Lorega: a beautiful day.

Sometimes in life there are those moments were afterwards you look back and think, "did that really happen?" Yesterday I experienced one of those moments. We went to Lorega early in the morning, and as we were entering the outskirts, we stopped under some huge spreading trees to ask God to show us where he wanted us to go. As we were praying, some of our little friends ran over to us and we began to play with them. Amber played pogs with some of the little boys. Amberly and I played with Rea and Andrea some of our special little friends. As we began to play with the girls, we noticed that the ground was strewn with beautiful, pure white flowers that had fallen from the trees. Their smell is one of the most fragrant I have ever smelled, and it was so strange to be picking these stunning blossoms up from among the garbage and the graves. We spent a long time making little florrettes and bouquets from the blossoms. Then the kids started climbing the trees, so we went up with them too. In between the high buildings of the city, you can see beautiful green mountains from that high up. It was very calm and serene under the huge spreading branches with these beautiful children. I found myself marvelling at the beauty of God's creation; the view, the flowers, the children. And then I remembered I was in a cemetary in one of the busiest cities in the Philippines. It is a testament to God's goodness that he can bring such beauty to such a place as this.

We also went to visit Louis. Louis is 21, and is autistic. His parents are loving, but have to keep him in a cage so he doesn't wander off and get hurt. He sits in his cage on top of a tombstone all day by himself on a little couch, and yet whenever we go by, he is so smiley and happy to see us. When we went by him yesterday, we brought him a bouquet of flowers, and he was so happy with them. Then we asked his mother if we could visit him. He was absolutely thrilled to have mga basita (visitors)! He ushered us in to his little sanctuary and we chatted with him for a while. He can't actually talk, so I guess it was more us chatting, but he seemed to be happy with that. He showed us the picture of his Lola (grandmother), which he was quite proud of (I'm not sure if he was proud of the picture, or his grandmother). Kids clung to the chicken wire all around his cage while we visited him, and as we left, some came in to see him. How we wish they will keep visiting him, and realize what a great friend he is!

We went to visit Ate Glee and get halo halo again. I found one little girl, Nicole, who I had been worried about because she had not been to Compassion for a while. It was great to see her and let her know I had been thinking about her.

It is such a joy and a priveledge to be in this place with these wonderful people. We are so grateful to God for this opportunity and for these friends and so blessed to know this really is where we are supposed to be.

Love,

Amberkay

AGAIN! its been awhile...Us 3 have been battling sickness for the past few weeks. The nasty cold has spread through our house, I had a bacterial infection from bad food, ...we are experiencing bad food effects right now, and Amberly is suffering from a foot infection. sigh...

but i would like to quickly share an incredible Saturday: We went to Lorega for a few hours last Saturday, after promising a few children we would for sure be there. For me, the awesomeness that was on Saturday was just how real it became. I know that Amberly and Anna both enjoyed their time on saturday thoroughly, but i can really only write my personal involvement. we stopped by one of the Bahandi bags sewers, and her daughter and her were making a Philippine dessert, Halo Halo - they invited us to sit down and made some for us, and it was the first time i ACTUALLY liked it!!! It was delicious :)
There are two girls (13 & 14) that have really captured my heart and I desire so much to build a trusting relationship with them and for them to know God's love. AND this time around we visited both of the girls houses and met their family, which was huge (for me)!! I felt blessed to know more of their lives and that they would share it with me, and just talking and singing a couple songs on the karaokee machine made my day! And walking through Lorega, we stopped several times to talk with new friends and laugh!! oh it was great!
All 3 of us are building incredible relationships here, and are already sad at the thought of leaving them :(

peace out
Amber Rae

More animals found in our kitchen

Cat. =)

Animals I have Found in our Kitchen

1. Ants

2. Cochroahces

3. Mice

4. Rats

5. Geckos

6. Little black gross bugs we don't know the name of.

I really think I would not be exaggerating at all to say we have several MILLION ants in our kitchen.....they can pack more in because they're quite small; it's like a little stream of ants starting at their hole all the way across the ceiling, down the wall, and to wherever that little scrap of something is. Or maybe I should say a river of ants. It's kind of frusterating when it comes to cereal because as soon as the bag is opened somehow or other those ants find their way in. We are getting much more accustomed to them though. The other day I poured myself a bowl of cereal and then did a sort of sifting procedure to shake the ants out before pouring the milk on. I may not have got them ALL out, but you know; extra protein.

As for cochroaches, we have put the fear of them behind us. They biggest reaction I've heard recently is a low moan when one scurried across someone's foot. They do seem to have rather sinister personalities, but that could just be my imagination.

The rats really are a problem though. There is one HUGE one about a foot long that creeps around when he thinks nobody's looking. There are also about 6 little mice which have unfortunately developed a fascination for the upstairs and we now have a large quantity living in our bedroom. I guess it's good in a way as it gives us an incentive for keeping our clothes off the floor. As I was falling asleep the other night, I observed 3 sniffing out my jeans as a prospective nest.

Honestly, compared to cochroaches and rats, geckos are like a breath of fresh air. They are so cute and come in so many different sizes. Our first encounter with a gecko was really rather comical. We were at a church service and the pastor was in the middle of preaching and suddenly a sound like a kid's squeaky toy burst through the sanctuary. I wondered who on earth would let their child continuously squeak their squeaky toy during a church service like that, but finally it stopped and afterwards we went outside and found the culprit clinging to a window.

There is a small rat who is darting around the sala where I'm writing right now and hoping I won't notice him. I know I'm not fast enough to catch him, so I'm just being a kind friend and letting him think I don't know he's there.

Love,

Amberkay

Basketball, fireflies, motorbikes, and coconuts.

Can you fit five people on one motorcycle? Um, well, yes. After an hour long bus ride travelling South of Cagayan, we hopped on the back of some motorbikes and took off into the country. This island is very different from Cebu. Out in the country, there are many coconut farms, wide wet fields, and carabou....(this is not like Canadian caribou, you say cara-bow, and they are more like very muddy cows). This island is not so much of a tourist hot-spot, so 7 white people are like snow in July. At last we came to Christians' Haven, or CH for short, the companion orphanage to the Transition house we had visited in Cagayan. It is a beautiful spot, and I was overjoyed to have clean, fresh country air to breathe again, and no traffic sounds all the time. There are tall coconut palms scattered over the property, and one of the boys climbed one with a machete, and cut down 7 coconuts for us. We tried drinking the water inside....it was good, but was in rather overwhelming quantities. I didn't know coconuts were as big as soccer balls! We started playing a game of volleyball with some of the kids, and soon there was a full-fledged competition going on. Those boys were good! Then when a basketball showed up, we all raced over to the basketball court and enjoyed a rousing game. It was fabulous! We played until we couldn't see the ball anymore, and just then the fireflies came out....my first time seeing fireflies!!!! That night at "chapel" (a big circle of chairs out in front of the dorms), we sang songs together and the kids got to ask us questions. They were mostly interested in what the names of our mothers were, so we told them. =) They sang a song for us, and we (feeling slightly inadequate after that) sang "How Great is our God" for them. After a bible study, we spent a long time singing songs and just hanging out with the kids. They all play guitar and are so talented!

We all fell in love with CH. It is a restful haven, and it touched our hearts. Street kids, orphans, and abandoned, abused children are living together in this beautiful sanctuary, surrounded by mountains and palm trees, and are so happy and healthy and just plain fantastic! I was so blessed by what God is doing in this place.

Love,

AmberKay

Dreams Really Do Come True!!!

We 3 Amber's defied all cultural and gender taboos this weekend when we fulfilled a lifelong dream of ours(a lifelong dream that developed about a month ago...) and rode on the back of a jeepney! As Amber Rae had mentioned before, she attempted such a ride and was told to come inside, because it was 'not proper'. But no one in their right mind could think that any of us would give up that easily, so this weekend, as we were in a different city on a different island we decided to give it another shot.

We were on another island because Ate Rhonda has many friends and connections there, so she thought it would be fun to go visit for a few days. There is an orphanage there, as well as a 'Transition House', which is where the kids from the orphanage live after they graduate highschool and are attending university.

So we arrived in the city of Cagayan after an overnight boat trip. We spent the day just relaxing and meeting the people at the T-House. We got along with them very well, which became evident as a very intense game of 'spoons' broke out, a bet being made that if one of the 3 girls playing were to lose, she would have to eat something weird, but if one of the guys lost, he would have to have makeup put on him in a public location. It was extremely close, but one of the guys did end up losing.

The next morning we woke up early and headed out for white water rafting!! It was on the way to the river with the rafts that we had our jeepney ride! Since it was not a public jeepney, the driver said we could hang off the back! It was probably one of the most memorable half hours of my life. The scenery was gorgeous and we could just relax with the wind whipping through our hair.

We arrived at the river and separated into our groups. We had the adventurous groups and the not quite so adventurous groups. Naturally all 3 of us were in adventurous groups. There were the traditional rafts, as well as 4 tubes attached together. Anna and I were in a raft, but Amber Rae was in a tube.

Now this rafting company was a little different than most in that they actually allow you to purposely flip the rafts. They feel secure in the abilities of their guides and know that it's so much more fun this way! They also informed us that the record number of flips in one trip was 8, so we decided to go for the record. Unfortunately we only got 6, but that was okay anyways. Personally I fell out a grand total of 11 times, so that was good enough for me. All in all it was an EPIC adventure, definitely worth it! Ooh and on the way back we rode on top of the jeepney on top of the rafts that were up there. And then, of course, we did not forget about the card bet and the makeup and had a very swell time decorating Sherwin's face with bright red lipstick.

We really enjoyed our time in Cagayan, and hope to go back sometime!

Sorry about such a long post! There's so much more I could write about but don't want to bore you to death! Hope you read it anyways!!

So long,

Amberlea

Brother- sister- new friends

tsk tsk, us Ambers have been slacking on the whole blogging thing...but in all fairness its been a pretty busy week. Its Amber Rae here, and i'm totally pumped to let y'all know that my brother and sister are here!!! who would have thought, that all the way in southeast asia, on two seperate trips we would meet up!? Sitting across from them in a restaurant yesterday, it kinda hit me how strange it was and yet it felt completly normal and right :) Jared has dived right into helping add onto a home in Lorega, even though apparently the other builders just stare and him and don't speak to him...sigh :) And the kids in Compassion and Lorega love Rachelle and Jared, and vice versa. Last night was a very encouraging night for me - a couple weeks ago when we were in Lorega i met a couple girls about 13 years old who i realized i wanted to get to know better and focus my time with them - I usually choose to be with the younger children because well i love them, but I realized that as a 20 year old girl, i could be a good example for them...here's hoping ;) Anyways so last night Rachelle and I brought nail polish and rounded up some of the girls and went down the street under a street lamp and spent an hour painting nails! And it was alot of fun and encouraging to build relationships with these girls. I told them that this weekend we would be travelling to another island, and one of the girls said, "oh...than we shall not meet again"...and i was surprised and said, "of course you will! I will come to visit you next week!" and the way her face lit up warmed my heart. She thought i wasn't coming back. And i am just excited to see them again and know how their life is going!! Now that we have been here for a month, we are starting to actually build relationships with these lovely people and remember names and faces and have more of a reason to come back often. We pray that they will see God's fire in our eyes and that our love comes from Him. I just thought i would share quickly :)

Peace out
Amber Rae