Day Five

Hi its richard writing my first entry onto the blog. Sorry it's been long, but i hve limited acess to the internet since i am staying at the church and not at the girls' home like Sarah and Becky.

I will update on what I have done/experienced that sarah and Becky have not. Firstly as I mentioned I am staying in an appartment at the church which is about 10-20 minutes from the girls' home (depending on traffic) and there are three others staying at the church as well, Tony the caretaker, Daal who is a bhurmese student at the seminary and Leo who is the old caretaker's son. On Sunday afternoon after the morning service there was a time when some of the officers of the church did sme open air preaching in the streets. I went along with them and watched, with a few others but the preaching was in tagalog so i couldnt understand it. The preaching was relatively well recieved, there were around 30 who styed and listened. There was no vocal or physical taunting, some appeared intersted but i think most of the people stayed out of courtesy, as is the culture here.

Tuesday 6th June

In the morning i went to the shopping centre with tony after helping with some basic chores around the church. The shopping centre was upmarket and had shops such as adidas, nike and Marks and Spencer! After lunch i was picked up by the minibus that was collecting the girls from the home who attended elementary school. I spent the rest of the day there and we played with the children, who enjoyed playing with our cameras and took alot of pictures, five pictures of my feet were taken on becky's camera alone! Some of the girls took us up a hill near the home that gave a great view of the city, and that was a good opportunity for even more photos. I was also able to learn more of the circumstances that some of the girls were in before coming to the home, and they are very sad stories and the girls really appreciate the security that comes from staying at the home.
After we had dinner at the home me, sarah and becky gave the devotion to the girls. We shared with them our testimonies and taught them a chorus ("wide, wide as the ocean...."). We had been asked to each take devotions for the girls' the day before and we thought that as this first one was short notice we would share it, and tell them of something familiar to us, I am taking a devotion on friday, but this will be to an older goup. I then was given a lift back to church, and when they found that i have a licence i was offered to drive at some point while i am over here. The offer was quikly rejected as it seems the drivers here all have a death wish! That is all from me today