Trip halfway around the world is ‘fate’

When Destin’s Lisa Snuggs began preparing for a trip halfway around the world in March, it was the culmination of a set of circumstances that began four years earlier.
“The chain of events that put me on that plane is extraordinary and what happened when we got there could only have one explanation — ‘fate,’ ” Snuggs told The Log.
“On the ‘flight that wouldn’t end’ between Atlanta and Seoul, Korea, I couldn’t sleep at all and had plenty of time to think about how I ended up in that cramped seat on Korean Airlines.” Snuggs said.
Her story began four years ago in the Winn Dixie parking lot where she met Robin Collins.
“I saw Hawaii license plates on a truck,” Snuggs said. “While I loaded my groceries a woman approached the truck and I hollered at her explaining Haleiwa, Hawaii, had been my home for 16 years. Her name was Robin Collins, she was from Maui, and we became fast friends.”
Collins’ journey brought her from Hawaii to Destin, where she became the next-door neighbor of Barbi Carroll and John Hawbaker, founders of Mission Love Seeds. Collins’ housekeeper, Fely Zapanta, was from the Philippines, and she and Carroll became good friends as she shared stories of the poverty in the Philippines. When Zapanta returned to the Philippines, she became coordinator for Mission Love Seeds in that area.
Collins joined MLS on their mission trip to the Philippines in 2007, and told Snuggs about seeing Zapanta again, about the worship center being built and plans for water purification systems for the villages.
“The stories of farming workshops and the dental and medical clinics ministering to the needy touched my heart, but there was one story that stuck out,” Snuggs said.
“She told me of a man, Marlon, who so loved his wife, Corazon, that he wrote a letter asking for help with her breathing. The letter was translated into English and it was determined that Corazon has asthma. Robin’s heart was so touched by the love this proud man had for his wife that she and the mission team made a long journey into Manila and purchased a nebulizer and Albuterol medicine with her own money. Although there is no electricity in the village, arrangements were made for her treatments elsewhere. I thought of the nebulizer under the sink in my bathroom that we haven’t used in five years and felt very guilty.”
In January of this year, the idea was mentioned to Snuggs that she join the group on the mission trip scheduled in March.
“As the idea settled in, I knew it wasn’t in our family budget,” Snuggs said. “I concentrated my efforts on fundraising for Mission Love Seeds in Destin, asking people I work with, members of community groups I’m involved with, and friends and family to help provide what they would need for their trip. I was amazed at the outpouring of generosity within our community. Everything collected was taken to the villages and distributed. As time grew closer to departure, I was urged to join them. So I ordered my passport and decided that if it arrived in time, I would go. Three weeks later I had my passport in one hand and a ticket to Manila in the other. Passports never come that quickly! Coincidence or fate?”
So Snuggs loaded her bags with medical and dental supplies, balloons, toys, candies and other donations from people in Destin — and began her trip.
A trip with “four people I barely knew to go somewhere that I had no idea why I was going — yet a voice inside me kept saying ‘GO.’ ”
Next week: Meet the children of the Philippines with Lisa Snuggs.