Expectations get the best of World Racers. Here is a little rundown of what I expected some of the months of the race to look like…and the reality.
In India we worked in a special needs orphange. The idea of this our first month made me a tiny bit uneasy. The sinful human me imagined it would be a month full of intense babysitting and possibly covered in drool the whole month. I was secretly a bit jealous of the other teams who got to be in “normal” orphanages. Honestly I will never be the same again after what the Lord did in January. These kids were the most beautiful things I have ever seen in my life. I actually still swear to this day that I will go back and adopt one of the little boys Baskar one day. Culturally they were considered “unwanted” but as I looked into their little beautiful eyeballs all I could see was how beautiful the Lord truly is. I fell in love for sure.
Upon arrival to Swaziland, we knew we would be working with a ton of AIDS orphans. My expectation? I imagined getting out of the car and walking in slow motion– with soft sad music in the background– to a child in a crowd glowing with a shirt that says “I am dying of HIV” and I would sit there weeping and crying and the child passed away from this world. Ridiculous I know but that’s what the commercials/stories make it seem. Honestly I have no idea whether 99% of the babies I held had aids or not. It didn’t matter at the time. There are little to no symptoms. They are just normal little kids running around being kids. Don’t get me wrong, it is an absolutely terrible epidemic but it is SO easy to love on them. it isn’t a scary experience. It is normal life. What we are called to do. Swazi was the second time I fell in love on the race and for sure desire to go back and yet again adopt a kid… or 12.
In Mozambique we worked with street boys. I expected they would be boys who have been orphaned and have no where at all to go. Who are hungry. Scared. Who will just want to curl up in my lap for the whole month and feel my love. WRONG. These boys are hilarious but SO out of control. There are some who have ended up on the streets based on situations at home but most are addicted to the thrill and freedom of living on the street. One reason I heard was” my cousin ran away and so I left home to find him… haven’t left the streets since.” Really? Real life. There are some that have been abused or just not a good environment at home but for this day and age there is always an alternate route. There are places all around Mozambique and the world that are eager to get kids off the streets and/or send them home. It has to be a choice… but there is a huge need for advocates. Here I am. Third time I fell in love on the race.
We are currently in Thailand. This entire year I have anxiously awaited this month working in the red light district. I can’t lie… leading up to this month I obnoxiously imagined wearing all black clothes with a bazooka on my back running through dark allys ripping girls out of chains and dragging them to freedom. What is it really like? It looks like a bar in the US. It is nothing out of the ordinary. You walk onto this road and there are hundreds of bars lined up. They all look the same. They all have 5-6 bartenders that you can just so happen hire for a couple hours for sex to feed the desire in your heart that is in desperate need for the Lord. The difference between this reality and what I expected is that the girls we come in contact with.. have a choice. They are not trafficked for the most part. Those who are trafficked are in the closed bars we are not allowed to enter for our own discretion. It is heartbreaking but it gives me hope… we can have an influence on these girls who are literally think this is their identity for life. They aren’t necessarily happy BUT it does give them a paycheck at the end of the day. Which is where we come in this month. More info to come on this month don’t you even fret. This is the fourth time I have fallen in love this year.
I can go on and on with all the months but you got the gist. In conclusion to all this- clearly I have a minor pride issues. In every single one of these situations I wanted to be the savior. I wanted to be the instant gratification of “the least of these” while in retrospect we are all the same. We all need love. The babies in India? Need love. There are no where near enough workers at the orphanage to love on these little babies. They are taken care of but they do not get the necessary amount of attention. Babies in Swazi? Need love as well. They are not broken. They are not gross. They will not give you AIDS just by being around them. They need people just to hold them. It is hardcore looked down upon in African culture to have AIDS even if the kid was freakin born with it. They need love. Mozambique boys? Need love as well. They need to feel the love that they lack at home. They need to be reminded that they are merely kids. They don’t have to be the grown men they are expected to be on the streets. And the Prostitutes? LOVE. They need to be poured into and told very softly that they are worth so much freaking more than the way they are treated. Funny how all of the above need love. Weird. It’s like we were made to love or something…
