Cutting chickens and being sick.

I take it back. I will never complain about vegetables again. This past Sunday I spent all day butchering Cornish game hens—ie, whole chickens :(. It was not pleasant cutting ‘em up and taking out the spines/fat/guts, lemme tell you. Sometimes we got to see what the chicken had just eaten before they got axed because we’d find whole kernels of corn inside of them. The proper knife went missing so raw chicken juice went flying everywhere. Awesome… not. We’re so spoiled in the US; all our “meat” comes in neat saran wrapped packages. Poor chickadees. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it.

This Sunday was the first time when I missed home. It’s been a tough week. I was supposed to be off this weekend, but one of the girls on the other team asked me to fill in her shift, so I worked almost 7 days straight. There’s a reason for our weird schedule—considering the fact that we work 12 hour, labor intensive days in the galley, 2-3 days is all we can physically take before we need a break. By Sunday, I’d worked the past 4 days, AND we had to wake up at 5:30 AM to serve hot breakfast, AND I was sick (queasy, fever, headache). I was not a happy camper that day. The entire day I found myself wondering, "Lord Almighty, what have I gotten myself into?" (except I used more.. colorful vocabulary). Honestly, if I were at home, I could’ve been sitting on my couch in my PJs, watching DVDs with my dog sleeping next to me. Only by the grace of God, and the lovely effects of some citrus flavored Alka-Seltzer, I made it through.

But even when I have my moments, I don’t doubt for a second that this is where I’m supposed to be. I love it here. I can already tell that I’m going to be in trouble when I have to leave because I don’t think I’m going to want to. It is such a joy to live in this community. One of my first nights here, one of the people I met on the ship let me know that a group of them were planning on taking a guitar up to deck 8 to sing songs. The ten or so of us just sang songs for an hour under the African night sky—how surreal, and how completely amazing. I sound really cheesy right now. I’m cheesing, I know, but it lifted my spirits so much. I’d been in an unsettling place in my Christian walk before I came here— very comfortable. Which normally doesn't come with negative connotations, but I was comfortable in the sense that I'd become complacent... almost apathetic. I didn’t feel challenged in my faith anymore. And now I’m around all these Christians who are actually doing something with their faith instead of just sittin’ on it, and it just rubs off on you; it’s infectious. By all means, this is far from a Christian utopia, but it’s still a pretty cool ommunity to be in, nonetheless.

In sum, I’m glad I’m here. Despite the chickens.

PS. I googled "chickens," and this is what came up. I decided I needed to share.