Getting here/First night

This is our blog; welcome. We hope that this will be the major source of our communication over the next 12 months as we try to share our life and experiences for our friends, families and supporters. We'll do our best to continually post new and (what we see as) exciting events, so please bear with us as we try and learn how to discern what we right about. Thank you for your support. Enjoy!

So we have made it to Davao City with no major hiccups, and with a good night's rest, we're beginning to feel more human. The more than 24 hours of travel went by faster than expected. We got a few good hours of sleep on the ride from Vancouver to Hong Kong and watched a couple of movies. Arriving in Hong Kong was slightly anti-climactic since the weather made it hard to see anything around the airport as we began our descent. Once we found our terminal we grabbed a coffee and a muffin from Starbucks. I'm not sure when the last time was that coffee tasted that good. After a short layover we boarded our next flight bound for Manila. The two hour flight seemed to pass quite quickly and as we began our descent I couldn't help but be excited by the scenery. Everywhere I looked was lush and green, the roof tops were all kinds of bright colors and the ocean was light blue and looked very inviting.

We spent roughly 4 hours in Manila. We had to go through customs, transfer to a different terminal, go through security again, check our bags then wait for our plane to board. Boarding our last plane, a 747, was particularly exciting for me as I had not yet flown on a plane of that size; it was huge! After a short trip across several islands, it was finally time to arrive in Davao. As we were taxing to our gate I was looking out the window and was amazed at what I was seeing. Here I was sitting in this massive plane and just off the runway there was a young man riding his bike through the grass. There were several abandoned buildings around the airport, overgrown foliage, a garden and antennas seemingly randomly placed about.

We were met at the airport by Matt the driver, and Kriz, Dann's right hand woman. As we drove from the airport to our room for the night, I was blown away by what I was seeing. There were people everywhere, working on the sides of the road, walking, driving, cars everywhere and everything seemed to be so fluid. We were driving very quickly and lanes for traffic didn't entirely exist. I was barley paying attention to the conversation because I was so excited by what I was seeing outside the windows.

After a brief stop at the HOB (House of Barnabas) where we would be staying for the night, we headed to Coffee For Peace to pick up Joy, another staff member of Peacebuilders, then off for a bite to eat. We had dinner at a place called MTS which was basically an outdoor food court where you could choose to eat from several different kinds of restaurants. Dinner was good and it was nice to talk with Joy, Matt and Kriz and get to know them a little bit. While we were eating a group of percussionists and dancers came out onto a stage and began performing different songs and dances that were somewhat based on traditional dances of the local tribal people. What a great way to get thrown into the culture!

After dinner we headed back to HOB for a good night's rest. So that was our first night in Davao...

We'll post again soon! And hopefully with pictures...

- Keith