Bringing Sight for the Blind

We’ve been working with 3 different ministries, “St. Nicholas Home for the Blind”, Adventist Hospital, and KAWAN homeless ministries. We are in a YWAM (Youth With A Mission) “base” or housing with 4 floors, washing machines on the roof, and beautiful sunsets overlooking Penang Hill… we love to listen to worship music and have meetings on the roof 🙂 It’s not too hot here (80s- low 90s) but the humidity is pretty killer. However this month we are in a city called Georgetown, on an island called Penang, with a little over 1 million people living in it, so the modern commodities do include AC. 

• 33 hours wiping walls 
• 26 hours cleaning windows
• 14 hours moving organizational closets  
• 12 hours mopping dirty floors, cleaning dirty fans, and talking with the staff

Well… actually none of those numbers are true, but it sure felt pretty close at times. Wish we would have started counting from the beginning ;)… Its been a great time there, the staff are hilarious, and the programs they have set up for the blind and visually impaired are impressive to say the least. They do a wonderful job of building awareness in the community as well as bringing equal opportunity for the visually impaired. 

• Information Technology Courses
• Visual aids such as braille printers and screen-reading software help make IT employment a viable option from even the craziest of circumstances
• Vocational Training/Employment
• Massage
• Baking

• Basketry Arts                         

Penang is mostly Malaysia people (about 50%) but the breakdown of the other half are  50% Chinese, 20% Indian, 10% Other (Japanese, Nepalese, Thai, etc) And in this melting pot of Malaysia enough people speak English to get by but the occasional “Tarima Kasi” (thank you) or “Salamet Pagi” (good morning) can help to make the locals smile 🙂

I hope you enjoy this little video of the walk into the St. Nicholas Home/School for the Blind… where  

 “We Walk by Faith, Not by Sight”

Love Love.

Joshua