kinda nervous

I'm kinda nervous about going to Peru next week. We were supposed to be sharing our feelings and such during our last group meeting and I'll admit, I couldn't screw up the nerve to say anything. Partly because I feel that how I feel is sort of silly, or that it would be perceived that way, and partly because others in our group have more serious issues that they're facing that may or may not be resolved this week, or may actually result from the trip itself.

I've done as much as I could to stay away from making expectations for the trip. I've been to Peru 4 times already. I've been to Lima once. That already makes me the most experienced person on the team. I've tried to do what I can to be a resource, stay away from being a know-it-all, and be useful. But the last time I was there was over 5 years ago now. I don't know how things may have changed. If you still need a current adapter for electricity? I don't quite recall if we'll be able to flush toilet paper, or we'll have to throw it in the trash, like we always had to do in the jungle. I don't know any more than general travel tips, no special insight into Peruvian culture. I spent much more time in the jungle in general, so Lima is not somewhere I'm intimately aquainted with as it is. I just fear that I've been giving bad or outdated information and that I'll be proved very wrong when we get there.

I'm also pretty ashamed of my current ability to speak Spanish. I haven't spoken it fluently for more than about 3 minutes at a time in over 5 years, and that's mostly been simple translating at work, off a script that I know pretty well. So maybe I'll take the 7 hours that we'll be flying from Atlanta to read my spanish-english dictionary. I have this thing about practicing in my head, having imaginary conversations with friends and stuff; I've been doing that lately, I guess we'll see if it helps. It's at least helped me realize how much vocabulary I've started forgetting....good thing we'll have translators.

Overall, I feel good, I'm very excited to go, looking forward to seeing old friends and making new ones, being challenged in my faith and learning a lot. There's not much I can do about any of it now except make sure I'm packed and ready to go on Saturday morning and give everything I can while I'm down there, I guess.