Baggage
Leaving home gets harder the more I travel. I worked out the other day that I have been on 6 long haul flights and 3 short haul international flights in the last 7 years, 7 of which have been for a month or more. I can certainly see that God has been faithful in His promise that I would travel! Sadly I haven’t improved on my packing technique despite all this practice. Preparing for the flight to Australia was probably one of the most stressful periods in my recent history… not happy days. A succession of small irritations gradually became overwhelming and I spent my last day in a state of denial that a) all these things were happening and b) I was actually leaving for the airport at 5pm. I think I started packing about 2.30ish.
The most annoying and stress inducing factor was the discovery on confirmation of my flights that while Singapore Airlines do allow an extra baggage allowance for sports equipment, you have to pay for the first 6 kg at £35/kg. Which is still over £200. Which I didn’t have floating around, as you may well imagine. Having alerted the prayer troops, I managed to sweet-talk my way around paying it once I got to the airport. Which was considerably later than I had wanted to arrive because after 20 mins on the first attempt we realised my passport was still sitting on the stairs… I think by the time I actually made it through security I was in such a daze I didn’t notice much!!
Anyway, this trip has been percolating for so long that it surprised me to feel so unprepared when it came to actually leaving. I guess the material things don’t really matter, and I can get whatever I desperately need in Australia (even though it’s SO expensive here!!). And it’s probably a good thing to not be so reliant on the stuff you carry around with you, however scary it is when things go missing, like when I arrived in Australia to find that my daypack (which is designed to zip on and off from my main backpack) had disappeared somewhere along the way. I was so jetlagged that I didn’t notice at the airport, and it wasn’t until I arrived at the YWAM base on the Sunshine Coast that I figured out something was wrong. Sadly because I had checked the bags in as one item, I hadn’t labelled up the small bag and so it’s floating around out there somewhere with absolutely no way of getting back to me. The annoying thing about it is that there is nothing in it that anyone would want to steal – just my Bible, prayer journal (which is 2 years old) with cards from friends and encouragements stuffed in it, and a notebook, hat and hairbrush. So it’s just been a random carelessness that has separated me from a record of my most private thoughts and the ways God has moved in my life over the past 2 years, which is only of value to me but leaves me feeling quite exposed and vulnerable knowing that someone could have picked it up and read it. All I can do is trust God that He guides it into the hands of someone who needs to hear how He loves people through the words they read in it, and that they can see through the venting of a private space and understand to treat it with discretion. His strength is made perfect in my weakness and powerlessness.
The most annoying and stress inducing factor was the discovery on confirmation of my flights that while Singapore Airlines do allow an extra baggage allowance for sports equipment, you have to pay for the first 6 kg at £35/kg. Which is still over £200. Which I didn’t have floating around, as you may well imagine. Having alerted the prayer troops, I managed to sweet-talk my way around paying it once I got to the airport. Which was considerably later than I had wanted to arrive because after 20 mins on the first attempt we realised my passport was still sitting on the stairs… I think by the time I actually made it through security I was in such a daze I didn’t notice much!!
Anyway, this trip has been percolating for so long that it surprised me to feel so unprepared when it came to actually leaving. I guess the material things don’t really matter, and I can get whatever I desperately need in Australia (even though it’s SO expensive here!!). And it’s probably a good thing to not be so reliant on the stuff you carry around with you, however scary it is when things go missing, like when I arrived in Australia to find that my daypack (which is designed to zip on and off from my main backpack) had disappeared somewhere along the way. I was so jetlagged that I didn’t notice at the airport, and it wasn’t until I arrived at the YWAM base on the Sunshine Coast that I figured out something was wrong. Sadly because I had checked the bags in as one item, I hadn’t labelled up the small bag and so it’s floating around out there somewhere with absolutely no way of getting back to me. The annoying thing about it is that there is nothing in it that anyone would want to steal – just my Bible, prayer journal (which is 2 years old) with cards from friends and encouragements stuffed in it, and a notebook, hat and hairbrush. So it’s just been a random carelessness that has separated me from a record of my most private thoughts and the ways God has moved in my life over the past 2 years, which is only of value to me but leaves me feeling quite exposed and vulnerable knowing that someone could have picked it up and read it. All I can do is trust God that He guides it into the hands of someone who needs to hear how He loves people through the words they read in it, and that they can see through the venting of a private space and understand to treat it with discretion. His strength is made perfect in my weakness and powerlessness.
posted by Susie at
12:37 AM
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