Friday 1 June 2012

Blame it on the jet lag....

Well folks here I am officially in Malenovice Czech and I have survived the amazing race! (Well our three day version of it.) It has been a wild and crazy last few days... probably the most things and places I have packed into three days ever... maybe. My feet are hating me right now and so it is awesome being able to sit on my comfy bed gazing out at the gorgeous view of the Czech mountains. I am about to tell the tale of the Amazing Race 2012... if you are not interested you can skip the next large chunk.

So I will take off where I last left off..... after Munich I arrived with my team mate Jordyn in Krakow Poland at 4:15 pm on Tuesday. I did not have my luggage sadly but I was welcomed by the always cheerful face of my missionary friend Laura. After this about 10-15 of us latecomers were taken by train to the mall in Krakow. I met up with the other members of my team who were not late and we were required to put on a fashion show in front of the mall for all of the public to ridicule us. Especially the guys in dresses and heels. Quite the interesting way to get to know your team I must say.  From there we ran around Krakow to many places including the mall and the main square doing different tasks. We had to find a statue of Copernicus that apparently know one in Krakow knew about .. an hour or so later we found him and had to build an accurate model of the solar system  using fruit. (More difficult then it sounds.) Finally in the dark we completed and ran back through Krakow to stay at our hostel coming in 11th place out of 15 that particular evening.... not the best. 

Day 2 (As in Thursday) Wake up call was 7 and the teams all departed at staggered times over an hour from 8-9 am based on our arrival. We began the morning by chugging hot hot tea (as a common European experience) we then had to go to a park in Krakow and transfer a large bowl of m&ms to another using only a straw.. not so easy. We then raced to the other side of the main square to the house where Pope John Paul 2 stayed and we had to memorize part of a speech he gave. Other Krakow events included having a Polish childrens book read to us by a local, building a lego thingy in Wawel castle, putting on a puppet show about the local legend of the Dragon, counting items on 52 crests in the old Krakow market and finding the Schindler factory. In the afternoon when we got to the old Schindler factory we had time to tour it. It is now a museum about Krakow under the control of the Nazis  from 1939-1945. It was an amazing experience. From there we took the bus to Skoczw Poland and eventually after another road block walked on foot about 7 km to H2O camp which is owned by Josiah Venture in Poland. We arrived around 9:30 pm but that was not the end. We then had to eat blood sausage and sauerkraut. After wolfing down my portion when 2 other teams showed up I then at 3 or 4 teammates portions of sauerkraut (yay for my german background) ...ya that didn't sit so well. We ended day two in 6th place! Woohoo!

Day 3 we once again began our race at 8am at staggered times. We taste tested tea to find the flavour from the previous morning and we participated in the H20 Olympics. The events included shotput with balloons, and interesting relay, diving for Euros and kayaking for lego pieces. When we finished we booked it out of the camp and ended up hitchhiking back in Skoczw where we took a bus to Cieszyn Poland where we ran across the border to Cesky Tesin Czech and had to learn a traditional Czech folk dance. When we did it correctly we went on to the train to |Frydlant nad Ostravici Czech and after doing a word search we had our last txi ride to the finish line at the Malenovice Hotel owned by Josiah venture. At 1:30 pm in 9th place.  

So here I am .. there has been lots of running, lots of walking and lots of language barriers but I made it and I am so blessed for my team of 8  other interns and our Polish team leader. Team Polska is by far the best and I am so glad to have made 9 new good friends in 3 days! I praise God for our unity and for the amazing creativity of the Josiah Venture leadership. It has already been a blast and we have only just begun. So here we are at intern training for the next 5 days.. I am so pumped to be hanging out with 102 other awesome people! 

Well that's all for now... I'm ready for dinner

Do Widzenia

Kat

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