Big Brothers Big Sisters

For a little over a year now I have been the liaison for my church and Big Brothers Big Sisters (BBBS) for our county. Now, before beginning my role I had only associated BBBS with the inner city because most of their promos have non-white children featured and our county is predominately white...let me fill you in, when I graduated high school there were only 4 black students at my school and 3 were siblings...triplets actually. Get the picture? I quickly learned that while our county, specifically our town, is very wealthy we have a divorce rate that is higher than the national average. The people in our town tend to put on a show and pretend that everything is just fine inside their huge houses located in the gated neighborhoods but the truth is their families are struggling too...and boy do we see this being involved in youth ministry too. I know our town has issues, I just didn't know BBBS was involved in neighborhoods that aren't located in the inner city.

BBBS has this awesome program where mentors can meet with students during their lunch break on the child's school campus. This is an amazing ministry for a few reasons...one it is only 45 minutes a week so it is not a huge time commitment, two, you can talk about anything you want with the student..even Christ!...three, it makes a huge difference to the students.

Last year I met with an 8th grade girl who was labeled "at-risk" by the school counselors. She was failing most of her classes and had been caught in the bushes with boys...during school hours. She was a beautiful girl who had lots of family issues and just wanted to be loved. We had a great time when we were able to meet and she even graduated the 8th grade which she was not expected to do.

This past week I was able to meet my new little sister...she is a little ball of fire! We were no more than two minutes into talking and getting to know each other when she says "My life sucks!" At least she is open! She is also "at-risk" and is failing most of her classes and has some family problems but hopefully our time together can be great and we can get her grades up.

I tell these stories to encourage you to get involved with BBBS. It truly is an organization that is making a difference in our communities. A lot of the students who are in need of mentors are lacking one of their parents being involved in their life and have little to no friends on campus. Meeting with them at lunch could mean that once a week they know they will have someone they can sit with at lunch and they won't be alone, someone to listen to them, to encourage them and someone who can tell them they are worth something and that they are cared about.

Check them out and see how you can get involved in a child's life...

Culture Shock

Culture Shock basically is the disorientation or confusion felt when entering a different or unknown culture. Not surprisingly I experienced this when getting off the plane in Calcutta but I also experienced what is known as Reverse Culture Shock which happens when re-entering the familiar culture...well, I actually experienced this during our layover in Dubai which is located in the United Arab Emirates...the Middle East. Dubai is the wealthiest city per capita...mind you, Calcutta is the poorest city per capita. The airport itself is incredible. There are huge water falls, beautiful decorations and it is spotless. They even have reclining chairs for those long layovers. On our way home from Calcutta we had a long layover so we stayed in a hotel and had the opportunity to do a little sight-seeing.

The mall in Dubai is unbelievable. I've never seen anything like it...and I am NOT exaggerating. This mall has every restaurant you can think of...we ate at Chili's...and it was great! The most impressive thing about the mall was that there are ski slopes inside the mall. Yup, you read that correctly, ski slopes...in the middle of a mall which is in the middle of the desert!


Yes, Dubai is sweet. They pride themselves in being the best and having the record in everything. Dubai just built the tallest building in the world, has a building that is on the ocean and has a grocery store called "Safest Way"...that's right, not Safeway because that is American but Safest Way.

After being in Calcutta for 2 weeks and drinking instant Nescafe coffee I was thrilled to get a real latte and do a little people watching.

To Go or Not To Go....

Anyone who knows me or even reads my blog can tell that I am a huge missions person. I became a Christ Follower on a house building trip to Mexico and have done everything I can to go on more each year. This year we were set to take over 200 high school students and leaders to Mexico over Spring Break when chaos broke out. The media decided to begin showing stories of violence in the California/Mexico border towns and warning people to not go near Mexico. Now, as Christians we are called to live on the edge through faith, right? We are called to go into places no one else wants to go into. Well, that is not exactly how the parents of minors see it.

One Wednesday night one of the top news stories was about how people are getting killed all over Mexico. (Now, let's be realistic here...it's not happening ALL OVER Mexico. It's kind of like when there are huge wildfires in Southern California and I live at least 6 driving hours away from them I get calls from family that live on the East Coast asking if our house is burning down. Lesson 1: before going crazy pull a map up from Google and take a look at the areas of violence and the areas of travel.) So, news story airs on Wednesday night and thus begins the frenzy. Thursday the church office gets swamped with parents saying their child is not going, the Church is being irresponsible in taking kids to die...because clearly that was our goal all along, Mexicans may need homes but their child is not going to die for THAT...and on and on. We decide to hold a parent meeting in which we could address these issues all at once rather than one by one and even have a representative from the organization we are working with fly up from San Diego.

Here is a brief recap of the meeting:
Matt (Pastor of Student Ministries and my husband) and Jon (Amor Rep.) begin by speaking for about 35-45 minutes about our safety precautions, what we know as fact, what are rumors, how we handle everything, yada, yada, yada....they do a GREAT job by the way.

And this happens....

Parents begin asking questions:
some are valid questions-
can my child at least call to let me know they are OK? (We usually don't allow contact with family/friends at home for many reasons but that is another post for another time!)
How far away from the violence will you be....
Is there a fence around the area where you stay...

And then the ridiculous questions:
Q. Who will be armed (carrying guns)?
My thought: is that really the best solution? To add more guns to the situation...and what are you expecting- for us Christian missionaries to get into a shoot out with the drug cartel?
Appropriate and given answer: it is illegal for US citizens to carry guns into Mexico, so no one will be carrying guns.
Response from a parent and leader on the trip: there are 230 of us and we all have hammers-so yes we are armed!

Q. Do the drug cartel know our group is coming down over spring break?
My thought: Yes, I just emailed them and they will be waiting at the border for us. Oh, Should I not have them on our email distribution list??
Appropriate and given answer: I'm really not sure.

Q. Does building houses in Mexico even have a benefit.
My thought: I'm going to hurt you right now for even asking that question.
Appropriate and given answer: The Mexico trip changes not only the lives of the Mexican families we minister to but all the lives of the students and leaders.

So, after the meeting we thought the frenzy would calm down...we were wrong. In fact, one parent began emailing students will information from the CIA (false information from what I researched). And, of course on the night of the meeting there had been no reports of violence in Tecate-where we were going. Wouldn't you know it-Wednesday morning reports of 2 sixteen year old girls (from Mexico) being found dead in Tecate began popping up all over the Internet and news channels. Nice timing! So then the calls began to flood in-you lied! You said it was safe in Tecate. Ugh! It WAS!

So, after much, much prayer and hours of research we have had to postpone our annual Mexico trip. I can't tell you how difficult of a decision this was-especially for a missions driven person like myself. If we were taking adults instead of minors on the trip we would still be going. I personally don't think we would encounter any danger but also have to remember that it is different when taking minors instead of adults and that we need to not take the trust of our parents lightly.

I know God will do amazing things wherever we serve. My heart breaks for the students who so badly want to go.

I did learn that I never want to have a parent meeting like that again. I heard that all community meetings in our area are similar to that, needless to say I will not be attending any of those!! It amazes me how we as a youth group/church can do so much for some families and they can turn on you in an instant. It is frustrating to see how some parents have no trust or respect for the church leadership. It also makes me think about how God must feel when people are lukewarm and when people only turn to Him when they need Him and use Him like a genie. If it frustrates me this much I can't imagine how He feels.

Let's pray that the violence in Mexico calms down before Spring Break 2010 so we don't have to go through that again!

Slumdog Millionaire

You've probably heard about the movie Slumdog Millionaire by now but in case you've been in a cave somewhere I'll give you a brief rundown...
Slumdog Millionaire is a movie based in Mumbai, India and it follows the life of a boy who grows up in the slums...he is a slumdog. I won't give away the rest of the story but it is amazing. This movie has won multiple awards including movie of the year.

My husband and I finally got an opportunity to see it on Valentine's Day and I am so glad we did. This movie is very well done and very realistic. The only thing missing for me was the smells of India. Everything else was included in the movie.

It was difficult for me to watch because it immediately brought me back to Calcutta and made my heart ache for the people I left behind there and for the little kids that I encountered. One scene in the movie is of kids getting their eyes burned with a hot liquid. This particular scene was difficult for me to watch as I encountered kids who had damaged eyes. This happens so that the children can become "better beggars". Often times parents will break the bones of their babies so that they will grow deformed and they too can be better beggars. It is a tough movie to watch but one that I think everyone should see so that we can gain awareness of what goes on in other countries.

One little girl who we encountered in the market was trying to sell us these bead looking things that grow into gel balls when put in water (they were really strange). She followed us all around the market begging us to purchase her product, which of course none of us had a use or a desire for. We began to pay extra attention to our surroundings and noticed that as she was following us a man was following her. We asked her who he was but she said he was no one and then he started staying further back. Basically he was her pimp...not in a sexual way necessarily but in the fact that he gets the money that she earns from selling her bead-to-gel-ball product. This became a real struggle for us as we had to decide whether or not to purchase one of these items. On the one hand, if you purchase the item the money goes to the pimp and supports him and supports the problem but on the other hand, there is a good chance that if she does not bring in enough money (whatever that is)she will probably be beaten. What's the answer? I'm not sure but we did purchase one packet and had to haggle with her because she wanted to charge us 4 times what she should have. What do you think? What would you have done?



Another thing we encountered over and over was street kids holding crying babies while begging for food and money. Now, sometimes they really are siblings but sometimes they are "borrowed" for purposes of begging. Older children will take crying babies with them so that they get more sympathy and hopefully more money.

It's easy to get frustrated and annoyed that these kids are shoving a crying baby in your face and it can be frustrating when you think about how they are playing with your emotions for money but when I really sat down and thought about it I could not even imagine what I might be willing to do if I was in their situation. I have no idea how I would react and could not get mad when our hotel staff would ask for a bigger tip or a teenage boy would see us coming and go pick up a crying child to show us.


Go see Slumdog Millionaire! It is totally worth the $10.75 or whatever it costs to see a movie now! Go see it so you too can fall in love and then you can go back to Calcutta with me in a few years. I go to a new place and this happens...I always fall in love and can't wait to go back!

Parasites

Often times when staying in another country, especially a developing or third world country, one will become very sick from the water or the food. And, one may even acquire a parasite...it's not that bad, think of it as a gift from your host country. Well, one night, actually our first Saturday in Calcutta I became quite sick...I traced my meals back and realized that I began feeling sick after eating a chicken dish at our hotel. Now, almost everyone had chicken while we were there and it was not my first go at the chicken dish but that did not matter. For some reason that specific piece of chicken did not mesh well with the inner workings of my body. Now, I tell you all this to get to this picture of something we passed every morning on our way to work at Prem Dan.



I show you this not so that you can think about how disgusting it is or how unclean other countries are but so that 1.) you can realize how it is possible for us to get parasites in other countries and 2.) to give you a glimpse of the way of life on the streets of Calcutta. There is nothing wrong with it in Calcutta, they don't get sick from it, just us wimpy-stomached foreigners do. In fact, if we were to bring them to the US and showed them our meat factories (or whatever they are called) they would see an enormous waste of money and time. I bring this up because so often we look at the way others do something and immediately want to fix it and show them the correct way to do it. However, it is only the correct way in our eyes. This method has worked for them for many decades and for us to think that we have all the answers is ignorant and arrogant and is the reason why so many countries around the world despise the US. And, let me just add that when people from other countries travel here to the US they often get sick from our food and water too...it is simply what your body has grown up on and what it is use to...so come on now...let's get off our high horses...we don't have all the answers :-)

Barbara

Barbara was one of the patients at Prem Dan that spoke English really well. She was at Prem Dan because she had a stroke and was not able to move her left leg. Other than that she was pretty healthy. She had even been in a regular hospital but they were charging her too much so she had to leave. And, while she has a family and an apartment her family was unable to take care of her since she needs help getting to the restroom and such. Barbara even knew the pastor we worked with, Pastor Gus, and attends his church. Since the homes for the dying do not offer any rehabilitation or physical therapy our team decided to do it on our own. One day we got Barbara out of bed and we taught her how to use a walker to get around. We would stretch her leg for her and teach her how to do it herself so that she didn't get worse from not using her muscles.

Barbara is an amazing lady and taught our team a lesson in humility one day when she asked if we would pray with her. We prayed for her and when we were finished she began to pray for us. It was a beautiful moment. It was difficult to leave Barbara as we were able to grow closer to her because we did not have a language barrier.

I wanted to share this story with you today because this morning I got great news. Exactly one month ago today we left Calcutta and this morning we got word from one of the volunteers that is still working in Prem Dan that this morning Barbara went home to be with her family. It is wonderful news for us as she was very unhappy and lonely staying at Prem Dan.

This morning was bitter sweet as I heard this news. I am so happy for Barbara but so sad for the other ladies that won't get to go home to their families or don't have families to go home to. It reminds me that while we left Calcutta and came home to the prestige of the United States the men and women we encountered are still there, still struggling for life and still living in the same conditions we saw them in. It reminds me that they were not there just for us to serve but they were there because that is the life they live. They don't get to spend two weeks in it and go on to something better and that is difficult for me to think about.

Street Sights

While grown men are known to bathe on the streets they start raising them up young in Calcutta...here is a little boy being washed by his mother. This sidewalk is right in front of one of the main train stations in Calcutta and is well traveled. It is also alongside what seemed like a freeway (at least a bigger street than anywhere else).


Not only are the street corners a perfect place to take a bath but also to get a shave. Men visit the barber for a facial shave right on the street corner.