Imagine the first time your first born baby started to move, touch things, crawl. Imagine how happy it made you to see your baby be able to do those things. Now, imagine yourself living in a very small place with two other families having no space at all for your baby to be able to move. All you could do is to sit him/ her on the bed so that he/ she isn’t touching the other families stuff. Imagine being told to shut your baby up every night as he/she cries. On top of all that, imagine someone coming to you and saying, “I am going to bring seven more people into this space to live with you.
We got off an overnight ferry at 6AM yesterday. We had until 11:30AM to rest. We got to the refugee camp at 12PM. When they said our first day was going to be a training day, I expected to be sitting in a room listening to someone talk for a few hours. Boy, was I wrong! Our trainer, walked us around camp and pointed out where things are located and some important rules/boundaries we need to be aware of. After she had been talking for a while, she asked us if we were willing to stay and work until 8:30? We agreed to stay and work even though we were all exhausted and in need of sleep.
My teammate Emily and I walked into the office and asked how we could help. We were told to go find a tent that has a certain number on it and see how many people are living in there and how much space there is available. At first, we couldn’t find the tent, but with the help of a very kind old man we found the tent we were looking for. We asked the person inside if we could look around his tent. He very kindly let us into the tent. The first thing I noticed in the tent was an adorable chubby baby sitting on a mattress. Without even saying anything I tried to make the baby smile. I asked the gentleman what his and his baby’s name was. He told me. I asked how old the baby was. Nine months the father answered. Next, we asked how many people were living in the tent? He told us there were 13 people living in one tent! His family plus two other families. We told him we were going to bring a family of seven into this same tent. He said, “I am sorry, I can’t let you do that.” He told us how it is so crowded in the tent and his baby has absolutely zero room to move around. He told us how for the first 25 days he was at camp, he slept outside. Through rain, hot weather etc..he slept outside for 25 days! I started to cry. I didn’t know what to say to him. I wished more than anything to have a place for him and his family. A place his baby could move around and do all the things babies normally do. I told him how sorry I was to see him live the way he is. I told him how much his opinion matters. He said “ I am sorry too”. He said Emily and I were sweet and he could tell it was our first day. We went back to the office and told them what the gentleman said. They told us there are only two families registered to live in that tent and we have no option but to go back to the gentleman and tell him the family of seven has to move to his tent. We went back and told him what we were told. He said “ I am a peaceful person, I like to use my words not fight with my fist.” He told us it was impossible to move seven more people to the tent. He was a very peaceful and kind man. Emily and I kept walking back and forth between the tent and the office telling each party what the other one had said.
I told Emily, through tears “I can’t do this.” She gave me a hug and explained that she was there for me. During our 3rd time going back to the tent, one of the volunteers that has been working there for a while decided to come with us and talk to the gentleman. The conversation kept going for a while. The volunteer lady told the gentleman, she understood his situation. But, there are hundreds of people coming each day and they simply don’t have enough housing for everyone. Because of that, wherever there is space they have to put more people. He asked if he could be moved to a different section where there is more space for the baby. She told him there wasn’t space available at the moment. He said, “If you bring more people to this tent, bring the police with you because I will fight for my baby.”
When I heard I was going to Greece to work with refugees, I was excited. I also knew it was going to be hard. I didn’t expect to be so broken down and be physically and emotionally drained on the first day though. Normally, I feel like if I can’t offer people anything else, I can at least smile. Yesterday, I felt like I couldn’t even smile. There were people that spoke my first language. They were excited to see me. They wanted to speak to me. But, I avoided eye contact and walked by. Because, I didn’t want people to see my sad face. I want to be a person that brings hope to the hopeless through Christ. I didn’t feel like I was doing that yesterday. I was consumed by the brokenness around me. I had a hard time looking at anything positive. I saw so many pregnant women and so many thoughts went through my head. What if that was me, trying to give birth to a new child where there is 5000 people living? Where I don’t even have a proper bed to sleep on? Then I looked at all the young men standing behind fences. I wondered, what if that was my brother Zeke, Charlie, or Getch standing there letting other people make life decisions for them.
This month will be one of the hardest months I will have on the race. But, I pray that I focus more on loving people rather than their problems. Jesus never said serving Him was easy. Please continue to pray for the teams that are serving in Bulgaria and for the teams that are working here in Greece.
Thank you.
