The End

So. This is it. It's been exactly 27 weeks since I left home, and though there's still two more weeks till I actually arrive in Finland, this is it for Australia. I guess this day was always gonna come, and now that it's here I'm finding it hard to believe. It's like in my very first post here, when I told about how even though I spent my last day in Finland just packing and preparing for leaving I still managed to forget that I'm going. Now it's different though, as everywhere I go on the base I'm reminded of the fact that the people I've spent the last 6 months with are no longer here. Having to say goodbye to someone almost every other hour has been emotionally draining, and tears and desperation come in waves. But then again I feel like I've fell into a comatose state where I just perform the things I need to, not thinking about what's gonna happen in a few hours, when I say goodbye to this place one last time.

The last few days have been the same. But I've been surprisingly calm and able to enjoy the last moments. On thursday night we had our own MAD grad, that was full of reminiscing and just enjoying each others company. On Friday night we had our actual graduation, but there was no time for inside jokes or sharing memories as we were graduating with two other schools. It was more fun than sad, though when one of the girls in our school shared her testimony I teared up a little as I could see how much she had grown on this journey. After graduating, we all went into town to take advantage of the freedom of doing things we'd been deprived of for six months - like alcohol. None of us drank a lot, but most of us had some. It was a little strange, like a bubble that suddenly burst. Seeing people smoke and drink, the people that had reached such depths in God, it just reminded me that we can never judge. I was drinking too, and it was ok. God wasn't judging us. He was there with us. A good example of this was one of the guys who gratuated from Beach to Bush dts, Chris, wo got pretty wasted that night. But when he took a taxi to go home, as he sat down in the car he was suddenly completely sober, and during the 20 minute ride from the city to our suburb Mitchelton he brought the muslim taxi driver to the Lord. How crazy is that? Just goes to show that God is with us everywhere and as long as we let Him, He can do great things through us no matter what the circumstances are.

Since saturday things have been a lot more depressing, as people started to leave. I still don't understand that these people are gone forever. Most of them I will never see again. Apparently the relationships that you form during your 6 months of DTS are equivalent to 7 years of normal interaction... how crazy is that, to say goodbye to a friend you've known for seven years, and then never see them again. Stressful, I must say. We've created a culture here that will be extremely hard to recreate back home. So I'm in for a social culture shock, surely. Even just having my very own room again and falling asleep in total silence will be weird... I can't even imagine all the ways that I'm gonna miss Australia..

But it's still good to go home. I've been fairly optimistic about returning, though Re-Entry lectures kinda brought my expecations to a more realistic level I guess. But still, even though I am a little scared to go home, at least it's for completely different reasons than it would've been in the beginning of DTS. I have changed. And here's where I'm most gonna need grace from everyone around me. Now if ever I need your prayers to get through the next few months. Just understand that coming back will be really hard, and don't get upset if I'm not the person that I was when I left. Cos I'm not. But it's a good thing. It's a very good thing.

My ride to the airport leaves in 35 minutes, so I guess I should wrap it up. But I just want to say this: this time has been AMAZING. It's een an experience like no other. I know it's gonna be hard when I go home, but I know I have no reason to be afraid because my God is with me, and He is the same in Australia and in Finland. And I know that even if everything else fails, even if it turns out that my worldview hasn't changed, that my attitude towards serving hasn't changed, that my self-worth hasn't changed, that my ability to love my neighbour hasn't changed, I know that my relationship with God has, and that's all I need. I know that I'm His beloved child that's allowed to screw up and be incomplete, and He loves me still, because He loves me, because He loves me, and there's nothing that can separate Him from me. And that is all that matters. That is everything.

So this is it. I sincerely thank you for reading my blog and for praying for me. I'm gonna be in Finland on May 10th, so call me up and we'll go for a coffee. But please don't stop praying for me.

I love you all! And I guess I'll see you on the other side.

yours,

Sonja

Countdown

4 cold nights left in Australia... What should I say. I'm exited, sad, confused. But I've managed to come in terms with the fact that I might never come back here, and I will never see most of these people again. It's sad of course, but I don't feel like the time we have left is too short. I'm more excited to start my real life back home. But while I'm still here I might as well share about stuff that's going on at the moment.

The last two weeks or so have been very laid back. We spent a long weekend in Hervey Bay where we did outreach debrief, and just hung out. I managed to get some of my tan back, but I'm still fairly pale compared to what I was in January... Sad days. After coming back to base, this time for good, we've had a very laid back week. Musicians did some recording (hopefully I'll be able to put some stuff on myspace at some point) and everybody else was free to do whatever. This week has looked pretty much the same. Some lectures on Re-Entry (read: the shock of coming back home), and a lot of parties and reminiscing. Graduation is on Friday, FRIDAY!!! It hasn't even hit me yet, that it's the day after tomorrow. Oh well. As I was saying, it's time to move on with my life. But more about the Grad maybe in my next (and probably last) post.

All the stuff I said about myself being a changed person after outreach in the last post wasn't necessary true. In Hervey Bay my old struggles with not being noticed started and I freaked out for a little while that I'm back in the starting point, but I found a balance and managed to get a more realistic picture of the ways that I have and haven't changed during the DTS. Last week we also had 2 lectures on Strengthfinders, which is a programme that helps you understand your personality and strengths, as well as other people's. I'd done the test you're required to take even before the DTS, but the lectures made a lot more sense than just knowing my top 5 strengths. I learnt a lot about myself in just two days, and managed to understand the causes and effects of so many dysfunctionals tendencies of mine. Some of my top 10 strengths were Empathy, Communication, Strategic, Responsibility, Command, Significance and a couple more that I can't remember. It also helped to see what are not my strengths; I'm not high on Positivity and Woo (Winning Others Over)... Makes sense. Makes a lot of sense. To me. This of course makes absolutely no sense to you, and I'm sorry for being so boring... Moving on.

Our last weekend on DTS was cool. On Saturday we had our very last MAD dance party, with a 50's swing theme. It was awesome, one of the best ones we've had. I'm gonna miss those parties... On Monday we had our band's very last gig, at a Lutheran College. I didn't have high expectations but it turned out to be really good. Musically it could've been better, but the audience was amazing, these little kids even came up to ask for autographs. After the weekend we started Re-Entry lectures. Yesterday we shared some constructive feedback with our outreach teams. We had to write about each member in our team what they should 1) Keep on doing, 2) Stop doing and 3) Start doing. Sounds pretty harsh, but it was really good. I was encouraged to keep on writing songs and finding my identity and security in God instead of other people, to stop putting myself down, focusing on the negative and being self-centered in my relationships, and to start thinking about what I say before saying it and expressing myself through other arts and not just music. Sometimes you just need to hear these things straight up in-your-face style. But nobody was mean, so that was good. This weeks mostly about closure, as well as preparing for the future. Today we talked about the challenges that'll face us when we go home, how for most people it's gonna be really hard when nobody understands and how circumstance change drastically and there's little to hold on to when the storms hit us. It's serious stuff and a bad Re-entry could take years to process. I'm not too worried, but of course I don't have any clue what the enemy might have in store for me when I go back. So I'm just bracing myself anyway...

Only 4 nights left... The last few days have been very stressful because of the volcano incident in Europe; I wasn't sure if I'd be able to fly into UK or not. But now most countries have opened their airspace, so as long as there won't be another eruption or a plane crash down cos of the ash, I should be good. Right now life feels like just waiting. A lot of stuff that I do is like the last time I'm doing it. Last dance party, last gig, last page of workbook, last community cleanup, last work duty(WOHOO), last last last. I'm sure the pressure of waisting valuable hanging out time by sleeping or blogging or packing or whatever will hit me at some point. It seems like everything except time has slowed down. Nothing's happening. It's like we're all just waiting, yet hoping that it would never end...

Oh well. We don't have to wait for long. Cos it will end. In two days. Please keep praying for my flight to be fine on Sunday. And pray for our school so that we could enjoy and make the most out of our last days together. Thank you!

Back in Oz

Ever since we found out our outreach teams at the end of week 4 many of us had been wondering what it will be like when everybody gets back. Will it be awkward, will it be joyful, indifferent, or what? Some of my fears came true, some didn't. I was afraid I'd sort of fall back into feeling disconnected from everyone and just start to fade away, especially when I was the only student girl in my team, and hadn't really managed to build rock solid relationships with the guys who ended up disappearing once the other teams arrived. But I realised that I just had to decide not to let the feeling of not fitting in to take over me but to walk in the opposite spirit and stand against the awkwardness. So I chose to fight and I ended up finding the person who I'd become on outreach. Feels like that sad timid girl that had taken over me around christmas is now gone and I'm actually starting to be myself again. It's awesome.

We had a couple of days of just relaxing and hanging out. It was weird being back at the base - it felt like I hadn't been gone at all, yet at the same time it felt like I had been gone for years. The February schools (Beach to buch dts, sports dts and Frontiers dts) had invaded the base and my old room was now full of people I didn't know, and our old classroom was now used by the Frontiers dts. We didn't even have a chance to get back into the routine as we were sent to the town of Toowomba for our last little step into missions - Easterfest.

Easterfest is the largest Christian music festival in Australia, and all the schools available from our base (excluding the schools that were still on outreach) were helping out as volunteers. All of us were still exhausted from outreach, and having heard only horror stories of last year's rainy and muddy festival, none of us were too excited to go. I had absolutely zero motivation for this last crusade, but was truly surprised by the experience in the end. It ended up being the most gorgeous weekend the festival had seen in years. And the jobs I got were easy and the teams were sweet. The food was amazing. Worst part of the weekend were the nights, as the temperature dropped down quite a bit, and my superthin sleepingbag was pretty useless. Getting barely 6 hours of sleep, working 9 hours a day, I was pretty nackered afterwards. And I also didn't shower for 5 days, which I think is my personal record during the dts. I didn't really get to see any of the bands that I wanted to, and wasn't bothered to go see the once I could've. I did see a little bit of sanctus real, but I didn't really like them. I did see the guys from Hawk Nelson in person, though not on stage. I said "excuse me" to one of them, as he was blocking my way in the music store. I'm so cool! The headline artists weren't really that good anyway. I did see a couple of artists on the smaller stages, and I thought they were actually better than the ones on mainstage. But in the end it wasn't about the music at all. What made Easterfest so great for me were the randomest times when I got to witness things like a 3-metre teddy bear being pulled up to a tree ( I have pictures) or random guys playing guitar for us while we were just sitting by the gates checking people's wristbands. And most of all discovering my confidence again. Even though I hadn't showered in 5 days, hadn't slept more than 6 hours each night for just as long, I still felt beautiful and confident in who I was, and I still had the strentgh to push all the way till 2am the last night, as we were taking down the chai tent. It was an awesome experience, and really showed me how much outreach had taught me.

Coming back from Easterfest on Monday we were even more exhausted. We were going to go to Harvey Bay on tuesday, but it got postponed till Thursday, which was really good. We had 2 extra days to just relax and hang out, and that's basicly all that we've been doing - absolutely nothing. Now we have ahead of us a week of debrief with the MAD school, it'll be good to have entire school in one place once again. We'll be sharing stories of outreach and also ust processing the stuff that's been going on for the last week. It's gonna be good, Im sure.

Now it's getting late and I still need to pack up all my earthly posessions on this side of the world before going to bed, so it'd better be going then. Keep me in your prayers still, especially as the Re-entry depression is lurking at my door trying to get in. See you in a week!