School started last Wednesday. Each morning one of us goes over to the girls hostel (dormitory) at 6:30, and “helps” them bathe and get ready for the day. Even the youngest (four years old) seem to be very self sufficient and able to take care of themselves, so it is a bit of a struggle for us as we don’t feel useful during this time. It is a good lesson to help show that God doesn’t need our help either, and so we are, in a sense, “useless,” in that everything we “do” for Him is really His gift to us.
At 9:00, we go and cut vegetables for the children’s lunch. Beets, potatoes, onions, cabbage, along with other vegetables that we don’t have in the states (at least as far as I know). Cutting the vegetables becomes a game, as the cooks (who don’t know a bit of English) try and tell us what size to cut the vegetables for each different curry.
11:15 we head over to the school, where we observe the first and second grade English class. First and second means the four to 8 year olds, so it’s a pretty wide age range. In a few days we’ll start teaching English ourselves. Ay yi. There is one teacher for the 36 children. She hits them with a stick when they don’t listen or are acting up, which personally I think is because we are in the room distracting them.
And then comes my favorite/most difficult part of the day: five o’clock. We head over to watch/play with the girls till around 7:30. Everyone crowds around us: “My name, sister?, My name sister?, My name sister?” as 8 children ask and tell us their names all at once. The worst part is that they then expect us to remember all 100 of their names the next day. It breaks my heart to see their crestfallen faces when we cant remember their names. Pravina, Pradiba ,Priya, Gogeela, Ramalakshmi, Kaveeda, Kaveeah, Yoha, Vashna, Asha, Meena, Salvarani, Sarasudi, Marysudi, Sobena, Velmedi, Vijitra, Natia, Satiya, Cameela, and the list goes on. J
We then play all sorts of games, and they try to teach us Tamil and practice their English on us (Superman, Singing in the rain, days of the week). All of them, even the older ones, are very clingy. They fight over who gets to hold our hand or play with us. If we swing a little 6 or 7 year old around by the arms, the 110, 11, 12, and 13 year olds want us to do the same to them. I think our muscles are going to be bigger when we come home. ;) They also delight in teaching us Indian dances.
There is one little girl, Ramalakshmi, and her little brother, whom everyone calls Tambi (little brother). He is in shock, and so he stays with his sister at the girls hostel. They are both so lonely and needy that they cling to me much of the time. The first day or two they wouldn’t smile at all, but now you can hardly erase the smiles from their faces. Rama insists I call her “Tungachi” (little sister), and she calls me “Akka,” (big sister). Most of the children call us “sister.” Yesterday when another little girl tried to call me Akka, Rama got this entirely fierce look on her face, and hugged me tightly. “MY Akka!!” she said. These two are favorites.
At night, we take turns sleeping over at the girls hostel, or perhaps staying would be a better word, as there is nary any sleep involved. We take care of the children when/if they cry in the night. (although apparently I am the only one that has really experienced this).
And so goes each day. Sunday evening we will start teaching Sunday school for the girls also.
Sierra is all the boys and middle (9-12) girls favorite. I think its because she can throw balls and play games with the best of them, whereas Bridge and I are lacking in these skills.she just has this joy about her that they all love. Bridge has taken on the older girls (ages 12-15). They like to sit in a circle off by themselves, so sweet Bridge goes and sits with them. They love her for this. I think that mostly the children all feel great love from these two daughters of our Heavenly Dad. It’s impossible not to. I mostly play with the littlest ones, although at times we play with all ages.
Pray for love. That we would love each and every child as Jesus does. It is hard to love the spoiled difficult ones.
Pray for rain. They haven’t had real rain here in several weeks, and the farmers need it for their crops, as well as just a regular need for water.
Pray for only Jesus Christ to be seen in us, that we would not be seen, but Christ, and Christ alone.
Praying for you all as it comes to mind.
Your sisters in His service.

Hmm. The children arrive tomorrow. I think this place will be simply bursting with joy when they do. It is amazing to see the joy of the Lord in children, and how much He must delight in them, as He delights in us. We are His children. :)
Yesterday was quite the day. We went on a picnic with the family, which of course included a few second cousins, fifth cousins, and Edgar, our German brother, who is also a volunteer here. We rode a rickety bouncy young bus for about an hour and a half. then we reached the waterfalls where we would have our picnic.
This was a most marvelous and extraordinary thing, a novel idea. The waterfalls? They are used like a communal shower for the people. The men go “upstairs,” to the first waterfall, while the women go to the lower waterfall. They all take showers with their clothes on, except the small children, who unabashedly wear no clothes at all and run around splashing through the water. Halfway through this wonderful experience it occurred to us that all the water from the men was splashing down upon and we were showering in it. Ha.
Every evening now at 5 o’clock the children come. All the games we play become a competition to see who can get the “sisters” on their team. Sierra Sister, Bridgette Sister, and Tacie Sister taught them to play red rover, and this is now their favorite game. I think they like the aspect of holding hands, and being a team.
Jeba, a skinny little boy of ten, dances ever spare moment he can. He is quite the dancer. If a little child gets hurt, or cries or something, he breaks into dancing, rolling all over the floor till the baby is laughing at him. If any child gets hurt, every single other child gathers round and fawns over them till they are better. There is a lot to be learnt from these children as to caring for others, and how we as the hands and feet of Jesus should be.
When we were in town yesterday, there were monkeys all over the streets. :)
Another thing that is everywhere is pictures of light skinned people. Even the believers have these pictures in their homes. It’s a sad thing to see.

day six here in tirnelveli. school still hasnt started yet. our heavenly Dad is teaching us much about contentment these past few days. mostly about food, i think. all the food is very good, its just they keep giving us more and more food. its as though it never ends. we are learning to be thankful for mountains of food, yet asking God to show us how to say no, and whether it is right to say no.

wednesday night we went to prayer meeting. although we could not understand a word they said, it was a blessing to be amongst other believers and hear them pray and worship jesus.

two days ago, the other volunteer, edgar, returned from doing vbs in some other towns. he is from germany, and quite a funny person. he told us we need to teach him english hymns, and so that night we and a cousin of sornaraj all sang hymns for a while. it was a joy.

everyone here in this town is related. :) crazy. one of my favorite things is seeing how caring everyone is for each other. a baby was born a month ago, and so now his family brought him here to meet his extended family. they all fawn over him, and put him to sleep with a harmonica. :) its a delight.

observations:

1) there are pictures of light skinned babaies in every single house. we are not sure why.

2) everyone takes a nap in the afternoon. it is entirely too hot to do anything else.

3) people dont say thank you here. they just kind of bob their head instead.

4) everyone wants to be american. they tell us we dont need to learn tamil.

5) calnders have two months on each page, instead of one month.

pray for: contentment, as mentioned above. that these people would realize that they are beautiful and dearly loved as they are. God to be glorified in every action, every word.

lovelovelove

your sisters in Christ Jesus

ps. we will have a phone number, i think, pretty soon to call home. and letters take a week to get there. they're on the way. :)

address:

c/o P. Sornaraj

mission compound

Vadamalapuram P.O.

Mullikulam 627755

Tirnelveli - Dist

South India

it is our second day here at the school. BUT we found out when we arrived that there is a new person in the government, and they have decided that school will now start the 15 of June, instead of the 1. :) So there is not much to do. all three of us feel very very lazy. But the headmasters wife, Sona Kumari, insists that we "rest" and "i tell you if i need help. i dont need help, ok?" i never thought i would need grace to be content being lazy. ay yi.

as a result of us being lazy, however, dear ones, letters your way soon. :) there are some children here though, and they are all precious. one little girl has taken it upon herself to be our teacher in Tamil. we are all learning some words, and it is a joyous thing to see the faces of people when we (mainly sierra) practice on them. it is a special thing to know that people care about you enough to learn your language. tamil is very hard to pronounce.

we went to the town today with Sonakumari, and bought some indian clothes. side note: indian women are so very beautiful. we rode a rickshaw (car on three wheels) into town. bridge sat on my lap. it was very bumpy. and uncomfortable. BUT the most marvelous thing in the world, i cant even tell you. its such a wonderful feeling.

observations:

1) we eat so much food. ay yi, you cannot say no. if we do, everyone thinks that we do not like the food. at almost each meal, we end up eating so much we feel sick to our stomach. i have no idea how they are able to eat all they do.

2) the children all call us sister. "no, no sister! you come with me!" "sister, sister, play!"

3) the head bob is stupendous. they kind of wiggle thier from shoulder to shoulder. this means yes, but they do it all the time. when they say hi, when they say goodbye, ALL THE TIME.

4) there are lots of snakes here. they come out at night on the road, apparently.

5) the electrcity shuts off constantly.

pray for: priscilla, the headmasters daughter, is sick. she goes to the hospital tomorrow with her father. contentment. love and joy for the children. patience with the food (its all delicious, but oh so much to eat). God's glory to be seen here. perseverance for the believers here. the church numbers about 15.

we are all safe in chennai now. we arrived at 4:45 in the morning, june 5th. it took us a bit to get out of the airport, but by the grace of God we made it with few confusions. we are at the blue diamond hotel in chennai waiting for our train at 8pm tonight to take us to madurai, where someone will pick us up and take us to the school.

observations:

1)no one pays attention to traffic laws. everyone drives where they please, when they please (hmm, was that a white line i saw?):)

2) there are no white people here. its a bit shaking to realize that WE are the different ones now. but thank God for the opportunity to see things through a foreigners eyes in america.

3) there is no toilet paper.

4) it is so very difficult to understand the people when they speak, as im sure it is hard for them to understand us when we speak.

5) everything is so very beautiful, and yet so very dirty at the same time.

6) as we were driving by in our taxi, i saw a teenager with one leg in the side of the road. then i realized that many of the people on the side of the road had injuries/were begging.

7) it reminds me a lot of mexico (siler family)

When we arrived at the hotel, there were i think 5 "bus boys" waiting to help us. somehow they all managed to escort us to our room, where i then had to figure out whether to tip all of them, some, or one.

these people are so poor and needy, both spiritually and physically. Yet this is how we were int he sight of God when He so readily took us.

pray for: the train ride, exchanging money (we were cheated at the airport. fortunately it was very small sum). we've figured out that when they have this little smirk on their face, they are/will cheat you. :) Gods glory to be shown as we try and communicate His Love without words. homesickness. i think it has finally hit all three of us that we will are actually here.

Praying for you all as it comes to mind.

"Don;t judge a man until you've walked a mile in his shoes." -English Proverb

His grace is sufficient for us.