Okay, has it been three weeks since the last time that I updated? I would love to write about everything that has happened since then, but I know the longer my post is, the less likely people are to read it. So I'm just going to tell you about Faith Weekend

This past weekend (I started writing this blog post a long time ago, it was the weekend of the 11th) we were put on teams of 3, given $10 NZD each and thrown out on the street. Literally. I mean...it was a little more polite than that. But Thursday after lunch we were put on vans, driven out to a spot and dropped off on the side of the road and told "Don't come back until Sunday at 2pm"
I purposely did not tell my parents about this beforehand because they would have either insisted that I not go, or they would have worried all weekend.
So I was put on a team with Fredrik, my Nepal team mate from Sweden, and Didi from Austria. It was kind of fun being the only American this weekend everywhere that we went. So we were dropped off outside Oxford and the three of us had no plan. We took out a map of the southern island and decided to aim for Timaru where our teacher from "Father Heart of God" week lives. I'm not sure what we were expecting at this point, I think the plan was to just show up on his doorstep and hope that he would offer for us to stay there.
We were picked up after about 30 minutes by a girl named Sophie. She drove us into Christchurch (30-45min drive) She told us about her boyfriend that used to be in a hitchhiking club at university, so she knew a good spot to drop us off. And she told us about her sister going to a "religious school" for theater and how she's going on a mission trip of her own to Skid Row in Los Angeles. Sophie was very sweet and appreciative of what we are doing as students of the Justice school. When she dropped us off she gave us her business card and told us that if we ever need somewhere to stay we can call her up.
We waited about 10 minutes at a busy intersection until we were picked up by Shane. He was driving a minivan with a child's safety seat in the back. He told us that he was on his way to...somewhere that I can't remember the name of, to spend the weekend with his kids. He seemed like he was living a pretty bleak life and I hope that meeting the three of us and hearing about the adventure that we're on stirred up his heart into dreaming again. He dropped us off in the place that I can't think of the name of and we waited 10-20 minutes until we were picked up by 2 Irish guys on their way to Timaru. They were absolutely hilarious. The one driving mumbled so badly that we couldn't understand what he was saying half of the time and his friend in the passenger seat kept having to translate for us. They told us that they're working on a Dairy farm in New Zealand because there are no jobs to be had in Ireland. They told us that we were the first hitch hikers that they've picked up! We talked to them about which is scarier, bungee jumping or sky diving. They agreed that it was bungee jumping. They dropped us off in Timaru outside of a cafe that was closed for the night. In fact, most things were closed for the night, stuff closes early in New Zealand.
We sat outside of the information center (closed) and snacked on the peanut butter sandwiches and cheese puffs that we were able to pack for the weekend. We had no idea how to find Gordon at this point so we spent a bit of time on the bench praying for guidance and for the other teams that were out on the road. We ended up in a bar at the Royal Arcade (one of the only establishments open at the later hour of 6:30pm) called Petite something. They graciously allowed us to use their phonebook and we started trekking for Gordon and Joanna's house after being told that it would be about a 30 minute walk.
After about 30 minutes we were still walking. We asked a woman that was stopping for tea if she knew where mountain view road was and she told us that it was another "couple k's" UGH it was getting dark at this point and she told us that if she saw us walking on her way home, she would pick us up. So she drove us the rest of the way to Gordon's and we thought "what if he has guests?" Well he DID have guests, haha, he was having a missions board meeting in his living room. You can see the front porch from the living room, in fact the whole wall is glass. So once we stepped onto the porch there was no way of escaping. Gordon let us in and told us that we could stay the night as soon as we told him that it was Faith Weekend. We sat awkwardly in his dining room while the missions board meeting wrapped up. So the first night of faith weekend we were able to sleep in a bed! Hallelujah! We went to bed that night praying for the safety of the other teams.
The next morning after a breakfast of toast and cereal we helped Gordon do some demolishing on the upper story of his house that was meant to be renovated that weekend. Didi and I ripped up carpet and cut it into squares, I'm not sure what Fredrik was doing in the other room. We prayed that morning about whether or not we should move on and Gordon told us that he was pushing us out of the nest! So that was our answer. He drove us to a little place called Pleasant Point, we planned to head for Lake Tekapo and sleep in a picnic shelter somewhere unless we were offered a place to stay that night.
We sat in a parking lot in Pleasant Point for awhile before we were picked up, but still less than an hour I think. A mom of 3 boys picked us up on her way home from meeting with friends for lunch. We didn't get her name, but she told us about her sons (all in their 20's I believe) and what they're up to. It was a beautiful drive from Pleasant Point to Fairlie where she dropped us off. We stood in front of a sign next to the road holding our piece of cardboard that read "Lake Tekapo" as it started drizzling.
It was funny actually, after we'd been standing there about 10-20 minutes this girl got dropped off just in front of us, and she hopped out of the car and stuck out her thumb a mere 50ft in front of us. We still got picked up first : ) by our lovely friends Nandi and Arne. We were standing there feeling pretty cheated by this girl, and we probably won't get picked up until someone picks her up first and a car pulled over just behind us. A young South African couple on their way to Lake Putaki for a day trip had stopped to pick up their first hitchhikers ever on a whim! So the three of us piled into the backseat of their car and began to tell them what we were doing. Nandi shared her candy with us, and they drove us all the way to Lake Tekapo. It's beautiful, you should google it. When we got to Tekapo, Arne asked us if we wanted to keep riding with them to Lake Putaki. They had already casually mentioned that we could stay with them for the night if we wanted to head back to Christchuch, and if not they'd dropped us back off in Tekapo on their way back through. We definitely had no other plans, so we kept going. We stopped at Putaki and kept going almost all the way to Mt. Cape which is on the opposite coast from Christchuch, where we started.
It was past 7pm when we started heading back and the weather was beginning to get really yucky, cold and rainy. As we neared Lake Tekapo Arne turned and asked us "you guys still planning on staying outside?" We all just kind of looked at one another until Arne told  us that he and Nandi wouldn't be able to sleep that night if they just dropped us off in the rain, so we were welcome to come home with them and they'd even feed us. So, very relieved, we accepted.
Five hours later, with 5 whopper meals in hand, we arrived at their house. We sat around on their living room floor eating the first fast food we'd gotten since arriving in New Zealand, exhausted and grateful. They had just moved to New Zealand and didn't have much in the way of furniture which Nandi apologized profusely for, but we honestly couldn't thank them enough. The three of us slept on the floor in their spare room that night, marveling at how we had made it there and how God had brought these people to us. They told us a couple of days later how they lay in bed that night wondering what had just happened, and how it was that there were 3 strangers sleeping in their house.
The next morning we were able to take blessed showers and head out into the rain to help in the yard. It was MUDDY and we made friends with the cows living on the other side of the fence. Didi, Fredrik and I had talked about moving on after helping in the garden and maybe calling up Sophie, the girl that had given us her card. When Arne asked what we were planning on doing that night, that's what we told him and he said "Well, Nandi and I are going to a party tonight for the South Africans living in Christchurch, if you guys want to go with us and stay another night, you're welcome to. We'll drive you home tomorrow"
Well how could we pass up a South African party?? So we agreed and showed up looking like bums at the community center to help set up tables and chairs and wait for people to begin showing up. There were a couple of times that night that Arne, Nandi and their friend Paul forced the three of us to get up and dance with them and we just kept looking at each other and saying "Faith Weekend?" and cracking up. How had we gotten there? We had our first taste of koeksisters-a traditional south african dessert that I'm still determined to learn how to make, and Nandi sat next to me for most of the night to tell me what the songs were about that were in Afrikaans. We got home late again that night, crashed on the floor and wondered what the next day would have in store.
The next morning Arne told us that he and Nandi were making roast lamb for lunch and they'd like us to stay and then Arne would drive us home. Paul, who we had met the night before, came over to join us. Once the roast went into the oven Arne suggested getting ice cream and going to the beach. So we did, and it was beautiful and cold. We had to call our school leader to tell her that we might be home a bit late because the people that had taken us in wanted to feed us roast lamb. It was surreal. After we had eaten and packed up, we said our goodbyes and thank yous to Nandi, and Arne and Paul drove us home. We had written Nandi and Arne a thank you note, which we left on the window sill in the spare room with the 25 dollars we had left from the 30 that we were given. We were the last team to arrive back at the base and everyone was so happy to see us, it really was like being greeted by family.
After hearing everyone's story from the weekend and some of the awful things that happened, I feel even more blessed to have been helped by so many people. But I am especially grateful for Nandi and Arne and for their hospitality, their humor and their beautiful spirits.