Six Degrees of Separation...

Last week Paul, Elizabeth and I safaried up to Nairobi. The main purpose of the trip was for Elizabeth's prenatal check-up, but we also took advantage of being in "the big city" and visited some fun restaurants and fun friends. On our way to Nairobi Elizabeth commented, "I love going to Nairobi. It's just like going to America." After a few days there she was reminded that it wasn't quite like America and on our trip home she commented, "The great thing about going to Nairobi is that it makes me so happy to go home to Arusha."

So anyone who doesn't believe in Six Degrees of Separation clearly hasn't been involved with Young Life (YL) or know about Rift Valley Academy (RVA). Our first night in Nairobi we went out for sushi with some of Paul's friends from RVA (to clarify, RVA is a boarding school in Kenya). I ended up sitting next to Allison and it didn't take us long to put together the fact that we had a mutual friend through Young Life in the Dominican Republic. Go figure.


While in Kenya we also ventured to Naivasha to visit the Hovingh family. See if you can follow all of this...Paul knows Jason from RVA. Paul and Elizabeth spent some time with Jason & Lisa at RVA on one of their R & Rs from Afghanistan. Lisa used to baby-sit me. Lisa's sister, Lindsey, is one of my best friends from growing up in Holland and was my housemate my first year back in the States. On the Hoving's refrigerator I saw a picture of Jeff, who I used to lead youth group with and who now is Lisa's brother-in-law and works at RVA. I also saw a picture of Katie, who is the sister of one of my classmates/peer-group members from seminary and also now works at RVA. So when you throw in the fact that I once met Bruce Willis, you can see how we really are all connected.

All in all it was a great week...nice to have a change of scenery and always fun to get another stamp in the passport. More than that, however, it was wonderful to connect with friends from Michigan and see how it all connects with the friends I have now. I am a big believer in not saying "goodbye" to people but rather, "see you later." And not in the sense of "see you later in the big sky when we are all living happily together on streets of gold" but in the sense that I am convinced that God continually weaves people in and out of our lives with a purpose. And it is often more likely than not that you will see them again...especially if you have some sort of YL or RVA connection.