertain. But, over the last 6 months I have become more and more at peace with not knowing what lies ahead or having to have a plan. However, I can be certain of two things: God loves me, God IS good and if I follow Him, there is no telling where I'll end up!

Vanuatu Update #1

I arrived back in Port Vila, Vauatu at around noontime on the 7th of August (local time). We ended up coming back a day earlier than planned, for multiple reasons, officially ending Outreach #1.

Though we had to leave early and couldn't visit the Island of Meawo, we reached over 1000 people on the Island of Ambae. We offered a number or services such as free doctor's consultations, eye glasses, first aid, prayer and pharmacy.

The ship will do 4 more multi-week outreaches with rest/resupply weeks in Port Vila inbetween. I will be present for 2 more of these outreaches, my last of which will end on August 19th.

These past couple days have been filled with both good and bad realities of life Friday in particular. After meeting up with some friends on Thursday night, we made plans to go see "Finding Dory" on Friday morning. I arrived at the theater much earlier, as planed to get wifi. It was there while waiting for my friends to arrive that I found out that one of my cats had died. The news was hard but, God has helped me through and my friends have been really encouraging.

However, despite the sad news from home and so wishing to be back, I know that God called me here, at this time, for a reason. Of course I have questioned and requestioned Him, and myself multiple times but, I know that I am where I am meant to be.

How Did I End-Up Here?

How did I end up here? ...in another island nation, in the middle of the South Pacific Ocean, getting ready to voulenteer on a medical ship?

Great questions! In all honesty, I have only one answer: I followed the Spirit.

My DTS is now over and I am no longer in New Zealand. I had had the option to fly back to Orlando on the 22nd of June (today actually) but, somthing inside me opted to choose the next avalible award ticket date of August 30th 2016.

So, here I am back in Port Vila, Vauatu, ready to rejoin the the M/V Pacific Hope. While I don't know exactly what date my time on the ship will end, I have committed to approximately 2 months.

While so much is uncertain, I am really looking forward to my time serving on the ship. God called me here, got me here and will certainly see me through here. I am eager to see what He has planned!

Back in New Zealand

Sunday was my first full day back in New Zealand. I arrived in Auckland at around 11am local time, after about a 3.5 hour flight from Port Vila, Vanuatu.

In total I spent 4 weeks of my Outreach in Vanuatu, on land, off of the M/V Pacific Hope. The first 3 weeks were spent on the island of Tanna, where my team loaded all of our bags, food, medical supplies and ourselves (10 team memebrs, plus the driver and 2 porters) into a single truck for a 2 hours ride to our hosting village.

We stayed in the host village for 2 weeks, doing a number of ministry activities, both there and in neighboring villages. We were placed in an old missionary house near the church. The house had some of the most stunning views of Tanna's active volcano, Mt. Yasur, right from the front porch. Warching the sunrise over an active volacno? Simply amazing!

Some of the other villages we visited were really remote, one of which had never had "white" people visit it before. At least two were over 2 hour walks one-way but, it was so worth it to help spread the gospel.

The first weekend one of the missionary doctors joined our team. Once she arrived, were able to run a clinic in our host village, my job was to run the pharmacy.

After the two weeks in the village, we return to the main town of Tanna, Lenakel, where the ship first dropped us off. A church hosted us for this last week before the ship picked us up.

In Lenakel, we did street evangelism, prayer walks and shared sermons at local churches. We also got to share our testimonies at a local trade school and pray for the sick at the hospital, even attend a custom Period Party as team.

One of the days we went to the hospital to pray for the sick, it was at full capacity, particularly the children's ward. We came back 2 days later and the hospital was at only about 50% capacity and many of those there were new patients. God is good!

After our alotted time on Tanna, the ship picked us up and took us to Port Vila to prepare for our return to New Zealand. Though we were soon to return we still made time to do street and prison ministry.

Looking back I can only be amazed at God's faithfulness to, and grace for my team during our Outreach. Through spiritual and emotional tiredness, as well as physical sickness my team stayed the course.

Now back in New Zealand winter is in full swing and I am loving the nice cool weather. It feels so nice after sweating half to death on Tanna. Also, it has been nice to recover from worms in such a comfortable environment. Yes, due to a number of side effects it is believed that I was one of a few who contracted worms. At least I did not get the lice.

At Base, we're getting back into the flow of things as we wrap-up out school with "Re-Entry/Debrief Week" lectures. However, there is a sadness in the air as most of us prepare to leave this weekend and part ways after almost 6 months of communal living.

This has been an amazing chapter in my life journey, I have so many good memories to remember and tools to use in the future. Doing this DTS has been the best decision of my life yet and I am so greatful to God for this oppertunity. God is good!

8th Week in New Zealand: A Week of Honor

This was a very interesting week at base and not because of St. Patrick's Day, which went almost unoticed. We had Relationship Week, which consisted of not just being taught about our relationship with God but also discussing our relationship with people.

The first day of lectures on Relationships set the tone for the whole week. The topics at hand were Honor and Love, two things the Bible commands us to do, for all people... even our enemies.

Now obviously there are no enemies here on our DTS... at least I don't think there are. In all honesty, we as students, who have almost been woven together by God himself, have naturally been going out of our way to be honoring to eachother,  especially the guys toward the girls. However, we (Ship and Base students due to a second week of combined lectures) were still given an assignment to take things to a new level.

Our assignment was to specifically honor the person sitting to our rights and lefts at the time the assignment was fiven. On top of this were were given a paper test to take so that we could better understand our, and thus eachother's, top "Love Languages."

There are five Love Languages:
Words of Affermation (Complements)
Physical Touch (Hugs, Backrubs, Bromance, etc.)
Receiving Gifts (Fairly obvious)
Quality Time (Spending time with eachother)
Acts of Service (Helping someone with chores or other jobs)

My top two were Quality Time and Physical Touch, with Words of Affermation being my lowest (but, God is changing that slowly). My two "Honorees" also had Quality time is their top twos, which made things really easy for me. However, this did not mean that gifts were out of the question. Actually, the whole thing became more of an "Obvious Santa." The Main objective was to challenge us all to get to know eachother better.

We all had a lot of fun just being with eachother and going the extra mile to honor a fellow member of the "Whanau." I enjoyed just spending time with my Honorees and of course seeing their smiles from recieving a meaningful gift.

With all the excitement of Honoring it is almost easy to for one the other main highlights of the week, the "Burn."

Now we first learned about "Burns" during Spiritual Warfare Week. These are really just elongated praise and worship sessions, 12 hours in our case, though some have lasted for 2 days or more.

We went from 7pm on Friday night to 7am on Saturday morning, with both staff and students signing-up to lead 1 hours slots. I was one of a handful that stayed the while night long. As much as I would like to say that I was awake and worshipping the whole night, that would not be truthful. I did fall asleep a couple times but, got back into the flow of things after 30 or so minutes of shut eye. Actually I don't think anyone was fully concious for the whole event, but that was okay, there was always someone still worshipping.

Starting tomorrow we start Week 9, Destiny and Calling Week. So excited!

My First Week in New Zealand

I've been in New Zealand for one whole week now. Orientation week ended on Friday and the Lecture Phase officially starts tomorrow.

From what I have seen so far, Tauranga seems to be such a great city and I hope to explore it more. I went into town for the first time yesterday and had Thai food (also a first) with some fellow students, eager for future weekend adventures with my new YWAM Whanau.

#LoveDowntownTauranga

New Country, New Adventure, New Zealand

After 4 flights, 3 airlines, 3 layovers and 2 days, I arrived at the YWAM base yesterday morning. I do NOT regret listing to God and choosing this base, this place is absolutly beautiful.

I have been making lot of friends from all over the world. Just today, I got to practice both my German and Portuguese with native speakers.

Orientations started today, however classes won't really start till next week. So eager to see what God will do over these next 5 months. Might go to Vanuatu for Outreach! :)

2 Weeks to #MiddleEarth! YEA!

It is 2 weeks till the day that I start my journey to New Zealand for my YWAM Medical/Compassion DTS! (https://www.givesendgo.com/ywamnz)



Update (01/07/2016):

2 weeks to go before I depart for my DTS! I am so Excited!

Today, I made my first tuition payment. So far, I have been able to raise $3,400 (reflected in my “Amount Requested”), $400 from outside sources and $3000 of my own personal finances that I have been able to pull together. I have reached my limit in personal money and am seeking extra support to cover all tuition costs. Thanks in advance and God bless! 

Update on YWAM Preparations - #2

Note: If you are interested in contributing to help me meet my YWAM Tuition costs, please click here... (https://www.givesendgo.com/ywamnz)

This morning I got my Tetanus and Typhoid immunizations taken care of. Though, I only really needed to get my Typhoid immunization, the nurse at the county health department suggested that I go ahead and updated my Tetanus Booster (Tdap) as well. Technically I was good with my Tdap until 2018 (once every 10 years) however, she said for active traveling an update every 5 years was recommended.

As for my Typhoid, I got the pill option, it will take about a week for full immunization. I take one pill every other day (4 pills). This treatment is actually a “Live Virus” but, I will not be contagious or anything. She said some stomach upset and tiredness will be the most of my worries. However, with the pill I am good for 5 years vs. just 3 years with the shot and the pill option was cheaper... poor marketing if you ask me. :P

All in all, I went in today not planning to get any shots but, I ended up getting two. The other was for a non-travel related immunization regiment that I fail to complete when I was a child. So, I am all set healthwise for my trip... SO EXCITED!!! :D

Next task is to get my International Driving Permit from AAA. Doing that today, leaving in a few minutes...

Happy 1st Birthday... To My Travel Blog Of Course!

To be totally honest, I cannot believe that it has been a year since I started this travel blog. I am so excited for future travels, my YWAM DTS in New Zealand (http://bit.ly/1Ncg7Tj) is just next month... God, time is flying!

Some current stats:

Total Page Views: 1850
Number of Visiting Nations: 25+
Blog Posts: 65 (including this one)


My First Blog Post:

"A New Adventure"

"While I have traveled the world, this "Travel Blog" stuff is totally new to me. However, I will not shy away from a new adventure. I might not be the most traveled person in this world but, hey... I got info to share and stories to tell."

I have sure come a long way in one year! To the FUTURE!!! :D

Fundraising : YWAM Medical/Compassion DTS Tuition

It is already October and time is ticking down to my January departure for the YWAM Medical/Compassion DTS. I have started this GiveSendGo page to help raise money for my DTS tuition.

Any and all contributions are greatly appreciated as you partner with me to become a shareholder in the great things God has planned for me regarding world missions. I know the training that I will receive at this school is going to greatly assist me in positively impacting the world around me, starting with the less fortunate of society.

Thanks in advance for your support and may you be greatly blessed! CLICK HERE TO DONATE!

#ywam #givesendgo