Some new pics and a video as well!

I've been pretty busy finishing of a database application in my spare time and I'm finally out of the other end. I have some new pics and a video that I would like to put on here for all to see.

First of all, is a wee video of me doing some very tame version of Parkour or Freerunning. It's totally timid compared to the guys who are really good at it but I just saw the overhang recently and wondered if I'd be able to climb up there. This was about the fourth time I filmed it and it's the smoothest I've got it yet, although there's definitely room for improvement.



Next up is a picture of one of my earlier attempts of the same. The truth is that my friend Kevin was filming but we discovered afterwards he had it on "image" instead of "video". Oh well, not to worry. We've still got a video so all is not lost.

This one might seem a bit out of place, but it's still relevant. This is me reading a story to Kasey who is almost 17 months now. No, she's not mine before you ask. I know it's Christmas but no immaculate conceptions have been happening around here. Her parents, Kevin and Angie, are on the same course as me and it's been fun having a "small person" around.

Right, now it's time to go from the sublime to the proverbial ridiculous. I leave you today with a picture of me and what I have come to affectionately refer to as my "Biohazard Cookies". One of my hosts here in Kansas City works at a doctor's lab and he drives around picking up various dubious samples of different varieties. (He told me he even picked up a leg one time.) The disturbing part is that he uses the left over biohazard bags to present cookies to me. He told me the bag hadn't been used before, but I'm starting to feel a bit funn..#:;,...

Latest from Kansas City

It's been about a month since I've written anything about the CPx course that I'm doing just now. Truth be told, I've been having a bit of a rough time. I don't know if it's culture shock, team dynamics or generally losing motivation for missions, but somewhere along the lines things got a bit tough. Some people tend to get more communicative at such times but I tend to withdraw and go quiet.

I'm feeling a bit better now but I still reckon God's challenging me by putting me in situations that make me uncomfortable to expose my heart and turn me to Him.

It's only three weeks until I go home for Christmas and I think it'd be a huge relief to be around people who understand me a bit better. I've been getting a number of odd questions from well-meaning locals saying things like "So do you celebrate Christmas on the 25th of December over there in Scotland?" There's only so much of that you can take before it gets annoying. I've also realised that after a while you start to feel like you're uniquely "special" in the oddness of your worldview. I remember one time coming home and being really excited about driving in Scotland because other drivers responded the way I expected them to. For instance, when I came up behind someone in the fast lane, they'd change lanes to let me past. It may be a small thing, but it's just one example of people seeing the world the same way.

I've got a few videos I made recently so I thought it was about time to upload them to YouTube.

The first one here is my attempt at a "Borat" impression while out in my kilt in Kansas City. You need to take my word about the kilt part, you can't actually see it in the video.


Video number 2 is a brief rant about the fact that they had a Christmas celebration in November and it wasn't even Thanksgiving yet.


Finally (for now) we have my thoughts on the possible onset of winter.

More about Peak Oil

I realised last night's post was pretty brief so I thought I should explain more about what this whole "Peak Oil" thing is about. I have also read a few websites that reckon it's all a big conspiracy by governments to control people and that there's no problem at all. I would suggest that even if there is no shortage of oil, we should probably still use less of it to cut down on greenhouse emissions.

So why is Peak Oil such a big deal? Well, first of all we should consider what we use oil for. It's not just a question of finding something else to fuel our cars. (I always thought it was.) All plastics are made out of stuff derived from oil. Inks also come from oil. A lot of pharmaceuticals also rely on our supply of crude oil. Finally, almost all of our food industry in the west relies heavily on oil to exist. Tractors, farm machinery and of course the trucks that transport everything around are reliant on oil. If there is no oil, we have no food, medicine, transport or even ink. That's pretty bad.

The name "Peak Oil" refers to the global production of oil hitting the highest it will ever hit and then dropping off. Although that means we have only used 50% of the world's oil, it means the remaining 50% will be very expensive for a number of reasons. 1) The longer you extract oil from a field the harder it gets to extract the rest because it is initially under pressure. As the pressure drops off, water has to be introduced to force the oil out, which then has to be processed more afterwards. This is more time consuming and more expensive. 2) The demand for oil and the world's population have both been increasing so even though we may drop to a level of production that was sufficient 10 years ago, it might not be enough for today. Increased demand leads to increased price.

I don't claim to be an expert on this subject. I'm just very interested in what it could mean for the future of our society as we know it. I already have been feeling that we have been very wasteful of the Earth's natural resources and this is one more thing to consider. It's naive of us to think that oil will last for ever and when you look at how much of our society relies on oil, it makes you wonder how we'd cope if we suddenly had no oil to run our lives.

I've read some articles by people who say Peak Oil is just a big scam. They claim that oil as actually being produced by the Earth itself and that oil wells are being re-filled, resulting in an endless supply. They believe Peak Oil is a scare tactic by our governments to prevent us targeting them when oil prices go up. One article goes far enough to say it's a Misleading Zionist Scam. Not being an expert, I can't claim to know who's right. It does seem, though, that each website opposing Peak Oil has a decidedly mocking, critical tone which makes the whole thing seem unprofessional and childish. I'm not saying they're wrong, just that the people who believe Peak Oil is reality seem a lot better at articulating their story in an objective, grown-up way.

Maybe the whole topic isn't as clear cut as I first though. I still think it's worth looking into. If nothing else, we should all try to use less oil anyway to fight global warming. We are meant to be stewards of this planet and we're not doing a very good job, as far as I can see.

Here are some websites I've found interesting on this subject:

postcarbon.org
Peak Oil page on GlobalPublicMedia.com
BBC Article on Iceland switching to Hydrogen energy
Anti-Peak Oil site suggesting it's a Zionist Scam

Peak Oil

I heard an interesting thing in class today. It seems that the global production of crude oil is set to peak in the next couple of years. This is no trivial fact. The result will be that production will be slower and more expensive resulting in crude oil being more and more expensive. This will result in petrol prices being impossibly expensive and oil-dependent nations being pretty stuck basically.

I found a website that says much the same as today's speaker was saying: http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/

Our speaker tied it in with God's plan for the end times. He reckons that as oil gets more and more expensive, there will be more and more wars over the countries in North Africa and the Middle East that have the majority of the remaining oil. It's not too unrealistic a connection to make that the great end times wars and rumours of wars around Israel could well be relating to the shortage of oil.

It's interesting stuff, although not one of the more cheery things I've commented on.

I spoke up about something - and it changed

I've got a really cool story to tell that I'm pretty pleased about.

It all started with a new online game called The Ship. It's a game based on Valve's Source engine. If you're familiar with online games at all, that means it's based on the same world as Half Life 2 and Counter-Strike: Source. If none of that makes any sense to you, don't worry. It's not important to the story.

The ship is based on the classic murder mystery scenario with the scene set on board a Victorian sailing ship. (Think of Agatha Christie's Death on the Nile and you're probably close.) Each player plays the part of a passenger whose mission is to secretly murder another passenger whose name they are given at the start of the round. The tricky part is that at the same time someone else is trying to kill them. You don't know who's trying to kill you, and you should try to be as sneaky as possible in pursuing the person you're after as well. It makes for some pretty intense gameplay.

As if that wasn't all tricky enough, you also need to avoid security and take care of your bodily needs. You need to eat, drink, sleep, socialise, wash and even go to the toilet. This means there are certain times you are vulnerable. Someone could potentially get you while you're asleep or "on the throne". The game has a very humourous, cartoonish feel and it's a lot of fun to play.

The game has an inventory system and you find lots of clothes, weapons, books and so on scattered around the ship. Each item is accompanied by a witty description. Amongst other well-known books, the game includes the bible as one of the items you can interact with. Its description was, "Epic fiction about an angry, omnipotent guy known simply as 'God'." I was a bit surprised and saddened to see that there.

The reaction I had to this was just one of disappointment, more than anything. Up to this point I was enjoying the game but now it had turned on me and I felt a bit insulted, as if it implied my beliefs were intrinsically wrong. I felt that God was being misrepresented as well and I wanted to express this to the company who made the game. I don't see God as an "angry omnipotent guy" at all.

The game is published by Outerlight, who I was pleased to discover are actually based in Edinburgh. I e-mailed them to express my sadness about this unnecessary, anti-Christian remark in the game. My initial couple of e-mails were handled by Ed Wilson, their Technical Director. He assured me that they were taking my concerns seriously and that the team would discuss it further.

A week or so later I heard from Ailsa Bates, the Operations Director at Outerlight. We communicated back and forth on the issue over the following month. Her opinion was that it was only intended as a joke and that everyone in the office had found it funny and didn't really see why I wouldn't be able to see the funny side. She suggested if I was able to come up with a better description they could change it. I sent a few suggestions that I considered quite witty along with one that my mate Greg came up with simply saying "A good book." (I also suggested making the bible a weapon so you could "bible bash" people, but Ailsa reckoned that'd be even more controversial.)

Today is a special day because I finally saw the fruit of my labours. As of the latest patch that I installed on The Ship today, the description of the bible has now changed! It has change from an epic fiction about an angry, omnipotent God to "A good book." It was so cool to see that! It's not about being proven right or anything like that. I'm just feeling more like, "Wow! I expressed my opinion on something and someone decided to change it, just because of what I said. I feel strangely valued!"

It's making me realise that I do actually have influence if I have honest, respectful communication with someone. I could have easily written off Outerlight as a nasty, anti-Christian company but through talking about it, I found where they were coming from.

It's nice to be heard.

We're going to France!

It was finally decided yesterday that our three-month church planting outreach will be to Marseille, in the south of France. We had been given a few options to consider including France, The Ivory Coast and South Africa. In the end we opted for France for a variety of reasons. Of particular concern, our group includes a married couple with a young baby and a second one on the way. Since Angie's pregnant, she can't get any vaccinations without potentially harming the baby. This ruled out The Ivory Coast and we also felt that the conditions in the South African location would be a bit challenging.

One of the cool things about Marseille is that they have a large Muslim population. We're going to be focusing on north African Muslims so that we can learn church planting in a Muslim community while still living in a stable and safe country. I'm excited about going there because I'll also be able to use some of my French which is actually my most academically studied language besides English, although I've never been in a French-speaking nation for any significant length of time.

We don't have exact dates yet but we'll be heading to France just after New Year and we'll be finished by the end of March or start of April. It looks like I'll be celebrating my 30th birthday in France. I daresay some of my Scottish chums could come to visit. I think flights to France are pretty cheap these days. :)

A great quote from "The Village"

I was watching The Village on TV tonight and I noticed a great line that I had not appreciated before:

The world moves for love.
It kneels before it in awe.
 

Rainy Evening

Tonight I was a bit bored so I decided to go out for a walk. I discovered there was an Einestein Brothers bagel shop nearby and although it was closed, I wanted to have a look around to see if there were any other shops nearby. It started raining but I stayed out for a bit longer anyway. Feeling somewhat peckish, I got a big bag of Tostitos and a can of Red Bull. The rain was pretty heavy and I sought refuge in a few interesting places along the way. Here are a few videos in case you're interested.

This first one is a commentary on my walk in the rain:



In this one, I talk about a potential Parkour feature I found:

Puja

On Sunday evening I attended an interesting worship experience. It is called a "Puja" which is a Hindu term from the Sanskrit language. We were learning in class about contextualisation, which basically means presenting the gospel in a way that people can relate to in their culture. Too often, missionaries present the gospel as a very western thing, resulting in the indigenous people thinking it is a western God, when in fact no-one in the bible was western at all.

The analogy we heard about contextualisation was to think of the message as the water of life in a container. The container it is presented in might be different depending on the culture. In the west, we are quite familiar with mugs with a round handle and an image printed on the side. In India, though, this would be very foreign. Contextualisation is the technique of using a vessel people are more familiar with so they can receive the drink.



The whole setup of the meeting was very different from anything I've ever seen before. We were still singing songs of worship to Jesus, though. We were simply using a style that Hindus would be very familiar with. This has been really successful in India where people have felt comfortable and familiar with the surroundings and able to receive the message and understand what is being said.

We had communion as part of the Puja. Instead of bread and red wine, we used bananas and milk. These are both things that are very abundant in India and easy for people to get. The milk can represent purity because it is white and the banana can represent Jesus body which was broken.

We also heard the gospel explained using a coconut as an illustration. As Dag, the leader, explained that Jesus was bruised and beaten for our sin, he hit the coconut with a hammer several times. Eventually, it cracked and the clear milk poured out of it, reminding me that when stabbed with the spear, water came out of Jesus' heart along with the blood. He talked about how we can now be as white as coconut because of this. To someone in India, a phrase like "as white as snow" would not make sense as most of them have not seen snow, yet everyone knows what coconuts are like.



Another interesting aspect was the use of incense. As we worshipped it was interesting to engage the sense of smell as well as sight and sound. It reminded me that Jesus can be like the air we breathe, able to expand and rise to places we couldn't reach.

We sang songs in Hindi with the English translation alongside it so we could see what we were singing. We sang about the name of Jesus, how it is a powerful, beautiful name and we sang about how he is our ultimate Guru and even that his word is our mantra. All the time, we were using terms people would be familiar with to help them understand our faith better.

The whole Puja experience gave me a bit of a feeling for how it must be for someone from a different culture to come to a "normal" church meeting in the west which is in a different language with all kinds of new things happening. At first I was constantly reading the English beside the Hindi to work out what I was actually saying. After we had repeated some of the songs a few times I started to remember and I was able to focus more on actually singing.

I've learned that there's no one structure or pattern that is correct for worship. In our western churches we are so stuck on the pattern of having a band playing worship songs and us all sitting in rows listening to someone at the front. These things are not bad, but they are not necessarily relevant to all cultures. It would be wrong to re-create the same thing elsewhere in the world and expect people to be familiar with it.

Village Experience

On Thursday and Friday we did an interesting practical exercise called the "Village Experience". We didn't know quite what to expect and we were told very little about what was in store for us. All we knew was that we had to bring a bag of overnight things including a sleeping bag and that we had to be able to carry everything. We were only allowed one piece of food each as well.

It started off late on Thursday morning when we were blondfolded and loaded into a van. We were instructed to be silent and to keep our blindfolds in place. We drove for maybe 10 or 15 minutes. It's hard to say how long it was because it seems longer when you can't see anything. Maybe it was some vague recollection of a Hardy Boys book or something but I started mapping our route in my mind. I memorised all the turns we took and tried to visualise a map in my head of the path of the van. In the end it turned out that information was irrelevant, but I suppose it illustrated that I still had to keep my mind active. Actually, if the journey was much longer, I might have just forgotten about it entirely.

Once the van stopped, we were told we could remove our blindfolds and get out. We assembled by the side of the road with our backpacks on and Randy explaned the procedure to us. We were given the first clue which would lead us to the next clue. Each clue would lead us to the next until we finally reached our destination. We were to collect the clues to give to Randy at the destination and we were to pray for the village at each clue.

The journey was a fairly enjoyable hike along a few country roads on the Missouri/Kansas border. The clues were pretty straightforward and they were easy to find as well. It was a bit weird praying for "the village" since we didn't know what that exactly meant. At the first clue, we were presented with 3 logs that we had to carry with us to present to the villagers. This proved to be quite challenging with the additional weight. Later one, we collected a jar of Jalapeño Olives which were also to be presented to the villagers. We also collected three more logs further on. This was really sneaky and deliberate of them. There were five people and six logs. The uneven load was a strategy to test our teamwork. Someone would need to carry more logs than the rest and that would test our patience and co-operation.

When we finally reached our destination, we were allowed to rest for maybe ten minutes before we were taken to "meet the villagers." The rest of the experience was far more bizarre than the hike.



As we walked down the path, we saw a secluded area of grassland up ahead that was surrounded by woods on three sides. We were confronted by two or three men dressed in middle eastern outfits with some kind of arab headdress. They blocked the path and looked inquisitively at us. They spoke amongst themselves in Spanish and didn't understand anything we said. Fortunately, we had two girls in our group who could speak Spanish so they translated for us.

It would take too long to describe each event in great detail, but we had all kinds of things happen. They didn't trust me because I wasn't married, and they got the girls in our group to each throw a log to see who could throw one the furthest. Then they tried to get me to marry the one who threw the furthest. When I refused, they gave her to one of their villagers instead.

When we first arrived, we gave them the Jalapeño Olives. They looked suspiciously and made us each eat one to show them that they were ok. They fed us roasted grubs (which we had to eat), chicken and "cat". (which was actually rabbit)

The grandfather-type character was sick and we asked a few times to pray for him. When they let us pray, he got worse and called for the Witch Doctor who relieved the pain for a while. Later on, when we prayed again he got healed. The Witch Doctor wanted to buy the power from us with one of his necklaces.

We slept in tents nearby and it was COLD at night. In the morning there was frost on the ground and on the tents. It had dropped to freezing during the night.

Here are some videos I made along the way:



You can also browse the video playlist on YouTube.

End of week one

I've finished my first week of CPx. (The church planting experience) Today, Monday, is my day off so I thought this would be a good time for a brief update. We had class from Tuesday to Saturday with each session starting at 8:00 am. That's been a bit tricky to get used to. Usually we finish at 4 or 4:30 in the afternoon.

The class hasn't exactly looked like what I expected, although I didn't really know what to expect in the first place. We meet in a small house in a residential district of Grandview, which could be considered either a suburb of Kansas City or a neighbouring town. I normally get a lift to class in the morning from one of the others on the course, although I'm hoping to get a bike soon. One odd aspect of Kansas City is that a lot of the roads don't have pavements to walk on beside them. (sidewalks to you N. Americans) Even in residential neighbourhoods, I need to walk on the road or on the grass. It's a strange omission.

Each morning we start with an hour of prayer and worship. So far this has been a very quiet routine which I've found difficult to engage in. I think the point is to strip everything back to the absolute basics of what we might encounter when planting a church. Combined with the early start, I tend to find it hard to stay awake.

As for accommodation, I'm staying with an elderly couple who feed me and look after me. They have their own eccentricities but they are good to me. They have matching rocking chairs and a clock that sounds every half hour. On the hour it chimes the appropriate number of times and on the half hour it chimes once. (I noted this could lead to ambiguity around 1 o'clock.) Although this clock is in the living room, it has woken me up a few times in my room.

We've had a fairly interactive teaching curriculum so far. On the first day (Tuesday) we learned about prayer walking and then went out in pairs to walk through the neighbourhood and pray. The next day we learned more about contacting new people in the street. We went out again in pairs, this time to talk to people in the area and start to make connections. On Thursday and Friday we had testimonies. We each had to prepare a 20 minute talk about our testimony.

On Saturday we had a seminar on "What is church?" We looked at the different ways the word "church" is used in modern day English compared to what it actually meant in scripture. We looked at the Western model of church and noted some of the things that aren't actually essential but are still part of our image of church. When planting a church, you tend to reproduce what you are familiar with and care must be taken to avoid placing a Western worldview on a new church in a different culture.

On Sunday we had a small house church meeting before going out for lunch. It was fairly simple and community-based but it was still church nonetheless!

I uploaded some videos to YouTube

I've been making videos with my phone for ages now but I've finally taken the time to learn a better way to share them with you. I previously uploaded them to a really obscure website and then added links to the files manually. It was pretty clunky to set up. Now I've got an account with YouTube, which makes things a lot easier. You can see my latest videos on my YouTube profile page: http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=kencares.

To kick things off here, I thought I'd share some specific videos of things that I've mentioned in a few recent blog entries.

Sailing on Lake Ontario


Windsurfing
There are two videos here. I made one each day at the end of each session in the water. In this first video, I discussed a few of the technical aspects of windsurfing.


In this second video you will notice I sound much weaker. That day was really cold and I think it shows in the fact that I look like I'm about to faint any minute!


Fun with Steve's Car
This first one shows Steve explaining how things work under the hood of his beast.


The second clip shows us flying round a dirt road on the way from Newmarket to Toronto. At one point, we skidded out pretty wide on a turn. Don't be alarmed by the extreme angle of the video. The car didn't actually tip! I temporarily lost control of the camera a bit as I was distracted by the slide.


After the fun and games on the dirt road, we stopped to inspect the damage.


Once we got to Toronto, we had a bit of fun doing donuts in the Colossus Cinema parking lot. There's not much happening at the start of this video but I couldn't find a good way to edit it.


This is the second video of donuts in the parking lot. We got quite fast in this one and you can even see the smoke from the tyres coming into the car.


We went and looked at the parking lot after the donuts.


Kansas City

When I arrived in Kansas City, I saw a tetherball which I found really amusing. Here's my Napoleon Dynamite impression.

First Sunday in Kansas City

Yesterday was my first Sunday in Kansas City and it was a day of several "firsts". To begin with, I went to Metro Christian Fellowship for the morning meeting which was preceded by "biscuits and gravy" because it was the first Sunday of the month.


I was introduced to a number of people including a few of the students who had arrived already. The meeting was good and I particulary appreciated the pastor's message which was about the way God makes us wait to allow the issues that are inside us to come to the surface. He communicated well and I identified a lot with what he was saying.

In the afternoon I visited the International House of Prayer for the first time. I was really excited to do this because I've heard so much about it. It was really great to experience firsthand the atmosphere of the constant harp and bowl worship with people pacing around praying and others singing along with the band. I also saw some of the faces I recognise from the podcasts such as Mike Bickle, Misty Edwards, Dwayne Roberts and one of the drummers. It was strange to see them in real life but I suppose it's only because I've seen them before. I'm not going to get distracted by the people. The house of prayer is for God and he will be my focus as I go there from time to time.

Flight and first experiences of Kansas City

The flight from Toronto to Kansas City was really easy going, especially compared with the Customs experience earlier. The plane was really small. It had 13 rows with a total of four seats across. There were two either side with one aisle down the middle. There was one toilet at the back of the plane. A few times when I stood up, I hit my head on the ceiling.

This time I was able to take my laptop and small backpack onto the plane and I managed to fit them both in the overhead locker without a problem.

A pretty cool thing was that I had an empty seat beside me. I effectively had two seats to myself with the aisle to one side and the window to the other. That's the same as the other flight. God has been good to me in that regard.

When I arrived, I was greeted by someone from the Metro Fellowship who offered to take me for something to eat because my host family hadn't prepared anything for me. I suggested Perkins and we set out on a mini-adventure.

We pretty quickly found an exit that claimed to have a Perkins at it. For whatever reason, though, we missed it. At this point my driver decided to take a brief detour via the school she worked at to get something from her desk. It was there that I saw this pretty sweet Napoleon Dynamite-esque tetherball.




After the stop at the school, we returned to our quest to find Perkins. We drove about 3/4 of the way round Kansas City and none of the exits from the highway had signs for Perkins. We ended up using Google on the cell phone to find the number for the restaurant to call ahead. We got there in the end but I felt kinda bad that I hadn't asked for McDonalds or Taco Bell in the first place. I really wanted a tremendous twelve, though. It was definitely worth it in the end.

Fun and games getting into America

On Saturday afternoon I made my way to Pearson International Airport (or Toronto Airport to those not in the know) to fly down to Kansas City. When flying from Toronto to the US, you go through passport control prior to boarding the plane. That way you can arrive at the domestic arrivals in the US and go straight to baggage reclaim and out of the airport. I'm never sure what to expect when entering the US and so I approached this experience with interest.

The first assistant wasn't the frendliest I've ever met. He asked me a series of questions without ever actually looking me in the eye. He seemed a bit unimpressed that I intended to spend 83 days in the US without actually having any documents I could show him about the training course. I had figured that since I would be staying less that 90 days I could get in with a visa waiver and, consequently, without too much scrutiny. It seems they are still quite cautious, even with visa waivers.

At the end of our conversation, he asked me to put my index finger on the pad to take a fingerprint sample. I concluded that he had decided to let me in since he was checking me over. Unfortunately, his camera wasn't working, so he passed me on to the neighbouring booth. The lady there asked me a series of very similar questions before redirecting me to a separate room for more questions.

When I got into the other room I was greeted with another fairly grumpy individual. He sent me through to another room which appeared to be for agriculture. The man there made me wait a good distance from his desk for a few moments before calling me over to deal with me. He x-rayed all my bags and then sent me back through to the other room.

I waited there for a while and wondered just how long they would keep me waiting. It seemed I still had some time before my flight was going to leave, but still I didn't want to wait too long. I still had a sense of peace, though. I really didn't care if they were going to deny me entry or whatever. I decided if God wanted me in America it'd happen.

There was one guy behind a desk who didn't appear to be doing anything but he didn't call me over either. A couple came in and he called them up straight away. I found it strange that he hadn't called me up so when he had finished with them, I went over. I was holding the large yellow envelope that they give you containing your passport, customs declaration and visa waiver. He took it from me, announcing that "you're never going to get seen if you don't hand that over." I thought to myself that it might have been an idea for someone to tell me that in the first place, but I knew better than to point that out to him.

I then waited five or ten minutes more before he called me up again. He had gone away to another room and come back again in between times. I don't know if he was checking up on me by calling someone or if he was just going to the toilet. I sometimes wonder if the whole process is just to make you wait for a while to see what you do.

When he called me up, he stamped my passport and gave me my visa waiver and told me to enjoy my day. I noticed with amusement that he didn't actually check my fingerprints or take my photo but I didn't think he'd appreciate it if I reminded him.

I'm here now, though, so that's all behind me. Now I have my three months of church planting to look forwards to.

Windsurfing

Keeping up my theme of going places outside of the city, I spent some time with my friend Marcel in Barrie. His house is quite nicely placed on the shore of Lake Simcoe. As if that wasn't cool enough, they have a wee dock beside the water with a canoe and a windsurfing board. Indifferent to the somewhat chilly late September weather, I decided to give windsurfing a shot. I always like trying new things and, well, windsurfing is a new thing.

I need to be honest here and point out that I wasn't entirely unprotected from the elements. Marcel lent me a wetsuit-vest thingy. I don't entirely know how to describe it, but it was a short-sleeved t-shirt sort of a garment with a zip on the back. When you zip it up, you have your own "Keira Knightley in a corset in Pirates of the Caribbean" moment but you do forget about it after a while. Actually, by the end I didn't want to take the thing off because it really did keep me warm.

I was also given a pair of water-shoes (or river-socks or some combination of the two terms) to protect my feet. I was warned about a curious creature called a Zebra Mussell. It seems these strange little things amuse themselves by sitting on the floor of the lake and sticking a sharp pointy thing up the way in the hope that some unsuspecting windsurfer might step on them. Odd, I know. I think they might be a product of The Fall.

The windsurfing itself took place over two days. The first was fairly windy. In fact, as we were in the water we noticed the clouds were getting darker and we expected a storm to come in soon. I actually saw lightning in the distance but I didn't mention it to Marcel until afterwards because I didn't want him to call a halt to things. We went in when it started raining. (As if that would stop us in Scotland!) The second day was much more placid and I found it much easier then. Having said that, I did have a day of experience under my belt, as it were.

As with a lot of sports, windsurfing has a bit more to it than meets the eye. You have to keep your balance on the board and you have to point the board in the right direction. The mast must lie at right-angles to the board on the surface of the water. You also need to lift the mast out of the water with your back to the wind and ensure that when it gets close to upright your body is counter-balancing enough that you can hold it at arms-length. Then once you can do that all you need to think about is rotating the sail to catch some wind and steer it in the direction you want to go. What could be easier? Well, pretty much every other water sport ever invented, except that kiteboarding one. It's wack.

I managed to stand on the board. That was ok. It was quite hard to get onto it in the first place because the board has a hard surface and kneeling on it is sore on the knees. Once standing, I had to be sure my feet were equidistant from the mast. (Great word) This meant I was applying equal pressure to both sides of the board so it wouldn't rotate either way.

The next thing was to raise the mast out of the water. This is achieved by picking up a rope that is attached to the mast and pulling it towards you, leaning back and using your bodyweight rather than your arms. As you do this, it might get interesting. Hopefully you have positioned yourself with your back to the wind and your board across the way. If so, the sail will point directly away from you as it comes out of the water and it won't catch any wind. Think of this as being in "neutral". Now imagine an automatic windsurfing board. That'd be weird.

If the wind is NOT directly behind you, it gets fun at this point. The wind blows the sail until it points in the direction the wind is blowing. Think of the sail here like the classic "Dad's hankie prior to launching a kite". If the sail starts to turn, you can no longer rely on it as a couter-balance and the chances are you'll fall in. If you don't fall in, you can correct the situation by rotating the board until it is perpendicular to the sail.



Rotating the board is achieved by putting more weight on one foot than the other. Whatever side you push will go forwards, so left foot goes clockwise and right foot goes anti-clockwise. This is a bit weird at first but after a while I found myself instinctively using my feet to correct the angle of the board to the sail as the wind changed or the board drifted.

As the mast gets closer to you, you need to grab the bar. The bar goes all the way round the sail and it's what you hold on to while riding. It's not possible to raise the mast out of the water by pulling on the bar in the first place because you wouldn't be able to keep your balance wrestling with the force of the wind, weight of the mast and your own balance on the board.

Once you have the bar in your hand (I managed this a few times) you start to rotate the sail to one side. The first time I did this I got a fright because it was the first day I mentioned and the wind was STRONG. I suddenly caught the wind and thought "Oh no! What do I do now?". I answered my own question by promptly falling into the lake. I'm pretty sure that wasn't the next thing on the list.

All in all, I had a great time. It was tricky and demanding on my balance, co-ordination and physical endurance but I liked it. By the end I was becoming quite confident with the first couple of steps like correcting the board angle and raising the mast out of the water. The part I was finding tricky was leaning back enough so that I could hold the bar at arms-length. I was standing too upright and pulling the mast completely vertical. This meant I didn't have much stability and my arms were weakening fast.

The other bizarre thing of note was that I got slashed by a tiger mussel, despite my protective footwear. The blighter got me on the hand. I think it was actually my very first attempt and I fell backwards off the board. I instinctively reached out my hands behind me to break the fall and cut my right thumb in the process. I didn't feel anything but when I was about to climb onto the board again, I noticed blood coming out of my hand. The cut seemed to be fairly deep. When I looked at it the area inside was white with a few red dots of blood on it. It looked odd to me. Someone later suggested the white stuff was called "bone" but I don't think it was that deep.

Heidi and Brian's Wedding

Ok, so I'm totally on a roll with this blog-a-thon thing, but my battery is running out and I can't connect to the Internet and charge my battery at the same time, so this is going to be some pretty rapid blogging...

The wedding was really cool. I had a great time. It was outdoors in an apple orchard. They had a grassy area set up with two sets of chairs and the obligatory aisle down the middle. At the end was a nice canopy/gazeebo kind of set up with flowers and what not. The whole area was surrounded on three sides by trees on the left, right and just beyond the aforementioned canopy thingy in front of us. They also had some leaves and other autumnal things strewn on the ground for the bridal party to walk on as they entered.



The most noteworthy thing in the ceremony itself was the prayers of the nations. I'm not just saying that because I was part of it. I thought it was a really cool idea. They basically called up lots of people of varying nationalities and language skills to bless them in their own tongue and to welcome them to their nation as a representative of that place. Lacking the Gaelic for the occasion, I prayed in a Scottish accent. Many wept at the beauty of my words and thousands got saved. Ok, so I made that bit up, but it was good anyway.

The reception was unlike any I've ever been to. As well as the expected speeches, Heidi and Brian took time to individually honour each of their bridesmaids, groomsmen and parents. If you're not familiar with "honouring" just think of it as the opposite of a Scottish wedding. They said really nice things about each of the people I mentioned, and they meant it. (Compared with us saying nasty things and not meaning it.)

All in all, a great day was had by all. My battery's about to die so I'll sign off now.

A house in the country

Although I've lived in the city (or town) all my life, I still feel like I'm a country boy trapped inside an city boy's body. Is that bizarre? Probably. One of the places I got to stay on my travels was in the blip of the Ontario map known as Baden. My friends Chris and Lorri stay there and it also happens to be really close to Stratford, where the wedding was.

Chris and Lorri's house is in a new area where some of the houses on the street are still wooden frames and one is still a big muddy bit of ground. Theirs hadn't even had the driveway paved yet. The coolest thing by far, though, was the view behind their house. The back garden was freshly laid turf (covering all manner of building refuse I wouldn't wonder) with a fence at the end. Beyond the fence was a rather large corn field. Yes, corn. I looked at it up close and I could see them on the cob, on the plant. Weird. So that's where that stuff comes from. I kept expecting Mel Gibson to burst out and annouce "you won't get famous doing this". From the upstairs window, I could see across the field to the rest of the farmland. It's nice to get out of the city.

Eating in my favourite places in Toronto

It's funny the things you miss about a place. Most people who have spent significant time at TACF could be excused for listing things like "the presence of God" and "the Father's love" as things they miss when they leave. Well, I missed all day breakfasts and quirky Japanese food. I suppose we're all different.

Within my first day or so back in Toronto, I had eaten at a number of my favourite establishments. First of all, I had a Beef Teriyaki at the infamous Woodbine Mall, near TACF. Later on, I managed to make it to Perkins, where they do all day breakfast, 24 hours a day. What a deal! I always think of breakfast food as very special. It's kind of like my equivalent to caviar or lobster. What is the reason for this accolade? Well, basically, places like McDonalds stop serving it at 10 or 11 so I'm never there in time to buy it.

Sailing on Lake Ontario

The day after arriving in Toronto, my roommate-for-a-few-days, Maciek, offered to take me out sailing on Lake Ontario. Although it was September, it didn't take me too long to agree. It was pretty good fun. I liked the fact that all of the odd looking wee bits and pieces on the boat actually served some function or other. It was also pretty cool to all of a sudden be very interested in the direction of the wind, relative to where you want to go. Too often these days we take for granted that we have motors and engines to take us wherever we want to go regardless of the environmental conditions.

We sailed out of Port Credit and headed towards Toronto. Although it was quite far away, the CN Tower still dominated the skyline from our position. We headed towards it for a while. I took a turn of steering (or should that be "navigating" or "piloting"?) and it was a strange feeling. Whenever I turned the tiller one way, there was a short delay as the new angle of the rudder caused the water to deflect off it. I would then realise that I turned it quite far so I would compensate in the opposite direction. For a while the boat was wiggling from side to side as I tried to keep the CN Tower in line with the bow. As time went by, I tried a form of "prophetic steering" where I turned it a bit and then guessed how far I had oversteered before the boat actually turned. Either that or I made smaller adjustments, I don't know which.

On the way back, it was more tricky. This was because the wind had been at our back on the way out and now we had to sail into the wind. "How do you sail into the wind?" I hear you ask. Fear not, I shall explain. It seems that a sailing boat can still use the wind by pointing diagonally past it. In other words, if you were facing into the wind, you could turn say 45 degrees to the left or the right and the wind would propell you in the direction you're facing. How exactly does that work? Well I think the wind kind of pushes past the boat, causing it to move in the direction that has least resistance in the water, which would be the direction it's facing. Also, I suppose you can turn the sail a bit. I don't actually know what I'm talking about. I'm just guessing.

In order to get back to where we started, we had to adopt this 45 degree angle to the wind that I was just talking about. The only problem with that was that we really wanted to go into the wind, rather than off at some angle to a different destination altogether. For that reason we had to do some tacking. This is simply a technique where you travel to the left of the wind for a while and then turn 90 degrees to travel right of the wind for the same distance again. You then keep repeating this until you get to your destination. Think of the direction you want to go as a straight line up and down the way, and the actual path as a zig-zag line that veers off to one side and then turns back across but gets to the end eventually. Ok, that was a rubbish comparison. I basically repeated what I just said. Undaunted, I carry on...

Sailing into the wind is a bit slower than having it behind you, as one might expect. For this reason, we changed the front sail to a bigger one to help speed things up. This was pretty good fun. I had to go to the bow (front for you landlubbers) of the ship and lower the front sail, unclip it and gather it into a big bag. I then had to repeat the process in reverse to attach the larger sail. It was great fun. All that bouncing up and down made me slightly sea-sick but it was good to feel alive again.

The return trip was much bouncier and the boat tended to lean to one side quite impressively. Maciek assured me that it would be impossible for the boat not to right itself in the event of an extreme "leaning" (?) situation. The reason for this is that the keel is very heavy compared to the weight above the water. Basically, that means if it capsizes it'll right itself. Thankfully no capsizing occured, although a jaunty angle was entertaining in its own way.

Blog catch-up

Ok, so I'm about to splurge lots of stories onto my blog as fast as possible. I don't want to do them as one big super-post, though, because then it's harder to find them in the future. I will post them as separate posts, starting with the topics I promised in my most recent post.

Having fun in Canada

I realise it's been a few days since I've written anything but that doesn't mean nothing has happened recently. In fact, it's quite the opposite. I've got so many fun photos and videos from my adventure so far that I want to do them justice when I write about them here. Until I get round to doing that properly, though, I'll give you a sneak peek just now of the things I'm going to be talking about.

1) Sailing on Lake Ontario
2) Eating in my favourite places in Toronto
3) Staying with friends in a house that looks out over endless fields
4) Going to Heidi & Brian's wedding

I don't know if this is worse than not posting at all, but I just wanted everyone to know I've not forgotten about you and I'll write more details soon.

I have slept

I'm now part way through my first full day in Canada. I got up at about 10:15 which was a fairly reasonable time to get up. I had gone to bed at about 11 o'clock the night before. Oddly enough, despite my being awake for so long, it still took me a wee while to eventually get to sleep.

I was trying to figure out just how long I had been awake when I did finally go to bed. I had got up at 4:10 am (Glasgow time) the morning of the flight. I then went to bed at 11 pm (Toronto time). That's about 24 hours all together!

This morning when I woke up, I had no idea what time it was because I was in the basement and my phone which is my only clock was in the other room. I thought I would probably wake early since I've moved 5 time zones to the left. :) The first few times I therefore went back to sleep.

The other odd thing is that my throat is really sore today. It's possible it is from the flight but I don't think that could be it, because I had already been in Canada 12 hours since the flight without any problems. I actually think it's an odd sleeping characteristic of mine. I know that I can snore for Scotland and I think this is especially true when my body has missed out on some slumber. Perhaps I have a "snore quota" that needs to be fulfilled and the lack of recent sleep has left my body with little option but to compensate. I'll keep drinking lots of water and see how it goes from here.

Kenada

I have arrived safe and sound in Toronto. I had a direct flight from Glasgow. It was cool to get a direct flight rather than having to change planes somewhere.

The flight was scheduled to depart at 8:15 am which all sounds very civilised, but in reality I was meant to be there three hours in advance. Yep, that's 5:15 am. Well I was a couple of minutes late but it was fine. Checking in was a bit slower than usual because they were being very strict with the security measures.

First of all, passengers were only allowed one carry on item each. Secondly, it had to fit in a wooden box near the counter. They were very strict with the fact that the bag had to completely be contained within the box. This meant a lot of people had to re-pack certain items. I had to move my musical instruments from my backpack to my suitcase.

I had a bit of a silly moment when waiting to board the plane. They were boarding by row number which was fine. They started off with rows 1-4 or something like that for first class. Then they did something like rows 22 to 32. My boarding card said row 33 so I groaned inwardly and then waited for my row to be called. Next they said something like rows 16 to 32. I thought it was odd that they were going in the wrong direction. It was then that I noticed that 33 was actually the GATE number and I was actually in row 22. I could have gone earlier!

I got a whole row to myself which was so cool. There were three seats, from the right windows to an aisle. Unfortunately the nearest TV screen wasn't working so I had to watch the one a bit further down the plane.

All in all the flight was good and the cabin crew were very cheerful and helpful which always makes a difference.

Stay tuned for more updates of my antics!

Crazy Week

It really has been a crazy week in more ways than one. We have had an amazing prophetic conference at our church this week with Patricia Bootsma and her team from Jubilee Christian Fellowship in Stratford, Ontario. It was especially busy for me because I was doing sound. This meant I had to be there early for each session and available for the band during sound check as well as being there throughout the sessions. I also knew a few of the guys in the team so we invariably hung out together when the evening meetings finally finished around 10:30pm or thereabouts.

As if this wasn't enough to be keeping me busy, I was also packing everything up. I've been getting ready to finally move out of my flat and today was the day. I am writing this at the home of my good friends Phillip and Sarah who have let me stay here tonight. I am currently of no fixed abode! Well, ok, technically speaking my parents' address is the one I use but I'm in transit already, although my flight doesn't leave till Monday morning.

I'm starting to get pretty excited about going to Kansas City. Even though it's been a really busy week, there's something I love about being active. I feel kind of reluctant to say I like being busy because I know the whole School of Ministry thing was so much about rest and not striving. I would say, though, that it's being active rather than striving that I enjoy. :) I like feeling tired when my head finally hits the pillow (or cave floor) at night. It's good to have a sense that I've actually done something today!

With that thought I'm going to leave. It's late and I AM actually tired! Nice one!

Blog of the Day, apparently

You may have noticed my previous post was a bit more techy than my usual ponderings in here. Part of the reason for that is that I wanted to follow up on a my post about the new look for the blog. It seems that entry earned me the title of "Blog of the Day" on the aptly titled blogoftheday.org website.

Here's a nice wee link to it so you can see for yourself:



For those of you who were a bit perplexed at the complexity of my discussion on CSS and HTML, I want to reassure you that normal blogging will resume momentarily. Thanks for your patience!

Slight tweak of layout

I noticed that the "Edit HTML" feature of Blogger Beta was now active so I've been trying to make a few small improvements to the layout of my blog by hacking the CSS and HTML a bit. I say "hacking" just because these changes weren't possible through the layout editor itself.

Today's shopping list contained two items:

1. Change my Dari Blog Description to be right-justified.


2. Change the font of the Blog Description to one that looks a bit nicer.

Right-Justifying the text

The Blog Description is written in Dari, which is an Arabic-based language. It is read from right to left and, consequently, should really be right-justified on the page for normal situations. (Granted, in English we sometimes right-justify things that are written in English, but that is in special cases such as the header of a letter or something.)

There are two ways I knew of to right-justify the text. Firstly, you could use the CSS attribute of "text-align:right". I was able to do this by editing the Template HTML and finding the rule for "#header .description". However, this isn't really the best solution. Why do I say that? Well, because the direction of the text is implied by the content, not just by style. As we are all starting to catch on to these days, Style=CSS and Content=HTML. Therefore, an HTML solution would be better here.

The HTML solution I had in mind was to use the dir attribute. It is used to indicate that a piece of content is either ltr (left to right) or rtl (right to left). To make this change, I had to check the "Expand Widget Templates" checkbox above the HTML editor, because the HTML for the Blog Description is hidden inside the Header widget.

Inside this widget, I tried applying the dir="rtl" attribute to a number of different elements but it didn't work. Now as I write this, I'm wondering if it only affects the direction of the characters while not implying a change in justification of text one way or the other.

A quick check on the web reveals this W3C article which suggests setting the directionality on a block element should change the justification. Oh well. I've stuck with the CSS option for now, but I don't like it.

Changing the Blog Description's Font

The font for the Blog Description can be changed through the Fonts and Colours section of the Template area of Blogger Beta. You can choose the font family and size as well as bold and italic settings. It contains the following fonts:

• Arial


• Courier


• Georgia


• Times


• Trebuchet


• Verdana

While I understand that these are probably the only fonts you can assume a user has available, I would still like to add a font of my own choosing to the front of the list. With CSS, the browser will attempt to use the first font family specified and then roll over to the second if the first is not installed and so on.

In my previous Blog Description, I used the Tahoma font which makes Arabic characters look quite nice. I wanted to make that the first font it would attempt to use here, with Verdana and sans-serif as the other options.

Poking about the CSS in the template, I discovered the #header .description rule contained the following attribute for the font:

font: $descriptionFont;

This is using a placeholder which is later substituted with the values you chose earlier in the font settings. Very clever - a spot of dynamic CSS. I tried adding my font to the front of the list like so:

font: Tahoma,$descriptionFont;

This didn't work, though, because the $descriptionFont variable does more than simply state the font family, it specifies font weight, size, boldness, italicisity (?) and finally font family. My attempt to hack it produced this CSS:

font: Tahoma,normal normal 173% Verdana, sans-serif;

This isn't a valid CSS rule since Tahoma should appear between 173% and Verdana.

In the end, what I did was add a font-family attribute immediately after the font: $descriptionFont; line:

font: $descriptionFont;
font-family: Tahoma,Verdana,sans-serif;

This way, I can still use $descriptionFont to alter bold, italic and size settings, while my rule will only override the font family.

I think in the future, custom fonts could be supported through Template -> Fonts and Colours by allowing users to specify a font family in a text box while still forcing them to choose one of the generic fonts as well. Their own font would be put at the start of the list and ignored if the user doesn't have it installed.

Phew! That was quite a long post. Sorry about that!

Come Alive

"Do not ask yourself what the world needs, but ask yourself what makes you come alive because the world needs people who have come alive."

- John Eldredge

Everythin's up to date in Kansas City

...They've gone about as fur as they c'n go!

(If you have no idea what that's about, don't worry about it. Just read on. It's nothing to do with what I'm about to say.)

Well I'm on the move again. I've only been in Scotland a year since I was unceremoniously dumped by Canadian Immigration, but it feels like a long time.

I've finally decided that since I hate programming so much these days, I should really get on with it and do something else. In the words of Why Don't You (theme song), I'm going to "...switch off my TV set [or monitor in this case] and do something less boring instead."

The "something" I am going to do is a church planting course in Kansas City. I will be at the All Nations Training Center, doing CPx, which is the "Church Planting Experience".

I'm actually leaving in 2 and a half weeks which is not very long at all. There are still a few details to finalise such as my flat and... oh yeh.. all the money!

If you feel like supporting me financially by any chance, have a look to the right of the page here and you should see a PayPal donation button. You can use that to send me money. Isn't technology handy?

New look for the blog

I've been looking at the new Blogger beta and I decided to switch over. To make the most of the new layout tools, I decided to switch over my layout to one of the new templates. Now the layout editor is much more simplistic. It seems that not everyone who edits their blog layout really wants to tinker about with HTML and CSS all day. I have to say that when I'm not getting paid for it, the novelty does wear off a wee bit.

The new layout editor is much more like a proper content management system with blocks on the page where you can add/edit/delete page elements. All very nice.

Being the details kind of guy, though, I still want to make a couple of tiny CSS tweaks that I can't seem to get at right now. All in all, though, it's pretty good.

War Wounds on Flickr

For those of you who've been unable to play my video of my recent longboarding "war wounds", I've uploaded some pics to Flickr.

Go to this page to check them out:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/theken/tags/warwounds/

Käck

Yesterday I ate a Käck. It was quite nice.

Reflections on risk, pain and failure

I was reflecting for a brief second there on my experience yesterday with the longboard. If you didn't read yesterday's post, the gist of it is that I fell off and it was sore.

I was just thinking about various people's attitude to what happened. Someone said that it was time for me to start "acting my age" and that I can't treat my body like that. I began to think about what they meant by that. Was it simply the idea that grown-ups don't ride longboards (or any skateboards) or was it something else? Maybe it was an attitude that since grown-ups don't heal as quickly, we shouldn't risk things like that any more.

It just made me think, because I feel as if we lose our sense of adventure as we get older. Children are expected to take risks, to learn to ride their bike, skin their knee occasionally. However, if I, being 29, decide to take up a new hobby such as longboarding, there's not the same social acceptance of that. The general attitude is "ooh - watch you don't hurt yourself" and that sort of thing.

I was weighing up the two sides of my longboarding experience. I have had three months of fun with my board so far. I ride to church, I use it to get around and I really love the ride. There's something liberating about carving your way down the street with a smooth ride.

The flip side (excuse the pun) of my experience is the fall I had yesterday. Assessing how I feel just now, I have a bit of a sting on my left shoulder, elbow and hip. (Can you tell I ride regular?) I also have a bit of what I assume to be whiplash in my neck. I just realised today that I totally think all the fun I've had balances out the pain I've felt, and continue to feel. If I had never got on a longboard for fear of falling off then sure, I wouldn't be in pain just now, but I wouldn't have had the same great experences either.

Is this a pointless discussion? I don't think so. I think it highlights our attitude to risk, fear of pain, fear of failure and so on. I don't ride because I want to get hurt, that'd be pretty twisted. I ride because I love it. If I fail from time to time, I will learn from it and get up and start again. I reckon the only way you can guarantee you never fail is to never try.

I like taking risks. I think God made me that way for a reason. Time will tell!

War Wounds

Today, I fell off my longboard for the first time. Hopefully it'll be the last time as well! I was carving and the board turned too far and stopped instantly. I think I went over some loose stones that made it skid. I flew off it, rolled a bit and then landed on my back, finishing off with a wee bump to the head as well.

Being the sharing sort, I thought I would let everyone else see the assorted scrapes for themselves. (Mum, you probably wouldn't enjoy this one.)



Note: I realise I look somewhat out of it in this video. I just want to reassure everyone that I was very tired, slightly sunburnt, possibly whiplashed and in no way under the influence of anything questionable.

Tentmaking

I've been wondering about something lately. It's something about a biblical character that most people have probably never given a thought, or seen the relevance of. However, it kind of sums up where I am just now.

"Did Paul enjoy making tents?"

There's only one reference I could find to Paul being a "tentmaker" in the bible. (I used Bible Gateway, as opposed to a thorough personal study.) Despite the fact that so little is said of Paul's tentmaking skills, the word "tentmaker" has become a Christianese term for a job you do that isn't especially spiritual or enjoyable but you do it to pay the bills. I'm finding myself dying a bit each day as I sit in front of a computer in my empty flat. It really is rubbish. I'm convinced I should be doing something I'm passionate about.

This brings me back to the question, "Did Paul enjoy making tents?" Was it something he was passionate about or did it kill him on the inside? I only had a very brief look at the chapter where Paul's tentmaking was mentioned (Acts 18) but I can't help feeling the meaning was one of a brief, transitional phase where he returned to his previous trade because the people he was staying with also made tents. He didn't do it for years, desperate for something else.

Maybe the term "tentmaker" has been exaggerated from the original context, or maybe I just can't accept the conclusion that everyone else seems to have settled for, that fulfillment in your work is unimportant, and the paying of bills is all that really matters.

For me, I have this possibly naïve notion that we should be passionate about what we do. We'll see how it goes. I'll bet my income on it.

Snowboarding in July - God is good

Last night I went for a lesson at the sno zone at the Braehead Xscape centre. It was pretty good stuff. For those who don't already know, it's an indoor slope with actual snow. The whole area is kept at a temperature of -5. (It feels so hot when you come out.)

I did a 1.5 hour lesson in Freestyle Level 1. Freestyle refers to doing tricks such as jumps and spins rather than simply riding down the hill. Level 1 refers to the fact that it's as basic as they can make it. I figured that since it's not a very big slope anyway, I'm not going to get too much of a thrill from just bombing the hill because it'll be over in 10 seconds.

In the lesson I did the following:

• Nose press


• Tail press


• Ollies


• Nollies


• Flatland spins (both frontside and backside)


• Switch (Fakie) Riding

It was pretty cool stuff. It was encouraging to find that my ollies were actually better than I thought they were. I was able to jump 3 rows of cones and my instructor was finally relieved when I clipped one because I kept clearing everything he put in front of me.

Another part that was really encouraging was when I started to ride switch. I found that once I got over my fear of putting my weight on my right foot (normally the rear foot for me) I was able to link a few turns and swing my back foot round pretty well. I'm still not quite ambidextrous by any means but I'm a lot better than I was.

The flatland spins were a useful introduction to riding fakie. The deal is that as you go down the hill, you keep rotating the board in one direction. This means that for half of the spin your usual front foot is leading and then for the other half, you're leading with your weaker foot. The trick is really to shift your weight from one foot to the other when your board is across the slope.

After the lesson we had half an hour of practice time on the big slope. It's not HUGE but for an indoor venue it's pretty impressive. I did a few runs riding fakie and only fell once. (and I was actually watching someone else fall when it happened)

Today I'm feeling a bit worse for wear. This usually happens the first time you ride in a season. My back's pretty tight and my triceps are a wee bit achey too. I feel it in the back of my neck - possibly from trying to jump and spin. My bum muscles hurt when I walk as well.

All in all, though, it was a grand day out, and I would heartily recomment a spot of freestyle riding to anyone who's getting bored with simply carving down the hill.

While writing this entry, I found an amusing list of snowboarding terminology.

Esau living as Jacob

I've been thinking a lot recently about the two personalities of Isaac's sons - Esau and Jacob. I'm not going down the road of Esau despising his birthright or Jacob being a cheat. I'm thinking more of the notion of Esau being a wild man of the outdoors and Jacob preferring to spend his time around the tents. I feel as if I'm an Esau who has been raised as Jacob.

I became interested in computers in childhood when I didn't really get the chance to go "out" just for the sake of going out. I would go to friends' houses. Consequently we did Jacob-ish things like sit around computers for hours on end. Now, years later, I've developed a love for the outdoors that I really wonder what would have been different if I had found this sooner.

I have told friends before that I would love to go back in time to the day I decided computers were cool. I'd love to take that kid and say "Hey, here's a skateboard, a snowboard, a kite, a tent..."

I know God can still use what I've learned. I have skills that are useful. (Still don't know much about bo staff or numchucks, though.) I've realised, though, that my future is not yet written. I don't have to think down the narrow lines of computer programming forever and a day. I think there is a better way...

A week without Levi

It's been an interesting week or so. I had to send Levi (Ken's faithful lappy) back to Samsung to get a problem fixed. It's interesting how different my life has been without it.

I've been listening to teaching tapes from when Graham Cooke was at our church last year. I've also been worshipping, reading my bible and basically doing useful, productive things.

God's been showing me some cool stuff about myself and my future as well which is all pretty encouraging.

Back from Rio

I just got back from Rio a few days ago and I'm slowly adjusting back to life in Scotland. The biggest thing right now is trying to adjust to the timezone. It's 1:30 am and I'm not especially tired. I hope I get to sleep when I finally go to bed.

The trip was amazing. It was such an experience to see another world. The kids in the favela were so sweet. They were always smiling and happy to see us. They remembered my name and the second day they were shouting "Ken! Ken!" as they ran up to me. They really do love very easily.

One day I was playing a game with them where they would describe something with gestures till I guessed the name of it in English. (This game was motivated by my lack of Portuguese.) To begin with it was things like bicycle, kite, dog, bird and so on - the kind of things you would expect. Then things took an interesting turn when they said "granad". From their description it was clear that they were talking about a hand-grenade. It brought it home to me that despite their loving, playful innocence, they were essentially living in a warzone where violence and death were not uncommon.

Leaving for Rio in the morning

Well, it's finally here - my last night in Scotland before the much-anticipated trip to Rio. I think I'm excited about it now. Some people get excited about things way in advance but I'm quite short-sighted in a sense when it comes to things like this. Once I'm on the plane, I'll be forced to contemplate what's about to happen. I find a change from your normal surroundings tends to prompt the brain to focus on what's about to take place.

We're going to be away for just under two weeks. We'll be doing some physical work on a school/orphanage of sorts in one of the favelas of Rio. I'm excited about getting away from the computer, actually. I have my doubts about being a programmer, as it happens. I just think I like the outdoors and people too much to make a true programmer. I mean, I can do it if I have to but generally it bores me to tears. Now professional snowboarder or longboarder might be a different story...

Longboard

On Monday, I bought myself a longboard.



I've been riding it every day since then. In fact, it's been a bit painful on the right hamstring (my kicking leg) which took me by surprise a bit. I've been trying to learn how to stop properly. It seems the best technique for me to learn at this stage is footbraking. That doesn't mean breaking your foot, incidentally, but using your foot to slow down the board.

Yesterday I was riding through the park and a group of girls whistled and waved at me. It seems I'm drawing attention to myself, although that wasn't my purpose.

Nat and Nick's Wedding

On Friday I had the pleasure of going to Nat and Nick's wedding. It really was a great time.

The wedding was at St Aldates Church in Oxford which is a very nice place indeed, although I did spot a masonic symbol on a wooden panel inside the building. That point aside, the place was very nice.

One amazingly awesome moment was when Nicky, the bride, entered the ceremony. It was the most spectacular entrance of a bride I've ever seen. No, she didn't abseil from the ceiling or ram-raid through the wall (although they would be fun) but she had the most amazing music ever.

In keeping with the North American way of doing weddings, the bridesmaids came down the aisle first. They came one at a time, interspersed with the occasional flower girl distributing petals on the floor and not quite seeing what all the fuss was about. Just as the last bridesmaid reached the front, the music reached its climax and in came the bride and her father, a beautiful sight to behold as the choir sang. The track they used was Benedictus from The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace by Karl Jenkins.

I played bass with the band, since Joel couldn't make it. I've played a few times before although not very much. The church had a bass so I just had to show up and use it. However, when I got there I discovered it was fretless. In case you don't know, playing a fretless bass means you have to get your fingers in EXACTLY the right position or the note will be out of tune. I'm not sure, but I don't think I'd ever played one before. Well, I played at the wedding all right. By the end of the practice I had a blood blister and a regular blister on my two "plucking" fingers. It went ok, though.

One of the other cool things that happened that day (though not as spectactular as Nicky's entrance) was seeing The Queen. Yes, I really did. It turns out that while the wedding was in progress, Her Majesty was visting Christ Church just across the road from St Aldates. After the bridal party left, some of us were fortunate enough to be in the right place at the right time as The Queen's car left Christ Church and drove right past us.

Being the organised sort, I had my camera phone close to hand and made sure to capture the moment as best as I could. The Queen was sitting in the back-right seat, wearing a pink suit and matching hat. She waved to the crowd as she passed but since she was on the far side, I didn't get the best view. Still, for one brief moment I saw her and that was amazing in itself.



I was thinking of how much we lowly people get excited about seeing the rich and famous. I don't tend to be really interested in the private lives of celebrities or any of that sort of thing, but it was special to see The Queen. We waited there for some time but there were those who had waited much longer. I'm sure there were those who waited for hours and their reward was a passing glimpse of the head of The United Kingdom - a genuine royal figure.

Although the experience was so transient, each person's life was changed for ever. I'm sure all of them would have told at least someone that they saw The Queen that day. Something of that magnitude has to be passed on.

Having said all that, consider our response in church when we meet with God. Do we really believe we've met with the creator of the universe? Do we honestly think that we've had a moment where someone more powerful than The Queen has not only passed and waved but stopped and interacted with each and every one of us on a deeply personal level? I think half the time we think we made the whole thing up.

I know I've had experiences of God. I have no doubt about that. However, I don't know if it's the invisible and therefore less tangible nature of God or if it's simply the enemy sowing doubt, but we feel incapable of talking to other people about it sometimes. Maybe we think they just wouldn't believe it. I don't know quite what it is, but I know I was much more of an evangelist for my queen encounter than I've been for any of my God encounters, and that's something that concerns me.

Being Judged

I had an interesting experience on Sunday that I thought was worth mentioning. We were having a curry festival at church to raise money for our Rio Trip and we were all going to dress up in suitable curry-related clothes. Well, since I had lived in Pakistan before, I had my own Shalwar Kameez. I decided to wear that along with my Pakistani waistcoat and Afghani cap.

So, I walked to church dressed like that, not really expecting anyone to make a fuss about it. Well, I hadn't got far when I got a very extreme reaction in Queens Park. I was walking along a fairly wide path (wide enough for a car or two) and there was a middle-aged to elderly Scottish lady walking her dog, heading towards me.

As soon as she saw me, she did a MAJOR body-swerve and walked as far from me as possible, along the opposite side of the path. I think if there was a road in the middle to cross, she would have but given the fact there was only the path, she didn't have the choice.

As if that wasn't bad enough, it got worse when she actually passed me. I was going to smile and say "hello" or something like that if she looked at me but she actually turned her head away as she passed and actually slightly raised her arm towards me as if to protect herself from my obvious evil presence. It was SO bizarre. I've never seen anything like it.

Walking through Govanhill, a Pakistani man congratulated me on being well dressed. I'm not sure if he thought I was a convert to Islam or if he just liked seeing someone wearing traditional Pakistani clothing.

When I was at church, a number of people tried to joke about my appearance by saying things like "I'm surprised you didn't get arrested walking here dressed like that" or "Do you have a bomb vest under there?" It actually really angered me. I don't mind people poking fun at me if they think my hair's ridiculous or if they don't like my taste. I mean, whatever, have your opinion. I think what I reacted to so much about the comments was the ignorance and judgment it demonstrated.

I happen to really care about people from the Middle East - Afghanistan in particular. It's horrible to think that for many people here in Scotland, whenever they see someone dressed in middle eastern clothing they immediately judge them as some kind of scary terrorist. I feel for the innocent people who fled the horrors of war in their homeland only to be judged and treated as wicked here by the people who have offered them refuge.