Of tax liens and trust funds...

Finally, after about a week of resting and procrastination, I decided to sit down and write about the Real Estate Expo.

So we got to New York, went straight to Sharayah's Church where the guys were staying over night, then dropped the girls stuff off at her house. Then we went to New York, to the Jacob Javitz Center where the Learning Annex was hosting the New York Real Estate Expo. We got there a little late due to lack of time and some traffic issues, including a not so successful U-Turn on one of the busiest streets downtown, but it all worked out, we had our training session which was interesting, but at least for me, not that helpful. We were split up into our different areas of service, I was in Product, which meant I moved boxes of the speakers product to different classrooms and to the product tables in the main room. It was a pretty simple job, pick this up, move it over there.

It was definately nicer than some other people jobs, like the girls who did sales and had to deal with cranky people, credit cards and answering questions they barely knew about product they just got. So compared to some of the girls, I had a cushy, low-pressure job. Which was fine with me.

The next day when we actually started working, it took us 2 hours to drive 30 miles because traffic was bad, we got there at almost 11 am and worked till 10-10:30 pm. So it was a late night, we got home and had dinner at almost 12 am. Then the next day we were up at 4:30 am so we could get there to start at 6:30 am, that day we worked till 10:30ish as well, so it was a really long day for all of us.

Besides the other guys working product with me, I didn't get to see anybody that often, so it was always really exciting when we got to deliver boxes to a table where people we knew were working, that made it fun.

Overall, it was a very interesting experience. I've been to many christian conferences where they have speakers and people worship God and get all excited about Him, but this was like the complete opposite. This conference was all about getting rich quick. It was so, over-the-top selfish, it was really a strange feeling, to see 15,000 jumping up and down, giving each other hugs, hooting and hollering, all for the sake of self and riches.

At one point, during Marshall Sylvers(a hypnotist) session, I felt the overwhelming grief of the Holy Spirit as Sylver presented a counterfeit move of the the Spirit and talked about the power of self and doing whatever it takes to be rich, successful or whatever. It was all about manipulation and control of self and others, it was really so, so sad.

There were some half-decent speakers, most of them were so humanistic it was hard to get alot out of what they spoke, but some were at elast fun to watch, like Tony Robbins, he got everybody so pumped up, it was funny to watch 15,000 peole run around and hug each other. I also learned a few good tips on real estate and investing, although I'm not sure how much of it translates to Canada and the laws and regulations we have, oh well.

As much as it was humanistic and all about self, I did get some really great things out of it. For example, it was awesome just to be there and serve, the managers could really tell that we were there to work, it was a blessing to the people around us. I learned about the weakness of man, how these people were so desperate for wealth, success and fame, that they would put their trust in man and in themselves. In a kind of weird way, it was almost exciting as I saw the hunger of these people for something true, I knew that God offered so much more, that He could fulfill them way beyond their expectations. It was also good going to learn how to put on a seminar as I believe we are going to be doing that next semester, you learn some good tips that will help streamline your own event after watching things at this one, so it was actually really good going. The best part of it is, even if I didn't learn anything, if I had nothing positive to say, we knew that that was where God wanted us, that He arranged for us to be there, so it was awesome to just be able to be obedient and do what he wanted. That's what it's all about anyways, whether or not we see any fruit at the moment, who knows what seeds were planted in people, who knows what he was preparing us for. Maybe someday some of us students will be speaking at a conference at the very same building and we were just there to begin to prepare the place for that event. Who knows, with God it's limitless.