Wondering Whether there will be Weather

I still don't believe people when they tell me that it rains all the time in Seattle. This is my second time visiting the lovely (supposedly rainy) city, but have yet to experience the miserable weather!

Washington was pretty cool. The people that we met were awesome! Our first night, we stayed with a fellow Nomad's dad... and played some intense games of ping pong! Quite enjoyable :) The next day, we were shown around the delicious side of Seattle by Pastor John, who took us out to eat burgers, ice cream, and coffee. Also quite enjoyable :) We even stayed with Ms. Robb, who had a beautiful view at her house, overlooking the ocean, including a very short walk down to the beach, where we proceeded to see seals swimming & ate some brie and crackers. Yum. We also stayed with Sean's brother's family... with their cat that has thumbs, and their dog that just loves everyone (and Sean's adorable niece... need I say more?)

On Thursday, we drove over to Spokane for a screening at Whitworth University. Wow. The students there rocked my socks off! Amy & Morgan were great hosts, and sent us off with goodies for the road. The students even stuck around for an hour after the screening to talk to Jane & I about getting involved with LiNK :) Fun times.

Next Stops: The beautiful, rainy state of Oregon
Also Seattle... tomorrow morning. We have to leave Portland at 4:00am to get there. Hmmm....

Oh Canada!

What a whirlwind trip to Jane's home country/home town! It all started with the 13 hour overnight drive to even get here... then we got stopped for 2 1/2 hours at the border (Our big black van is sketchy? What?). We were a few minutes late for our first screening, but they were very understanding, and loved the documentary. The PRINCIPAL even commented on what great speakers we are. That was definitely something awesome to hear after a looooong drive. It made it very-much-so worth it.

After our 5 days here in Canada, we as the West Coast team, have officially raised enough funds through donations to rescue ONE refugee! :) Thank you to San Diego, Phoenix/Tucson, Los Alamos, Orem/Provo/Logan/Salt Lake City, Twin Falls, and Vancouver for making that possible!

As soon as I finish writing this, we are off for one last sight-seeing adventure here in Vancouver (to Stanley Park), and then we are off to Seattle, Washington. The past 3 weeks have been wonderful and inspiring, and I'm excited to see what the next 2 weeks have in store for us before we head down back into California! :)

Hiding Teaser (part II)

This teaser is the first 2 minutes of the film. Wow.

Hiding Teaser II from LiNK Global on Vimeo.

Week 2: The week of opposites

After heading back to Arizona from New Mexico, we got to hang out with & meet some awesome people! Arizona was quite enjoyable, though rather warm, I must say. So on Monday night, we started driving to our new location... Utah! We ended up spending the night in the van, because it was raining (which ruined our camping plans...). Utah was pretty much the exact opposite of Arizona-- hot & dry turned into cold & rainy. Even though the weather was opposite, the people were just as cool!

The first night after sleeping in the van, we were put up in a hotel! (Quite the opposite there as well). We also met Mike, who has a stuffed Pokeman that matches the one traveling with us in our van :) Alex was a fun person to hang out with-- she even came with us when we visited the Mormon Temple in downtown Salt Lake City! We had some fun times together.

On Saturday, we drove further north to Twin Falls, ID. Our introduction to this lovely town in the middle of nowhere was watching 14 crazies jump off of a perfectly good bridge into a 500 foot deep canyon... with parachutes, of course. It was pretty crazy & intense! We met up with Bryan, who took us to the farm house that would become our home for the next 2 nights... complete with stink bugs & spiders living in the basement (well, the whole house, really). But it was super fun & super nice! The people at The River Christian Fellowship were so receptive to our story, even though we were only able to show 1 story of hope (not the full documentary). Tonight we will be showing the doc to their young adult group (and possibly some of the other members of their congregation).

Overall, Utah and Idaho have been pretty awesome! Next stop: VANCOUVER, BC, CANADA! I can't wait for Jane to show us around her country (well, at least the very small part that she grew up in)! :)

Rainy Utah

Well, Utah... You are a fun & interesting place. We spent the greater part of this afternoon in Temple Square... and learned about all sorts of interesting things! We saw a giant 15-foot statue of Jesus in space, toured the LDS Conference Center (that holds 21,000 people!), and saw a miniature model of the Temple.

When we first came into Utah, it was about 1am... We were going to camp in Kanab, but it was pretty sketchy. So instead, Sean drove for an additional 3 hours to get us to a random rest stop in the middle of nowhere, where we slept for about 4 hours in the van. We then woke up & continued on to Orem for a screening at Utah Valley University. We've had some great screenings here in Utah-- the people are all so nice.

We've also had some crazy fun times here. Sleeping in the van is always an adventure-- and it was raining the whole night-- relaxing, but unfortunate for our original plan of camping. We have seen some beautiful sunsets (and sunrises), especially here in Utah with all the mountains & lakes.

One of our contacts (Mike), also has a stuffed Pikachu, which was RATHER exciting. The West Nomads & Mike are clearly soul mates. That is all about that. Though right now we are watching Star Wars with Alex (and quite a few other people). It's always a fun time!

We have the next three days off, so I'm really excited to just hang out & get some stuff done. Today we did some sightseeing in Salt Lake City. Tomorrow we are going to drive up to Idaho (Twin Falls) to continue our trek towards the North! And in just 4 short days, we will be in CANADA!!! I'm pretty stoked about that.

First Week on the Road

What can I say? The West Coast has, so far, proven itself to be the Best Coast (sorry Brenda, but it's the truth). We have met some of the most amazing people, from San Diego to Phoenix to Tucson to Phoenix to Los Alamos to Tucson! They have fed us delicious food, given us comfortable places to sleep, taken us around town, been interested in what we have to say & in what we are doing, and have overall just been amazing.

In Phoenix, we met some super inspired kids who were so interested in our cause. They know what's up, and they can relate because they know people in very similar situations (minus the refugee part-- but they know the "economic migrant" part).

Tucson was also exciting. Our screening at U of A was crazy! The room that was originally reserved for our screening ended up being given away to another group for a seminar... so 10 minutes before our screening was supposed to start, we found another room to utilize. Our contacts there were so great, being flexible & helping us out as much as possible! After the screening we ate ate eegee's in Tucson (a local restaurant chain)-- they serve the best drinks! It is basically a mix between a slushie and an icee. Wow. So delicious. Shaina (our host) tried to take us to Seguaro National Park (with the GIANT cacti), but the park was closed by the time we got there. So instead, we laid on a bench and looked at the stars (For you Californians & other City Folk, stars are bright, burning balls of gas in the sky that are absolutely amazing).

We headed up to Los Alamos, NM after we finished up in Tucson and Phoenix, arriving at 1:30am at my parents house. They were so sweet-- all of us had sheets on our beds (or the couch), and in the morning, my mom baked us Company French Toast, which is bascially the best breakfast that has ever been made in the history of the world (I'm not biased or anything, I promise... haha). LAHS was super cool. I am so proud of my former high school. The kids were so attentive & many of them were extremely inspired (in fact, some of them inspired US because they were so cool). My home church was also super cool. They know their stuff up in Los Alamos, and knew the questions to ask and the things to say. It was nice to know that they now understand what I'm doing & what LiNK is all about. I'm glad we were able to share my passion with the people that I know and care about.

I was also invited to do a radio interview for a christian radio station in Santa Fe/Albuquerque (KKIM). It was basically like an intense 15 minute Q & A session. It was really great to be able to get the word out throughout New Mexico about what we are doing! We have another radio interview when we are in Idaho... and maybe a few more will come through (?)

We are just arriving in Tucson for another screening tomorrow. Valerie (our host) has already made herself identifiable as an awesome person! She is so prepared for us to come already, and has thought out every minute detail, even what we want to do tomorrow afternoon (hiking, sight seeing, other fun activities). She is such a sweet lady & we haven't even met her yet!

Even though this is just the first week, I'm pretty sure this tour is going to be amazing (at least I'm hoping so!) Things I'm looking forward to: Camping on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, visiting Vancouver, and having (so far) 15 screenings in one week in LA (and it's not fully booked yet), and meeting lots of awesome & inspired new people! Crazy & fun times! :)