Happy Landings -- Wales Mission July 2010

We arrived in Bristol without much of a problem at all. We were expecting to be detained, questioned, and waterboarded by the Immigration officers like Allen Rice and Tim King (among others) had been in December 2009. But preparation paid off. And especially prayer. Part of the problem last time was a team of 24 coming into Britain all at once on a largely unoccupied plane. We stood out like some sort of Land Run Okies galloping in a conestoga fury toward the customs gates. This time our team of 19 was coming in two subtle waves. Our first wave of eight (Allen and Deedee Rice, Tom and Donna King, Lonnie Hamman, Danny Tengram, Shannon Richardson, and Jennifer Nath) was just a wave of six because the Kings had invaded a couple of days early to explore London – they joined us in the airport lobby for a day of touring. So that little band of six mixed in unobtrusively with a gigantic crowd flooding off the plane. The second wave of eleven will slip in next week, hopefully as unnoticed as the first eight.

Now about prayer. No amount of preparation could have made entering Bristol so easy and quick. God’s hand was upon us. That is because the prayers of the saints were buoying us up. Thanks be to God and to our faithful prayer friends.

Six of our team of eight had gone on one of the previous Welsh missions. Donna and Jennifer were the rookies this week. And maybe because of their beginner luck, everything went smoothly. The noteworthy event in the Newark airport was that as Allen awoke from his nap on the stained-carpet floor he turned to see a pigeon running toward his face. Oh, New Jersey. The only major events that happened on the plane was that a little girl took Shannon’s plane seat from her – and Shannon happily obliged. Oh, and the loudest shrieking banshee ever to inhabit the body of an infant child slammed her high-pitched blitz of decibels in Jennifer’s ears the whole seven hour journey across the pond.

Our driver was a sweet Bristol man of about Allen’s age, but he looked 15 years younger (that’s actually a commentary upon Allen); his name was Chris and he was the best driver we have ever had. When we parted at the end of the day, he mentioned many times how he wanted to say goodbye to each of us, and how kind and generous we were to him. He suggested we request him personally to drive us again – and we certainly will. Chris was as much tour guide as he was a driver. He took us on an unscheduled trip to the Bristol Bridge where we looked down dozens of stories to the city of Bristol and the river Avon below. Lonnie decided to see how the other half lived by walking across the roadway to see the walkway on the opposite side. A uniformed official came running from 100 yards away, yelling at Lonnie not to step on the opposite walkway, which unbeknownst to us was closed. Of course, everyone but Lonnie could hear the bellowing man as he charged officiously up the street. He somewhat crankily informed Lonnie that the walkway was closed for a reason – but he never told us what that reason was, nor where the warning sign was posted. The Brits can Pharisaically judge you for rules they assume you know but they diabolically never post.

Chris also took us up to a high tower overlooking the bridge which had in its top floor a “camera obscura,” a Nineteenth Century system of mirrors which projects a movable 360 degree view of the surrounding countryside down upon a circular white table. It is like a panoramic HDTV view on a flat screen TV 170 years before there were flat screens. We stared at it hypnotized and somewhat nauseated until Jennifer’s claustrophobia inspired us to flee the little, dark, well house of a room.

We also toured Castle Coch (a stylish Victorian Disneyland of a castle constructed 100 years before Walt Disney was invented by his parents) and Llandaff Cathedral (a glorious patchwork of random building stones -- in yellows, grays, and mottled purples – and a pastiche of styles across several centuries). The cathedral sits at the bottom of a long, slow hill which causes the building to give the impression it is rising to greet you. For lunch we sampled Welsh food (rarebit, cawl, and Welsh cakes) at Glamor’s in Caerphilly and for dinner we met Matthew Rees, Euros, Huw, and Derek Rees at an Indian restaurant were we talked, laughed and planned for an early start in the morning.