The official day 1 of our ICC trip!
The first day started off pretty slowly. The coughing hadn't woken me up as much last night, but the illness still fatigued me significantly. Fortunately we didn't need to start until 2:30pm, so I had a bit of time to get myself together. After getting up out of bed at 9, went and had a Maccas breakfast (nothing else is open that early in the morning!), came back and packed and by the time I'd finished it was already 11:30am and I had to leave before the checkout time of 12pm. Said a few online "goodbyes" as it might've been the last time I had an internet connection before I left for Henyang. And then I went to the YMCA.
Only after I got into the taxi did I reallise there were some significant gaps in my preparation. Which YMCA was I supposed to go to? There are at least two I know in HK after all! How was I going to know who I was going to meet? (I had totally forgotten to at least try and remember some faces from the photo sheet they sent out before the trip). My mind was too clouded to be too concerned about these finer details, so I just kept going.
I was early (I did end up finding the right YMCA at Tsim Sha Tsui!) and so I went and had lunch and did a bit of shopping before returning to meet the team. And then it began... the awkward waiting, looking at everyone and wondering whether they were "it". Hmmm should I wave to that person? Seems as lost as I am. Mayyybe not. Then I noticed a big white man giving me second glances, which made me suspicious. Then I realised I had my sick-mask on, so I would have been hard to recognise! It was then that I noticed that he had a small little book in his hand, and in it were some pictures. I thought, "That must be him!", and decided to get up and give him a try. By that time he was approaching me too, and we made our initial introductions. Fortunately we were both correct in guessing that we were both on the same team. And that was how I met our team leader, John Cooper.
Soon more people joined us. I ducked off to put my bags into my hotel room, and by the time I came back there was a crowd of 26 people gathered together around John. There were many Americans, two Canadians, one Singaporean, John was British and I was the only Australian. One thing that surprised me was that there were quite a lot of "kids" (ie teenagers) on the trip. But it also meant that we had a pretty good spread of ages represented, from the teens to the middle-ages. After we had met briefly, we hustled off down into the MTR as a group to our next destination: our briefing room.
I had not expected that the briefing room was going to be in Sheung Wan! So it was quite an experience seeing a group that had only met each other for the first time several minutes ago try and move together through the MTR system and try and end up at the same place. We didn't even know everyone's names yet! It had quite an "Amazing Race" feel to it. But we all made it in the end, and surprisingly we were able to get to know each other a bit more despite all the noise and the hurry.
At the briefing, John noted a lot of things, but there are two things that ring in my memory (because I wrote them down :P).
1) Live in the moment - often with the busy-ness of the whole thing, we often forget to treasure the experience we are having and it's over before we know it. So it is important to remember not to get too carried away with busy-ness and to remember this time we have working with our Father.
2) E'v'angelising without e'v'angelising - The "M" word is not to be mentioned! We are not allowed to speak the Word to them. In fact, if we're asked about why we're there, we should not go further than "we're here to love the children". Which is very strange given that trips of this nature usually involves us telling people about our First Brother. This makes the entire task both easier and harder. Easier in that we don't need to even think about trying to engage in that hard task of breaching the initial barriers; but harder in that it can be more frustrating that we can't tell people we're here because of our Brother, and not because we're "just good people".
After the talk we scrambled back to the YMCA Salisbury at TST, had a break, then had our first meal together. Our last good meal before we come back, I'd expect :'( But oh well, who knows.
The main personal reflection for today is simply my suspicion that the real challenge will begin when I get back. What will I do with what I have experienced? What will I say when people ask me about it? Can I be bluntly honest about what my Father did there, or will I be afraid and try to filter it and soften it so that it will be more acceptable to their ears? But then maybe I'm thinking too far. Who knows, I haven't even started the real journey yet and it has already been difficult! I think it's a bit presumptuous for me to say that the Road After will be more difficult than the Road itself!
Time to tie it up and get to sleep before our early 8am departure tomorrow! D':
