WORLD RACE MONTH 10
Where:
Penang, Malaysia
When:
September 24th – October 19th
Who:
The Goonies (NEW TEAM!)
Abbie, 22
Anna, 22
Sarah, 22
Kirsten, 23
Lindsey, 25
Alyssa, 26
Ministry:
This month, the Goonies are working with a ministry called St. Joseph’s Home. The home provides housing, meals, and overall care for 39 kids, aged 5-18, who come from struggling families. The home is overseen by the local Catholic Church and runs completely off of donations.
Hosts:
Sister Margaret
Currency:
Malaysian Ringgit
Language:
Malay and some English
Dress Code:
This month, our dress code is basically the same it’s been all of Asia. Cover your shoulders and chest and no short shorts. That it’s, nothing crazy. But this month has been really interesting because most of the women here are covered from head to toe to abide by Muslim religion.
Food:
What even is Malaysian food… it’s like this weird mix between Chinese and Indian. So basically curry. SPICY curry. And if you know me, you know I don’t do spicy food… it’s been quite interesting. Most of our meals are prepared by the staff at St. Joseph’s. We eat what the kids eat. We sit down with them at meal time, pray, grab our plates, wait in line for food, eat with each other, and then wash our dishes. It so much fun getting judged on how we eat by 8 year olds…
<<< Fun fact: in Malaysia, people eat with both a fork and spoon. A fork in the left hand and a spoon in the right. No chopsticks! The kids always look at me so weird when I eat with only a fork. I’m pretty much a monster to them…>>>
Lodging:
We sleep in the home with the kids. There are two rooms for us. We have beds, fans, and angry bird sheets! We have it made. Although there is no a/c and it gets pretty toasty in rooms, it rains a lot so that makes the weather a little more bearable. The rooms are so peaceful… besides the church bells that ring every morning at 6am for about 5 minutes nonstop!
Bathroom:
This month, each room has its own bathroom. There are toilets, toilet paper, sinks, and showers! At some point there were warm showers, but somehow we’ve managed to break the water heaters. Not sure how, but now it cold showers!!!
Laundry:
I wonder if I can go the rest of this year without ever having to hand wash my clothes again. That would be so awesome. This month, once again, we have a machine. It’s so great to be able to just throw your clothes in and go on with your day and not have to spend 3 hours scrubbing.
Ministry:
• Hangouts: This month, our main ministry is with the 39 kids that live at the home. Everyday when they get home from school around 1:00, they are ours. We help them with schoolwork, play with them, and basically just talk to them. It’s so simple, but you can tell it means the world to the kids to just have someone to talk to. They all speak very good English and refer to all of us as “sister”. It’s been so entertaining.
<<< Fun fact: the kids all have cool names like John the Baptist, Joyce Meyers, and Julia Roberts >>>
• Organization: While seeking out additional ministry, we offered to organize their supplies closet. This was seriously the most overwhelming thing I’ve done on the race. I didn’t know a single place could contain that many pens, pencils, and erasers. No joke, there were thousands of donated school supplies and we spent a week going through every item to find its place. The majority of the team said they loved organizing and that it was “therapeutic”, but most of the time I just sat on the floor and played with weird things I found in the closet while everyone else was in their “zone”…
• Painting: we spent a couple days scrapping and painting the ceilings in the home. For as much painting we’ve done this year, we are still pretty bad at it. Haha. But the ceilings really did look great after we cleaned up.
Adventures:
• Exploring Penang: This city is definitely one of my favorites. There is so much to do. Most free days were spent just walking around finding new and interesting places. There is tons of street art hidden on every road, tons of cool coffee shops (wheelers is the best), and tons of delicious street food. I even rented a gas scooter one day and just took off exploring the island. It’s was sooo much fun!
• Batu Ferringhi: We hit up the beach one weekend and spent our time getting completely fried. The beach is about 40 minutes from us on a $.50 bus. It was nice to finally get some sun on our pasty skin.
• Penang Hill: We read that this was a cool touristy thing to do here and so finally on our last free day, we ventured up the hill on a sketchy train. We reached the top just before sunset, and we’re greeted by an amazing view of the city. It was such a cool and kinda sad moment to stand with my team overlooking Penang and think about this past year and the fact that we only have about a month left. It’s was a deep moment, especially because there was random sad music playing on the speakers. Haha.
Thank you sooo much for your continued prayers and support. It means the world to me.
If you want to reach out to me, please do! Even just to say hi! Facebook is the way to go and I’ll reply as the the wifi allows.
Love you all!
Cheers, Abigail Sheckells
