For the month of August, we stayed with Andrei and Larisa Luca in Ocnita, Moldova—so far north, we were 3km from the Ukrainian border. While there, we partnered with Andrei’s church, the House of Prayer, where we did manual labor in the mornings and kid’s ministry in the evenings.
They warned us Moldova was the poorest country in Europe. They warned us Moldova was a major hotspot for women being sex trafficked to other countries. They warned us Moldova (and each country we’ve been to so far) was still reeling from the worldwide economic downturn.
But that’s what I saw. They didn’t describe the rolling sunflower fields littering the countryside or the freshly ripe peaches sold at the farmer’s market for $0.65/kilo or the beautiful kids playing semi-violent Russian games in the church yard.
When it comes down to it: Moldova is memorable because of the kids. Kids popped out of the woodwork each day when we manually bushwacked the overgrown weeds surrounding the church. Kids climbed through the broken fence when the church gate was locked. Kids walked us home after the lesson we put on, even if that meant they walked to their own home in the dark. Kids communicated through games and song better than any adult could overcome the complicated Russian-English language barrier.
Katya is a bright, smiley, beam of sunshine who would see me coming from 100 yards away, run up the street, and body slam me with her hugs so hard my knees nearly gave out.
Sasha is a chubby, sailor-hat-wearing, 10-year-old little man who tucked his plastic, green water gun into his waistband as he deftly hacked away trees with a dull axe.
Marick is Andrei and Larisa’s 2-year-old miracle who ran around our house butt naked, liberally using his freedom to pee anywhere he chose, whether it be the welcome mat, sidewalk, off the balcony, or our shoes.
Nastia is a 16-year-old beauty that gracefully lifted the responsibility of leading the band of neighborhood kids, while simultaneously translating our English stories into Russian (she knows four languages, by the way).
Every day we worked at the church, I saw these same kids come by and help. We never asked them to weed, but I saw a girl stick her bare hand into a tangle of poisonous vines to rip them out, while all us racers were using thick work gloves. Sasha refused to stop sawing branches off trees until they were all cut down, and even then, I had to pry the saw from his hands.
I don’t know about you, but I sure as heck never voluntarily did anything like that when I was a kid! These kids were joyful turning work into play. Neither their home and family situations nor financial situations took away from their eagerness to spend their free days working with us on the church.
One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned is that they've found joy in the small things. Have you?
