Highlights from January in Manila, Philippines: Loving The Lice!
If you know me well then you know that anything that comes off of or out of a person’s body (scabs, boogers, dandruff) grosses me out in the worst way. Hair is by far the nastiest, especially when taking it out of your food. So spending an afternoon deliceing 8 kids with kerosene and then picking the eggs out by hand, one at a time wouldn’t sound like my favorite afternoon, but actually its up there with the top 3 this month!
One of my love languages or ways of expressing love to people is acts of service. I enjoy showing people I care by doing little things for them here and there that they might want or need. I didn’t want to end my shift early so for the last 30 minutes I pulled up a chair and started the egg hunt. We definitely looked like primates grooming each other. So much of the month has been reprimanding the kids and reminding them again and again to follow their first rule: obey the first time. Again, attitude accompanied by murmuring under breath and words in Tagalog. It is incredibly difficult for them to understand that we are only trying to help them, that all of this is really for them. So when I had a chance to tend to their needs and help them in a way many wouldn’t I was super excited… not at first but eventually.
As a friend put it “doing mindless tasks, like weeding a garden or stuffing envelopes keeps my flesh busy so my spirit can thrive.� I totally enjoyed the effortless chore of: find an egg, pull it out, find an egg, pull it out. As my hands were working God was showing me love in such an odd place: lice eggs, and whether the kids realized it or not it was awesome to love on them more than I usually take the time to.
