Greetings from Istanbul!

Hello family and friends!
Yes, I know that we are supposed to be in Brussels today, but God had other plans for us.  We left San Antonio on Saturday around noon as planned and had an uneventful flight to Dulles.  We were supposed to pick up a Brussels Airline flight to Brussels, and be leaving D.C. around 5:50 pm, but on arrival at our gate for the Brussels flight, we were informed that our flight had been cancelled and our plane was "unsuitable for flying"!  Apparently the incoming flight to Dulles had been struck by lightning, and they were concerned about the functionality of the plane....YIKES!  How's that for a divine intervention....you WILL be taking another route to Nairobi.  So instead of a relaxing 3 hr wait for our connecting flight, we (and about 300 other passengers) were faced with collecting our luggage (many kudos to Marilyn for persevering and finally rescuing our "luggage in limbo"...another story of collosal incompetence on the part of airline bureaucracy...for another day), leaving the secured area, and standing in line to talk with one of 3 Brussels gate agents faced with re-routing the whole planeful of passengers....how would you like to have been one of those gate agents (or one of the passengers for that matter!).  In any event, we fortunately had an after hours emergency contact number for the travel agent who makes the arrangements for Samaritan's Purse volunteers.  While standing in line for hours on end, I was able to reach her, and she quickly reserved 2 seats on Turkish Airways (a Star Alliance partner) connecting in Istanbul, and then on to Nairobi late Sunday night.  Unfortunately, she was only able to reserve the seats, but authorization still had to come from the Brussels airline agent who was barely visible (with my telephoto lens!) at the front of my seemingly endless line.  After about 5 hrs of thanking God for keeping us off an airplane that we were clearly not supposed to board!?...right?.... We were finally ticketed on Turkish Airways, had an uneventful, though malodorous flight  (perhaps Google will one day allow us to attach an "odor file" to these documents?...now THAT would be something special!), and are now in Istanbul, awaiting our second overnight flight later today.  Consequently, we will once again miss our planned overnight stay in Nairobi, and will be arriving at the Nairobi airport about 8:00a.m. Monday, to be picked up and transported directly to Tewek Hospital on Monday afternoon.  We will probably not have internet access again till late Monday night (which means Monday am or early afternoon San Antonio time (7 hrs later in Nairobi)).  I will try to update everyone again when we get settled into Tenwek.  In the meantime, I'm on the lookout for God's purpose in this change of affairs....hopefully He wasn't trying to tell us to stay in D.C.!  Please continue to pray for safe travels, safe passage through customs, safe travels to Tenwek.  Marilyn and I both feel a great love for Tenwek, the people who serve there, and the people who are cared for there...we have a strong certainty that this is God's call for us at this time.  Looking forward to seeing what the coming weeks will bring!
With Love,
Randy