One of the best things about working in the high rise commercial part of London is the walk home. My late night shifts finish around midnight and it’s about a twenty minute walk back to my flat. It starts around the now quiet high rises, I then pass brick lane, where all the amazing clubs are, and then finish in residential area, where I live. Anyone who knows the walk hates that I do it, even my “guys from the park” and my ex-cons shudder whenever discussing it. But for me it’s bliss. I’ve always loved walking at night but because of the danger don’t get to do it leisurely, so here’s my chance. I absolutely love staring at the sky and even though I usually can’t see any stars I have faith enough to know they’re still there. I’ll never forget star gazing in Africa in the middle of the bush with no electricity for miles. Honestly the poor little city girl didn’t even know so many existed. But now here I am in London where city takes on new meaning and so does a “starless night”.
I love London though. Laura and I have started realizing that this time isn’t forever and are trying to savor each bit. (Not that we really want it to be forever but…)
Hey good thing about Sudan! A huge body of water has been found under the earth in Darfur! Well digging is going to commence within the next while and they say “hope is returning to the war ravished area”. Now I know the only thing that’s going to bring lasting hope is Jesus but he’s amazing to bring water to the dry land. =)
I’ve been studying Child Soldiers lately and am annoyed at the lack of immediate action I can take. It’s eye opening though learning about the Government soldiers and the Rebel soldiers and then thinking back to my brief encounters in the Congo. I laugh of the naivety of my team at the time, not that I know much more now, but I don’t think we quite realized who we were really dealing with.
Hey ONE more THING. I got a baby! We’ve become good friends with this couple who have four kids aged 10mo-7yrs. Every time I see them I steal the youngest and kiss him until exhaustion. =) God is good! I’ll try to get pictures up and going within the next little while.

Cass is grouchy

I've been in London 4 months today. Or yesterday. Maybe the day before. It's great, i love it, amazing city but I'm sick of the west! I miss orphan babies, I miss Africa, i miss any and all adventure. not regular adventure but like ends of the earth, almost driving off cliffs, what's that fungus on my arm? adventure. OH MY GOODNESS! And breathe

It’s been quite a while since I blogged an update so here’s a quicky (sorry for the delay) I’m a working girl again! I got a nanny job a few weeks back but it fell through last minute and instead of waiting for another one I got a job as a waitress. Funny but tips included, it in fact pays better then a nanny job would. So that’s nice. It’s a fancy little Italian restaurant in the business area of London. I really like it actually. I still will sometimes break out in tears as the job in itself is miles away from my heart. It’s fine though, God’s totally been blessing me loads in it all. I finished my training a week early and was opening shortly thereafter. (which is good as you don’t get tips while training) I’ve also had amazing customer experiences, as people from other tables randomly come up to me, put their arms around me and tell me how much they like me, or say that I’m the “happy waitress”. The other day I got talking to some high class business people about my long term goals. Haha I started sharing Jesus and how he’s the only answer for a war torn Africa etc etc. and they welled up with tears! They gave me the “who are you” look and their business card and we’re supposed to go out for tea and talk more.(lol) So it’s been fun. The kingdom is a comin and I’ll settle for nothing less.

As of now, I’ve sort of stopped the “celeb banquet job” though. It was great and all but I didn’t want to get taxed and lose money, so I’ve been putting it off. As fun as it was all in all people are people and Beyonce doesn’t even tip that well. ;)

My neighbourhood has been quite the place lately .In the past few weeks the gangs have gotten quite restless. Whether just walking home from work or from the tube or wherever they have suddenly decided that we need to…get to know each other. It’s weird cause they never used to bother us but now they’re starting to cause some trouble. A pimp even tried to pick me up at the grocery store the other day! I was very annoyed. After a few rude encounters with some of the gang guys and a group of “wannabe gang” guys I got really frightened for a while and was ready to become a hermit in my flat. Funny that I’d be more scared here then I was in Africa.( I think just cause there I always had guys to protect me and here all of our friends live miles away) But, I had a good talk with God about it and he reminded me who he is and who I am and that (oh my word) he’s actually pretty big. And what can man do to me anyway? (Again, don’t wry, I’m not stupid just not scared)

Sorry that’s not too exciting. I have another cold and am pretty tired. My mom’s coming to visit me in just over a month though. That’s blog worthy. So that’ll be end July, if you want to come and visit (cough cough, Evan and Crissy) end Aug. would be great.

So there you have it, my one month flaky update. :)
Tons of british lovin to you all, speak soon!

a little AYS action

Completely strapped for cash I recently got a job as a banquet server. The company is AYS and they do fancy dinners such as movie premiers, celeb parties, rich people’s gatherings etc. (The fact that I got the job was such a miracle as I showed up to the interview late, soaking wet and without being able to hear in my left ear due to an ear infection). I had my first job on Friday at a millionaire’s house. Now most of you know, I don’t really care who you are or how much money you have. Truthfully (as bad as it is) I find it easier to love the poor and broken then the rich and “whole”. (cough cough) So I’m on my way to wait at this dinner and I start crying realizing just how far this is from my heart, I do my best to suck it up but it doesn’t get much better. When I arrive the other workers weren’t very nice to me and my supervisor didn’t seem to like me. I bolted to the bathroom and did a panicky “God what’s up!” He was so sweet and just said “Cass, just do it for me.” Instantly a joy comes over me and I go back out to serve a platter of 260 pound “mini beef burgers” (about $630 for one of many plates of canapés). Well the night shifted and it seemed that all the guests liked me best! Suddenly the supervisor wasn’t so mean and by the end of the evening instead of cleaning up I was in charge of all the guests, making sure they were all topped up and happy. Haha. It was very sad though as those hundred pound dishes often went in the trash. We were aloud to eat some so long as we kept working and I found it soon became “one for me, one for the garbage”. That could only last so long however before the nausea kicked in.
It was so frustrating though seeing all the food going in the rubbish bin that I soon began to collect it. I think everyone thought I was a little weird at first as I start talking about the homeless and how we could develop programs to give the leftovers to street sleepers. They said I could do what I like and by the end of the night I had a trash bag of food that I hauled home.
My job Monday was much different. It was a L’Oreal party (is that even how spell it?) for the upper class and celeb’s. Apparently big shots were there and I felt quite out of the loop as I didn’t know any of them. I had two VIP tables where people would walk straight from the runway to my table but I didn’t know them. They didn’t tip either so I don’t know why they were so special. Lol. (Rumor had it that Beyonce was there but I looked for her and didn’t see her so I think it was made up)
So there you have it. London takes a twist as I now work for the richest of rich yet the poorest of poor. lol

Cornwall Vaca 2007

The Plan: Surf Holiday in the Province of Cornwall
The Result: A rained out weekend of bed rest
So the weekend started out great. We spontaneously left a day early to the beautiful story book village of Gwithian, Cornwall for a few days of fun in the sun and surf on the sea. It had been an intense couple of weeks and we were all ready for a lazy good time ("We" as in Laura, Me and a girl visiting from Canada whom we had met in Africa 2 years previous). The forecast however called for rain and even before leaving London it started pouring. We get there and I'm not feeling to hot. I had been sick all week but it had seemed I was on the mend. Not the case. As the night went on my ears started getting all funny and before I went to bed it sounded like I was "underwater". Well two o'clock in the morning rolls around and i'm pacing the floor in excruciating pain. I honestly thought my had was going to explode out my ears. When I would try to be still and sleep my body would convulse from pain. (lol not the highest pain tolerance) So after almost an hour I woke up the girls in the other room ( I had been quarantined in the lone bedroom due to a bad cough) and collapsed on their bed cring. They prayed for me, found me drugs and put me back to bed but it wasn't until the wee hours of the morning that I managed to get back to sleep. The next day after having my head in the toilet as a mean of coping with the pain we headed to the doctor. The verdict: A nasty ear infection. So we were off the the pharmacy and then I went straight to bed. The end result: No surfing for Cassandra. Exhausted I spent most the vaca sleeping. It seemed that if I rested 3 hours I had energy for 2 and personallity enough for about 30 minutes. I still managed to visit the beach however and see some pretty shops. And due to the chilly weather nobdoy went surfing anyway.
So that was my weekend. I was going to give a full update but I'm bored so maybe another night.

“If your dreams don’t make you want to crap your pants, then they’re probably not from God”.
A guy I know recently said this and it was an oh so timely reminder.
With the wrong perspective big things can look very small. The moon for instance as massive as it is, can easily disappear behind your thumb when caught at the right angle. The same with God. So often we’re so focused on our own problems that ‘our fingers look bigger then the moon’. Funny that we’re called to a life of impossibilities yet we run around only doing the things that look possible. Everything Jesus did was impossible without God so why would we think we’re to live any differently? I’m saying all this because at this exact moment everything seems impossible. Everything I want, everything I’ve planned, even my basic needs. Everything. So really, if God doesn’t show up I’m screwed. Pretty much. It’s amazing, I’m really happy with it and looking at history the “odds are for me” but I’m really learning to rest in what feels like the unknown. Anyway,

The last couple weeks have been ones to ponder, good but interesting. A while back God was talking about me going to Paris. It was right when my job at the clinic ended and I had no money to spare. He wouldn’t drop it however so I made a budget and said that if he wanted me to go he’d have to pay for it. Well, suddenly the job started up again and by the time it ended, it was exactly my budget.
So I got back from Paris Wednesday and have determined that England takes the cake over France ;) . It was an amazing trip I’d do it over in a heartbeat but I probably wouldn’t recommend Paris for the lone lady traveler. The French guys lived up to their reputation and I was actually shocked by their aggression. Even with my diamonds they still persisted! (thus the reason England gets cake) The food was amazing though. A chocolate crepe and the Eiffel tower at night…quite a feat.

One week left in April and I’m looking forward to May. Bring on the heat.

(I saw this in the Paris Metro and thought of Jarett, can you believe it's been 2 years?)

Happy Resurrection day!
Laura and I went to the cottage for the Easter Weekend. Friday we tanned and Saturday we managed to slip up to Blenheim Palace. The Sunday was beautiful and topped off with a chocolate egg hunt that that we put on for the parents and baptismal service in the evening. (LOVE baptisms) Don’t really feel like blogging much else so here are some pics instead. Yay for spring

Only in Oxfordshire....

Seems to have lost his pants in battle :0