This month while in Manila we have had the privilege to live together as a whole squad and not just in our teams. So since there are 25 of us here in Manila we can serve in a variety of different ministries. Four of us Jessie Pace, Gabrielle Rodgers, Jane Kim and myself have been serving with a local ministry here in Manila named Samaritana. Samaritana is Tagalo (the local tongue) for Samaritan woman (John 4). This ministry serves the local community and helps women who are working in prostitution and it trains them in a trade so that they support their families outside of prostitution.
Well – there is my preface so you know why this blog had to be written. We are living this month in Antipolo (Manila is set up with different “cities” or areas) and Samaritana is in Quezon City. Well without traffic it takes a half an hour drive to get to Quezon City but with traffic one and a half hours +! I don’t have words to describe the traffic here in Manila it is unbelievable! Anyways, we take a taxi to and from Samaritana each day we go.
Well, it is almost impossible to catch a taxi as a white person here. We waited the other day for 1/2 an hour and about 5 taxis passed us but they were full. Then a few finally pulled over and they wanted to charge us triple the standard meter rate! All over the world (that we have been to thus far) people assume white skin = money so prices are changed and such. Everday that we attempt to go to Samaritana or come home from there we have waited 30 minutes or over an hour to get a taxi. So while we wait everyday we question why does it take such effort to get a ride. Our recent thoughts have led us to conclude that it is an attempt to discourage us from this ministry and we have all agreed that it is the thing that we cannot do. We cannot get our own transport we have to rely on the Lord to provide. Here is Rollie today trying to fetch us a cab (with a Jeepnie in the background). It even took him a long time to get a ride for us.
We have begun pulling out the missionary card so when they try to price gauge our ride we tell them we are poor missionaries (even Rollie pulled the “M” card today)! So the lesson we are learning is dependence – it seems a silly way to learn to depend but that is what we are learning through everyday life.
