So much to share.

There is so much that I need to catch you up on. It has been a roller coaster couple of days but there has been some crazy things happening. I will take you day by day.

Thursday-
We spent the day at the garbage dump. Yesterday we had a ton of rain and so with all the standing puddles of water there were flies everywhere. Although I look at the homes there with a different set of eyes after my Manila experience, it still makes me sick to my stomach to be there with that smell, the thousands of flies, and then seeing them bathe, wash clothes, drink and relieve themselves in the same creek of water that sits beneath the pile of garbage. Although it was nice to pass out clothing donations to the family today, I wasn't really feeling like we were doing a whole lot. We went from house to house and each family member got a t-shirt. The t-shirts were old StuCo t-shirts that we had from past events. I think in my mind, and maybe I am wrong, but going to a house with 3 suitcases full of shirts and giving each member only one shirt was an extremely odd feeling to me. I would have much rather given all of the stuff to the pastor from the dump and let him hand them out. I have done a lot of missions stuff before and I think the thing I believe in the most is whenever handouts are given, they should be given from the local church. I don't want to ever distort viewpoints or embellish the idea of the "rich American." We did have the pastor with us, which was great, but because our gift seemed so small, I almost just wanted to give him all of them and just allow him to pass them out without 20 people standing around getting pictures of us handing over our gift. It was 100% genuine but it just sat a little weird for me. Either way, it is good for our students to be apart of giving stuff away. After the clothing handout, we went over to the dump site school and put on a concert for the students. Once again, I was super proud of our students that we brought. They were so good. We set up an amp, drums, electric guitar and few microphones and aside from the singers swallowing a few flies while they sang, all went perfect. At the end of the concert, I had the opportunity to call up the teachers and thank them for the way that they are pouring into the students lives. I got to encourage them as a fellow teacher and then we presented the school with a bunch of school supplies, toothbrushes and toothpaste. We also gave the school a set of baseball bases, a baseball bat and a 16'' softball. After all, every school needs a good softball program :-) Thursday evening I had one of the most nerve wrecking experiences I have had since I have been here. Part of what frontline does is put together tent crusades. These crusades draw hundreds of people and allow them to share the gospel with them. I may show my cards a little too much by writing this but I HATED it. I am not a bullhorn Christian, and if I am honest, I never will be. I don't like the idea of scaring people into a relationship with Christ. It isn't my style nor do I ever want it to be. At the same time, what they are doing out here seems to work. I believe that some people are great at that stuff, and some poeple need that type of outreach in order to encounter God. After all, if it hadn't been for tent crusades, nothing within frontline ministries would have been started. At the same time I am glad we don't do those type of things back home. Anyway, they asked Tim (the other youth pastor) and myself to speak at the event. In reality, I could have said no and it would have been fine but I knew that I needed to stretch myself and share a little. The worst part was that the translators weren't the greatest at English. Basically, I am not sure if what I really said was communicated to the crowd but I guess God will use whatever came across. There was one part of the translation that stirred quite the laughter. I was trying to relate part of my story to the crowd. I said, "if you, like me, came here tonight...." Instead, the translator relayed the idea of "if you like me...." The comma between the you and the like was crucial in that statement. There was a lot of laughter and it wasn't until later that night that it was explained to me what happened. After the testimony, they showed this AWFUL video that presented the gospel. I didn't like it at all. Although I was nice and tried not to laugh too hard, it was a little too much for me when they showed the people screaming and melting as they were surrounded by the flames of hell. I don't want to judge because I believe 100% in what frontline is doing, but it wasn't my cup of tea as far as movies go- not a big fan at the scare tactic. I felt bad for Tim who had to follow up the video with a message. He did a fantastic job! His message was great but once again, I am convinced that the translation was lost. The guy that hopped up to translate came with us on an outing a few days ago and I am pretty sure he knew a total of 20 English words. I felt terrible for Tim but he took it in stride.

Friday-
We took the refuge kids to go ice skating. What an adventure. We went to this huge mall in Manila. Funny how just the other day in Manila the poverty was devastating and then today we went to the other side and went to this HUGE mall that had an ice skating rink in the middle. Who would have thought. The kids were so scared on the skates and it was pretty fun to see them get to try something new. I can't remember the last time I ice skated but I was presently surprised at how I was able to remember how to do it. We then treated the kids to pizza hut (which most of the FTC kids ordered chicken and rice instead of pizza) and spent the afternoon hanging with them. In the evening, Romano (blue box pastor) took Tim and I to see a life group, the churches version of "small groups." It was incredible! The life group took place in something similar to a squatter village near the market. In order to get to the families house, we walked into what appeared to be a small alley. The trench for the waste from the outhouses ran along side us as we weaved through this narrow walkway to get to the back of the village. We weaved around for at least 2 minutes before we got to the end. As we walked back, I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that if a fire started, all the people on the inside would be trapped in. There is no way, all the people would get out, there is just too many people and only one small passageway. We sat on the porch of a home with a group of people that ranged from their 70's to about 5 years old. It was such a beautiful sight and such a real example of what community looks like. The members of the group were all from the village and started coming because of the one couple that lived there. On the car ride over to the group Tim asked what the group had been talking about over the past couple of weeks. Romano shared that he had been spending time talking about prayer and then he talked about the things that he was going to cover that night. When we got to the group, we opened with a word of prayer, one song and then Romano said, "I have brought friends from the United States and they are going to lead us tonight." At this point in the trip, it doesn't seem to faze me anymore. Two weeks ago, I would get frustrated if the announcements or the service flow wasn't communicated for a StuCo service at the yellow box. Now, I think I am just used to the "whatever" type of mentality that occurs out here. I have come to accept that at a moments notice, I have to be ready to do anything. After the life group, Tim was going to give speaking at the crusade another chance and I decided to head back to the blue box to join our youth who spoke at the youth service.
After the youth service, Bob and Vicky (two other adults from our group that are out with their family) Lani (one of the students living at FTC) and myself decided to hit the streets of San Pablo. Lani came to FTC about 3 years ago. She lived out on the streets, used to rely on the glue as a form of inhalants to help her deal with the hunger pains, and had suffered the sexual abuse of male figures in her life. About 3 years ago, Bob was out on a trip the Philippines and him and the others from the group came out to hang out with the street children. Lani had met people from frontline before but like most of the kids on the street refused to go with them to live at the center. Most of the street children don't want help because they know it means that they will have to live with some structure in their life. They don't want the rules, they don't want to go to school and they can't imagine breaking away from the drug addictions that they have. At this point in Lani's journey, something opened up to allow Bob to really work on her heart. Although it took several conversations during Bob's stay, Bob finally expressed to Lani how he had a daughter who was Lani's age. He didn't want to go home and not know if Lani was going to be alright. Lani broke down, her heart softened and she asked for one more night in the streets and then she would return to FTC. Although Bob didn't believe that she was going to make her way to the camp, Lani was showed up when she promised. About a month after Lani arrived, they found out that she was pregnant. Now, Lani is a mature 17 year old mother with the most beautiful little girl I have seen. Bob, Vicky and their family has kept in touch with Lani and they have come out on numerous occasions to visit her. Lani really views Bob and Vicky as a parent figure. It's a neat thing to observe. Lani took Bob, Vicky and I to all the places she used to sleep before she came to the camp. She walked us through her story, explained how she used to get food, shower and stay safe. It was fascinating. We stopped to buy shad pow (a bun filled with rat meat) and talked some more. Lani showed us how to eat the shad pow but I picked at the bun and pretended to eat the meat. There was no way, with all my digestion issues, I was taking the risk of eating this thing. I tried to be polite and although Bob called my bluff, I was alright with being a wimp about this one. Jeff Rice (one of the American missionaries) heard that we were walking the streets and met up with us. We continued to walk and found a group of street kids. They all knew Jeff, or as they say brother Jeff, and we spent some time hanging out with them. All of them were super dirty and they were higher than a kite. The glue smell on them was super strong and their pupils were so dilated it was crazy. At the same time they were soooo loving. You could tell that although they were going to refuse our offer to join FTC, they loved it when brother Jeff showed up. We took them to Jollybee (the local fast food chain) and bought them a chicken and rice meal as a trade for all the glue they were carrying. If they didn't hand over the glue, we wouldn't give them the meal. As we walked into the restaurant, kids started coming out of the woodwork. When it was all said and done, we bought about 15 kids meals and spent about 30 minutes just getting to know them at the restaurant. The kids ranged from a 4 month old, to about 15 years old. My heart has never quite broken so much for a group of kids. It was the weirdest thing, after the meal to just walk away and tell the kids we loved them. Those kids have a choice and unfortunately, they are choosing the streets of San Pablo. They find garbage or scraps of cardboard to pad the sidewalk and they just sleep there all night long. They get raped, they go without food, but yet they choose the streets because it is less structure and they can be with their friends. Once we said our goodbyes and wished them the best, Lani wanted to take us to see Rachel. Rachel was her best friend on the street and also her cousin. Rachel was there the night Bob encouraged Lani to come to FTC. Lani said yes, but Rachel refused the offer. We walked up to Rachel and she was sitting on a bucket at the street corner. She was surrounded by her pimps and a couple other females. You could see all the bones in her shoulders and her eyes couldn't stay focused on us. It is obvious there is quite a bit of brain damage that has taken place due to the drugs she has been using. Lani talked with her for quite a bit. She asked her to stop going with these men and tried to show her how much better her life has become. While we were there Rachel got a costumer. Rachel refused to go and the guy (who was higher than a kite) became super angry with us. He asked us to follow him and we didn't. He came back with a small wrench and asked again. My heart began pounding at this point, and Vicky and I moved closer to Jeff and Bob out of fear. Jeff agreed that we needed to leave and said our goodbyes to Rachel. On one hand, I wanted to get off the streets and back where it was safe but on the other hand, I knew that this 15 year old girl was going to allow this high, disgusting jerk take advantage of her for a measly couple of pesos. It made my skin crawl. I wanted to go back and beat the dirtbag with the wrench. Once we got to a more public place, we caught a trike and headed back to FTC. When we walked through the doors of the camp, my heart looked at the kids so differently. Suddenly each of their stories were so real. The beauty of the camp was shinning a little brighter. These kids really do have hope. They have a chance to become something. As I hugged the kids to say goodnight, I felt this motherly sense stir in me. I was so proud of them. I was proud of them for saying yes to getting off the street and into FTC. At the same time, my heart is broken tonight knowing that there are kids we fed that could face some brutal stuff tonight.