Tuesday May 17, 2011

Our morning started out early, as we traveled to Union Square (14th Street) to meet up with Susanne for a tour of NYU (New York University). Although it was raining, we were still able to see the beautiful buildings and even saw the arch that was in the movie August Rush!
Once inside of the buildings of the University, we sat in a lounge and listened while Susanne told us all about her chaplain position at the school and how God has used her in that place. After hanging out for a while, our group traveled down a few flights of stairs to the Christian office/department and had a prayer time before heading back out to find our lunch.
Our group split up for lunch, with the majority of people (including Dr. Brown) stopping at a pizza place. However, Jared was craving Mexican food, so we stopped at Qdoba, the closest to Mexican food that we could find.
From there, John Ramirez took our group to Queens to a Hispanic church, Iglesia la Palabra. They had some extra food from their lunch that they fed to us and it was delicious! Before heading out and leaving three of our team members there to work (Lacey Colborn, Seth Smith, and Kyle Morrison), our group prayed with the pastor, Winston, for his church and the community.
Promptly after praying, our group began our long journey back to the Upper West Side of Manhattan. We had just arrived back at Grand Central Station when Jared received a call from Kyle that Lacey had hit her head on a low hanging iron bar and needed to go to the emergency room for stitches. After hearing that, Dr. Brown corralled those of us left (Matt Lange, Erin Jeffries, Katy Aleshire, Jared Doyle, and I) and we quickly headed back toward the area from which we had just come.
On our way to the hospital, we learned that Lacey was okay, and that we were traveling to Flushing, a stop farther north than where we had previously been. However, we were not sure which hospital to go to or how to make our way there, but thankfully a nice woman on the subway informed us that she was going that way and would show us! The people of NYC are so willing to offer help when anyone seems even a slight bit lost!
So, we exited the train and followed her to our bus. She showed us which stop to get off and viola, we were at the hospital. We soon learned that we were at the wrong hospital. After quickly learning directions to the correct hospital, we were soon on our way. Upon our arrival at the correct hospital, we tried three different entrances before we found the right one and were soon taken to Lacey, and then to the waiting room.
I have no idea how long we were at the hospital, for Jared and I both fell asleep. As soon as Lacey was released (with staples!), we all headed back toward Manhattan. Jared and I stopped off at 34th Street for supper and a stop at K-Mart (since again we had no time for laundry), and then headed back toward Times Square to meet up with the rest of the group.
After arriving back at our housing, Jared and I went out for a dual purpose, ice cream and to check the hours of the Laundromat. We were determined to do laundry one way or the other! Before heading to bed, we learned that the five members of our group that did not have previous assignments were to work in the MNYBA building, freeing us to do laundry all day if we needed that much time.
The day was a long one for everyone and we were all glad that it was nearing its end.