My team spent the month of January in the Philippines at Kids International Ministries. Here is a glimpse of all the ministries that I was involved with last month and what it looked like.
Arvin is so special. This kid is lit up with joy whenever I see him. He is joyful despite his disabilities. Arvin is in the special needs class at the primary school. I got a chance to be in his class one day and it was great. He is one of 3 in the class. After being in his class I began to notice him on the streets outside our mission base. He runs up to me and jumps up in my arms each time he sees me. Never wanting to let go of me, Arvin makes me feel so loved. He is so precious, though I do not know exactly where he lives or who his parents are. I don’t know what his home life is like. Each time I am holding little Arvin my heart melts thinking of how much he longs to be loved.
I had the chance to go to the birthing clinic twice last week with my team mate Amy. Women come to the clinic once a week for a checkup, snack and bible study. I felt so privileged to be there with those women helping with their checkups. The first day I was asked to take their pulse but I got too nervous because I have no experience in such. I was able to weigh the women when they arrived and give them vitamins and eggs as they left their visit.
The next day, I went again to the clinic, this time determined to do the pulse’s. Before we began the checkups, Amy did a devotion for the women. She spoke on how our bodies are ment to be a temple of the Lord so we must take care of it in different ways, such as spiritually and physically. After her 15 minute devotion she continued on to a 15 minute Zumba time! These ladies where loving dancing with us. It was a lot of fun and the nurses decided they want to start doing Zumba with the ladies each week so they can stay physically active. So, yes I did take the ladies pulse that day and it was good. I felt empowered to be able to do anything that God asks of me each day even if I feel I have no clue what I am doing.
Amy and I have gotten close to a family this month. There is Ati (aunt) Vergie, Chona, Vergie’s sister in law, and Beyonce, Vergie’s daughter. Ati Vergie owns a shop right near the childrens home. These ladies are so kind, sweet and amazing. The first day I met Ati Vergie she invited us to Beyonce’s birthday party that evening. We went and it was a lot of fun just hanging out with the family, eating some delicious food like fried chicken and spegetti, and getting to know them a bit better. The next day Amy and I took them out to Mcdonalds for a treat. Since then, I have been stopping by as often as I can and saying hi and sometimes even going in to hang out with the ladies. Beyonce is adorable, always asking me to sleep over. Their home consists of the small shop down stairs and up a ladder inside is their room. They have a mattress leaned against the wall and some plastic chairs that stack up to sit on during the day. They live simple and sweet. I have grown to love this family so much and am already in tears thinking about leaving them next week.
The main ministry I have been involved with this month is the feedings. Each day, Monday through Friday, at 10 am and 4 pm there are feeding in different communities. We load up a vehicle with hot food and volunteers. We then travel to a poor community and scoop out the rice and protein enriched meal. Children and adults line up to get their food. Some of us scoop out the food, others go through the small streets yelling “feeding! Feeding” and the children come running behind us. I absolutely love this ministry and loving on the people in each place. Two nurses also come to the feeding and provide first aid medical care, bandaging wounds, giving vitamins and other medicines they may need. The feedings have defiantly given me ideas of what I could do in African villages one day.
There is a children’s home around the corner from the base and I have gotten to work in the nursery a few times with the infants and toddlers. I have fallen in love with these babes. They need so much love and affection. I worked a shift from 10 pm to 6 am the other night. These kids are rowdy too, waking up between 4 and 5 am ready to play. They are quite the handful. Two of the 2 year olds are being adopted. One of their parents are coming next week and the other within the next month. The little girl understands that she is getting a mommy and daddy and for that she is very excited!
Some of us have been going down to a community known as the River Beds and building relationships with many women and children there. We would just go and walk through stopping to talk and get to know the women. There are not many men around but there are teenage boys who our guys play basketball with when we go there.
We had a “Girl’s Party” one day for all the women and girls around the River Bed Community and so many people showed up! It was so much fun painting nails, doing make up and dancing with them. I actually painted nails almost the whole time the party was going on. It was nice to be able to talk and get to know them a little bit as I was painting. I found out that many of the women have gone to Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia, and many other places being nannies. This is good for income but not so good for their families because they end up leaving their children with whoever while they are away for up to a few years at a time working.
Our ministry contacts have gotten some land across from this community donated to them. They are in the process of finding out what the community is in need of so that they can put it into use for their benefit. This is a main reason they sent us out to the River Beds to find out their needs.
Another ministry here is a Spa. The spa is at the base and has given training and jobs to many women in the community. The women do manicures, pedicures, facials, haircuts and massages. Personally, I have taken advantage of the massages here. The girls on my team look at it as; we are feeding a family by getting a spa treatment!
This month my team has been living at the Jazz home. It’s a home where 30+ preteen and teenage girls live. Most of them have families just living here for different reasons such as their home life just was not very good for them to stay in.
It has been fun living here though I wish I had gotten to know the girls better. These girls are so busy with school and sports and we are in other ministries as well. We took the girls to the pool on Saturday and a few of us went to their basketball tournament and they won! It was a great day spending time with the girls and building relationships.
January was a month of amazing ministry opportunities. I enjoyed this a lot!
