Life Among Death

Hey, Amberlea here. I figured since the other girls were going post crazy, I'd better write one too. So I decided to write on a topic we have mentioned, but not yet really expanded on in this blog. That topic is Lorega.

Cebu City is divided into communities, one of them being Lorega. Only about a 5 minute walk from our house, this is one of the poorest places in the city. People can rent land here extremely cheap, or just squat. Their homes are just shacks, built out of stone or whatever they can find. What we would consider to be a small room is their entire abode. Sometimes for 10 people. They get their electricity by tapping onto other people's lines. Prostitution, gambling, and drugs run like water here. But in spite of all this unbelievable action, there is something perhaps even harder to believe. The entire community of Lorega is built on a cemetery. And not even like a nice Canadian clean cut cemetery with neatly rowed tombstones. No. The tombs here are above ground, some stacked upon each other, placed with no seeming order whatsoever. Sometimes the concrete may crack open, so a homeless person will sweep out the bones and use it for shelter from the rain. That is, until somebody else dies and they are placed in the disintegrated crypt and it is re-enclosed.

As appalling as this all sounds, words cannot even begin to describe it. Even pictures, which they say are worth a thousand words, don't convey the actuality of life in Lorega. My attempts to express what it feels like to see children living in this environment, a graveyard as their playground, cannot tell you wholly about this way of life.

However, in the midst of all this destitution, God is working in wondrous ways. An example being the story of Riezl, who has spent her whole life at Lorega, still having hope and faith. And now a 2nd year student in university training to become a travel agent. Or Davis, a former hit-man and drug addict, now holding Bible studies and leading people to the Lord. The sewers for Bahandi bags, now able to earn enough income to feed their families.

I so wish I could be able to make you understand about this place. Because you cannot experience it and come out unchanged in some way.

Please pray for the people in this community, and please pray for us as we weld relationships in this place, that we could do something that will last, not just be a small breeze stirring the dust only to let it settle immediately afterwards.

Peace be with you,

Amberlea