Don't look left

Monday, September 19, 2011 (1:46pm)
Tomorrow I will have been in England for exactly 4 weeks already. Which means I will only be here for 5 more months but when people ask me how long I am staying I still answer 6 months out of habit. Some of the kids I skateboard with have already been asking “what are we going to do when you leave?” I tell them not to think about it because it is a long way off, but it is going to be a sad day here.
Right now I am at McDonalds, using their free WiFi, I looked into getting a device which would allow me to access the internet from my house but it cost way too much money. So for now I will make the long bike rides to McDonalds.
Monday is my day off each week, which sounds kind of funny because before I left I thought I might get bored during the week because of too much free time. I have actually been quite busy. So far my average week consists of hanging out with Jon (person who had the idea for me to come to England) during the day. On Fridays we go down to the Chippenham market, he has a trailer he parks there and gives out free Christian literature. We spend most of the day sitting and talking with people that stop by. We also go over to his dad’s barn and work on the new trailer he is building.
I also go with him into the schools and help him with his talks. Tuesday we went to St. Paul’s and taught the story of Zacchaeus to a group of first graders. There were about 30 of them and it was an interesting experience. Jon read the story and since my name is Zac, I had the role of acting everything out. He would say something like “Zacchaeus was really short”, then look at me, and I would have to convince the kids that I was really short. The majority of the commands were fairly easy to act out, but when he read the line “…so Zacchaeus climbed the tree” I was totally lost. He then proceeded to say “and I am the tree”. I wish what happened next would have been caught on video, because the kids died laughing as I tried to climb up Jon. It was a really funny day. I think we are going to a high school this week to do a more serious talk.
In the afternoons I go to the church to ride my skateboard and hang out with some local teenagers. I sometimes do not get home until after 11pm. We have a lot of fun right now; hopefully the weather will not get too severely cold for a couple more months. None of the kids who skateboard and scooter at the church actually go to the church; they just really enjoy how smooth the pavement is in the parking lot. So recently I have been answering a lot of questions related to God and the Bible. A few of them have even come to the 11am service on Sunday.
Wednesday night the church opens up their gym for what is called kids zone. They allow anyone to come in and play soccer or basketball for about 50 minutes and then we sit and talk with them for the last ten minutes. From 7-8pm is the younger group, and 8-9pm is for the older ones. We had about 20 of the skateboard/scooter kids come in last Wednesday for the 7-8pm session and I gave the ten minute talk. I was really encouraged because they can be extremely crazy at times but they were very quiet while I spoke.
Someone came to pick me up from the church last Tuesday and as we were leaving the parking lot all the kids were saying “see you Zac” and “what time you coming back?” I did not think much of it because it happens everyday, but he was totally shocked. I listened as he told his wife when we got to his house, he said “you should have seen it, they were all waving goodbye and asking how long he would be gone.” For so long the people who go to the church have had a really hard time communicating and relating to the kids that hang out in their parking lot, but it has come really easy to me. I guess it has something to do with the fact that I am younger then most of the people in the church, along with the fact that I skateboard and am from America. I remember talking with my dad the day I was leaving, and he said I had nothing to worry about because I was a very likeable person. A part thought he was just saying that because he was my dad, but so far the people here do seem to like me.
Wednesday a lady from the church brought down 20 burgers and 20 fries from McDonalds for the kids while we were skating, there was about 25of us so some did not get one of each but they were super excited anyway. And Saturday some people volunteered to drive us to a skate park about 45 minutes away because Jon was unable to start the mini bus. The kids are starting to notice that the people in the church do care about them; I have already seen the gap close a little bit.
The day at the skate park was a day to remember. Haha it was an outside park and it had rained before we got there so everything was wet. We tried to dry off the bottom of the mini ramp by kicking the water off the side. It was working, but it also made my shoes soaking wet. As soon as it was almost dry enough to ride it started to rain again. This pattern carried on through out the day. We took about 14 kids, and spent most of the day sitting or standing around waiting for the rain to stop. By the end of the day, around 7pm, everyone was in a bad mood. Most of the kids, including myself were starving and cold. All I had eaten that day was candy from the vending machine. Some of the cars arrived to pick us up about 7:30pm; they did not have enough room for everyone. I had to stay with 2 of the kids and wait another 45 minutes for Jon. Driving home it was hard to feel my feet because my socks were still wet. All I could think about was what I was going to eat when we got back. Plans changed though when I got dropped off at the church and saw 5 kids sitting outside the door. One of them asked if they could use the bathroom. I said sure, I had to go as well, when I came out I saw that the rest of them were sitting in the church café. A side of me wanted to tell them to leave so that I could go home and eat but I could hear them talking about how warm it was inside the church and I decided to sit and talk for a while. After about 30 minutes of talking about random funny things that happened at the skate park one of them asked why it was called “café three hundred and sixteen” (cafe3.16) I told them it was because of a verse in the Bible called John 3:16. That then got us somehow talking about Adam and Eve and creation, I asked them what they believed and shared with them what I believed. It was a good talk; I enjoy sharing truth with them because they are not hearing it in their schools or homes. That’s why I am here. I was glad I sat and talked instead of going home to eat.
Two boys came to church yesterday morning who had never been; we got some pizza and hung out in the youth room playing pool and video games after church. A lot of other kids showed up through out the day, around 5:30pm I realized it was almost time for the night service and I had not even been home yet.
Off topic, I was in a town called Malmsbury last week, walking around a church that had been built over 1,000 years ago. We were outside looking at some of the gravestones and one of them was 200 years old and it was for a girl who was eaten by a tiger that came into town with the traveling circus. As we were walking away, someone said “don’t look left”, obviously I looked left across the river and saw a overweight man wearing nothing but hiking boots and a back pack. Hahaha apparently they do nature walks in a private park close to the church. I really wish I would have not looked left.
Off to the church now to skate.