Good Morning all! Here I am in Stade, Germany.  Just about half an hour by train north west of Hamburg.
Am enjoying some time with my niece Anja, and great nephews: Leandro, Joanna, and Matteo. Will post som pics of them a little later. But now I will post some pics of Singapore to snow you what a wonderful time Judy and I had while there.
The temperature was way too high for walking outside 28 at night and 31 up during the day.
Rachel's sisters were wonderful to us!  We stayed with Laura who is now the youngest in the family (position held by Rachel before).  Spent a day with Yok who lives in Malaysia - visited her son and daughter in law plus the grandchildren then to Yok's place.
We ate all sorts of wonderful food during the whole time we were there saw many sights as well: Sentosa Island; Garden by the bay; Orchid Garden in the botanical garden; Little India; Chinatown; afternoon tea at Raffles hotel.
The trip from Singapore to Hamburg was really long. Over 7 hours to Dubai then three hours in transit most of which time was spent in getting from one plane to the next!  Then another 7 hours to Hamburg.  Then a train from the airport to Central city and a connection to Stade. These 24 hours have given me a wonderful break. This afternoon I travel to Berlin where I will be met by our friend Elke.
Tomorrow is the fateful day we are to get the Belarusian visa, so need you all to pray for us.

Journal 1

Friday 27 September 2013
Journal day 1
Flying from Brisbane toSingapore right now. It is 4.30 pm Nz time.
The first day of the trip had its moments!  After having spent a harrowing two months catching up with two years of stress fallout, preparations for the journey on the peace train, visa anxieties, etc, etc.  we finally left the house only ten minutes after we had planned. Not bad, ay?
After a couple of purchases in Feilding we set off to Hamilton to see the grands :)
Well, would you believe on the road past Hunterville I was stopped by a cop for speeding!!!!  $80 and twenty demerits.  We noticed between there and turangi some five cops cruising and stoping cars.  We stopped in Waiouru for a cuppa and a change of driver.  Desert road, and one of those cops pulled Judy over for speeding. Another $80 and another 20 demerits these for Judy he he he we each got a share

Spent a lovely afternoon tea with my daughter-in-law Lee, Isabelle, Elyssa and Finn.  They are all gorgeous!
Can't post pics yet cause my uploader won't work with the new iOS 7. Apparently iOS 7 blocks non apple devices - the perils of upgrading!  As soon as I get something that works will do so

We got to the gateway hotel around 6.30pm and after checking in had a lovely meal with my daughter Trisha and her partner Mark. Marie and Christine were with us and a happy send off was had by all.

Singapore 3.56am (7:56am nz)

As u can gather am totally in nz time sleep pattern!  Here I am wide awake in the middle of the night!

We arrived in Singapore around 4.45pm local time. Laura Chiew (Rachel Lim's)sister and her son Caleb met us at the airport and took us for a delicious meal @ the university campus.  Then home and to beddie byes as we were whacked.

Needless to say its kinda warm here: 30 degrees!
Night night all!
Shalom

final countdown!!!

tonight is the final night I sleep in my own bed :)

hotel sleep in Auckland tomorrow night and early wakeup call  - have to be @ the airport @ 3am!!!

Finally got my Passport back from the Russian embassy with the long awaited visa about an hour ago :)

and I do believe I have done all the pretrip things I wanted to do with time to spare :D
thats all folks!!!
shalom for now

4 more sleeps!

This morning attended a wonderful Spring Festival Service @ Knox Church. Met up with old friends. Ron Townsend gave a wonderful message from the parable of the weeds and the wheat.  About biding ones time and not jumping in without seeing the consequences. 
Blessed with a commissioning prayer which included Mum and Judy. All followed by lovely catch up time.

Countdown

It is now less than two weeks to go!  I have received my Chinese visa and am en route to getting my Russian visa. Suitcase ready to start receiving items in the spare room.
Still have mountain of "to do's" - one at a time will do. 

Testing testing one two three

I am reactivating my blog just to see if it will work for my trip blog.  I am planning to post pictures and text so that I will be able to remember and keep all in touch with what is happening.
first pic:

let me know what happens

talk about bias !!!!

on Sunday night I watched a program on TV One that many of you may have watched which saddened me enormously.  The show was "Investigator Special - Jesus the cold case".  The main reason I was saddened was because I felt the investigation was very biased towards a predetermined end result - it felt as if the reporter had an answer he wanted to arrive at and he went on to find the scholars that would agree with him.  Biblical Scholarship, Anthropological studies and Theological Scholarship have moved on dramatically from the middle of last century's 'the bible is all myth invented by the early church for the purpose of denigrating the Jews'.  It would have been good to see some modern anthropological evidence and some modern scholarly testimony added to the mix.  I feel that would have made the results presented on Sunday much more credible.  The case for the discarding of the biblical text has not been proven at all in my book.  That the interpretation of the scriptures in the early history of christianity was misused to scapegoat the jews in the same way it has been used to bolster misogyny (bias against women) and slavery and many other  is undeniable but to ascribe heinous motives to the writers of the gospels is just not necessary.  The writers were not antisemitic, thy were jewish themselves they were part of the establishment it was much later that the split between jews and christians came about.  
Allow me to recommend some authors:  Anthropologist Renee Girard Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World   and The Scapegoat 
Biblical Scholars and Theologians: N.T. Wright, James Alison, Raymond E. Brown, Joseph A. Fitzmyer, James G. Williams, Gil Bailie, Robert Hamerton-Kelly. Oh dear, I got carried away here :).  There are a myriad names to add to this list of current scholars who would be helpful to read.