My Week in Nashville

[ajmrowland]

I bet some of you were wondering where I've been this past week. Well, my church's youth group took a trip to Nashville, Tennessee to help out at some homeless shelters with CSM-Center for Student Missions. The whole week was so interesting, I'm posting it in parts just to make sure I have everything! I'll also post pictures, as soon as I get my hands on them!

Sunday: Basically the trip there. We left the church about 3:30 in the morning and drove 2 hours to Madison, Wisconsin. Then, we hopped a flight to Minneapolis. My attention span goes haywire when I'm flying, but unfortunately, I had a middle seat; Not a window seat. It was when were starting to land that I realized I had accidentally left my pillow at the security check.
In the Minneapolis airport, I tried to keep an eye out for some donuts(*drools*), but couldn't find any.
The second flight went just as smoothly, but there were far more, and more solid, clouds. Always the solid ones make the interesting shapes.
When we landed in Nashville, we waited for the chaperones to rent vans(ended up with 4), and some of us kept beating John with our bags. He's a 6'4" Junior.
Anyway, we weren't expected until about 4:30 or 5:00, and our trip only took ten hours, so we spent two at a local mall. Mostly girls stuff(unlike our mall) and I was the only guy to be sorted into a group of girls, led by one(unnamed) that couldn't decide what to do. Mostly just eating snacks at the food court and walking around.
There was also a roller-coaster simulator that was the shit. Me and another kid rode on it, and even though it was designed for arcades, the seats vibrated, "rolled" and jerked like any real ride would. And you get to choose from six video rides with the push of a button(and a dollar).
Pretty soon, we got settled in at the church we were staying, then ate dinner at a Thai restaurant. The meal was okay, but too much pineapple in the sweet-n'-sour chicken. The rest was fried rice(yummy) and a fountain drink. Then we basically did the evening re-briefing, and introduced ourselves properly to the other church group, who were a step up from last year, and the CSM leaders.

I'll post the rest of the week throughout this week. This is much better with pictures!

[ajmrowland]

Monday:

In the morning, our group went to work organizing a bunch of donated items in a warehouse for donated apartments. That place was full, full, full! Much of the stuff was dirty with dead insects and such, but we made a good amount of progress.
The afternoon saw the prayer tour. We drove around and learned much about Nashville and the homeless and the music industry(recording studios=a bunch of rented houses).
That night, something really funny happened, but the person who took the video is having trouble uploading it. I'd mention it here, but that would spoil it.

[blackcauldron85]

I think it's neat that you traveled to do some good for others! I volunteer in some food pantries, and there will be gross things...there are even mice at once pantry. Not that mice are gross, they're not, but I don't want them crawling on me! Can't wait to read the rest of your report!

[ajmrowland]

Here are some pics! All names are listed from left to right.

The Trip there:



Nathan and Kristen


Abbey


John


Our arrival:

Andrew, Nathan, Paul, Denver, Stephen, Abbey, Mikaela, and Aurelia.


the Thai Restaurant:





Stephen, John, Sam, and Paul.


Andrew eating.



Considering I'm pulling from different sources on facebook, I'm leaving it here so I can add more and arrange by order of events. Also last names are omitted for obvious reasons.

[Prudence]

I used to live in Nashville. I love the place.

[ajmrowland]

Tuesday: Sorry I couldn't post this sooner.
In the morning, we went to a shelter called Community Cares. There was a nice woman-who had that southern black woman accent everyone loves- who showed us around. A church downstairs and a cafeteria upstairs. The church got a pa system from Germany, apparently, and they have Sunday school there too. The Sunday School Library got cleaned up by Abbey, Mikayla, and Chloe. What was barely room to stand in became standing room only. Me, Paul, and Denver were sorting out goods in the food storage area. LOTS of food. Everyone else was washing dishes or doing laundry.

That afternoon, we were each given a dollar for lunch and put all our money together which amounted to 12 dollars. We got bread, 2 jars of peanut butter, jelly, two packs of wafer sticks, pretzels, raw noodles and chips. the plastic cups and knives costed extra(:x) Most of us had water bottles, so we didn't need much to drink.

Then we went to a place called Nashville Cares. This is where people with HIV come for aid. Here, we were taught about the disease and how it gets spread(like, through little wounds in your mouth, etc.), sex, and stuff. We were all expecting to have a very mature experience, but never expected the teacher to have done this in high schools before.
So, to our surprise, she used the word "cum" however many times in five minutes, and we ended up making a lot of jokes on the side(about Dan's "Family movie night" and such). Then, we took one of those tests where you choose whichever side of the room you're answer is on.

[ajmrowland]

Wednseday: We went to serve at a soup kitchen in the morning/lunchtime. While others had the first shift, David and I went and chatted with 3 black guys, and got into good, friendly conversation/debates with one of them who's name was Larry. After that, we got our aprons and hairnets and had a photo-op, in which David did a really funny sexy pose. I, of course, got stuck serving the bread(never get anything hot, for some reason).
That afternoon, we went on a "scavenger hunt" while eating our lunches, across an 80-90 something degree downtown. We were split into groups. Me, Peggy, Mikayla, John, and Dan were together and we trudged across the park, capital hill, and all the way down to the river, a couple blocks to the right, and back up three blocks before we could find a homeless person to give our extra lunch to. They're harder to spot than you'd think. Not only can you confuse them with other people, but the city government tries to move them away from tourist areas. We also had to ask him questions, but he refused, and we let him eat in peace with a wonderful, thankful look on his face. We found a street guitarist, and he answered a couple questions(I forget what was asked though). We didn't need to ask a police officer about the homeless situation, because one had already been talked to. On our way back, we bumped into a couple of groups from the other church(in the rarity that they were doing the same activity), and in the market, found a nice Jamaican restaurant. We had to ask someone of culture about their culture, and the owner was only too willing to talk about how their schools teach the bible, how many Jamaican's want to be American. And she gave us free samples too! That was a nice experience. Plus, I got to roll down the hill, but I only went halfway, because my shorts kept slipping(tad too big, and relatively new, too). Off Topic sorta: Mikayla found out that an old friend of hers was in a body cast, but it was texted to her Peggy(her mom)'s phone from her own, giving her reason to complain about her dad invading privacy and reading all her messages she received during that time. Honestly, he made that too obvious.
Dinner was at a middle-eastern restaurant(with a celebrity wall, I might add). It was the first time I ever had gyros before. They were delicious!

A nice day it was!

That night, we had the "quite time" in which we watched a visually exciting, yet repetitive video that just basically told us to drop everything and everyone we love and just love Christ and God. Most adults, let alone youth, would be unnerved by that. It's no wonder one or two of us have proclaimed themselves Atheists. I severely question religion enough as is, and didn't want to think about such things afterward. I might just add religulous to my Netflix Que, because someone recommended it.

[ajmrowland]

Thursday: Had to be at Loaves and Fishes by eight o' clock. We were cleaning the cafeteria there. Had a nice Pizza lunch.
There were two janitors with us(I'm horrible with names), but one was old and completely convinced that we didn't know how and when to use cleaning solutions. The other was younger, easier, and had a Chowder t-shirt that I couldn't help look at anytime he was within eyeline. They told us how it would normally take them 18 hours to clean the place, but we got most of it done by 4.
Mikayla, Denver, and Nathan were mopping, some people worked on installing shelves in the back.
Me and Dan learned how to use the Buffers. Those things have power, and will drag you places faster than my dog on a walk, when not handled properly.

David and Paul were cleaning the bathroom, and apparently, somebody(literally) left shit all over the stall. From what David told me, the old guy went on and on about how to do everything, and all they really needed to know was where the cleaning supplies were. Then, David just pulled a Potter, and brewed up his own solution. That apparently, resulted in really hot fumes, but got the job done like what you see in TV commercials. One scrub and it's gone.

The weather was odd. At times, it just suddenly dumped rain on the area, and suddenly stopped after two minutes.

That night at about 6:30, we split up into groups of about five each and each of us had to fund both Dinner and round-trip bus tickets on five dollars. After wandering around, we decided to cheat and went to a (different) middle-eastern fast-food restaurant to order combos. Then, we had to find where we'd sleep, and chose a spot by the River.
Then, we basically just rushed back to the bus station for the 8:00, only to find out that half of our other groups went back early, because everywhere was closed(hence, our cheating). The ride back wasn't easy, either(though, I rode in the rotatable middle portion of the bus.) We had to call our stop when we saw our destination. After that, all some of us did was play in the rain for a half-hour.

[ajmrowland]

I edited My Wednesday post to include stuff I forgot.

[ajmrowland]

Friday: In the morning, we(group 1) went to another soup kitchen. This time, I really didn't do much. Mostly just socializing in the cafeteria portion We busted out some board games, and I ended up playing 2 games of chess with another guy named Larry. First time, he beat me, and it was a pretty good game. Second time, he whooped my ass!
Then David took over, and I went and joined Mikayla and some dude who goes by the name of Bobby. He was pretty nice. I learned a new card game(which I forgot by now) and we talked about Harry Potter and other pop-culture stuff. Both decks of cards had Star Wars characters on them-one for heroes, one for villains-and we had fun matching up all the character connections.
When it was time to work, the only job left was a dishwasher, and David and Paul were already working hard at it. Then, we had some leftover brownies(yum!).
We were free that afternoon. We said our goodbyes, red off some Mad-Libs, and had a pizza dinner.
Shortly after pizza, we went to a place called the Wild Horse. It was really fun! We line-danced (some of us a LOT), and just went up to the third story to play pool when we weren't.
All the songs were rock songs converted to country. You can imagine not many people liked that(but I did!:P). I remember that was the night that Phelps won a gold medal for the international, but that was announced at about 10:20, and the rest of the night was some fun dancing.
Also, there were a couple of married to bes, and Ms. Teen Kentucky was also there. But nothing important; just some weird details.

Saturday was the trip home. Pretty much the same as the trip there, except we flew to Detroit then to Appleton, instead of Minneapolis to Appleton.

That was probably the most interesting week I had all summer. I'll post more pictures as soon as I can get my hands on them!