I made a comment yesterday morning about our vacation of backpacking being a bit more challenging some days than a vacation would imply. Alex promptly corrected me, "I don't think backpacking is ever a vacation, Stephanie."
Yesterday quickly agreed with him, and I think they're both right. (This isn't to say backpacking isn't incredible, but it's certainly not a "relax, take a load off, worry about nothing for the duration of your holiday" kind of excursion.) Yesterday proved that for a number of reasons, backpacking is not exactly what one might call a vacation.
1) "No further sailings on this route." The rail pass schedule you were given to ease your travel plans is updated by the individual companies the minute the rail pass leaves the interview, apparently, so the book you're given as a handy reference is hardly that. What I mean is this: even though the rail pass timetable for 2010 will say you can take a ferry on these dates from Germany to Finland, that doesn't mean that actually exists. Sometimes the one ferry the rail pass says will take you from point A to point B has cancelled all their scheduled crossings for the forseeable future.
2) Tight budgeting. You have to stay on a budget, since you have no source of income, and sometimes this means you eat peanut butter and jelly for 5 days in a row, and try to pretend you don't miss Taco Bell so much that you've had more than one dream you're enjoying it. (Maybe Taco Bell will read this blog, and appreciate my love for it so much that free Taco Bell for life will be in my future...)
3) Public transportation: 1; You: 0. Sometimes you'll miss your bus stop, because the bus driver took a different route than the destination and markers you had memorized. When you ask him to help you fix your dilemma, he'll try to help you with his broken attempts at English, but will eventually be required to do his job and carry on with the bus route, and he'll leave you stranded at the sketchiest bus stop in the middle of no where, with the not-so-encouraging, "There might be a bus coming by, but probably not tonight."
Rule #3: DO NOT miss your bus stop. Especially if it's past dark, in a foreign country where English is not the primary language. You may end up walking home.
And walk we did. Because yesterday we managed to find the only person in Brussels that doesn't speak some English: our bus driver. So despite getting him on the phone with our hosts hoping he can tell them where to pick us up, he quickly gave up, and left us on the side of the road.
So we're walking...
...3 kilometers in what we think is the right direction, in what appears to be an abandoned part of Brussels.
Rule # 4: You MUST pay attention to everything when you're traveling. It is absolutely crucial that you look alive, learn the keen perceptive skills, and take note of every detail. Because you never know when recognizing a word you only glanced at 7 hours earlier could be the key to your salvation, and that hot meal you were promised but can't seem to make it home to.
Last night as we got on the bus, it was the last leg back home, and we were tired from all the different legs of transportation. But it was a different bus, the wrong route, and even though it said it was going our way, it completely passed our area to stop in the Overijse commune (what they call towns/cities here), and as I mentioned, we were blessed with a bus driver who spoke minimal English.
Later we find ourselves dropped off in the middle of nowhere, at the sketchiest bus stop I've ever seen.
So we start walking, because we don't have any confidence that a bus will be along to rescue us at this bus stop before the next morning.
3 km to Overijse.
These are the streets no one lives on, the streets buses don't frequent after dark, and you certainly don't find sane and cautious people walking them (if they can help it).
2 km to Overijse.
The sidewalk becomes a muddy shoulder to the street, and the speed limit is 70. We're in mostly dark attire, and I flash my cell phone light at cars as they speed past, hoping to avoid a quick and anticlimactic death in the abandoned and dilapidated margin of Brussels.
1 km to Overijse.
We have no idea what we'll do when we run out of kilometers. We're praying something looks familiar before we run out of ideas. Funny how God often works that way...sometimes it's no booming voice or epiphany, but a simple idea you just think, "Perhaps we'll try this now..."
Our minds run wild with horror film plots as we traverse a street even the cars speed past refusing to stop or show hesitation by slowing down, only daring to tread these concrete waters to get through to where people reside, and angels don't dare tread.
Finally, Overijse Centrum, and what looks like the echoes of civilization.
I once heard that when using a compass, or trying to find your way, there are two pieces of crucial information. First, you need to know where you are. Second, you need to know where you're going. After that, finding your way is simple. It's determining the first two that usually provides the challenge.
We have an idea of where we need to be, but with no means of determining where that is in relation to its commune surroundings, it may as well be a place we only imagined. Earlier, when the bus driver left us in what looked like a potential setting for the Brussels Chainsaw Massacre, we had no idea how to tell anyone where we were. Neither did the bus driver, before dropping us off. And the phone numbers for the bus companies we found were out of service or don't connect after a certain hour. We were on our own.
But now, we had an idea, and it was enough to phone our hosts so they could come fetch us. Turns out our wildnerness skills were quite savvy, and we were a mere kilometer or two (at that point) from familliar, navigate-able territory.
My parents used to tell this joke when I was younger. A man who believes wholeheartedly in God lives in a two story house, and one day, it rains so hard that it floods. As the waters rise, a boat comes by.
"Come with us, we'll take you to safety!"
The man responds, "No, no, the Lord will save me."
Despite their insisting, the man won't budge. So they eventually leave.
The rains continue to come down, and the flood waters rise. The man is eventually forced to the second floor.
Another boat comes by, and the people plead, "Come with us, we'll take you to safety!"
But the man stubbornly persists, "No, no, God will save me."
So this boat also eventually leaves.
The rain continues to pour, and the floods continue to rise. The man is forced to move to the roof.
A helicopter comes by.
"Come with us, we'll take you to safety!"
But the man refuses. "No, no, God will save me."
The helicopter persists, but eventually leaves, just like the boats before it.
The floods continue to rise, and the man eventually drowns.
When he gets to heaven and approaches God, he's furious. "What is the deal?! I had faith in you, I believed with all my heart you would save me! Explain yourself!"
God replies, "Who do you think sent the two boats and the helicopter?"
Funny how the wisdom of society is often found in the lightheartedness of its ramblings, or in the creative side that is meant to entertain. As we heard in V for Vendetta, "Artists use lies to tell the truth."
Point being, faith and belief in something or someone is a tricky thing.
I don't think faith is easy, and sometimes it looks illogical. I think it requires you to step out of the comfort zone of having all the options figured out. At the moment I have no idea how we'll get from Germany to Finland, but I'm not concerned, and I trust we'll get there somehow. Looking at the rail pass book for the last couple months, I really thought it would be a piece of cake to hop from place to place. But sometimes in life, the ferry gets cancelled without asking if that's convenient for you, and you realize your ability to successfully plan 100% of the time is an illusion no matter what your belief system is. You end up places you never thought you'd be. You get disappointed, and things definitely don't go the way you think they should 100% of the time. Yet, disappointment and changes to the plans you have are not mutually exclusive with having a bit of faith, perhaps no larger than the mustard seed.
I've noticed some characters in the bible believing in something and leaping without really knowing how they'll be caught, and I always thought this to be so strange. They just seem to know (and believe through and through) that if they have a God with the heart of a Father that loves them and promises to provide for their needs, then they'll be taken care of. Somehow. Someway. Honestly, it does look a little crazy. I think faith is a little crazy, even though I believe it absolutely worthwhile. The world demands answers, people want to know how it will work out. I think Morpheus said it best when he was challenged with, "Not everyone shares your beliefs," and he simply responds, "My beliefs do not require them to."
Maybe sometimes we do fall. I don't have this whole thing figured out, not even close. I probably never will. But there is something about faith that trusts the answers will come when necessary...
"When you come to the end of all the light you know, and it's time to step into the darkness of the unknown, faith is knowing that one of two things shall happen: Either you will be given something solid to stand on or you will be taught to fly."
Looking back, the UK felt so easy to navigate compared to what we're doing now. (Yes, I know, save the schpiel about the similar language and relatively similar culture, etc). But just because it was easier and we didn't run into the same problems we're now running into, that doesn't mean this part of the journey isn't worthwhile.
The disappointments can be beautiful if the heart is able to go with the flow, trusting more in the heart of the One guiding than in the ability for events to go exactly as planned. This doesn't mean we sit at the bus stop and just wait, or ignore the boats and helicopters when help arrives. No, we get up, start walking, follow the help when it comes, and trust that in taking those steps of faith, in taking what steps we can, then the rest of the path will be provided for us.
And it seems when we take a leap and try believing in the One guiding, we often find it is our faith that has saved us. (Luke 7:50, 18:42)
One of my mentors gave me this verse as I set out for this backpacking 'vacation': "Go ahead and prepare your horses for battle, but remember, your safety comes from the Lord!" (Proverbs 21:31)
We've only just completed day 21, and our cup seems to runneth over on adventures. I stand corrected Alex; backpacking, this trip, it's no vacation. It is so much more challenging, exhilerating, strengthening, and rewarding. Thus far, I've quit my job not knowing what I'll do to earn money in the future, survived a car wreck logic would assume I shouldn't have walked away from, hopped a flight to places I didn't know how to navigate, not knowing when I'll return. I've stayed at people's homes whom I've never met, fallen asleep in places trusting everything would be as it should when I wake up. I've wandered in cities completely lost hoping to find something familiar soon. I've hopped onto trains praying the directions I was given will actually take me where I want to go. And thus far, I have safely arrived, enjoyed delicious meals, made new and fantastic friends, not lost anything more than a rail pass, and had adventures to last a lifetime.
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to be. - Douglas Adams
The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeing new landscapes, but in having new eyes. - Marcel Proust
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