THE PHILIPPINES | Manila/Malaybalay
Hey Supporters and Friends,
Sorry I have not written I did actually make it to the Philippines on time I just have not had a chance to write. I still feel a bit numb to this whole experience, I have to constantly remind myself that I am on the World Race and that I am half way across the world from home, but it is been hard because we have a lot of the same comforts.
We flew from Hong Kong to Manila where we spent from Wednesday to Sunday Morning with KIM, Kids International Missions. It was a wonderful ministry and experience in Manila. I have never been overseas so all that I knew was solely from pictures. The bus ride from the airport to the ministry was rough seeing all the shanty villages and people. I just tried to take it all in and keep from just pitying. When we got to KIM it was nice to be able to stay in dorms, with our own bathrooms. I did take cold showers but I found out later that everyone else was taking hot ones and I apparently was not turning the right nob….hahhah…but subconsciously I was just trying to rough it hahha. In Manila KIM has several ministry opportunities including churches and an orphanage which is where I spent a lot of time. The children were just so full of love and life. Most of them even spoke English and would make fun of me for being unable to speak Tagalong. But I tried my best.
On Friday they told us that we would be splitting up to our different ministry sites and that we would be going with three other teams to the island of Mindanao. In the city of Malaybalay, KIM has another branch. Their sole focus is a Children’s home.
We arrived here on Sunday afternoon with Jeremy and his family who are the leaders over this KIM branch. It is absolutely beautiful here with a perfect mountain view. And to our benefit it is about 20 degrees cooler than in Manila which is highly appreciated.
Our main focus while here is to help at the orphanage. There are 24 kids ranging from 6 months to 13 years old. They are all so beautiful and each definitely has their own personality. We have broken the responsibility between the 24 world racers into about 8 hour shifts 24/7. My first shift is tomorrow at 5 to help the older kids get ready for school and then Friday I have the night shift with the babies which I am sooo excited about!
Our other focus is to grass their soccer field. On first thought this seemed easy. But the field is HUGE and in order to plant grass we have to remove all the rocks including this large boulder in the middle. We also have to remove all the current grass and weeds from the field. So today that is what we did. All day I was either picking up rocks or basically hard-core weeding. Normally this would be miserable, but just thinking about the kids being able to play on nice green grass instead of an equivalent of Red Georgia dirt was enough to keep me going. We will definitely sleep well tonight.
The ministry is also nice because during the month we will have opportunities to work at a nearby jail, help with Awana, and do a feeding program for the city. There are also amazing places that we will get to go during our off days which I am also excited about.
I miss all of you guys but I know this is where I am supposed to be. God has already begun to work which I will talk about in my next blog…
