Day 1

Today marks the beginning of a journey so extraordinary that it is hard to explain. Nine unique individuals have chosen to embark on a historic trek to a country thousands of miles away. They are going sleep deprived and surviving on airline food for over 20 hours. Why? Because they are fanatics, fanatics about seeing the glory of God exalted as supreme all around the world.

Although, this journey began officially at 8:00 at Sea-Tac International Airport on Friday the 30th 2004, it has been anticipated for over a year. The families all arrived within five minutes of each other and almost all parked in the same section. The feelings in the airport were mixed with concern (moms) and excitement (students). Everything went extremely smooth as we all unpacked and re-packed the luggage that we were assigned to bring for the Greens. Spirits were high as last good-bye’s were given and moms released their children to cruelty our world’s airline travel.

Not more than five minutes into our adventure, we all made a pit-stop at Starbucks and loaded up on caffeine to counter-act the sleep deprivation. And so with that we boarded an airplane headed for Cincinnati, Ohio. A note must be made about the team’s flight experience. All had done some commercial flying with the exception of Jesse. So he began his air career on a positive note and flew 1900 miles in over 4 hours.

The view was amazing as soon as we broke above the cloud layer. The Cascade Mountain range provided great vistas of snowy peaks and a plethora of lakes. The flight was extraordinarily rough and bumpy, but all survived and were happy to land. All were hungry and rejoiced at the opportunity to eat something. But not long after we got our meals, they started boarding our next flight.

None of us were prepared for a trans-Atlantic flight overnight. This problem was the result of two specific reasons. 1) over the course of the flight, our bodies felt like it was 3pm-12am and so not until the end of the flight did we feel like sleeping, 2) even though our bodies were saying no, we tried to sleep, but that was all but possible with the lack of any room to move except for your feet a couple of inches. But God is gracious and sustained us through the whole flight.

Both flights had in-flight movies that were played. The first plane had a projector for each zone of seats and needed an upgrade desperately. The second flight came with complimentary headphones and personal screens for each passenger. There were several channels for movies and TV shows and several channels of radio.