After waking up this morning I ran to do a bunch of errands: meeting at the bank, getting travel plans sorted and itineraries printed at the State Library, packing for the next day, and generally plling my life together for departure tomorrow. At about 3:30pm I was to meet a girl who goes to the University of Queensland, who happens to be a friend of a friend. Honestly, I walked into this meeting not quite knowing what to expect. What was I supposed to talk about? I had pretty much done my time in Brisbane at this point so any suggestions she might have of things to do would be not all that helpful... I was pretty concerned over this little social interaction. HAH. As I would discover, these worries were completely unfounded. Claire was a wonderful person who helps out recruiting at her university for Semester at Sea. We had a great chat about where to go in Australia, what uni in Oz was like, how to get more Aussie students to study abroad in the US and Semester of Sea of course! It was so nice to talk to someone who completely understood where I was comng from in terms of how to travel and the best ways to experience life in other counries. Oh, and did I mention that when I stepped off the bus at the University, I was immediately handed about 6 packs of Haribo gummi bears? (mein lieblings Gummibaerchen!) It seriously could not have been better.
OH WAIT. It could. Because oddly enough, a bit before that meeting took place, a gent named Marc, who again, is a friend of a friend, texted me about wanting to possibly meet up later that night. So, right after getting back from hanging with Claire, I ran up to the hostel, threw down some of my stuff and headed out to meet up with Marc. Again, this was such a blessing. Marc was incredibly nice and quite easy to chat with--much like my lovely friend Huw who put us in contact=] (not that this is a competition or anything). Marc had gone to UVA for a semester and it was surreal to be hanging out on the other side of the world chatting with someone about Charlottesville, UVA basketball, and eating at Christians. To top it off, we ended up going to the lookout, which I didn't realize was on top of Mt. Coot-tha, the one place i'd been meaning to go all week and hadn't gotten a chance (hahah oh how sneaky God can be sometimes). Anyways, all that to say that I couldn't have asked for a better day....so thank you to Claire and Marc for showing me around, as well as Annie and Huw for putting us in contact. You all are wonderful, and it has made all the difference in my time here so far!
Before I close off here, I feel I should point out is that one of the first things I did this morning was hve a quick chat to God about how much I really just wanted someone to talk to today. Now, I've met lots of lovely people in the past week, and had a few fun conversations, but I cannot begin to tell you what a difference today made. Not only did I met up with both the connections I had through friends from home, but upon returning to the hostel chatted for about an hour with two of my roommates about life and travel and the insanity of doing a working holiday. I cannot call today anything but a huge blessing from God. Once again, when I needed it most, He came to the rescue. And, once again I am reminded that I have nothing to fear this coming year as long as I continue to lean on Him when things are hardest. I am so excited to see what other surprises He has in store this year=]
"Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you."
--Matthew 7:7
