WDWSP12 may be done, but life continues on...

So I my summer project at Disney World is officially over, but my life will not be the same. I have made my way back to good, old Nebraska and have started the process of processing through all that has gone on this summer. I'll wrap up how project finished here first, since I these last few weeks have been so insane and draining, I have not had time to really update on the final happenings of my summer.
Since my last update, which was quite a while ago (Sorry), I had a lot of opportunities to be able to talk to people and share the gospel. One of the really cool stories was when we were doing initiative evangelism, which just means we are going out and randomly starting conversations with people to try to get the opportunity to share the gospel. My friend Aaron and I were going around, and before we started, we tried something that we had been taught to kind of just rely on God with who we were to talk to. You ask God who he would want you to talk to and the different shapes or objects that pop into your mind, sometimes give you a clue on who to talk to. Sometimes it is amazing to see how exact God works when everything that came into your mind is all about one person. I was talking to Aaron about how throughout the summer, it seemed to me that everything that I thought that God was leading me to do and people I thought God was leading me to get to know this summer seemed to not work out, and God gave me completely different people to get to know and reach out to and different roles than what I thought I would have. And just as we are talking about this while not finding anyone who fit the things I thought God had given me to find someone, we just start talking to this guy sitting on a bench. We ask him a few questions and he had an extremely high interest in wanting to know God, so we just started going through the gospel message using a little booklet that we gave him that describes it quite well. He was really engaged in it and was just so amazed at how everything worked together and how cool it was that we did not have to do good works to get to heaven, and that it was just through the grace of God that we could get there. We don't have to do anything besides accept that God has sent his Son to pay the wages of our sin, which is death. And that He rose again and conquered death. Unfortunately he then had to go to work, so we didn't get to ask him if this was something he wanted to do now, but if it is in God's plan, it will happen. One random, kind of cool thing that happened while we were sharing with him was that as we were going through the gospel, we found out his name because when we were talking about how we were Christians, he said that his name was Christian, and then as we were going through a verse in Romans, he said that his last name was Roman. It was kind of weird, but what a cool name, Christian Roman!
Throughout the last half of the summer project, I had the opportunity to disciple 3 awesome guys and co-lead a co-ed Bible Study. These were great ways for me to really get to put into practice my gifts of leadership in our summer project environment in ways that were new to me. I know that I failed to do somethings in my responsibilities, and I know that not everything that I said was perfect, but I was blessed by the encouragement that I got from the people in Bible Study. I pray that I was able to help people really understand the gospel, either for the first time, or in a better way. We had coworkers, who are Christians and those who weren't, attending our Bible Study and so I tried to make sure that the gospel was clearly presented every week, because really everything comes back to the gospel that is important in life. It changes, transforms, alters lives. I have heard good things about it from others, so I pray that God would have really used me this summer through that. And my guys who I got to disciple, I couldn't have asked for a more diverse, interesting, challenging group of guys for me. I loved it and wouldn't have wanted it any other way! The accountability, talking about life back home, life on project, knowing God better, and just everything was something that I really enjoyed. Even though it was my role to build them up and teach them, the opposite is also true, and for me since I got to meet with all of them, I think that I got more out of it in total than they did. I am really grateful for these opportunities that I was given and I know that they will help me in the next few years back at school at UNO, building into other guys at Cru and people in general.
The last week and a half of work, we were making so many friends and so it was really sad to have to leave since there were so many people that we were just getting to know. I was really good at my job the last few weeks of work, so that when there would be new people working PAC or people who had just picked up the shift, the coordinators would ask me to help them out and explain what they needed to do and how to do it effectively. This was something that was really helpful for me, because it just gave me such an easy opportunity to start talking to the people and I could get to talk about why I and the other people on project were down working at Disney this summer and a lot of times that would lead into deeper conversations. I am glad that I was placed into the position that I was, because honestly it was the most fun thing that I could have done and gave me so many opportunities to grow. Then the end of project was soon in sight... The last few days of work when we were having to tell people that we were almost done with our program at Disney, it blew me away how many people were sad that we were leaving and the impact that we were able to have is more than anything that we can see right now, and it will only be realized when we are with God in Heaven. All the coworkers, even ones that I didn't think we had really gotten to know were sad that we were leaving, and quite a few of the coordinators were disappointed that we were leaving. There were people who really wanted us to try to extend our time there, and honestly if it was realistic, possible with my educational plans, and I didn't have some of the responsibilities that I have back here at home, I would have loved to stay there for a lot longer and get to know the people there a lot more. I think that if you have not been on this project, you will not understand how much of an opportunity we had to really impact peoples lives while we were down at Disney World. Unfortunately you cannot understand because you have not been here and not seen how broken of a place it is and how the people down here just really need to be loved and cared for like only God can do, and in this case, that is via us on the summer project. You cannot see how much the people really didn't want us to leave and how much they really cared for us and how much we really cared for them. I have been so blessed this summer to get to know a bunch of people who were on this project with me and all the coworkers that I got the chance to know. I hope to keep in contact with them and still have an impact even though I am no longer at Disney World. I have learned so much about myself, loving others, being a man of God, and living life intentionally all the time this summer, and I will not be the same as life continues on post-WDWSP12. I miss all my friends that I have made over the last 10 weeks, and hope to see you all again! PPD (Post Project Depression) has set in, but I am glad that I got the opportunity to get to know all the people I did this summer!
This concludes Andrew's crazy summer of 2012 with traveling to Italy, living in Florida and working at Walt Disney World, and living on mission for God throughout the summer. I hope that you all have enjoyed my blog and even though this is a wrap up blog, I may post another blog or two after more processing has been done, because I have learned so much over the summer, it is hard to even realize it all now. I will definitely not be the same after this summer because of the awesome experiences that I have had, the incredible people I have met, and the ways that God has changed me and my heart. Thanks for reading everyone!

Opportunities abound

Project is down to the last week and a half of work; it is so crazy to think about! These last couple of weeks have been so awesome and I believe we have finally been able to make an eternal impact on people here at Walt Disney World. The last few weeks we have developed some great friendships with some of our coworkers. We have had the opportunity to hang out with them a few times and we have gotten the chance to share the gospel with a few of them.

For me personally, the coolest story of my summer as far as sharing the gospel with someone happened this last week. There are a lot of Brazilian tour groups that come to Disney World and so Disney hires what they call "Brazilian Supergreeters." I had one of them, Gustavo, who just came up to me while I was working PAC a couple of weeks ago, and we just really got to talking the whole time we were working. He gave me his contact info and then we got to talking on Facebook, and I saw him everyday for a few and he kept asking me when we had a day off so that we could hang out. Unfortunately we have not had one until today since two Sundays ago, but we had one day where we got off "early" aka 9pm, so we decided that we could hang out that evening at Downtown Disney. I brought along one of the women that is in my carpool group, and he brought a girl that had just started working at Disney earlier that week. After we finally figured out a place that would serve us, we ended up in the Raglan Road Irish Pub and Restaurant. We ordered food and then started talking just about our lives. I had been praying for the opportunity to share the gospel with him, because it has really been on my mind to just get as many people exposed to it as possible. I just was asking him about his life and what he believed. He is gay and says that he just wants to find happiness in life. He used to be catholic, but now chooses to believe in different parts of different religions that he agrees with. Just by asking him a lot of questions and then getting the chance to respond for myself, I was able to share the gospel with him. I talked about how Jesus came to earth to pay the price for our sins and how he died in our place so that we could live with God forever and how God give grace to us all for the things that we have done. After our conversation about all sorts of things like purpose for life, love, and much more, he thanked me for the conversation and I thanked him for it as well. The girls had been talking, while we were outside because Gustavo wanted to smoke, and she mentioned that they couldn't believe that I was so friendly and kind to him even though I was not gay and was a Christian. This was one of the best compliments I have ever received, because it is only through God that I could be showing someone God's love like that when so many other people don't seem to care. I am still talking to him almost every day and I am just praying that God will work in his heart. Now is the time where I have to let the Holy Spirit work while continuing to show him God's love.

There have been many other good times and spiritual conversations in these last few weeks, and I am just trying to use my time as best I can while I am here for the last few weeks of project. That is part of why I haven't been able to keep this updated as much as I would like to, but I know that God has been working in a lot of situations this summer with all of the people here on summer project at Walt Disney World.

I love to see how God works!

Well, I haven't updated again in a while, so I will try to not make this too long, partially because of how long these get and partially because I find myself pretty busy and wanting to use my time here the best I can.
It has taken a little while, but finally after being pushed and asking God for help, I can say that we have really started to get to know some coworkers and are hopefully getting some opportunities to hang out and be able to talk to them about life. I just want my passion for Christ to be evident to them all and that God loves them for who they are and wants a relationship with them as well. There are a lot of really awesome and interesting people here, and I really do want to get to know them and enjoy the time that we will hopefully get to hang out. Lately, my whole carpool group has been doing an awesome job with getting to know people and getting their contact info, so that we can invite them to hang out or come to project stuff. All of us have stuff in our lives that we are having to deal with, but through God's power, we have been able to keep going after people and hopefully we will get great opportunities to share the gospel with them.
It has been incredible to see how God has answered prayers for me just in the last week. For the last week, I had been wanting to see one of my coworkers who was really cool and we had some common interests, but for some reason we were never scheduled together, so I missed my opportunity to invite him to the scavenger hunt that we had around the Magic Kingdom this last Wednesday. I had been praying that I would see him before that so that I could get his contact info and invite him, but God was working in the situation in a completely different way. Ironically after we were done with the scavenger hunt and just walking around the Magic Kingdom, I ran into him and I think it was his girlfriend. Anyway, it gave me a way better opportunity to get his number and ask him if he wanted to hang out sometime. In the past, I haven't really been good with just being able to do this type of stuff, and God knew that this situation would be the best for me to be able to do this. Another situation that was really neat for me to see God working was when we were in the Magic Kingdom, one of my friends has a tough situation at work that we weren't really sure how it would work out, so when we ran into a situation there right after the scavenger hunt, I was quick to get her away from the situation and start praying for her. I was praying that she would be calmed by God's peace and that He would help her through it, and then when she talked to me the next day, she said that everything was okay and that she didn't have too much trouble, even in that situation. I just love seeing how God is working here and I hope that he continues to bless us in our efforts to share his love. It is tough being the first group ever from Cru to work in the "attractions" part of the Magic Kingdom, because no one even knows that our program exists, so we have huge opportunity to show what we are all about, but also have it hard to establish ourselves in such a large group when there are only 4 of us. I think that people are starting to take notice of us and how we work, and so I think that God is finally starting to help us establish a little, for lack of a better term, "credibility." We are here with Cru, formerly "Campus Crusade for Christ," and we want to share God's love to all the people working here! I hope that we can continue to do this even though it is challenging.

Philippians 4:13

"I can do all this through him who gives me strength."

Mid-way through...

It is crazy to think that we are already halfway through our summer project down here at Disney World, but it is also crazy to think that we still have half of it left! Last night was our Mid-way project banquet, which was a time to thank the staff for everything that they have done, now that they will be leaving us, and also it was a celebration of what is still yet to be done with students stepping up into the leadership roles and really taking ownership of the project and its purpose.

This last week has been insanely busy trying to balance work, talking to people, figuring out how all the leadership stuff will work out, and just the normal project activities that we have going on. We finally have gotten into a little bit of a groove with how our schedule for work is, so that has been one of the positives of the last couple of weeks. We are now working 5 days of the week, with Wednesday off to devote just to project and one other day off of work. It has been really good for us to actually get into a normal schedule at  work, so that we can truly get to know our coworkers and develop those relationships. We have really started to get to know some of the people there that we see on a regular basis. Now we are trying to figure out how we can really get to know them on a more personal level by hanging out with them outside of work situations. I am really excited to see how we can actually get into these people's lives and really share the love of Christ with them.

My carpool group has had to deal with some really odd, awkward situations at work with one of our coordinators at work, so a prayer request would be for that situation to be resolved quickly. We desire to share the love of Christ with everyone there, so we want to be as much of an example of how Christ would treat people while we are working.

At work this week, it was the 4th of July celebration on the 3rd and the 4th, but since the 4th was on a Wednesday, we didn't have to work on one of the busiest days of the year for the Magic Kingdom. We did get the opportunity to work on July 3rd, so me and my carpool group did get to experience some of the busyness of the holiday. At first, when we got assigned our positions on for the parades and fireworks, I was a little disappointed because I was assigned to the bypass, so I didn't think that I would really get to interact with the guests as much and help them out, but then I volunteered to work as one of the people who would be positioned at the entrance to the bypass and keep track of the amount of people who came into the bypass from my entrance. This was cool because I got to be out on the edge of the entrance and still help guests out with questions. In fact, I even got the opportunity to help out a lady and her older son with several disabilities with a request for a restroom where both of them could be in at the same time. Me and one of my coworkers blocked off the men's restroom, since it is less used, and directed other guest to other restrooms while they used it. It just so happened that my manager walked by while we were doing this and was wondering why I wasn't exactly where I was assigned, and after I explained it to him, he gave me a Great Service Fanatic (GSF) card. It is the first one that I have received that I actually earned. (While we were training, the manager gave us one when we first operated the turnstiles). It is always encouraging to be affirmed that I was doing a good thing, because most of the time if people do these things, it goes unnoticed since there isn't a manager around most of the time.

Today, the staff has actually left, so it is finally becoming a reality that we are now the ones who are operating this project and they are not here to work with us. The responsibility is now more a reality than it seemed to be just even last night when we were saying the things that we really appreciated about the different staff members. I am going to miss the talks that I had with my discipler Chad and my discipler at UNO Lee, but I am excited to get to go even deeper with the other people here on project and grow in my relationship with Christ. I am glad to say that I have definitely been figuring out a lot about myself and my relationship with Christ that I had not actualized before now. Chad made me a "vision plan" for me personally relating to what he saw in me as strengths and areas where I can improve. It was encouraging for me to see that what God had been just recently teaching me, were the same things that Chad encouraged me to grow in, so it is always awesome to see affirmation in what God is teaching me. He brings up things over and over for me, on purpose, and even though I hate the fact that I have lots of things to work on, it is an encouragement that I am listening to the right things that God has been revealing to me so far this summer.

Galatians 5:1 "It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by the yoke of slavery."

I have been figuring out how I have not really been myself most of my life, and that through Christ and the freedom that he gives, I just need to courageously be me and leave what happens with my life up to Christ. I can say that the 7-8 months of my life, I have been myself more than I ever had been for an extremely long time, and even thought it is still a struggle, I am becoming more of myself as I grow in Christ.

Here's to the 2nd half of summer project and trusting God for what he will do with it. I'm out!

Men's Time "I'm a man; I'm 40! Come after me!"

Wednesday was full of wilderness, swamps, alligators, and manly activities. This week our project day was just devoted to Men's and Women's time, so we headed out to a state park and camping area to have our men's time learning about what it takes to be a MAN!

For men (especially me), competition can really bring to the surface exactly what is in our heart at that time, so whether or not the staff put us in these situations completely purposefully, it was something that I really noticed in myself and hit me hard. While we were competing during men's time, I was getting frustrated a little bit, and it was more with my attitude than anything, but I'm sure that it came out towards others. I've been a little frustrated with some things that were just really bothering me, and I had been trying to work through them, but this realization was probably the biggest help for me to go along with my desire to have the attitude of Christ in all things.

Now to actually talk about what the staff had more intended for us to learn from our men's time...

We have been covering what it means to really be a man and a man of God with the acronym RACE. We have been covering a different letter each week and we finished up since the staff will be leaving us soon.

R- Reject Passivity
A- Accept Responsibility
C- Courageously Lead
E- Expect God's Greater Rewards

Each one of these areas in our lives really impacts the way we treat our friends, family, loved ones, coworkers, and everyone we meet. Fact of life: men are different than women! ...Oh, good one there Andrew! Thank you for pointing that one out for me... But really, this is important to recognize, that there are roles that each one needs to fill and step up to the task because we were designed this way. Men today have in a lot of ways gotten away from what we were designed to do. Being a man is definitely not about age, physical abilities, a deep voice, or chest hair... It is easy for a guy to just sit back, be lazy, and just do what he wants. Rejecting Passivity is the first part to what we need to do to become a man. A man's role is to be a leader for others, and being passive towards what needs to be done is definitely a no-no. This kind of ties in with the next part of Accepting Responsibility. In life there are responsibilities that will need to be fulfilled and we as men need to step up to the challenge set before us. What man doesn't like a good challenge? I would say that a real man, one following after God, should always be up to battle the challenges of life set before us. As a man, I want challenges, adventures, battles, and struggles. I've got some other news: the Christian life doesn't have to be, and shouldn't be boring! It should be filled with fun, adventure, facing fears, trusting God, and leading through the unknown. We as men were also designed to Courageously Lead. Now this does not mean that there should be a dictatorship or lording over others, but as a servant willing to help others and follow our commander, Christ! Christ's love for us is great and all, but for men, we want someone great who we can follow after. This is something that gets overlooked by many people in the church today, and I agree with the staff on project, that in some ways this alienates men. It is all about Jesus' love for us, but that does not have as great of an appeal as a great commander who leads by sacrifice and serving to do what is best for us.

1 Timothy 1:12 "For this reason I also suffer these things, but I am not ashamed; for I know whom I have believed and I am convinced that He is able to guard what I have entrusted to Him until that day."

Now since we know that we were designed as men to do these things, what's next? Well, Expecting God's Greater Rewards, of course! If we come to realize that in all things that we do, when we are living for things with eternal significance, the rewards are greater. God will bless us far beyond what we can ever obtain here on earth, and that in itself should be motivation to live for God. We all strive and seek for others approval, so why not seek for the one who approval really matters? Live for Christ, not out of obligation of some religious activities, but because you love God and want to follow Him as your leader, and expect Him to reward you for following him well! These are just a summary of what we learned, my thoughts on it, and what I hope that I can follow through with in my own life, living to be a real man of God.

During our men's time day, we complete athletically in different races throughout our day, and then compared the similarities to these races and how we are to live the race of life seeking after God. We were challenged in areas that most men have struggles in and were told flat out how it affects you: spiritually, psychologically, and literal changing in our brains. Great instruction and accountability passed down from men seeking after God, to us college guys seeking to become men of God. We of course had food, because it cannot be a men's time if there is no food, and we really challenged to make sure that we understood what it looks like to be a man of God and if we wanted to commit to being a man. I am extremely grateful to all the staff men for the challenges that they have given us and the instruction, so that we can go hard after God.

2 Timothy 4:6-8

“For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time for my departure is near. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day —and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.”

A little project switchup

Well, again I have not updated my blog in a while, so this may be a pretty lengthy blog. We have had quite a bit happen since I last updated, so I'll start where I left off.

On Friday, we had our 2nd real work shift of PAC, and it sure was interesting. It was raining most of Friday, so we were not sure if there was going to be a parade, but it finally did slow down enough that it was only delayed about 10 minutes. In situations like this, they have tuggers parked along the parade rout in case the floats were to get stuck, which is going to happen when the pavement is wet. I was working a position on one of the corners where I needed to keep it clear for an emergency walkway and I also had to lay down space for where one of the tuggers would be and keep it clear until the tugger arrived. Once the parade started, I had to constantly be telling people that they could not stand on the corner or the walkway since it is our emergency path. People see an open spot and even though every single possible space anywhere near there is full, they think that there is some empty space right up front just left for them... It doesn't make sense to me as to why people would think that everywhere else would be packed and there would be empty space for them to stand, but I guess I am no psychologist... Haha! Anyway, there were several floats that did end up getting stuck going up the hill right by my tugger, so we had to get him out there and pull it up the hill. By the end of the parade, it had finally stopped raining, and my cleanup position was to take the stanchions out in the West part of the parade rout, so I follow along right behind the float and pull them out of the ground as quickly as I can to stay in pace with the parade. I enjoy doing this part, and I get to work with different people than who I was working with on the parade rout earlier. It apparently can also be dangerous, because my counterpart taking the stanchions from the opposite side of the parade fell down and hit his head pretty good and probably got a concussion from it, so he could probably use some prayer... After we had done this for the 9pm parade, we do it all over again for the 11pm one, but it is not nearly as busy. It was an interesting day of work, and hopefully I get to see some of the people I was working with again.

The next few days we had off of work, so I just spent the time we had off from project activities working on stuff for project, resting, and hanging out with other project people.

For some reason, my carpool group was having problems with our schedule and not getting very many hours, and if we don't have very many hours, it is hard to develop relationships with our coworkers, so it is kind of imperative. As of today, we have finally gotten that straightened out, so now it will be more consistent and we will have better opportunities.

Monday was a very weird day overall, but there were good and bad things that happened. Unfortunately we lost one of our guys from project because he had some issues that he needed to take care of at home, so that was sad. Some other weird things happened as well, but then that evening, since I had not really gotten to know any of my coworkers too well yet, I went with one the other carpool groups to hang out with them and one of their coworkers, who also brought along her roommate. We went to go see a really weird movie, which just added to the weirdness of the day, we grabbed some dinner, and just hung around downtown Disney. It was really a good time and I hope that they can continue to build a relationship with her.

Tuesday was another interesting day because since the staff will be leaving here in a week or so, they are choosing leaders to take over positions that need to be filled and they announced them before we went off for evangelism Tuesday morning. We have a few new project leaders and new people who will be leading the men's and women's times, discipleship and bible study leaders, and ministry team leaders. In talking to the staff, they choose people who they thought could handle the position, while also being able to learn a lot from the experience, so just because you are already good at something doesn't mean you would be put into that place, you might actually not be put there since you wouldn't get as much out of it. It is an excellent way to have people learn by the experience of taking on a position like this. I was chosen to take over for my discipler and bible study leader, since I told him that I wanted to start an all guys bible study/community group next year at UNO. Even though it would have been easier to take more of an administration role because I already have experience and am good at that, this role does give me more room to grow and improve since I don't have as much experience at doing this, so it will be a good thing for this project and for when I go back to UNO next fall. I am excited to see how I can learn from leading these dudes in discipleship and in our bible study.

One exciting story from our time evangelizing on Tuesday morning: one of the other guys on project, Kevin Spradlin and I went out together at a mall to go try to start some spiritual conversations with people, and we decided to start talking to this one guy who was originally from Germany. We just started by talking to him about the weather and random stuff, and of course Disney, because almost everyone has an opinion on it. After a while the guy said that he had to go back to work in a few minutes, because he worked in one of the stores in the mall, so I quickly transitioned into asking if he was interested in spiritual and Christian things, and he was surprisingly excited about it. He really did want to talk about it, but since he had to leave, I gave him my phone number on the back of one of our Knowing God Personally booklets and he said that he would call me on this Friday, so I am really hoping that he does. We'll see what God has in store for him.

The rest of Tuesday was work time, and this was the craziest time that I have had at work so far. I got a position where they just had made a change to it, so they did not know how it would go, and I would say that it wasn't great. For the parade, it was absolutely packed. I don't think I have seen it that full yet, and apparently it will only get worse this next week since it is the 4th of July week. The parade didn't actually go too bad, but when we had everyone move into the street for the fireworks viewing, it was a mess because people would not move into the middle of the circle area in front of the castle unless I was beckoning them right in front of them, and if I tried to do that, then people would fill in along the edge bleeding into what was supposed to be our emergency walkway. It was a mess until we finally got a few extra people to come help clear it out a little bit, but even then, there were so many people and they were so stubborn that it was difficult. After this adventure, I was pretty worn out, so it was a good that the next parade was much less packed and it was extremely easy to help people out. During work on Tuesday, I actually met a couple of people from Nebraska, so that was pretty cool. Another thing that is cool at work is that there is one girl name Mikey, who seems to really like all of us in our carpool group, so hopefully we will get a chance to get to know her better.

This post is getting ridiculously long, so I will just make a new one for our Men's time that was on Wednesday, so stay tuned, there will be more to come! Please keep me and our project in your prayers as we are making this transition soon and are trying to spread the love of God to Disney World.

Earning my ears again, and finally starting real work

Well, this blog will be kind of long since I haven't done it in a few days, so here it goes... A few days ago, Sunday and Monday, my carpool group and I have had been training for our 2nd new position as Parade Audience Control (PAC) people. I have really enjoyed the opportunity we get to interact with guests and our coworkers more in this position than in park greeter. We get to "go make friends" around our area so that we can have a easier time getting everyone to cooperate when we need to tell people to move out of the areas we need to keep clear for emergencies.
During training, we would have instruction times and then we would go out and the four of us and our trainer would man one of the positions for whatever parade is going on. We helped with the "Celebrate A Dream Come True Parade," which is at 3pm everyday, "Move It, Shake It, Celebrate It! Street Party," which happens multiple times a day, and "The Magic, The Memories, and You!" show along with the "Electrical Parade" that happens every night at least once at 9pm, most nights at 11pm as well. We get to have a lot of fun most of the time when people are being smart and staying where they need to be. We even get to dance around a little bit and just have fun during the Street Party, so it is quite entertaining. For the 9pm parade, the whole parade rout is super crowded, so it is one of the more difficult parts of our job. People want to stand everywhere, even in the emergency walkways, so we are constantly having to remind people that they cannot stand there and that they may find a place somewhere else. We are always told to give options to the guests so that they can make the best choice for them, so we almost always recommend that they either go to the town square, Frontierland, or wait for the 11pm parade if we have one, since there are not nearly as many people around for the 11pm parade. It is still fun even though some guests get very frustrated with you for telling them that they cannot do something.
As far as evangelism is going, it has been rough the last few days. On Tuesday, we went out to a mall and then downtown Celebration. Me and my group tried to talk to about 10 people and no one even wanted to talk at all and it was sort of depressing until finally the last person we tried to talk to actually let us talk to him. He was a 12 year old boy who was fishing in a lake in downtown Celebration. He was a Christian, so he gave all the typical responses to the questions we were asking, but where the situation got encouraging was when his mom actually came up to us as we were kind of winding down the conversation. She started asking us questions about what we were talking about and started explaining that one of her son's friends was asking a lot of deep questions to her, like about if she believed in God and how that affected her, and she said that she wasn't really sure how to answer some of his other questions. We were glad to talk to her and we showed her some of the information that we have to share with people about God and the website EveryStudent.com where he could type in questions that he had and it should have relevant articles to answer his questions. She was really excited about this, so hopefully she can share these with him and he will be able to have some of his questions answered and come to know God.
On Thursday, we finally started actual work, since we had finally completed all of the training that we need for a while. We arrived at work for our 6:15pm-12:15am shift; we started out working park greeter for 45 minutes, where I got assigned to sweep the whole time... Haha! Anyways, then we went up to our meeting room at 7pm for our meeting before the 9pm parade. It was interesting since it was our first time actually having to do this all by ourselves. I was assigned to Castle 1 position, where during the parade I get a spot along the top of the hub in front of the castle, and watch and make sure that everyone stays back along the curb, there are no people using camera lighting which can be dangerous for the performers, and just making sure everyone is generally safe. Once I have my spot set up, since I am not in an essential area to keep guests moving, I got to do PACtivities! It is just different games and activities that we on PAC do with the guests to entertain them and help them have an enjoyable time while they wait for the parade. One of my fellow PAC people, Alexis, who said he was from Belgium, and I started a jump rope for the kids. At first all the little kids were kind of shy about it, but as soon as we got a few of the little kids to go, we had a long line waiting for their chance to jump rope. It was a lot of fun when the crowd around got into it and would applaud the kids when they would do well. After we had done that for quite a while, we had to get ready for the parade. There were these really young brother and sister who couldn't see if they were back where they had space so since I made myself a nice big box to stand in, I had them come up next to me while the parade was going on and they were so excited to see all the characters. I had the little girl say hi to Ashley, one of the ladies who is in my group, since she was doing the parade escort, and was telling them all about all the different characters. They were so happy and excited to say hi to everyone; it made my night, and I think it made theirs as well. Then after the first parade went by, I was the river-side rope, which means that I hold onto the rope that goes behind the end of the parade while it makes its way through the 2nd half of the rout. I also am helping the person rolling up the rope so that we can keep somewhat in stride with the other side and their rope roller. After we finished up getting all of the stanchions and ropes out of the way, we got a little break before doing the whole thing over again at 11pm. Overall it was a pretty good night, now we get to do it again Friday night, tonight. Since we are finally getting the opportunity to work, hopefully we will be able to make some friends with our coworkers and get an opportunity to find out more about them and love on them with God's love.

Finally some time off work...

So the time has finally come when I have actually had some time off of work to just rest and get my bearings back... It hasn't exactly been time completely off from doing things, but it still has been pretty good. On Wednesday, we got the opportunity to go to Cocoa Beach as a project and attempt to get into spiritual conversations and then we went surfing, this time for real! (Photo cred to Trinity)
It was a blast and had a few good rides on the waves, but I got decently beat up with some good bruises, scrapes, and pains.
I got to have some time to clean up and serve other people here on project; I spent a few hours on Thursday fixing one of girl's condo's vacuum cleaners and cleaning up our condo. I also had the opportunity to go to a couple of the parks here at Disney finally. On Friday, I got to go to Animal Kingdom and then on Saturday evening I got to go to Hollywood Studios to see Fantasmic. I hope that I will have some other time off so that I can actually get to see everything here in Disney, because even though I work here, I haven't even been to most of it personally. I am constantly answering questions about how to get to this park or that park when I do exits, and I have been told what to tell guests on how to get there, so I have no personal experience at it, so I could be lying to them and not even know it...so I hope to get to know how to navigate around a little bit more.
I haven't had very much time at all to be by myself in quite some time now since I was in Italy for 3 weeks before this and did not get any time while we were there. I am pretty balanced as far as being introverted and extroverted, so having alone time is quite necessary for me sometimes, and the only time that I have had on project was for devotionals, which is only for a half an hour or so and there are still people around, so it really isn't alone time for me. I was finally able to get a little bit of that on Saturday, and it was long overdue. On Friday when we went to Animal Kingdom, about halfway through our time there, I had my introvertedness really kick in and just wanted to be by myself and couldn't stand to be around all the people there. I just wanted to go into shutdown mode, so it was quite difficult to stay around for the rest of the time we were there. Balance is one of the things that is really hard to have while on summer project: getting enough time to be by myself, time with God, time with people, and time at work. This is something that I could really use prayer for.
On Saturday after taking most of the day for myself, I made some of my awesome scratch banana pancakes and invited other people to come over and have some, so this was really good, cause I was ready for some friendship again after having some me-time. Everyone seemed to really enjoy them, even though I now realize that I forgot one ingredient that would have made it way easier to fry (that is what happens when you try to make sometime from memory), so next time they will be even better. Tomorrow, actually today technically, we go back to work after church, so we will get more opportunities to build relationships with our coworkers, and I can't wait to get back at it!

Earning my ears!

The last three days have been so busy with training, I can't even begin to explain it... This seems to be how I start just about every blog lately, but it is all good and will be a great thing in the end. Our group had the longest and most intensive training schedule of all the different positions at Disney; we had 3 full 8-hour days of job specific training before we had our assessment day today, not to mention the other two full days of training we had. Then today we had finally made it to our assessment day where we were required to take a 55 question multiple choice test, be assessed while doing about an hour of working at the turnstile in the busy part of the morning, and get an assessment from one of the managers. It didn't really take very long at all for us, because we are all intelligent and have become fairly proficient at this the last few days. Since we passed our assessment, we had finished "Earning our Ears" which just means that we are no longer training for the job. We will probably get our little "Earning my Ears" ribbon back when we doing training for PAC this next week, but we got to enjoy it for part of one day.  After finishing up a few online training things, we started actually working our job as Park Greeters at Walt Disney World - Magic Kingdom! I can't even count the amount of times that I said either "insert your ticket right there" (with the Disney Point aka 2 fingers), "please place your finger on top there for me," "have a nice day," and "have a magical day" while I was helping people with their tickets getting into the park. I really do enjoy it, particularly when the little kids are just so happy and can't contain their smile any longer when I ask if they want a Mickey sticker and sheepishly say "Yes..."
I also got assigned a lot of random tasks later in the afternoon when the lines were not very long like taking pictures for people, handing out celebration buttons, and cleaning off the bio-devices that are used to take a picture of the persons finger. The last task that I got assigned was doing exits for the park; this is one of the more enjoyable parts for me because I get to help guest with strollers and wheelchairs get out the gates, answer questions that guests have, and mess with the guests a little bit. I also get to wave a big mickey hand stick and tell the guest good-bye. The most frequently asked question by far is, "Do we need a stamp to get back into the park later today?" or some variant of this. This is my favorite question to mess with the people a little; I always tell them, "No, you just need your ticket and your finger" and "Don't forget your finger." Every person's reaction to this is a little bit different, so it is really entertaining! Haha!
It is also entertaining to mess with the dads every once in a while when they are wearing their favorite sports team shirt. My favorite today was when a man with an Iowa hat asked me what they needed to have to get back into the park, and I said I didn't know if they would with the Iowa hat on and then informed him that I was from Nebraska. He said we would see them the day after Thanksgiving, but I am sure that we will end up on the good side of that one. I was able to go to last years game, and with how we handled them, I say good luck to them.
It should be a good time doing this and PAC for the summer, and I am excited to start getting to know my coworkers and being able to poor into them with the love of God. This summer is just starting to get into the swing of things, so I am excited to see all the God will do through us here in the next two months!
I am so thankful that I finally will have some time off from work now. We have Wednesday off every week just to devote to project stuff, so we have that day off. Then my group also has Thursday, Friday, and Saturday off! I am plenty tired and will be really grateful for some rest and recovery the next few days.

I'm out. #keepingitclassy #disneypoint #noticketynomickey #WDWSP12

"Hi, please insert your ticket and place your finger on the scanner..."

The last couple of days have gone by super fast and have been extremely crazy. My group (I now realize that I didn't even mention who they were before) Ashley, RaeLynn, Heather and I are in Parade Audience Control (PAC) and Park Greeting, so the last couple of days we have been bombarded with all sorts of facts and information about the park since we are the first people that the guest will be interacting with and we will be just interacting with the guests while we are waiting for the parades. I know more about how to interact with guests, run a turnstile, and Disney knowledge than I ever imagined me or anyone I even knew would know about these things. We keep getting told a ton of the same information over and over again so that we will remember it and be able to assist guests with all of their common questions and needs. Yesterday we were introduced to what we do if we are working PAC. We go to a meeting before the parades where they relay any relevant info about  it to us and then we are assigned a certain position along the parade rout. We go out and begin setting up the ropes and stanchions that don't impede too much traffic flow before the parade starts, then we get to go around and play games with the little kids, talk to guests, and just be part of the show. This is the part that I am the most excited about; I think I will enjoy just getting to have fun this way and help guests enjoy their time here. Then we will set up the complete barricade so that no one gets in the way or hurt from the parade as it goes by. Next we begin to tear down the perimeter right after it passes by us, so that everyone can be on their merry way again after the show. PAC seems like it will be a lot of fun and I can't wait until we actually get our full training on that.
Then we went back to the condos and ate some supper. Johann, my condo-mate who broke his arm, and I got invited over to hang out and watch a movie with "The Greenhouse," one of the girls condos. All of the people on project have had fun nicknaming their condos and coming up with theme songs and such. Me and my condo haven't determined an "official" name yet, but we have a motto, "Don't mess with the Johann!" Anyways, The Greenhouse: Dani, Sara, Shannon, Sarah, Jen, and Bri, had us over to watch Tangled. It was a lot of fun and it was funny to see all those girls joking around with each other.
Today we had our first training on Park Greeting. We started nice and early in the morning at 7am, which means we had to wake up at 5:30am or so to get there early enough we knew we wouldn't get lost and end up being late. We were told all about how we prepare the park in the morning, but for us, in our agreement after training, we will just be working in the evening, so it really didn't apply to us, but we listened and payed attention anyway. We went all over the Main Street area learning about where things are and what we are responsible to do. Then began our training on how to use the keypad for the turnstiles in case they don't work properly or people are trying to use expired or invalid tickets. It seems fairly straight forward, but there are a lot of different problems that arise with the people or with one of the 300+ different tickets that a guest may have to enter Disney World. We had the opportunity to work in one of them for a little while this afternoon during a little rush. It was pretty fun, but a little frustrating when people won't just hold down their fingers until the light turns green and they can come in. It is fairly simple, just insert your ticket into the slot and place your index finger on the designated place, but people are in such a hurry that they don't even look at the obvious steps to entering the park, and unfortunately some people decide to not follow directions and use other fingers. It makes in difficult when they don't remember what finger they used to get the ticket to work since they have to cycle through their fingers, but it is all part of the job, otherwise they wouldn't need people to work at the turnstiles. Haha! We have two more days of training left in Park Greeter before our assessment day, and then we finally will get a few days off. I am enjoying my time training and working at the park, but I am ready for a day off to just relax and get some energy back. Time for another early day tomorrow!

Crazy days

The last few days have been pretty crazy and a whirlwind... On Wednesday we started off with a little lesson and some testimonies on time management. It is increasingly crucial that we have this as we are starting our training and work schedule at Disney while trying to manage project activities and our own walk with God. As I said earlier, if you don't want to be challenged physically, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally, then don't go on a summer project! After we finished that little time, we headed over to the Cru International Headquarters in Orlando. It was really neat to see the amazing things that are going on all over the world with their ministries and really encouraging to me. It was amazing for me to find out that they have translated the "Jesus Film" into over 1000 languages! They are just doing some great work to try to reach the whole world with the gospel and I get to be a part of that this summer with all the people from around the world coming to Disney World. Since we got a taste of this mission, the staff gave us some time to have fun, but also to realize that every time we go to the park, we should be going with a purpose. We were told to go to Epcot last night and go explore, but talk to all the cast members there. In Epcot, they have a bunch of different nations with exhibits and the people working them are from the country they are trying to represent. We were supposed to go talk to them and make connections, maybe invite them to hang out, or just love on them. My buddy Nick and I decided to go off and see if we could just talk to a bunch of people in the short amount of time we had. We were able to have quite a few good conversations and we were even asked by a guy in "France" to come back and talk later after his store got less busy, so we did and were able to give him our numbers, so hopefully we will be able to build a relationship with him. It was really awesome to see how receptive they were to talking to us, so I just am hoping that we can build a lot of relationships quickly.
(Quick side note, we saw Topher Grace at Epcot, the first celebrity actor I have ever seen in person.)

Then today, we had our first day of training for our positions in the Magic Kingdom. We had to wake up really early in the morning, so it has been a long day. We were shown all around the Magic Kingdom because we need to familiarize ourselves with the whole park so that we can assist guests in the best way possible. I have already learned more about Disney than I ever thought I would in my whole life; I never envisioned myself working at Disney, or on a summer project at Disney, but that shows how God has other plans than our own. After we got a general overview of the whole park, we were split up into our groups of what we will actually be doing. I was hired in attractions part, and I have been eagerly awaiting knowing what I will actually be doing as a "Main Street Daily Operations" person. Now was the time to find out; I will be doing greeting/turnstyle working and Parade Audience Control or as Disney says "PAC." We walked through all of the Main Street area in great detail because we will probably be asked a lot of questions about this area since it is where we will spend all of our time. We need to kind of figure out what stores sell what and where the nearest restroom, ATM, map stands, ect. are located. It was a lot to try to remember, so there is definitely a learning curve with it. Then we got fitted with our new costumes for our different jobs. I will put up pictures later, but as a greeter I get to wear these awesome dorky looking yellow/orange shirts with dorky blue shorts and as a PAC I get to wear a white button-down shirt, dark pants, and a vest.
This will definitely be a big push for me personally since I am not exactly the world's biggest outgoing, friendly person, so the Lord definitely wants to push me in different ways this summer. I am a little low on sleep, so I am going to not go into too much detail about training or anything.
Then later this evening some of the lovely ladies on project had our condo over for dinner kind of for our condo-mate Johann since he broke his arm and won't be able to work at Disney this summer. Hopefully he will find out how he can best serve this summer and stick around to bless everyone on project. After supper, we a great men's time where God is continuously challenging me in different areas in life, sometimes when I think I maybe have more of life figured out, God comes and gives me plenty more things to work on that I didn't even think of before, but have needed work all along. This will be a great summer filled with magic, hard work, growth in life, and God. I am so excited, but we as a project and I personally could use all your prayers for God to really work and allow us to do everything for His glory.

It all started with a mouse...

Yesterday was a big day for us here on the Walt Disney World Summer Project; we attended Disney Traditions today at Disney University. It is the first "class" that you take when you start at Disney before you become a cast member. It told us a lot about the company, values of the company, and how we are to act while working at Disney. It was a long day from 8am to 4pm sitting there in the same room with small breaks to go observe Magic Kingdom, the cast, and the park design for safety ect., and a lunch break. I'm not sure that I can really say anything more than this about it, but it was a lot of basic info that you get before you start any job.
I did learn about what I would be doing while at Disney: Main Street Daily Operations. You may wonder exactly what that means, and you are not alone in this. I would also like to know exactly what I am doing, but the group of 4 of us assigned to it haven't been told yet what it is. We were able to talk to some other cast members later on in the day who said that it could be like setting up and parade control along with guest interactions, so I am still not sure exactly what it will all entail, but I think that it will be fun whatever I really get to do.
After we were done with our day at Disney University, we changed and headed immediately to go see Magic Kingdom. We had a little trouble with this since our cards weren't actually activated yet, but we finally got it figured out. Then we got to just have a ton of fun around the park riding a few rides, observing how things go on in the Magic Kingdom, and getting to know some of my other Cru project people better. It was one of the most enjoyable times I have ever had in a theme park because I was able to really get to know some people a ton better and we were not just rushing through to get to do everything. We enjoyed talking to other people we were standing next to in line as well. Then the last thing we did in the park was watch the parade, projection show on the castle, and fireworks. The projection on the castle and fireworks were two of the coolest things that I have ever seen. The castle would transform from one type of castle to a completely different one, and I am kind of a castle fanatic. I used to fill up notebooks with drawings of castles, create Lego castles, and play a 3d castle creator game on my computer when I was younger, so this was super cool to see. Then a car of us guys went to Pizza Hut afterwards and just discussed some things about the project and some of the concerns we have. It was just a great time to talk about it and really figure out that we all have similar concerns and we are all in this project together. I am super excited to do some great things this summer and hope God can be brought into Disney World through us!

Working together as a team

As many of you already know, I have the unbelievable opportunity to take part in a summer mission project sponsored by Cru with over 60 other students to Walt Disney World. I get the awesome opportunity to live down here in Florida and work at Disney world through the partnership that Cru has with Disney.

But more importantly, we have an incredible purpose and vision for being here this summer; we get the opportunity to share the love of Christ with tons of people. The Disney College Program attracts countless young adults from across the globe who work at Disney and then return home a semester later. This allows us to bring the message of Jesus to literally hundreds of nations, many unreachable but all accounts. I feel extremely blessed to take part in this vision and I know that it will have far reaching implications for the gospel and the kingdom of God. This opportunity is not so much for me, because I could be doing numerous other things with my summer, but this is an enormous movement that will equip the future leaders of the church and change eternal destinies the world over.

As you might imagine, raising the necessary funds is extremely challenging and many of the students have struggled to raise all the money necessary. The money donated is only to cover room and board for the mission and cost associated with ministry. We pay for all other expenses ourselves, so this is not about a moneymaking opportunity. I could have made a good amount of money if I had stayed home and gotten a job there, but that is not the purpose of my summer. As a project we are behind in funds even though I have worked hard to achieve the goal of what I needed, I would encourage you to consider giving to the project through my account. 

https://give.cru.org/give/View/5652939?pp=

These gifts are tax-deductible and would be a great blessing to all of us here on WDWSP. If you are not financially able to give, I would appreciate your prayers, because with God all things are possible. 

One of the most fulfilling days of my life

On Saturday morning we got up and ready to go out and start our "training" by being thrown out into the fire and just going out to share the gospel. It was our first scheduled time to go out and share the love of God with people. We had a quick time where we reviewed over some of the stuff that we had been talking about and just how we can love on all the people we talk to regardless of what they say or how they react. The whole point of what we are trying to do is bring glory to God, and sharing the gospel with people is just one form of that.
We headed out to Lake Eola, which is a park of sorts, and slit up into groups of two. My roommate Chris and I headed out and just started walking around the park. It was quite a different situation that we were expecting because there was a big event for special needs children going on all around the lake and people were just walking everywhere, so there weren't too many people just standing still so that we could approach to talk to them. At first we just were confused on what to do, but then we just approached any person we could find who did not seem to be busy. I will just share one huge highlight from our time doing this, there were other encouraging stories, but this one is by far my favorite:
We approached this girl, Chelsea, who was probably about a junior in high school and who was working one of the games they had going on. No one was at her game, so we decided to take a chance that she would have the time to talk to us. First we asked her if any of the topics on our sheet interested her, and she said that she guessed that she was interested in 6 Reasons God Exists or Prove That He's God. We asked her why she pick those and she said that she believed that there was a God, but wasn't really sure about how that it really had any impact on her. We were able to present the whole gospel to her while asking her questions about what she thought to see if she understand what we were saying and just trying to show her God's love for her. We had a few distractions with little kids running around and wanting to play a few games, but I believe that she was really responsive to it and really understood what we were telling her. She did not think that she was ready to give up her life to having God as the center of her life because she was a little skeptical of putting her faith into something like this and living for God, but she said that she had some grandparents that always take her to church when she stays with them. She seemed really interested in the information and resources that we left with her and we prayed for her and her brother, who has a bone disease, but she was thankful that he could still walk. I think that she is really close with how interested she seemed, but just needs time to realize the joy and freedom that Christ brings. It is really exciting and encouraging, so I am going to continue to pray for her and encourage you all too as well.
After we returned from our time at Lake Eola, we met up at the pool and exchanged cool stories about what happened, and then we went and had a ton of fun playing soccer in a small field across the street from our condos. It was a blast, but maybe not the brightest idea because immediately after we finished with that, we had our men's time.
This was the most physically demanding men's time I have ever been a part. We all sweated, were in pain, fought hard, and were emotionally and psychologically challenged together as men. That is all I will/am allowed to say about that. It definitely was something else, and I would not recommend going on summer project if you do not want to be changed and challenged mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. It was one of the most fulfilling days of my life where I really feel like I had a impact on others.

More training and some surfing fun!

On Friday we had a full day of training. I won't go into a ton of detail, but we had some excellent lessons and dialogue about Grace vs. Truth and how those can work together to produce growth. Also we discussed some developmental skills: bonding, boundaries, sorting out good and bad, and adulthood. It was very encouraging and helpful for me since this summer is a huge opportunity for personal growth as well as ministering to others. I just have been extremely encouraged by how open everyone has been to discussion and conversation in our training times with everyone in the same room. Sometimes people do not feel comfortable sharing in front of everyone, but it seems as though people are very willing to state what they think. After we had done our training from about 8:30am til 5pm, we got to have some supper and then celebrate with a surprise from our lovely staff.

The staff set up a time where we got to try a place called "Fantasy Surf." It was called "flowboarding," kind of like surfing in that you are gliding on a board over the water, but it is more like a combination of snowboarding and skateboarding. There is a powerful engine that shoots water up a slope and you get on a mini surfboard and try to stay upright and "surf." It was a ton of fun even though we all got knocked down and shot away by the water. I ended up with a few bruises, but nothing too serious. Unfortunately one of my condo-mates, Johann, broke his humerus, and may have to have surgery, so your prayers for him would be appreciated. Overall it was a really great time! After that experience, we headed back to the condos and went to have some fun in the pool and hot tub. It was a good day!

Casting Day at Disney

Yesterday was the casting day for our jobs at Disney World. We also had some other things scheduled for activities for our Cru group.

I started off the day with a meeting to discuss the financial support for the summer that we needed to have. After we met, I talked with my mom on the phone, as my parents were headed to the airport on their way to their trip to Europe for their 25th wedding anniversary celebration, and she let me know that my grandpa had donated the rest of the amount that I needed to have for the summer, so I should be funded at least for the general amount I need for this mission trip.

Then I had a few hours to kill before I got to go into the casting center for Disney to sign paperwork and get everything straightened out for that, and also get assigned to where I will be working at Disney. So while I waited for my time to arrive, I made good use of it and prepared some of the paperwork and information about myself for project and getting to know others. I was able to get these done and then dressed for the casting appointment in clothes completely not my own except my underwear, socks and shoes. I had to borrow nicer clothing from my condo-mates since my nice clothes are still in the mail somewhere between here and Lincoln, NE. I came straight down here to Florida for project after spending 3ish weeks in Italy, so I did not have any nicer clothes with me that I took to Italy, so I had pants that were too small, a shirt that was too big, and my attempt at tying a tie not my own. The pants were too short and they kind of flared out at the bottom, so they just made me look a little bit ridiculous, but it was all good and it worked. We headed over the the casting place and got all the paperwork filled out and signed... And I am pleased to say that I will be working in attractions department somewhere in Disney! They have not specified where exactly I will be working or which ride I will be working with, but I do now finally know basically what I will be doing.

After we had finished that, we had a scheduled time of soul-to-soul time with our discipleship groups, and we ended up going a little late, so by the time we were done, it was time for bed. Soul-to-soul, if you can't guess, is just each of us telling our own story of our life, who we are, how we got here, and what we are like now in total confidentiality so that everyone can feel better about being completely open and honest. Since we have such a short time here, 10~ weeks, to get to know each other, it is a great way to really get down deep and see where the others in our group are coming from. It is also good to think and evaluate your own situation and where you are, so I was thankful to get to do this with an awesome group of guys. It is hard for me to look back on some of the painful experiences that I have had, but it just brings me more amazement at how much God has worked in my life and changed me into who I am today. There is always room for improvement, but it is great to see God's work in my broken life.

First few days of Summer Project at Walt Disney World!

After arriving in Orlando late on May 28th (early May 29th), the Bickerstaffs were amazing and clutch allowing me to crash on their couch that night. They were a little worried that it might not be comfortable, but compared to some of the beds I had in Italy, it was amazing. Also I was extremely tired after traveling that day, so I would not have had trouble sleeping anywhere basically; May 28, 2012 was literally the longest day of my life, I think that it was about 30 hours long since I was traveling back time zones.
Anyway, I woke up the next morning with more sleep than any night I was over in Italy, so I was feeling pretty good for the day. I worked on some of the wrap-up stuff from my study abroad trip and prepared myself for the day. Then I packed up my little amount of luggage that I brought with me to Italy and went over to the main lobby for the resort. I was greeted by a bunch of smiling faces and hellos from the lovely staff and interns for this summer project.

 I got all of my registration stuff figured out and since I was one of the first people to check in, Lee helped me take my stuff over to my room. Here are some pictures of our condo we will be staying in this summer...
(bathroom, living room, bedroom, and kitchen)

We figured out that some of the guys rooms had been mixed around so the staff were calling each other figuring out what happened, but everything was straightened out before most of the guys came to check in, so it was all good. As Lee likes to say, "In grace, we have freedom to fail." Failure to have everything perfect for where people are staying is not a huge deal, and we all make mistakes. I'm glad that we can all come together with all our junk and serve the Lord this summer...

Then I just chilled and hung around the registration area for quite a while, since I did not really have any stuff to move into my room. My parents shipped me a box of clothes and other things that I packed up before I left for Italy, so it should be here on Friday.

Then I went back to my room and met my roommates for the summer: Chris, Rob, and Johann. We talked for a while and had some of the other guys visit us, we all started to get to know one another. I decided to do a little laundry from the small amount of clothing that I do have, so that I would have clothes for the next few days while I wait for the rest of them to get here. We then had a group meal where we got to see how big our group was and realize that this is really happening right now.
After supper we had one of the interns take us to Wal-Mart to go buy food supplies and other things to start us off for the summer. We split up in the store to go get group items that we would be sharing and individual items. We did pretty well picking up things that we knew we would need and we ended up with a pretty good sized receipt. It was good that we all figured out fairly well what we are going to be doing for meals and other necessities so that we can buy in bigger amounts and save money that way.

That night, I finally received my email so that I could begin filling out my paperwork for beginning employment at Disney. There are an unbelievable amount of forms that you have to fill out and I spent a good chunk of my evening reading huge PDFs and filling in information, but I was able to get it all done.
Then on Wednesday, we had our first big day of training and preparation for the rest of the project. We drove over to a local church where we were informed of a few of the details of what it is exactly that we will be doing in our time not spent working. There is still plenty that we don't know yet, but at least we now have a glimpse at it. It seems as thought "Going Surfing Every Day" is kind of our motto for the summer. The staff members did a good job of comparing how what we are going to be doing this summer to surfing. Our walk with God, sharing the gospel with people, and our whole summer can relate to surfing and the ocean. God is powerful like an ocean, untameable and majestic. Living for God and sharing our faith is like surfing in that while you know that it has the possibility to be phenomenal and amazing, there are elements of risk involved, but in the end it is worth the risk. This is just the beginning of the growth, and I'm sure there will be plenty of things that I will learn throughout the summer as we continue to spur each other on to live for Christ each day.
Later that evening, we had a group activity where we went and did a photo scavenger hunt in Downtown Disney. It was quite a bit of fun, and later on I may add some pics of it to this blog.
Thursday we will go and get all of our paperwork straightened out and find out what section of the park we will be working in. I can't wait!

Day 19 - Traveling back to US

Today, we left Italy and headed back to the good old United States. A group of us had flights at about 11am on May 28, so we all got a shuttle ride to the airport together. This experience was much less stressful than the previous time at the airport in Rome. We had to take a shuttle to get to our area for customs and airport security, but after that it was pretty much a breeze. I did get checked at the carry-on baggage check area for drugs, so that was kind of interesting. Then all the other people that I rode with made it through and we met at the gate area. Then their flight boarded and I got to say goodbye to all of them. Then I headed over to my plane boarding area, and I got shuttled out to the plane. This time, I actually got to keep my seat on the plane, and not basically get blackmailed into switching seats with a baby, like on my flight over to Rome. This flight was also much more enjoyable than the one that I had coming to Rome; the plane was nicer, the flight attendants were more kind, the food was better, and the entertainment was better. I was able to watch four movies on this flight, since the flight was over nine hours long. When the flight arrived in Orlando, it was even actually a little bit early, but that didn’t really matter since I already had a 3.75 hour layover scheduled. I was able to spend time responding to emails and other stuff through my phone since they didn’t have free Wi-Fi at the airport. Then I got some Taco Bell for dinner and was super excited to have free refills on my drink and all the water I could drink without paying an arm and a leg. It turns out that I even had more time than I anticipated since the plane I was supposed to ride on was broken, so they had to find us a new plane and we didn’t get to take off until two hours later, so I was not able to get to Orlando until 12:15am or so the next day. My ride, Lee, was clutch and was able to come pick me up this late in the evening, so everything worked out. Now I am ready for the next phase of my summer, Walt Disney World Summer Project!

Here is a little wrap up from the study abroad; We had to do five sketches for the class, so here are the five that I choose to do: Castle type building in Florence, Flying Buttresses on Duomo in Milan, underside of interesting bridge in Venice, column capital in the Colosseum, and the Pantheon.

Day 18 - Rome (The Last Day)

Today was our last day in Italy :( I leave tomorrow morning at 11:35am, but that means that I need to be there at about 8:45 or so, so a group of us will be taking a shuttle to the airport early tomorrow morning to be ready in plenty of time.

Today was kind of a travel and housekeeping day to get everything in order for everyone to depart and go their separate ways. We got up and ready to go at 8am and had breakfast. We tried to leave as soon as everyone was finished with breakfast, but as soon as we got the bus started, we got stuck in the mud from the serious rain we had the night before. The lightning last night was so cool and different from most times because the storm and lightning must have been right over the top of us; the thunder was so loud and immediate after the lightning, I had never heard or seen anything like it. So anyway, we all got out of the bus and started pushing.

It had to rock back and forth about 5 times, but we finally managed to get it out of the rut and onto solid ground again. After that, it was pretty smooth sailing the rest of the bus ride; we made it back to the hotel where we stayed the first time we were in Rome by about 1pm or so, and then we headed off for lunch. We had a group meeting at 6pm that night and got everything squared away with going to the airport and just getting ready to go our separate ways. Then we went out and had supper later that evening and we had a really good time. We had some of the best servers, no, the best servers we have had the entire trip tonight! They were great, teasing us and having fun. They even gave us some free wine! It was awesome! Then we headed back to the hotel to regroup before going out for one last hurrah of gelato.

Day 17 - Paestum II

Today was our last day of actually going around visiting sites and learning about different architectural styles. We went to the ancient city ruins of Pompeii and ancient Greek temples at Paestum.

We started off with a good breakfast at 8am and got on the bus right afterwards. We had a nice hour and a half ride to Pompeii. Once there, we bought our lunches outside the ruins, so we would not have to take a very long break for lunch. We were able to walk around the streets of this ancient city and see all the remains that are still there from when it was covered in ash from a volcano explosion. Quite a bit of it was well preserved because of this and there is still more that could be excavated today. We were able to go around and see kind of how the city would be set up and how the transportation worked. The wheel ruts from the carts that would haul things around the city were extremely visible in most places. It was a completely different experience than most of the other places that we have visited because we could actually walk through the town and get a feel for how it would be to live there and walk around to the different places they had. We could see some well preserved shops that would have been used as restaurants, some theaters, plenty of residences, and many other places. 

There was also an exhibit that had the bones of some of the poor people who died from either the heat or the ash from the volcanic eruption. They had been preserved by an archeologist by using plaster, so most of them is covered in plaster, but you can still see some of the bones. There were also some mosaic/tile floor decorations that were preserved that were pretty cool to see. One of the more interesting things about the city was that you could see how cheap the people actually were there (more cost effective? however you want to look at it). They built a lot of their columns out of masonry and then added a marble covering or finish to the outside of them. I suppose this is like today when we take precast concrete and cover then panels with brick to give it a masonry look when it actually isn’t.

We also got to see some amphitheaters and coliseum areas that were still preserved as well. Most of the seating for the theaters was still in good shape, but the coliseum’s seating was mostly gone. All of them were still interesting to see, and some of us were thinking that if something happened and down the road people were visiting somewhere in the United States, it could be like walking through Memorial Stadium. We also listened to a couple of presentations on the city and the aqueducts and those were both pretty interesting. After we finished up visiting Pompeii, we left to go back to Paestum and see the ancient Greek temples there.

In Paestum, there was an ancient Greek city that has 3 remaining temples and mostly just a little rubble for the rest of the town. The temples were pretty cool to see and Nate did his presentation on them so we got to learn about the history of them. Originally they were thought to be Roman temples, so there was some confusion on what was what. They were built by the Greeks, but then the Romans came in and conquered them, and then there was some evidence that they could have been converted to Christian churches before they were abandoned. 

These were quite large, some of the largest ancient structures with giant pillars that we got to see, and I thought they were a neat thing to see as the last major part of this trip. Then we were able to go visit a museum of artifacts and pieces of the buildings from the town that they could not leave out in the ruins. There were quite a few pots, some coins, and statues. Then we left our last place we were visiting for class.

We headed back to the hotel/farmhouse place and decided it was time to blow off some steam in the pool they had there. The water was nice and cold to start off, but then we started up some kind of water polo game with the soccer ball our bus driver gave us. We all got pretty physical and were pushing each other around and having a good time. Since we haven’t been able to keep as hydrated as we should, a few of us got calf cramps which aren’t exactly fun, but we just got back in and kept going after it went away. It was fun to just play around in the pool and get some physical activity besides walking a million miles every day. Haha! Then we had our last group dinner together and since this farmhouse place makes their own cheese from the water buffalos they have everything with it was amazing. They had some really good lasagna that I wish I could have had about 10 servings of. Then we had a time with everyone to just share stories, highlights, lowlights, and just whatever came to mind about the trip. It was fun to hear some stories that I hadn’t completely heard before, and listen again to some of the best of them. Then I headed off to bed because we are leaving nice and early tomorrow to get back to Rome to complete our journey.