Wednesday, September 20, 2006

Ask Josh The Pilot, Vol. V, Day 3: Africa, faith, and kids

These next two questions are related, so I’m going to answer them at the same time.

red pill junkie said...

I wanna ask about your childhood in Africa. What was that all about man?
Also, I want to ask this: If you and MB... lemme rephrase that: WHEN you and MB finally get hooked up, and you have a couple of rugrats, how are you going to deal with the "two-church" business? Are you going to raise them as catholic, lutherans, Ganesh worshippers? Or will you let them choose their church when they grow up?

Marla said…

As the other protestant who reads MB, can you share more of your religious background?

I grew up in the countries of Cameroon and Chad. My parents are missionaries with a Bible translation organization. My parents aren’t actual translators, they are administrators who do everything needed to keep the translators in the field working on their projects. I grew up in the large capitol cities of Cameroon and Chad, not in a village, so I didn’t have the “typical” MK (missionary kid) experience. I was able to keep up somewhat with current news and trends back in the States, so whenever we would come back here I wasn’t completely culture-shocked and freaked-out. As MB mentioned before, I kinda-sorta-learned French, but after 10 years back home I’ve pretty much forgotten it all, except I still have a great accent, so I tried to teach Tink how to say “bonjour” correctly.

Being missionaries, my parents raised me in a strong Protestant Christian home. Their faith was the reason we were in Africa, and I got to see daily applications of that faith. I have happily made their faith my own, and that faith has sustained me through many difficult times, most recently the last two years of waiting on the FAA.

Within Protestantism, I am specifically Lutheran (Missouri Synod), but I’m not much for dwelling on denominational differences; all through college I went to a Church of God church, and right now my parents go to a non-denominational church in Orlando. I am proud of my Lutheran background, but it didn’t blind me to the fact that Mary Beth, being Catholic, and I hold the same basic faith. Yes there are many differences, but we agree on all the important points, and we trust in the same God.

Concerning potential children, at the moment we are not planning on having kids. We’ve decided it wouldn’t be the best idea in light of my student loan debt and her health, mental and physical. Later on, we may decide to adopt, and/or we may have children of our own. IF we are blessed with kids, they will be raised Catholic but with a strong Lutheran influence from me.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

JTP - taking on politics last night and religion tonight? All we need is a good vomit story and you will have covered the 3 things one must never discuss at the dinner table. You must have a good vomit story - every pilot seems to have one. Please please! Tell us a vomit story!

Anonymous said...

We’ve decided it wouldn’t be the best idea in light of my student loan debt and her health, mental and physical.

Um, is there something we're not being told?

Josh The Pilot said...

It's a good thing this is isn't the dinner table!
Vomit story... hmmm... my most recent one is from about a year ago. I was flying an Extra 300 aerobatic airplane. The owner and I had gone (flown) to breakfast with a bunch of other pilots and their airplanes. On the way back the owner decides to teach me some aerobatic maneuvers. We started with some loops and barrel-rolls. My full stomach could handle those because they're smooth and the airplane keeps going in one direction. Then he decides to do Dutch rolls, which involve abrupt changes in direction. He did three and I told him that was enough. I could feel my breakfast wanting to leave my stomach immediately, but I didn't tell him that. A pilot would rather be bitten by a king cobra than admit motion sickness to another pilot. We proceeded back to base and I was fighting the urge to hurl the whole way. Right as we were about to land, I couldn't hold it down anymore. I grabbed a "Sic Sac" and let loose. I was glad I was in the aft seat, so the owner couldn't see me. He was clueless until after we parked at his hanger and he saw the full bag I was holding when I climbed out of the airplane. He felt really bad, but I felt worse for not being able to handle some basic maneuvers.

Josh The Pilot said...

Don't worry, Mike. It's simply that MB tires very easily, and not getting any sleep from having a newborn in the house would drive her into the ground. Not to mention, running after a toddler would do the same thing.

Anonymous said...

My family has way too many vomit stories (the rule about no vomit stories at the dinner table had to be made for a reason!). One cautionary tale explains why I haven't been able to eat Spaghettios for about 30 years.

A nasty stomach virus was running through the family. I recovered first and was sitting in the kitchen about to eat a bowl of Spaghettios. My mother and sister were in the livingroom. All of a sudden we heard the unmistakeable sound of my sister about to toss her cookies.

Now, here is where I want you all to pay attention because this could happen to you, and it's a disaster that is easily avoidable.

My mother made the mistake of putting her hand over my sister's mouth as she tried to rush her to the garbage can in the kitchen. Those of you who have enjoyed summer days of squirting friends with a hose by holding your thumb over the end to force the water out in a wider and stronger spray can probably guess what happened next.

Spaghettios never looked the same to me after that...

Anonymous said...

" IF we are blessed with kids, they will be raised Catholic but with a strong Lutheran influence from me."

Could you ellaborate on that?

I have never felt sick on an airplane (thank the Lord) but the absolute worst time I've ever had concerning my stomach was aboard a jet-propelled ferry that covers the distance between Cozumel and Cancun. Man was it a nightmare! Maybe the waves were stronger than usual, but because of the speed of the boat (and the fact you're sitting on a closed space) made me and my cousins feel like Hell. We all had a bad time, but our friend Miguel had the worst. Everytime he got out of the restroom he would stop at the corridor without reaching his seat and stand there for about 10 seconds, he would then turn white, then green, and then he would finally storm back to the toilet! For the trip back we asked some fishermen to give us a ride on their boat :-)

Josh The Pilot said...

RPJ, I won't ellaborate, it would take too long. Plus, I reserve the right to not share EVERYTHING about our lives on here.

Anonymous said...

Josh - Thank you for not sharing. Leave some mystery for the readers. But, I think your BC Admin rights will be revoked shortly after MB returns. Look what you've done to her nice little blog. She'll be sooooo impressed you've turned it into a vomit story happy hour! :)

Anonymous said...

I don't know, Kredin. I think it's kind of nice that what could have become a divisive blog entry instead led us to find common ground. We went from politics and Republicans vs. Democrats, to religion and Catholics vs. Protestants. Isn't it nice that we could all come together to enjoy some lovely vomit stories? :-)

MB would be so proud!

Anonymous said...

Fair enough dude ;-)

Heather said...

Well, whether they be adopted or otherwise, I'm sure they'll be the children of your heart and you'll both raise them beautifully together :).

PS: I'm a personal carer for the elderly and just a few months shy of achieving my nursing qualifications ... oh the gory stories of vomit and other bodily functions I could share ;).

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