Sent from my iPhone
Tuesday, June 30, 2026
Monday, June 29, 2026
.jpg)
Day Seven--Gloria
Today was our final day on the mission trip! Last night I made the grave mistake of telling Mike that he could go straight to stage 3 to wake me up, and I was awoken by a pillow to the head. We packed up our bags and threw a disturbing amount of condiments down the drain. We dropped David off at the airport, but not before he was able to share a Christian rock song in Gen Z slang. We made a stop at Shelter Island while Mike and Riley came up with a quick plan for the day ahead, and then headed to Balboa Park. I was astounded by the size of the park and we found lots to do. We visited the Botanical Building and Gardens and everyone except Riley and me was too pooped to explore it. I found an alarming amount of plants with leaves bigger than my face. We then found lunch and headed to the museum area of the park, and everyone was instantly drawn to the cannibal museum (except Riley and Kyle, who decided it was in their best interest to ride the train instead). We learned about how the label of cannibalism was often used as a justification for the abuse and colonization of many indigenous people, and also that Keith Richards snorted his father's cremated remains. Finally we returned to the van and headed to the airport.
This trip has again surprised me with how meaningful it turned out to be for me. I made many new friendships and tried to focus on this trip's theme of connection. I often struggle with conversing and connecting with strangers, but on this trip I made an active effort to seek out new friends and I believe that I have deepened my faith through that connection. It was beautiful to hear so many people's stories simply through asking questions, and I think everyone on this trip deepened their sense of curiosity. These mission trips have come to mean so much to me, and this trip especially was very meaningful. In an incredibly busy time of my life, this mission trip has taught me to slow down and live in the present moment. It was wonderful to forget about all of my worries for a week as I engaged in service and fun with my fellow mission trippers.
Day Six—Clara
We began the day with a lie-in, as we didn’t have to be at church until 11:15. We attended a service at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. The church had just finished their vacation bible school week, which was centered around joy. In lieu of a sermon, we got into small groups and discussed what brings us joy, and what about us we feel brings God joy. The service ended with the children singing a song that the rest of us joined in on. It was the most High School Musical church service ending I’ve ever seen. After church, we headed to the San Diego County Fair, where I went on far too many spinning rides with Saleah and ate a truly horrifying amount of fried food. Even after all that, we weren’t done yet. We received an invitation from David and Liz, the parents of a St. Mary’s parishioner to swim at their yacht club. We spent lots of time in the jacuzzi solving riddles. Afterwards, we all heading to Old Venice for pizza and great conversation. We wrapped up the day with a quality crying circle which is technically not my jurisdiction because some of it happened on Monday. I found the church service very unique and inspiring. St. Luke’s is a very diverse congregation, and the service was conducted in both Swahili and English, and well as a small group circle offered in Dinka. The hymns we sung were incredibly joyous, and as someone who enjoys group worship, I found it very moving. It was also fun to hear bible passages and the Lord’s Prayer in Swahili. This was an improvement from last year, because the service was also in English, which made it much more easy to follow.
Day Five—Kyle
Day five of the mission trip started with a late breakfast because we had finished our three days of service. Breakfast consisted of eggs, bagels, and cereal. We packed our last day of lunches for the beach, and packed our bags for kayaking and the beach. After everyone was packed we loaded all of our stuff into the van and set out for a fun day at the beach! We made it to the kayaking touring store and we all found the most perfect tote bag for Riley. We all got suited into life vest and helmet for our kayaking adventure! After we were all ready we walked over to the beach to get some simple skills on kayaking after that we got into the water and onto our kayaks. I was with Caroline. We made it out onto the water but I look to the left and I see Mike and Saleah capsize into the water and I just felt really bad because the water was super cold and the sun was unfortunately not out yet and it was very cloudy but they got back into there boat and made it out into the ocean with the rest of us. We listened to our kayak instructor and started paddling to the caves. While paddling we looked to the left and saw a sandcastle looking house that was beautiful we got a little story about the house and kept paddling. We eventually made it to the cave and got the names of each cave. We saw a injured sea lion who could barely swim and I felt really bad because we couldn’t help him. We made it to this very cool cave that we could go into to but the line was pretty long so we decided to go into the back way into the cave and a massive wave came in. Caroline and I moved out of the way but Cate and Clara got flipped over so one of our instructors got out and saved them. Once everyone was saved it was time for our tour to be over so we paddled back to the beach. Once we made it to the beach we headed to the shower to the get the sand off and then headed back to the kayaking tour store to take off our our life vest and helmet we walked back to the van and ate our lunches. After all of us had lunch we walked to the beach once we made it I sprinted into the water and I would say I spent a few hours in the ocean. I think I can say that we all loved it! We tried to catch a wave with and without a boogie board and threw a water foot ball together. Once our beach time ended we hit the showers and walked to get a local ice cream shop I got hazelnut cookies and cream and it was amazing! Then Mike picked us up in the van and we went to USD. We had a few minutes to shower or do whatever you wanted but after that we had a fabulous dinner made by David he made pasta and it was delicious and amazing! He said it was one of his family recipes after that we all played cards together sadly I got last but I had never played the game before so it was fine. This day of fun brought many connections but a couple connections that I thought were special were when Caroline and I saved ourselves from the wave and we had a very fun time together on the kayak adventure. Another connection that I felt was special was when Saleah and I were out into the ocean and were just jumping over the waves and having a nice conversation. Another connection that I thought was special was when Mike and I were throwing around the football in the ocean that was probably the highlight of the day because football and the beach are two of my favorite things in the whole world! The final connection that I thought was special was when Nathaniel and I were catching waves together in the ocean and we both caught some sick waves.
Day Four—Nathaniel
Day four of our mission trip started on a Friday with an amazing breakfast of eggs and bagels. (which we have every morning but still amazing👌) We left USD at around 9:30 and arrived at our place of service at 10. On Friday we worked at a thrift store that was partnered with Alliance for Africa which provided support towards refugees. When a refugee walks into the thrift store they would be provided with a couch and plenty of other living essentials for free to start their lives anew. We were tasked with decluttering the store of clothes to make room to browse. We found all sort of clothes including an ugly, mustard colered, Apple mumu (picture included below) and other very, very interesting articles of clothing. The clothing we were taking out of the store was forwarded to people in need in Mexico. In total we got rid of a total of around 30 full size trash bags of clothes, this made the shopping experience much more manageable. After our service in the thrift store we went to the beach. Me, being the smart person I am, brought my swimsuit everywhere so I went swimming with my sister and Cate, who wasn’t so smart, went swimming fully clothed. We returned to USD after our unplanned visit to the beach and had a youth made dinner of potstickers, stir fry, and ice cream. As dinner concluded we played a game of “O heck” where I sadly placed second😔, had Compline, and went to bed. This day was very meaningful to me because of the genuine reaction of thankfulness from the shopkeepers. They were so thankful for our work and said that we did something that the small staff simply couldn’t take that much time to do. It was also a memorable time together as a group in the thrift store. We had tons of fun with finding intriguingly weird clothes and coming closer together as a group.
Sunday, June 28, 2026
.jpg)
Saturday, June 27, 2026
Day Three—Caroline
Today we woke up bright and early to serve at Father Joe’s Village, which serves the homeless population of San Diego. They have a lot of services, including serving three meals a day to anyone who needs it, a shelter for families, permanent low-income housing, and much more. Our job was to serve meals to people in two different places: half of us worked in a kitchen serving food for families, and the other half worked in a kitchen serving food for any individual who wanted or needed it. I was working in the kitchen for the individuals, and I had two different jobs: for a while, I was scooping potatoes and gravy onto meal trays, but for a bit I was helping serve people with disabilities and people with pets who could not get into line as easily. We would talk to them, and get them trays of food and water. We worked from 10:45 - 12:30, when the cafeteria closed, and during that time we served about 685 people. After that, we ate lunch, and then took a 2.5 mile hike to a waterfall, which was beautiful! We splashed in the waterfall for a while and cooled off before hiking back the way we came. I had many wonderful conversations with a lot of the people on the trip, including Saleah and Nathaniel. We had a nice dinner afterwards, and then finished the day with compline. This day was rather amazing, both in terms of service and bonding time, but the service was especially amazing. Although I wasn’t always directly interacting with the people eating, I had some good interactions with people. One thing that makes feeding people especially fulfilling is that it impacts so many people directly, and we get to see all the people we are feeding. In many other types of service, we never really see the impacts of our service, but with feeding people, you see every person you help feed, and you can see the impact in all of the people’s lives. Sent from my iPhone
Day Two--Cate
On Wednesday the 24th, our second day in San Diego, we were woken up at 7:30 a.m. by either Riley or Mike. Thankfully, there were no pillow attacks involved! We gathered in our common room, ate breakfast, talked for a bit, and packed our lunches in brown paper bags. The adventure for the day was a gardening service project. We loaded into the van and headed to our first service site, Project New Village, a nonprofit organization that works to make fresh, healthy, organic food more accessible to everyone. We helped pack bags of freshly harvested produce for their grocery delivery program. We stamped the bags with the organization's logo, filled them with a variety of fruits and vegetables, and got them ready to be delivered. After that, we went to Mount Hope Farm, where we spent time gardening, planting, weeding, and composting. I worked on pulling out old, overgrown carrots and planting sweet potatoes. It was definitely a dirty job, but it was also a lot of fun. Next, we visited a local high school garden, where we helped clear out old plants and prepare the space for new ones. Throughout the day, we got to try lots of fresh fruits and vegetables. My favorites were the green beans at Project New Village and the tomatoes from the high school garden. They were both so fresh and delicious. Once we finished our service projects, we went shopping before splitting into two groups for a friendly dinner making competition. The group that cooked that night made chicken and fish fajitas. After dinner, we spent some time playing games together, including a fun game of touch football outside. We ended the day with our nightly Compline prayer.
Today showed me that serving others doesn't always have to be something huge. Even packing bags of produce or pulling weeds can make a difference for someone else. I enjoyed seeing how Project New Village helps provide fresh food to people in the community, and it made me appreciate how much work goes into growing healthy food. Even though we got hot, dirty, and a little tired, it was worth it knowing that our work would help others. I'm grateful for the chance to serve with this group, and today reminded me that God can use even small acts of service to make a real impact.
Friday, June 26, 2026
Day one--Saleah
The first day at SFO we all met up wearing our T-shirts. There was a lot of conversation and catching up, but I honestly was too busy trying to stay awake to catch most of it. We made it through security alright, got some breakfast at Peet's Coffee and then we got on the actual aircraft. It wasn't that bad of a flight besides someone behind me and Caroline kicking our seats for no reason.
After getting our luggage we got on a bus to get our van. After waiting at a broken crosswalk for 10 minutes, we only broke a few laws crossing the freeway and walking to the parking lot. It was a relief to finally be in a place with air conditioning after that crosswalk wouldn't turn.
Thankfully our first stop was to go get lunch at El Indio, which had some amazing taquitos I got 5 of. I got to talk to and get to know a lot of the other people better though, including David and Clara.
After wrapping up we went to get settled into USD. The dorms are really nice here, it's like mini hotel suites with more privacy. Caroline and I found out that our bathroom light sounds like a gargling garbage disposal, so that was interesting.
After some time to settle in David guided us on a walk around the campus and we got to see some student stores and their church on site (the Immaculate). It had some really pretty architecture, plus Kyle and Cate were playing football outside.
After our walk back we went and got dinner at a pizza place I forget the name of, in Ocean Beach. I was glad because we got a bunch of different appetizers and 2 different pizzas so you could pick what you wanted to graze on. We went to go watch the sunset afterwards (at Sunset Cliffs) and that was really pretty. Clara, Caroline and I found a hole in the cliff that has concerningly child-sized holes in the bottom of the fence around it.
After the sunset we stopped by Target and got some snacks & stuff people forgot. I liked being at the store at night though, it's a change from everything closing before the sun is fully down in SF. Finally we made it home, did a compline reading and I crashed in my bed.
For my first Mission Trip, it was a really nice first day. I got to make more of a connection with Clara, who I found out is from Los Angeles and David, our Wonder Voyage guide. I feel like if the rest of this week is like today, I'll be a lot more excited for the coming Mission Trips.
Thursday, June 25, 2026
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)