Finally Here

Well, I made it. I'm in Kiana, Alaska. Currently I'm sitting at the dining room table of the missionaries' house. Even though it's 10:30 a.m. here, I'm the only one up. The days run a little differently in this region. Because they don't have actual day and night cycles for most of the year, they are free to stay up later and then wake up later.

Getting here was interesting and an adventure in itself. Tuesday morning, the day I flew out, I was still pulling things out of my bags to make them lighter. Thank goodness my parents can ship some of my books to me. I took my car to Mr. Gary's so he could sell it for me, and then it was off to the airport.

Everyone came to see me off. One of the hardest things I've ever done was walking through security, away from my family. I'm glad I have Skype.

So, I flew to Houston, then Seattle, then Anchorage. As you get further up in the United States, you can see the empty stretches of mountains, even in the "mainland." I see why Twilight was set up in Washington. There's not allot there.

Anyway, I finally made it to Anchorage. The view from the airport was amazing. Snow capped mountains... Dusk was creeping in, at about 11:30 at night. Dark fell around midnight, and sunrise was at three in the morning.

I know this thanks to the six hour layover in the Anchorage airport.

It turned out to be fun. I ate at Chillis when I got there, then found a spot to watch the Lost finale. I grabbed some Starbucks and settled down with the second season of Mash until it was time to get back on the plane Wednesday morning.

From Anchorage I went to Kotzebue. I'll say this. The Kotzebue airport is much smaller than the Anchorage one. The Alaska Airlines portion consisted of one main room. It was nice, though. There were two other buildings for the smaller aviation companies, one of which I would be using to get to Kiana.

I had a nice surprise in Kotzebue. The youth pastor of First Baptist and his wife met me at the airport. They let me stay at their house for the few hours I had before my plane took off. They even made me waffles (yum).

They then took me back to the airport where I boarded the plane.It was me, the pilot and one

other passenger. I enjoyed the plane ride. You could see so much of the surrounding landscape.

Twenty minutes later we landed in Kiana. I finally met John Piepmeier, one of the missionaries I'm staying with. He is also the pastor of Kiana Baptist Mission. He and two other girls were there to meet me on the four-wheelers, or "Hondas."

The church is small, but pretty. It sits on a bluff overlooking the river. I've been shown around Kiana, but I haven't had a chance to meet many people yet. We're having movie night at the church tonight, so I should know more of the church members soon.

Well, that's all I have for now. Please keep praying.

Prayer requests

• John and Kim Piepmeier - pray for their ministry and for their health.
• VBS supplies - pray that the supplies I shipped make it in time. I found out after I got here that packages can take as long as three weeks. VBS is in a week and a half.
• Pray for Kiana, that I can help meet any needs the town has.
• Most of all, pray that God's will be done.