Dominoes.

I spent this past weekend in Austin, Texas with my beautiful and wonderful bestfran: Allyssa. We were fortunate enough to get to represent the Chamber of Commerce at Aquapalooza- this huge concert on Lake Travis- where we got to stand 20 feet from Brad Paisley and enjoy his musical stylings fo' free. In the tent that we sat in for the Chamber, we met these 3 extremely nice adults from a nearby county. When things were slow, we decided to play dominoes. We had never played before, but soon, we were (kind of...) getting the hang of it; but above all, we enjoyed the company of the people we were with.

Playing this game got me thinking about dominoes. I remember watching some sort of special on these little tiles on ESPN of all channels. It was some competition where you set them all up in those mazes (like when you were a kid) and you see how cool it can look when they fall. You hit the first, and that one causes the next one to fall, and so on and so on.

Life is like dominoes.

I am a firm believer in fate: everything happens for a reason. You have only a few things in life to rely on, and one of those things is the Lord and your faith, to get through the times in your fate that are the least 'ideal'. Nonetheless, once the first domino of life is hit, each subsequent one follows the next and the sequence of life proceeds til the last domino topples over. The ones in-between? These are the events that the Lord has lined up in place for you. How you chose to deal with them is entirely up to you, but these dominoes will fall.

One moment in particular on our trip to South Africa reminds me of this domino metaphor. It was near the end of our trip. In fact, we were leaving to come home to America after our month there.

It all started about 5 days into our trip. Domino 1. I get an email from Orbitz telling me our domestic flight from East London to Jo-burg was rescheduled... up 5 hours. This now gave us a 12 hour lay-over in the Jo-burg airport. Ew, ew, ew. This would have been uncomfortable not to mention unsafe because Jo-burg can be a pretty sketchy city. Needless to say, we were not hapy campers.

Domino 2. Contacting my dad. My dad is one that loves to be the hero of the story, you know, save the day. So, once again, here comes SuperDad to my rescue. One of his 50-something cousins somehow lives in Jo-burg. Her husband, Brian, is in the gold and coal mining business, and they have a 3 year contract to live in South Africa. Problem: my dad's cousin was in the states visiting. Luckily, she was so kind as to forward our information on to her sweet husband who promptly contacted us with TONS of ideas of what we could do in our 12 hour layover.

Domino 3. Then, Brian, the husband, proceeds to tell us that his driver, Wandile, this 6'5'' jacked black dude, would be to our services that day. He said Wandile would pick us up from the airport and take us wherever we wanted to go: Lion Park, Nelson Mandela Square, the Montecarlo Casino, the Mall, anywhere. But of course, he reminds us again of the sketchy-ness that is Jo-burg's greatest accessory. Good thing we had Wandile. Personal body guard and driver? Generosity at its best.

Domino 4. The day before our flight to Jo-burg, as we drove to our final destination before traveling home, we realize that we messed up... BIG TIME. The stupidity I felt when I looked at our 3 flight itinerary again to realize that we accidentally booked our domestic flight 36 HOURS IN ADVANCE was enough to feed all of the continent of Africa. What were we thinking? Better yet, how was it that this spoof was not caught until we were about to leave? Yes, I was panicked. Yes, it was obvious. Buttttt, Domino 3 was in place. It had fallen, and we were blessed and fortunate enough to have a place to stay in Jo-burg. Brain was overjoyd ot have us stay the night. His wife had been in the states for almost 3 months. He said, and I quote, "I am going batshit crazy by myself." We were happy to help.

Domino 5. June 16th in South Africa is Youth Day, a public holiday. Every office is closed. Our driver and body guard, Wandile, got in a car accident on the way to get us at the airport. So, Brian, my 2nd-cousin-in-law (?), met us at the airport instead. Luckily, he had the day off thanks to Youth Day, otherwise, once again, we would be two unlucky ducks.

Domino 6, 7, and 8. African Market. Lion Park. Nelson Mandela Square. Allyssa and I got to experience 3 incredible things, which, without our flub, would have been impossible. I love dominoes. I also love African Markets. We got to haggle with the store vendors, and we convinced them we were from Spain. 'Hola Chicas!' We also got to go to a wildlife game reserve and pet baby lion cubs and feed a giraffe. Just wait...

Domino 9. Giraffe feeding! How cool! Well, lets just say it was almost impossible to capture. Allyssa and I underestimated how much zoom kills the battery life of cameras. So as we get to the grand finale of the game reserve, our batteries die. At the same time. This sort of bad luck BUT then we met Don. Don Walker. The man of our dreams, that is, of course, if Allyssa and I weren't madly in love with our soulmates. Anywhoooo he was wearing a UT shirt, and we thought we could just ask him to take our picture and then send it to us when he got back to the states. It worked, and sure enough, we got this special memory captured.

Domino 9 1/2. Did I mention that Brian had a beautiful, luxurious house with CENTRAL HEATING?!?! Finally. Warmth. After a month in Africa freezing, as my grandmother would say, our gagutzas off. I finally was able to unpeel 5 of the 6 layers of clothing I had been wearing. I slept in shorts for crying out loud. Thank you Lord! He also had internet. Beautiful.

Domino 10. Friends. Allyssa and I got to share a few meals and time talking with Brian, getting to him and his life. He is a wonderful, kind man with a huge heart. He spoiled us while we were there, and we did nothing to deserve it. It was such a perfect example of grace and selflessness. I love this man :) We even got to be with him when he found out his daughter was expecting her first child! It was a very cool moment. We also made friends with our new driver, Senzo. He cracked us up! He was able to speak over 7 languages, including a majority of the languages spoken in South Africa. Lovely man! He was apart of our last picture in South Africa.

So lets reexamine this domino effect... If our flight had never been changed, we would have never contacted Brian, and then when we finally realized our mistake, we would have been stranded. BUT the situation was totally an awesome one. I got to pet a freaking lion cub.

I realize now that what may seem as bad luck or an unfortunate situation may just be the first domino in a long line of dominoes that leads to a very, very happy ending. Maybe this is how life should always be looked at: with sincere optimism. Why do we, as humans, always jump the worst possible conclusion? I am not ashamed to admit I do that often in life. Sure, I try my hardest and I work on my relationship with Christ to bring myself to a place where I can look at the world with a pragmatic point of view. But I have my faults.

I am so happy and blessed to have had this seemingly bad luck on my trip home. It turned out to be some of the best memories of the trip. And, most importantly, it taught me a little but about life. Of course, when I least expected it.

Spaghetti Night.

When I was a little kid, we ate A LOT of Italian food. Mostly because my dad's mom is an amazing cook and caterer, and she makes the best homemade meatballs known to man. So naturally, my family adopted this tradition of eating spaghetti and meatballs about once a week.

Now, lets do a little math. Children + red sauce + little hand-mouth coordination = mess. Simple, right? Well, my mother felt like the solution to this little equation was putting my brother and I outside on the deck-patio we owned while we ate our sketti. Side note: these noodle nights were half-naked. My brother and I until the age of appropriate age of 3 would eat this meal in our backyard in only our skivvies. Yep. This kept the house clean and our bellies full.

So, I found it highly ironic that my first night in Africa was spaghetti night. The INFAMOUS spaghetti night.

Allyssa and I arrived at Open Arms around 3pm South Africa time, right after "La-La" or nap time. This is the (second) craziest hour of the day for the 36 sweet, precious kids we fell in love with and gave our hearts too. I say that with the utmost love, but yes, this hour was CRAZY.

We soon took on our new names of 'Auntie Allyssa' and 'Auntie Lauren' and the kids climbed and jumped on us. Literally, every limb of my body was occupied with a kid! It was so overwhelming, of course, especially after the 48 hours of flying we did to get to our new home. But it was such a blessing, nonetheless, that we were finally there, able to put these kids before us, and serve them with all the love in our hearts.

Before we knew it, playtime was over, and dinner time had begun. Spaghetti. Red Sauce. Gird your loins.

Pasta was everywhere. I mean EVERYWHERE. The Mamas or cooks did not cut up the long noodles and the kids were given spoons to eat the spaghetti with. This combination is... well, deadly. So when Allyssa and I sat down to eat with them on the floor, our faces, hair, clothes, and own bowls were targets with giant meatball bulls-eyes for pasta. Before we knew it, we were covered in red gravy.

Sounds like the world should adopt The Schultzs' naked spaghetti night.

Now, after dinner, the REAL (first) crazy hour begins. The kids run everywhere! The younger ones cry, and say 'pick me up!'. And when you do, its only a matter of seconds before another one asks to be picked up too. So there we were covered in sauce, arms full of kids, crying babies filling the room with their melodies, and we look over, and one of the little ones is jumping out the window of the orphanage. No bueno.

I will never forget that first night in Africa. It was single-handedly the most stressful, crazy blur of my life... hands down. I can vividly remember journaling that night and writing about how scared I was. How I was ready to go home and give up. I desperately missed Johnny. I missed my friends, and I missed the normalness of my life back in America. I couldn't stop crying. Thank the LORD for Allyssa. She was my rock.

But as time went on, and as I hope you will see as I write more about my trip, my heart was changed. I realized so many important lessons in life have to be learned the hard way. Sometimes you have to open up your heart and dig deep into the things you are most afraid of; and as some of you may now, the change that is taking place is seemingly tangible. You can almost taste it, smell it, and you can definitely feel it. Its as if all of the negative doubts you have about yourself are forcing their way out, scratching their way up from the pits of your soul, until you finally come to a realization that you can overcome the obstacles you face.

For me, the obstacle was 5 weeks South Africa.

Let me just tell you, I overcame the hardships, the doubt, the fear.

But South Africa and those 36 adorable children did win one thing: My heart.

Cliche? Maybe. True? Yes.

South Africa 2010. Oh yea baby.

Lets start at the very beginning...

Which the Sound of Music tells us, is a "very good place to start." So I am going to go ahead and agree with Julie Andrews and start there: at the beginning.

I started this blog at work, of all places. As usual, I was bored, and after the conversation between me and my friend at work, Liem, the Vietnamese Biochem genius, died down, I had this idea to start a blog. So I did. And it was done.

The next stop on my ADD list of things to now that I created the blog was: what will I call it? Great question, even better answer. I settled on the name 'Little Miss Can't Be Wrong' mostly because if you know me, you know that is my attitude about 75% of the time. But, it is also a shout out to my dad, who, for most of my childhood would sing this song to me when I was trying to get my way or BS my way out of something.

...Not much has changed, so voila!

Anddd okay, okay, confession. This is also the name of my Xanga (yes, I had one. I am not ashamed...) from 9th grade. But that again is a side story, and if you are curious, you can google it.

So the last order of business, and perhaps the most detrimental part of the blog, is WHAT DO I WRITE ABOUT?

I guess that will be for me to decide and for you to read.

But, I with the help of a little red headed vixen (Sarah Stimson! what what!), I think I shall start with my adventures and service in Africa. And expand as my mind choses. And that, ladies and gents, is going to be an adventure in itself :)

So let the journey begin, and enjoy.

Oh, and disclaimer: I am always right. Hence the name.