After weeks of planning and anticipation the day has finally arrived. I left this morning for India. It will take almost 36 hours before I arrive at my final destination. That includes the layovers between flights and I am currently on the longest layover now. I am sitting here at LAX in the Tom Bradley International Terminal awaiting the longest flight of the trip (16.5 hours). It was an early morning start leaving Beatrice at 4:00 this morning to catch the flight out of Omaha at 7:25 a.m. I have to admit flying is not my most favorite activity. The only thing I really like about it is the fact it gets you to a place relatively fast. Is 36 hours fast?!? I know, I know, considering I will be on the other side of the globe from my home, 36 hours seems pretty reasonable. I have to say that the first flight take-off and landing were the smoothest I have ever experienced. Kudos to the pilot at American Airlines Flight 485! I have been a bit anxious the last few days and now that I am in the processing of finally starting this journey, I have to say I am thankful it is here. I will miss my family probably more than I realize but when God calls you to a work, it’s best to follow through. I think that is what is keeping me calm and collected as I navigate this experience on my own with only Him walking beside me. It is hard to explain what that feels like until you have done it yourself. As you look around and see NO familiar faces, the only thing that feels like home is talking to God about where you are, what you are doing and where He wants your next steps to go. It is my prayer that in this day and a half of traveling time, I can empty myself of me and totally fill myself with His Spirit and this amazing, humbling job God has given me to do in the next three weeks. Pray that the rest of my flights go as planned and when I finally arrive in Thiruvananthapuram I will find Abraham amongst the sea of people. Don’t worry, Abraham and I have been in contact and he assures me he will be able to “catch me” when I come out of the exit. The next post will be from INDIA!!!! Kevin
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This past weekend was an amazing weekend and I was humbled to be a part of the 62nd Annual Ocean Grove Choral Festival in Ocean Grove, NJ. One of the best things was getting to travel with a wonderful group of people from my church choir and here in the community. We saw a little bit of NYC on Friday and Saturday and then spent the rest of the time in Ocean Grove on the Jersey Shore. Below is a video of me conducting the 600 voice choir singing my piece called, "This Is Love." I had told you before the choir was 800 and another article said they were expected 1,000. In reality there were 600, which was still an amazing experience.
The people in Ocean Grove were truly welcoming and wonderful. The Quaker Inn where we stayed even had a sign outside the door saying "Welcome, Nebraska, Friends!" Everyone in town and in the festival choir knew we were coming and cheered for us when Jason Tramm (the musical director at OG) introduced us at the rehearsal. Even people in town would stop us and ask, "Are you the group from Nebraska?" You would have thought we were from a foreign country.
It was a great ride and now I turn to Thursday morning when I will board the plane again in Omaha but instead of landing on the East Coast I will land in the Southern tip of India. Please pray as I frantically finish up final details here at home before I head out. My next post will be as I await my 16.5 hour flight to India in the LAX airport. Until then! Kevin One week from today I will be aboard my flight to India. I am sure you are thinking, “It’s about time!” I have to admit, I am feeling a little anxious. I can tell by the way I react to the people and situations I have encountered this past week. The good news, I have a "small" distraction this weekend as I head to New York with 25 wonderful people from my choir and community. In just a few hours we will be headed to Lincoln and flying to Newark to spend the weekend in Mid-town Manhattan and Ocean Grove. I have the privilege of being one of nine guest conductors for the 62nd Ocean Grove Choral Festival on the Jersey Shore in New Jersey. First we will spend a day and a half in New York, see a few sights and go to see “Aladdin” on Broadway. We head to Ocean Grove on Saturday night and then will be part of the festival on Sunday. The festival choir is made up of 800 voices. That’s right, I will be conducting a choir of 800. They will be singing one of my compositions published by Lorenz called “This Is Love.” I hope to get a video I can share when it is all over. I can’t even imagine what it will be like but I am thrilled to have around 20 of my choir members there singing in the festival choir. We will return to reality on Monday and then I will have a mad scamper to get everything done before I head back out on Thursday. Please pray I can accomplish everything I need without driving my lovely wife insane. It seems SO many unanticipated things have come up in the last two weeks and I know none of them are a surprise to God so I need to grab hold of Him and by faith venture out. This has been a growing experience for me and I am sure the lessons are not over. Isn’t that what life is all about? Being willing to step out in faith, take a risk and see where He will lead and what He will do! Thanks for going on this journey with me and continue to pray as I prepare for my departure day. One last note of good news, I got an email from Abraham last week and the books that some of you have donated money to purchase have arrived at the college. For now they sit in a box waiting for me to come and deliver them to the students. Until next time! Kevin Okay this may be more of a rant than a blog post but I promised I would talk about the things leading up to my departure for India so here it goes… There are a number of things I hope to have done before I leave the country for almost a month. I want to make sure I have things in place not only for the weeks I am gone from church but I want things to be in good shape for Tami at home. We all know how there is always a list of things to do to keep your household running and in good shape. For us, it seems cars are always a necessary burden. We currently have three at our house. None of them are worth much or even in good running condition. In April coming home from a visit from Northeast Nebraska, Tami met a couple of deer up close and personal. It actually totaled our Honda Odyssey but it is still drivable as long as we don’t drive at night (no headlight). Keeli drives a ’98 Buick LeSabre. At about the same time as the deer incident, her car started leaking oil. Not just a small leak but almost to the point of adding oil as often as we add gas. We also have a ’07 Subaru. We have known for sometime the head gasket was leaking but we have been able to continue to use it as long as we keep watch on the oil. The air-conditioning was also not working. We took it to our mechanic to see if we could do all the repairs needed so we could at least claim we had one working car. Due to the number of miles on the Subaru (191,000) the repairs are far to expensive and our best option was to trade it off. So if you have followed this long and probably boring story, the Boesigers should replace not one, not two but three cars. Our goal was to find at least one before I leave for India so Tami does not have to deal with adding oil or worse yet, breaking down alongside the road. Cars that need a little TLC are really the norm for our household so the LaSabre will not get replaced - we will just continue to baby it along (sorry, Keeli, no new car for you). So the search was on for a replacement for both the Subaru and the Odyssey. I need to preface this by saying, I know some people probably enjoy the idea of getting a new car. For Tami and I, it falls somewhere between cleaning the toilets and scooping manure! We started looking for a car last weekend. The extent of the search was driving through some big dealerships, not even getting out of the car. In fact at one dealership a group of salesman stood watching for victims… I mean customers and as we slowly drove by one of the salesman approached the car (while it was still moving) and I panicked and we drove off. We did finally get out of the car at a lot where the owner was very low key and gave us space. The next option was to come home and do a little searching online. We found 3 cars at one lot and decided to try again on Tuesday. After spending 3 grueling hours, driving 4 different cars and haggling we found something we really liked. We didn’t buy it that day, we needed time to crunch the numbers and to decide if this was the right choice for us. Of course the salesman was pressuring us to at least put a deposit on the vehicle. We gave him the bottom line, to which he was pretty certain the manager would not go that low and he refused to even take the offer to the manager because we weren’t committing to the sale. Funny thing, before we walked out the door, he said the manager approved the price we asked for and would honor it for 24 hours. We decided to take the deal because in reality it was a good deal but MAN… do we hate the process. So I can leave the country knowing Tami has a reliable car AND I can look forward to going through the process of buying a car one more time when I get home to get a replacement for the van. There are still many things I wish I could say will be done before I leave but let’s be real, keeping up with your job, home, cars and life in general is a never ending job. BTW... two weeks from today, I will be landing in India! WOW! Until next time! Kevin |
INDIA 2016
This blog will journal my experiences as I prepare to go overseas this July and teach at the Asian Christian College of Music in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala in India. Archives
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