On April 25, 2009 Tori, Jenn, Jasmine, Hanna Wendy and myself, along with 99,994 thousand-ish fellow worldians took to the streets and 'abducted' ourselves. We congregated at Dundas and Yonge square and waited for instructions on our march orders. After about an hour, we began our march with a ton of people watching and police shutting down streets for our 500ish fellow Toronto Rescue Adbuctee's.
We separated ourselves into groups of 20 and each grabbed a hold of the rope, symbolizing being tied together as we march like the child soldiers often are.
As we marched we handed out little cards inviting people to the event and we made a whole heck of a lot of noise!
Wouldn't you know it but Aaron Carter showed up! He's the little brother of Nick Carter, former Backstreet Boy. I told Aaron that I used to love Brian from BSB and was dead set on marrying him but someone else got to him first. Then .........
I let Aaron in on the little known fact that my roommate Jenn (in red) auditioned for his music video when she was a whole lot younger! And for not chosing her (a decision that he's probably regretted ever since) he was chill enough to hang out with us for a few minutes and take a ton of photos.
We get to Queen's Park and set up camp. It was (up until a few minutes after this photo was taken) beeeautiful outside but we saw these dark clouds coming over the city and the wind started picking up....
Jenn and I pray for clear skies as Tori is on the phone with her boyfriend and he's telling her that its storming like mad at his house a few km's away so we hunker down and just as Jenn and I say amen, the skies open up and it starts to p-o-u-r!
Because we are such good planners, we brought little more than nothing to The Rescue but were blessed to find a random backpack and after i asked around if it was anyones, I grabbed the sheet of hole-y plastic that was attached to it and all 6 of us hunkered down for what we thought would be a quick downpour.
We got 'rescued' pretty soon after we got to Queen's Park. Olivia Chow and Jack Layton came from the NDP party and Jack said he came only because he recieved about 1000 emails the previous week and after researching this 'invisible children' organization all these young people were emailing him about, he was shocked he didn't know the situation, and vowed to us his support for the cause.
We decided to embrace the rain and take the obligatory jumpy photos for a while. Notice the giant puddles forming all around us. Also notice the vert Tori pulls off here and how I can barely get off the ground.
Apparently there was a statue in the park of the man who brought 'sunday school' to Canada! Neat!
Rick Mercer, from This Hour has 22 Minutes, came by too! I asked him if he could call George- they are on the same network after all. I then asked if he was going to make another Talking to American's.... he said nope.
Around 11 or 12, Tori and I took a walk and we took some photos.
The boy in the photo behind me is fighting in Uganda right now. He was abducted and has yet to be rescued.
This was our home for the night. It was not nearly as comfy, warm or dry as it looked. In fact, my head was cushioned by a saturated sleeping bag. Luxury, i know!
This is our little home we rigged up in the midst of the downpour. I think next time we'll pack a tent... or at least a tarp.
Who would have thought that 4 years after seeing the Invisible Children movie, The Rough Cut, I'd be camping out overnight to support a cause that had been seeded so deep in my heart. Who would have thought that at 20 years old i would watch a documentary that would turn out to be the catalyst for some MAJOR life changes. Now.... 4 years later, here i am! A new creation, changed from the inside out, experiencing life and hope and love in a way I'd never thought possible. Wow......
We left our little bench home at 5:30am in order to catch our greyhound bus back to Peterborough at 6:30am. We got home at 9 and cleaned the house prior to church at 10:30am.
As we were standing at Dundas and Yonge at 4pm yesterday, I started tearing as I thought about my friends in Uganda and the Amani mama's who had fled the war in the North- the same war that I was fighting against at that moment.
During the night I met some fellow abductees from across the path who were making their own shelter. We started chatting over talk of twine and discovered we were all Christians. We had the most beautiful amazing alive impromptu prayer session and it felt unbelievable to worship and pray with virtual strangers, to the same Savior. Beautiful!
I met a guy from HQ of Invisible Children in San Diego and had an amazing conversation about our mutual love for Uganda, Galatians, the gospel, and youtube :) I told him if they ever need a nurse, I'm their girl!
I wept through the church service today and had a sob through a worship song. My friend and the youth pastor was speaking on freedom in Christ and I cried and cried and cried the entire sermon. I was an exhausted emotional mess and ditched the young adults lunch for some alone time at home.
A wonderful night!!! And as I finish this off and head to bed, there are STILL cities left unrescued. check out the website
HERE to keep tabs on how things are going.
"It's in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for. Long before we first heard of Christ and got our hopes up, he had his eye on us, had designs on us for glorious living, part of the overall purpose he is working out in everything and everyone." Ephesians 1:11-13
