HelloGoodbye

As I was thinking of a title for this post, I was reminded of the band HelloGoodbye. They have a song called 'Here in your arms' (HelloGoodbye). I then watched the video on YouTube and it reminded me of 2008 and those lovely afternoons that the dream team would spend together driving around A-town like the cool kids do. Ohhh the days of pop music and Kayla's truck or Jenn's Ford Focus or the yellow sunfire. Awe yeah. It makes me lethargic thinking about it. Hmmmm. I thought that lethargic would be a good word in that sentence, but I just looked up what it actually means and it means sluggish or tired. That is not really what I was going for, but I'll just go with it.

Today is Friday November 23, 2012. Do you know what that means? That means that I am leaving for Fiji tomorrow. Yikes. Time flies. So fast. It seems like it was just yesterday that I got on a plane in Canada and flew to the ends of the earth. It has already been 3 months! I am truthfully so sad that lectures are done. I actually really love learning, as long as I don't get tested on the subject matter, so the DTS lectures were so perfect. But the saddest part is that I love everyone here so much and I will miss them when we all get split up for outreach! I don't get to be on an outreach team with anyone from my cottage :( and I love my cottage girls so much! I have them trained so well - they are now perfectly ok with various things such as peeing with the door open or farting, etc. You know how it is. But actually, my outreach team is pretty good at farting too. I won't name any names, but last night at our outreach prep meeting someone farted pretty much constantly the whole time. And it was not the silent sneaky kind, it was the kind that you can't miss.

But I will miss my roomies so much! Kat and Anne were the best. They were so tolerant of my massive explosion mess all over our room. Anne never complained until the other day when I decided to cut my fingernails on the floor because I was gonna vacuum anyways. She put her foot down and made me use the garbage can. That was probably wise since I haven't vacuumed yet.

And I will miss my ladies in the other room - Marit and Noemi and Kiwi Hannah. It will be so sad not being able to bring my mess into their room anymore! And I will miss our late-night chats and pigging out on junk food with them! I actually can't think about it anymore or I will cry. And of course I will miss my Schneggles too! Je t'aime!

Today was an awesome day actually. We had a cottage slumber party last night and we all slept in one room, so it was really weird waking up in the other room in Noemi's bed. But it was a good way to start the day! I was so greasy though. I have been putting off showering for a few days, and I have been wearing the same clothes for about 3 days, and I've been sleeping in them too. So I was pretty gross. But I didn't want to dirty my clean clothes before packing. So I made it through. But I think I was kinda stinky.

For worship this morning, each of the Mus-oh's got to pick one worship song and lead it. I chose one of my songs which is about God's song. It says that 'Your song is like a rainbow, a promise here to stay. ROY G BIV sings Your love song, and takes my fears away.' I thought those lyrics were pretty clever. Except none of the Europeans know what ROY G BIV is. But all the North Americans got it :) For those of you who don't know, ROY G BIV stands for the colours of the rainbow. Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet.

Other than that the rest of the day consisted of cleaning and packing and such things. I managed to fit in a run. It was super awesome! At dinner, Carly came and grabbed Hannah and me and we had a picnic on a blanket with flowers and champagne glasses (with water in them, relax!). It was so cute. She even had hummus and rice crackers for an appy. It was so lovely. Johanna gave me an envelope that says not to open it until I am on the plane!! I can't wait! I am so intrigued. I wonder what it says...

I have had my hair short for a week now, but every day I discover something new and exciting and awesome about short hair! First of all, when it is hot outside short hair is so nice! Normally when it gets a bit hot I have to put a ponytail in. The past few days it has been scorching and I have not had the urge to ponytail my hair once. The breeze just blows up in it and swooshes it around and you get refreshing cool air all up in your face and head. So awesome. Yesterday we rode in the van. I had a ponytail (a cute little tiny ponytail), and we went over a speed bump and it bounced. It was so fun. My hair also holds it's curls a lot better when it is short, and it is bouncy. So when I run it bounces and is really fun. And Kat and I just rocked out to 'Here in your arms' and my hair had lots of fun. LOVE IT!

Today I looked at myself more closely that usual in the mirror. I realized that I had SO MUCH plaque between my lower front teeth. It looked like the grout between tiles - the plaque was the grout and my teeth were the tiles. It was so nasty. So I had a really big flossing party and now my teeth feel like they can breath again.

While I was packing up my stuff, I found my really attractive toque/scarf/mittens thing that looks like an asian bear crossed with an asian cat. I couldn't fit it in any of my bags so I gave it to Kyle because I know he loves it so much. His team now has to take that toque everywhere with them and take pictures with it at all of the fun places they go! I'm pretty excited. It will be like I am there with them!

It is weird to think that tomorrow at this time I will be in Fiji. It is only a 3 hour flight. So that's a bonus I guess. I am pretty excited to meet Dan's family. They sound like they are pretty awesome! But I am a bit scared of the Fijian men. I am tall and blonde. And apparently they like to flip skirts up and grab women inappropriately in the street. I am pretty sure that if any man touches me I will drop kick him. That'll show him. But seriously. I am white, and I am significantly taller than all of the other girls on my team, and I am significantly blonder than all of the other girls too. I feel that this could potentially be a problem.

Usually when teams go to Fiji they gain about 20 pounds each because you get fed so much there, because Fijians are super hospitable and love to feed you lots of foods. So I was thinking that maybe I could just get fat while I'm there and then the men probably wouldn't like me so much anymore. But then I was thinking... maybe they will be like the men in Belize.

The Creole men in Belize love big women, or curvaceous women. I would consider myself quite big (tall) and also pretty curvy. This was not ideal when not wanting to attract attention from the male gender in Belize. They liked to call out to you as you walked by and say "Yeah Baby, you is a juicy mango! Mmmmm." And they rated your attractiveness based on how juicy you would be if you were a mango. So the stick thin girls really wouldn't be that yummy of a mango to eat, so they were not as attractive to these men. I have a feeling that the guys in Fiji will be kinda like this...

But Van has been assigned as the protector of the women. And if any man touches me then Van will beat him up. I was also planning on finding a ring for my ring finger and pretending to be married. But maybe that wouldn't stop them. I don't know... I guess I will find out tomorrow!

I am really hoping that I don't get fat in Fiji though. I asked Schnegg if he would still love me if I got fat in Fiji... he ignored the question and changed the subject. Enough said. I guess I can't get fat or else he will break up with me... again.

Anyways, I will be in Fiji until December 26. But I will have internet access there because there are lots of internet cafe's where we are going. So I will likely be able to post a blog periodically throughout my time in Fiji! Wish me luck! And a Merry Tropical Christmas. It will be so weird, and I will hate it. But luckily Emily mailed me some paper snowflakes. I will hang them up in Fiji, because I'm dreamin' of a white Christmas!