Great Weekend!!!!

Well as promised in my last blog this blog might be a little longer.  This last week was great, well mainly the weekend.  So this whole last week was busy…I kinda felt like I never stopped moving some days.  Then the weekend hit.  Now the weekend was very busy but it was so much fun.  Here at Hebron the school likes its sports.  So this last weekend was the cross country event.  Now we did not compete with any other schools it was just our kids against each other.  Almost all of the little ones ran in the race (shortened track of course), and 6 from each of the older classes ran as well(they run I think 5 km).  I got to work the little ones race, by standing by the path and cheering them on.  Their race for about half of them was almost 1.5 km long.  By the time they got to me they were almost done.  You could see it in their faces that they just wanted to stop but they didn’t.  Once all the kids past me I went to the finish line to see the seniors of the school running alongside the little ones and cheering them on to keep moving till it was over.  It was so sweet to see.  It reminded me of hear Brandon and Chris speak in the student group back home about the older ones reaching down to the younger ones.  That happens here at Hebron all the time.

After cross country I got to meet up with the couple that I stayed with in Bangalore.  They had never been to Ooty so they decided to come down for the weekend.  They took me to lunch and I gave them a tour of the school.  Then it was time to get ready!!!  Ready for what you might be asking…well for the Student Council Event.  These events are amazing.  There were all kinds of food everywhere from all different cultures to try out, and we get to dress up for these events.  This year’s theme was Shrek and his Fairy Tale Land.  See could dress up as anything from a fairy tale.  My roomies and I went as the 3 Musketeers.  The event was well put together and just wonderful.

Jade, Me, and Amanda as the 3 Musketeers!

The next day was Sunday, so we had church, but also all of us IGs had to plan a service for that evening, so most of the day was getting ready for that event.  I got to teach the IGs a drama that I designed and it was just nice to get to see my work on stage again.  All the staff said the service was a great success.  We had one of our girls tell her story with the Father, and we also had so really great illustrations.  After the service many people stayed to talk to the father, and seek him.  I got to talk with one young girl about life and making choices for the father.  It was just so wonderful.  After a whole weekend of being busy and always going to just take the time to look at the father for who he is. 

A few things to be talking to the almighty about are sickness(it is flying through the school like crazy), stamina, and just really being committed to our jobs here as staff and teachers.  This weekend we are taking about 130 kids to a retreat about the father.  We will be leaving on Friday after school and coming back Sunday after lunch.  Many of these kids do not know the father so please ask that he would show himself strongly.  

This pic below is just the father showing off his handy work.

Short Sweet and to the Point

Well folks I am going to do something that I am sure you never thought would happen....a short blog!  I know that sometimes I drag on and on but it would not be me if I didn't.

So this week has passed pretty uneventful.  I think everyone is kinda keeping their heads down just ready for it to be Christmas.  All the IGs are starting to realize how soon they go home, and we are all getting sad.

The only thing that happened really this week for me is I got sick.  This is the first time I have really been sick here.  It was nothing big just an upset stomach and a little fever, but the women at Hoz(hospital of the school) fixed me right up.  In about 24hrs of getting sick I felt like new, but maybe more rested from sleeping while I was sick.

Outside of that not much has happened.  I know that next weeks blog will be longer and many more great details.  So prepare yourselves for a good read!

Thank all for dealing with my rambles, and rants!  It is helpful to know that people back home still care what is happening here and in my life with the father. 

I found the civilized world!!!!

OK I know that most of India is civilized world, and that is pretty much true with Ooty.  But what I found was amazing!  I left for my mid-term break on the 15th of October after having given the PSAT to some students.  I got on a overnight bus to head to Bangalore.  Most of the buses here in India are pretty much like old school buses, but more uncomfortable.  I lucked out and had to take a charter bus style bus with blankets and water bottles provided.  It was a sacrifice but it was worth it :).  The ride to Bangalore was 8 hrs but I got to sleep for most of it.  Once I arrived it was about 5:30 am, and I was so tired.  The couple I was going to be staying with picked me up and then showed me straight to my bed.  I got to sleep until 11:30 which was so nice.  After that we just kinda hung around the apartment, then someone said "hey are you hungry?"  I of course said yes...so we went to KFC.  I have not had KFC in months and it was so nice to see things that looked and tasted like home.  After that night every day was wonderful.  The couple I lived with had lived overseas in different places for 27 yrs, so they had gotten really good about cooking western food with the supplies you could get here.  So I Western food all the break.  I also finally got to eat at a few other amazing restaurants.  One of them I am sure you may have heard of...it is a little place called Taco Bell.  I got to eat at India's first Taco Bells.  They had to have phonetic spelling of some of the food so that the people would know how to order.  They did not have any beef(beef is kinda hard to find here...its that whole holy cow thing), but the food tasted so much like Taco Bell back home.  Then one of the highlights was one of the other restaurants we ate at.  The name of the restaurant is The Only Place, it is called that because it is the only place to get BEEF!!!!  I got a huge steak.  It was so nice to have a nice piece of meat.  It was opened by a couple one from America and one from India.  I felt like I was back home eating at any normal restaurant.
OK before it sounds like all I did was eat(which is a lot of what I did, but did not gain any of the 11lbs that I have lost since I got here.)  I also got to go see another palace.  The palace was so pretty.  They actually let you go into the private areas of the family and see family snap shots of the kids growing up.  It was nice just to see them living these normal lives.  I also got to go this other "palace"  It was the biggest joke of a palace.  it was more like a palace apartment.  It took us 45mins to get to this place and it cost us Rs 400($9, but that same Rs 400 would buy me another steak dinner).  Once we get there it cost Rs 100 to get in...then it only took us 10 mins to get through the entire place and read all the signs posted.  Totally not worth it.  Now I am off that soap box.  I also got to go to a mall.  Now this mall looked like any mall in the States except all the stores sold Indian stuff and not American.  I got to hang out with another worker that is about 21, and we just walked around the mall for hours.  We even tried to go in to a little haunted house in the Halloween spirit, but we got too scared when they gave us rubber gloves to wear and then it looked like we were in a dead end so we ran out as fast as we could.  Me and her also went to the movies.  In India the movies are normally cut up really bad to make it fit in a time limit for the theatre.  Well I found out on this trip that it only happens in the tiny towns, but in the big towns you actually get to see the whole movie.  There were a few weird things about this theatre though.  You have to go through a security check point to check for food, bombs, guns, knifes, or cameras.  If you have a camera they make you turn it in or the batterie in so that you can't pirate the film.  Then once you get to the snack counter the food is different too.  They have the normal sodas and popcorn, but then they have fruit bowls, donuts, and fried Indian treats.  Half way through the movie they pause it for a potty break and snack break.  We went to see The Three Musketeers.  It was utter rubbish.  The acting was some of the worst I have ever seen.  I do not know what Orlando Bloom was even thinking when he took the role. 
This vacation was much needed.  Not just to rest from school, but the recharge with the Father.  The couple I was staying with was so encouraging.  Every night we would read from the word and just talk to the father about our cares and worries.  Then every morning I would come out and they were having their personal time with the father in the living room as a couple.  It was just so encouraging.  Then one night we had some women over to talk about the what the stress of being on the field can do to your marriage if you are not careful.  Then another night we went to study the word with a group of people.  We did the entire book of Amos in one night! 
Now I am back at school and the first week in almost over.  Everything is in full swing, and it is back to the old grind stone.  I have a new drama I am working on for Christmas.  The staff every year do a Pantomime.  This show is not like doing mime, but it is more of a comedy making fun of things that happen at school.  I am working with some other teacher to rewrite a script of Snow White right now, then we will start rehearsals, then have the show in December just before the kids leave.  I have also picked up some more drama lessons with the Std 7 kids and they are a hand full.  They all have super stores of energy that I can barely keep up with. 
Some things that you can talk to the father about are just making our time with the kids intentional.  Sometimes it is so easy to get into a routine and not be open to the prompting of the Father.  Ask about good times for the IGs that are leaving in December.  Also the plans for my December are starting to come together so now its the planning on how and when to get places.  I hope this blog finds all of you well and that the Father is blessing you as much as he is blessing me.

Where has the time gone????

The title of this post is a question that I have been asking myself for weeks now.  I feel like I have just arrived in India a few days ago, but it was really 2 months ago.  I feel like the time has been going by soooooo fast.  Well I will get on with the full update, because if I don't then I will just be rambling the whole time about time.

DRAMA WEEK!!!!!
   Is finally over.  I have never had such a great experience getting to watch so much drama.  For 2 weeks we had drama performances almost every night.  The students all did great.  The kids in my show got a few award, and they are Runner Up for Best Actor and Runner up for Best Actress and the Best Actress award.  I was so proud of my kids.  One of them even got a special award for composing and playing her own work in the show.  All of the shows were wonderful.  The one that I loved the best was the Std 13 play.  In that play it is completely done by the students.  This year they did The Hunchback of Notre Dame.  Can we say WOW!  It would have put some college or even some professional shows to shame. They got a standing ovation both times they performed.  I was very proud of them.

One thing that drama week was also great for was helping teach the lesson of humility.  The kids who thought they did great sometimes were not the ones that got awards.  It really showed the kids that we can not just always brag on ourselves but lift up and encourage others as well.

Now I am on break...we are having our "Fall Break".  So right now I am sitting in the lovely apartment of some fellow workers from the company.  Just enjoying the sound of nothing.  It is very calm and peaceful.  That is just what the doctor ordered.  I am very glad that I have this moment of peace and freedom.  Oh and I also had a real hamburger yesterday.  One of the teachers from the school ordered some meat before I left and we made some huge burgers.  I could barely eat the whole thing, but it was nice to have a whole lot of beef.

I hope you are all having wonderful days and the Father is blessing you as much as he is blessing me!  I can not wait to hear from you and I hope you all have a great day!!!

Lots of fun and some struggles all in one week!

       Ok before this blog officially gets going I feel I must apologize for its lateness.   Here in India the Internet runs a little different.  It kinda works like it would on your cell phone.  You pay so much a month for so much internet.  Well I went in the other day and said I needed to pay for my internet that month (that is another thing you have to pay for it before you use it).  I was told that all I needed to to was pay Rs. 50 and that would cover me.  I thought it was too good to be true, because I normally pay Rs. 671.  But I paid the man and went on my merry way.  Well then I go to use my internet and it is working for like 20 mins then all of a sudden it stops downloading or uploading....because I was out of internet credit...and not only out of internet credit it had also eaten into my talk time credit.  So now I had no phone, and no internet :(  So that is why this blog is so late again so sorry.
Now onto the official blog!
This last week was a very long week.  It all started normal and seemed like it would be smooth sailing.  Then it was time for Drama Rehearsal.  My students had yet to make it through our show once to even know how long the show runs, because we have a time limit since it is a competion.  Our time limit is 45 mins...did I mention my show is The Diary of Anne Frank ya thats right a show that normally runs around 2 hrs down to 45 mins.  Do you feel the tension yet?  Well we finally make it through the final scene and it is time for a full run thru.  We have 1 hr and 20 mins, should be plenty of time right...wrong!  At a hour in we had not even made it through half the show.  Now I am starting to get stressed, and starting to get very concerned.  So I tell my kids I will make more cuts and they have to know their lines, because the show is one October 6th and the 11th.
Then it happened...one thing that I hoped would happen...it was the IG weekend away.  So that means that all the IGs  got to go out of town where ever we wanted to get some relaxation before we had the craziness of drama week.  So all the IGs pack up and head to a town called Mysore.  To start the adventure off right we are taking a bus to Mysore.  It is a 5 hr bus of crazy.  The roads are so curvy.  For those of you who have been to Falls Creek imagine the High Road and multiply that by 100, and you will get a rough idea of what I mean.  The drivers take some of the curves at 40-50 mph when it should be more like 10-15 mph.  At some points I would not have been surprised to hear that the bus came off one side of its wheels for a second or two.  Ok enough about the bus there, Once we finally get to Mysore we have to find the place we will be sleeping.  Our two older IGs have voted to go the expensive route and stay at a nice hotel.  Us young IGs have left our fate of rooms in the hand of one of the youngest IGs.  He said he knew a guest house for people that work for the Father, and that we could stay there cheap.  As we found out later, he did know the place but had not been there in like 5 yrs, and did not really know where it was....So now we are standing 8 white people in the middle of a town we know nothing about trying to find a guest house that we have no idea where it is.  Finally we call the guest house and they give us very vauge general directions, and finally we find it.  Once we get there we find that the room we will be in is just that one room for 8 people.  6 girls and 2 boys, but the good thing is for all the night we will be there it will only cost us Rs. 2000 for the 2 nights. (that is what the older couple was paying per night for their stay)
So once we unpacked we decided to explore the city.  One of our first discovers in this new place is the rickshaw drivers are very aggressive and all want to give you a "tour of the whole city for very low price" .  If you did not buy their tour after they dropped you off they would drive on the street next to you try to sell you again.  We also found that if you just talk to some rickshaw drivers that they are so desprate for a fare that they will walk all over the city with you showing you around for no charge hoping that the next day you will call them for a tour.
Well I do not want to drag on and on about Mysore soo basically to wrap the week up....I got sick on our second day, and did everything but did not enjoy all of it.  I got to see a palace covered in 96,000 light. I rode a camel and an elephant, and was proposed to by a crazy drunk Indian man.  So that is the weekend(if you want more details later just let me know).
Now on to the main struggle of the week.  When I am overseas I normally have a little home sickness, but this last week I had the worst case ever.  It was on the day we got home from Mysore.  We arrived back in Ooty around 9 pm, andhad not eaten all day.  So we IGs began to talk food and where to eat.  Most places in Ooty start to close around that time so we have to move quick.  We finally find this little Indian resturant that was still open.  So we go in sit down and they hand us the menus.  I look down and have no idea what anything was on the menu.  The minute I saw that I almost broke down in tears.  So I excused myself and come back to the school.  All I felt like I wanted to do was cry all night.  So I did what I do sometimes when I am upset, I turned on my iPod and played it as loud as I could.  I had been listening earlier and it was shuffling through songs about the Father.  At that point I know that the Father had to be controlling my iPod because all the songs that played were about his strength and love for us, and how even in struggles he will pull us up.  Then I decided to go to the word.  I read in Ps. and it was all about the Father providing for us, and strengthening us.  So after about 45 mins, I felt so much better and at peace.  I love how when we feel our weakest the almighty can just pull us up with the littlest things like an iPod shuffle list.
Well like always my blog is another novel.  Sorry, but I hope it give you insight into my life.  I would love to hear about you and what the Father is doing for you.

The palace in Mysore

Sore Muscles and a Quiet Corner

Well this weekend was very eventful.  My dorm and the dorm of the same aged boys went out camping at a place called Quiet Corner.  I would not really call it camping because we pretty much stayed at a retreat center in the jungle.  One of the really cool things about this place is it is run by people who know the father, and the money they raise there helps to get the word out to others.  But there will be more about Quiet Corner later.

The adventure started on Friday at 3 pm.  All the kids were checked out of school early, and all of them came running to the dorms ready to leave.  So we hopped onto the bus, and set off for Quiet Corner.

We rode on the bus for 20 mins and all was wonderful.  I sat at the very front of the bus.  I mean the very front.  If we would have had an accident I would have no hope, but to just through the windshield.

My view from my Seat

After 20 mins we told the kids that we would be walking for some of the way because the bus had to go around the long way.  So we got out cheerfully ready to walk.  It was great for the first 5 mins....then I heard our fearless leader say we would be walking 2 hrs with 32 kids...insert frown here...Then we saw exactly what we would be walking...36 hairpin bends which at some points they had signs saying that cars could only be in first gear to take them...oh did I forget to mention that we would be walking on the main road between the hills and the plains.  So the walk started slowly walking down the mountain and it got slower and slower.  In the first 10 mins. one of my little girls fell and got hurt.  She got up and kept walking.  Soon she started hurting really bad, so we called one of the other sponsors who was driving a jeep like car.  So he picked her and a few other injured girls up.  That was wonderful for the first 5 mins, until my girls figured out if they were "hurt" then they would get to ride in the car and not have to walk.  So we began to have so many "injuries".

Before I knew it we had been walking for over a hour, and it was tea time...this school has tea no matter where we are...(football game or side of a mountain)...so the kids got a box apple juice and a bag of chips.  As we were sitting there trying to catch our breath I hear a group of kids screaming because a wild animal has came out of the bush.  I run over preparing myself to see a group of crazy monkeys, a rabid dog, or a tiger(that was a big stretch).  When I get over there I find my kids staring in terror at 2 little goats.  These goats did not even come up to my knees, but my kids were screaming like the goats had already eaten one of them.  So me and the other sponsors got the job of screaming at the goats and chasing them off.

The Wild Beast!

Once we finally got moving again I had lost even more of my girls to "injuries" so they had been put in the car to ride in comfort.  We kept moving and just encouraging the boys to keep strong when they questioned why they could not ride in the car.

 The next thing I know we have lost all the girls but 2 and then we had 18 boys, 3 male sponsor, and 1 female sponsor aka yours truly.  At this point it is starting to get dark and we sponsors are starting to really get nervous about the real wild animals coming out of the jungle to get us.  So we had the kids go single file and we marched them as fast as we could possible go to make sure we were not eaten.  By this point in the journey my arms and my shoulders have been used as a crutch to help people get down the mountain.  This is were the sore muscles start coming into play...so finally we make it down the mountain to meet up with the bus again at 5:45.  (After much discussion among the sponsors we decided that our hike was about 14 km, which in miles is 8.7miles.)  We all know what great physical shape I am in, so at this point I was hurting so bad.

Once we finally get on the bus it is so nice just to sit, but when it is time to get off I start to realize how sore I really am, and I am ready to go to bed...this did not happen.  We still had not had dinner and we also had to play games.  So finally at 10pm we tell the kids to go to bed.  I got to lay my girls down for bed, but they had other plans.  They did not finally start being quiet until 11pm.  I finally got to go to sleep and it was so nice.

The next day we all got up at 7am and after a bucket bath I went to have breakfast and to get ready to go swimming.

The food I do have to say at this place was wonderful.  Everything we ate was Indian food and we had no silverware so we ate with our hands. Quiet Corner was nice compared to what I had in my head of what it might be.(insert thoughts of mud huts)  The whole retreat center was not that big but the people who kept it worked very hard to keep it beautiful, and clean which in India that is hard.

Pictures of Quiet Corner.

Our Rooms

Jungle Behind the Rooms

This trees roots grow from the branches to the ground

Closer view of the tree

A trash can...yes you put the trash in the fishes mouth

Bamboo Path

In the middle of the Bamboo

 Back to the story.  So we went swimming in the river, which was fun and great until one of the little girls figured out that there was glass in the river the hard way.  So after she got cut, my fun in the river was done....I just stood on a rock close to side so that I jump out easily if I need to.  We also got to go shopping as well.

Then today was had a little service about the father.  The whole theme of this time was Kindness...these little ones have a hard time loving each other.  So we talked about the Fathers forgiveness and his kindness to us.  It was wonderful because some the kids seemed to really understand what was being talked about.  The other great thing is some of the kids believe in other types of powers, so they got to hear about our Father.  Then later I did get a little rest, in a wonderful hammock.  So I just put my iPod in and took pictures from there.  It was such a nice break from things.

 Pictures from the Hammock

Now that I am back home and typing this I am so tired, but I am not ready to go to bed yet.  I have a day off tomorrow so hopefully I will get to sleep in.  I hope that this blog finds all of you well and that you are seeing the Father work in wonderful ways.  I can not wait to come home and tell all my stories in person.  I miss you all and I love you!!!

Happy Birthday to my ever so lovely sister!!!!!

This blog is more of a way for me to say Happy Birthday to Deb.  I have always loved having her as a sister.  I know that we have had our fights but what sisters have not had their fights.  I have loved that Everytime that I call even from another country we can spend hours on the phone.  I hope that today is a great day for you Deb!!!! I also hope that your birthday package arrives and you enjoy the things I sent.
-Love
   Melissa