Actually the flight was only about 10hrs long, but when you add in the 5 hours that we came early to the airport prior to our flight (which was a good thing that we did because of the 3hr long line we waited in), plus the 2.5hr delay and then immigration, customs, baggage, etc., it all adds up.

I'm already missing the Philippines but it also feels good to be in the comfort of your own home...and in time to celebrate the New Year in Hawaii!

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I'd been wanting to eat some halo halo from chow king since we got here and finally on our last day I devoured it. It was worth the 8 brain freezes that endured while eating it.

Even though we arrived 5 hours early to the airport we still found ourselves at the end of a long long line to check into Hawaiian airlines. They haven't even opened the counter yet! Thanks to Chris Kanemura, we were prepared for this!

Walking into the sanctuary of Victory Church before service started

A GREAT SERVICE
Since it was Sunday, we decided to attend Victory church, a large church with many campuses around metro Manila that doing a great job in reaching a lot of young professional and college students. The service was much like our home church (Hope Chapel West Oahu), people packed air conditioned auditorium, awesome energetic worship, incredible video element, and a great message. On top of all this, it appears they have a strong emphasis on discipleship and growing deep Christians not just large congregations. God is definitely doing great things through this church.

EXCITED FOR THE FUTURE
But as great a job that this church is doing there is still a huge harvest out there in this densely populated city of young people. I was encouraged to see how this church seems to have a similar ministry DNA as Hope Chapel's and that it is successful in reaching people! However, Nolan's vision is even more exciting to me than this because I believe it adds another dimension of discipleship and relationship building with the implementation of a Coffee Shop/Church model!

Tomorrow we meet again with Pastor Noel (Director of Compassion International, Philippines).

Thank you for your prayers - they are being answered - Lynnette is feeling much better today. Please continue to pray for Nolan, Jay and myself - we all seem to have head colds coming on.

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CHRISTMAS DAY HAPPENINGS
On Christmas day, we decided to make our way to the Mall of Asia, a giant shopping mall that is also home to the IMAX theatre where we watched Avatar in 3D (IMAX movie tickets here are less than half the price of cost in Hawaii!), good flick, I would recommend it. Unfortunately, it seemed like entire nation gathered in this one mall on this day with the sole purpose of getting in my way and to watch the same movie as us, so we had to wait about 6 hours until the next open show. Also unfortunate was that Lynnette had gotten a stomach infection and had to deal with vomiting, diarrhea and a sore stomach the entire day. But because I was so excited to watch Avatar, I encouraged her that watching a giant IMAX screen from the 4th row with 3D glasses would make her feel less nauseous...I was wrong.

VISITING PASTORS THE DAY AFTER
The next day Lynnette stayed home to rest her body and to try to recover. While her and Jay (also not feeling to well) stayed at home to rest, Nolan, David, Kryz, Joe and myself were picked up by Pastor Ray, who is the the Foursquare District Supervisor. We had a chance to meet a couple smaller churches to hear their hearts and to continue to find out what the spiritual needs are in this city. God continued to confirm the need to minister to the young professionals in Manila. We also drove through the Makati business district (upper scale neighborhood), which is the only area that Foursquare does not have a church, AND on top of that it where a lot of young professionals live and work, AND it was one of the initial places that Nolan had a vision for. We'll see how God continues to direct us.

PRAYERS
Please pray for our health, especially for Lynnette, Jay and Nolan who either are sick or are starting to feel sick.

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For Christmas eve, Nolan's uncle was kind enough to invite all of us over to his place in Sampaloc to celebrate. They cooked us up a great meal and the traditional caroling took place, where the neighborhood kids go from house to house singing Christmas songs for money (or in our case we gave out candy). Midnight mass is a popular tradition here too, churches get packed in this Roman Catholic dominated culture - we passed by one Catholic church literally bursting with people inside and outside sitting on the lawn, on walls, sidewalks and fences.

A lot of Filipinos travel out of Manila to the celebrate in the provinces, but there were still plenty of parties as we passed through streets of blaring karaoke machines, and even grown shirtless men dancing to the beat of Rihanna.

Most people stay up passed midnight celebrating, but unfortunately with jet lag still haunting us foreigners, we couldn't keep our eyes open past 11pm (5am in Hawaii), which is probably the latest we've stayed up since we've been here!