Hello, my friends!
Wow. It's been such a long time since I've gotten on the Soup that some may be wondering if I still exist (I do ... lol). To tell you the truth, there have many unexpected things going on in my life that I've had to prioritize and reorganize how I spend my time.
Since I've moved from Idaho to Georgia a year and a half ago, I am changing gears yet again and will be now going to live in an RV/camper trailer with my brother, sister-in-law, and my nieces, and start travelling the states. The reason why this is all started is a bit complicated to explain, but it ended up with selling the house, selling the car, downsizing the vast majority of our stuff, buying a truck powerful enough to haul a camper trailer, buying a generator and other various equipment that's needed for RV living. And while a lot of this stuff was happening a lot of us were on the edge of our feet with Hurrican Irma just around the corner - we were told we were gonna experience some crazy heavy duty winds, and we were halfway planning on leaving the state (but couldn't afford to so we just hunkered down). Fortunately, the weather forecast was wrong, and we only got the tiny edge of it in Rome, Georgia.
While this stuff is going on, we are planning and saving up money for a huge trip (really, "vehicled convoy", if you will) to head BACK to Idaho to visit family and friends. This involves an RV, a van that will be pulling a pop-up trailer, AND a heavy duty truck that will be towing a camper trailer, all the way across America. AND this will all take place in January (the dead of winter).
Not the smartest time of year to travel, but it's the way everyone's plans lined up.
To be sure, this is already quite a bit stuff on my plate, but life threw another curveball our way two weeks ago. Before I go into it, I have to give a little backstory ...
A little over six months ago my sister and her family got the opportunity to travel to Kenya for a missionary trip and they took it. They are traveling missionaries, and have done work in an orphanage in other countries such as Guatemala and Honduras. Their plans were to set up an orphanage if they could over there, living off of donations, prayer and whatever work they would come across. They lived with a host family (the main man of the house, being a pastor), who would help them with their goal.
Well, they later found out that the people that they were living with lied about their intentions and just invited them to stay to scam them out of their money because they were quote-unquote "rich Americans". Things got dramatic real quick, and the pastor was even threatening to deport them if they didn't give them x amount of money.
They were obviously shocked by the whole ordeal, having the only people they knew in a foreign country betraying their trust and little money and resources to know what to do next. They sat down and prayed that God would send help ... and out of nowhere, He did. A random stranger walked up to them and said, "Are you the one I'm supposed to meet?" (no joke) ... some other complicated stuff happened that is a little too hard to explain through this blog, but the bottom line is that they were able to get out of their stick situation with a newfound friend.
It's truly amazing the great lengths people will take to betray, cheat, and steal from you, all the while being under the guise of a "pastor" .... convincing you to stay with them in their country to do charity work and set up an orphanage ... when, really, all they want is your money.
Some truly evil people out there ... no doubt about it.
Shortly after this took place, even more dramatic stuff happened in Kenya. A supposedly very controversial presidential election took place and the people that lived in their village were NOT happy about the results (to say the least). So much so that violent riots broke out, and even a couple dozen people were outright murdered by all this chaos. They had to hunker down in their house for a whole week and a half until things "blew over".
But unfortunately, things only escalated from there. Two weeks ago my sister and her family informed me that the other candidate, Odinga, still claims that he is the rightfully elected president and won't back down. He wants to split the country in two as a compromise ... but the only way that this could happen is civil war.
Sensing the tensions of this unsolvable conflict, (that could easily turn violent) they took the first flight they could out of the country back into the States. They just arrived a few days ago and are living with us in our camper trailer set up.
I am thankful that they made it out of the country in this difficult time, but still fairly shocked by it all. They've had to restart their lives out of nowhere.
Luckily, God provides, and with the help of several church members and friends they know back in northern Idaho they have potential opportunities in work and a place to stay, back in Idaho.
So, that's basically the gist of what's been going on in my life. I'm still on the lookout for online work so that I can help my brother with the bills as well travel the country. Once that happens I will be greatly relieved.
Sorry in advance for the lengthy details, but I felt the need to get some stuff off my chest. As well as keep in touch with my Soup friends.
-Tim