Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Juarez, Mexico: Part I Saturday, June 23 The morning started off on a good note. With my black, Youth for Christ duffel bag packed, I swung my sleeping bag, and backpack over my shoulder and headed out to my Xterra to load up. Within minutes, one of my other team members, arrived, large straw hat perched atop his head. "You ready?" I asked him. He nodded and smiled. With a final hug good-bye and a brief prayer, his mom was off and we left to pick up another team member. With a knock at the door and a few minutes of waiting, my other leader appeared, bleary-eyed from staying up til the wee hours of the morning talking with his "like" interest. "Didn't get much sleep, huh?" I smiled. I had figured he was going to be up for hours with her. He smiled back drowsily. He'd been away in California for several weeks without much contact with her and had been looking forward to catching up. With the back loaded up, we were on the road again heading toward the airport. We had one final team member to meet up with before boarding our flight. That's when things started to turn. We stood on the curb waiting to be checked in for about 15 minutes only to find out that we have to pay $2 per bag to check in there. Conveniently, the sign that states this was shoved behind the counter. Grumbling as I walked, I began dragging my bags to the U.S. Airways ticket counter where the line snaked around several times. This is where we finally meet up with our last team member. After 15 minutes, our group finally reached the front of the growing line. We each approached the the kiosk only to find out that each person was listed under my name for a group check in. Just one more roadblock to tackle. Quickly, I checked in, threw my bags on the weighing station and searched for my other team members who were stuck waiting for an airline worker to help them get things sorted out. We were all scattered, but I knew where each person was, thankfully. I buried my head in figuring out the computer kiosk for two of my team members, eventually got it figured out and then began to look around, discovering that I have lost one of my team members. Shoot. "I hope she's just waiting at the security checkpoint for us or this is going to be VERY interesting," I think to myself as I lead the other two up the escalator toward security. She is---along with her parents. Thank goodness they still like me! This is when I began to feel like a pretty sucky leader. Through the security gates we went and off to our gates, finally, as a group. I began to breathe a sigh of relief as we found our gate and put our bags down next to a group of empty chairs. That's when I heard "wait a sec, my ticket says I'm supposed to be at B11." I looked at my ticket. Double shoot. Off we trudged towards the RIGHT departure gate, located on the exact opposite side of the terminal. Thank goodness he discovered it before it was too late. Safely at our correct gate, a team member and I begin comparing notes about who's sitting where. "That's funny, we're listed in the same seat," she says. I examined it further--- she has a copy of my ticket. Oh geez. Grateful for a previous mistake at the kiosk, I rummaged through my bag and found an extra printout of her ticket that the airline worker had printed off for me. Crisis averted. About 30 minutes later, we were on the plane destined for an hour-long flight to El Paso, Texas where we were to meet up with the rest of our team with Youth for Christ. We were ready to help with VBS, sweat under the 100+ degree heat during work projects, and build relationships with other people. But there was so much more that we didn't expect...