I can't believe that I'm actually home, and the most challenging, amazing, exciting month of my life is over. After more than a day of traveling (even though we left Manila and arrived home on the same day technically), we successfully made it back to the states.
It still hasn't sunk in that right now, I'm sitting in my house. In America, not the Philippines. It almost seems like it never happened...but then I go through all of my pictures and I get the reminder that I really DID spend a whole 20 days in Manila. Today I had the tough realization that 1, it's cold here. Like...really cold. And there's snow here. No more 85 degree weather, no more sunshine. And 2, there's no kids to play with here. I mean of course there's kids in America and at my church and stuff, but they're not MY kids. They're not my street kids that I invested so much time in for 20 days.
On the plane, I journaled a LOT (like...almost 4 or 5 pages) and attempted to process through everything from the trip. I won't write about all of it right now, just because it would take me FOREVER. (I'd love to tell you more about it though if you ask!) So, I'll just give you a little taste of the things that God taught me on this trip:
1 - How to be flexible.
As teachers, we're taught that flexibility is the number one thing that every teacher should be. I never really had to experience that though until I got to Manila. When we got there, absolutely everything was the complete opposite of what we thought it would be. For one thing, they didn't speak English fluently like we thought they did. The educated people spoke English, but not as their first language. Everyone spoke Tagalog first, which gave them a very heavily accented English. So that was the first struggle that we had to learn to get used to and overcome. Another thing was that we thought we were all going to be at the same school, and we were all going to be co-teaching with another member of our team. It turns out though that we were going to be at 2 different schools, and only a couple people would be team teaching. We also weren't able to prepare anything, because we had no clue what grade we would teach and what the schools would be like. The teachers at Valley View (the school I was at) had never done anything like this before, so the teachers weren't totally sure what to do with us at first. It was hard to just sit and observe for so long, and then when I actually got to teach, it had to be pretty much straight from a workbook. Other than that though, my class was amazing. It was so great to be able to work with such a great teacher, and with a class that was so welcoming to me and so eager to learn .
2- How to rely on HIM, and Him only.
This trip was really, really tough for me at times. When I'm at home, I have my family and boyfriend and a lot of people that I can turn to and rely on. But in the Philippines, all I had was the team from Taylor, and that was it. I was close with a few of the people on the trip, but for the most part we were all a bunch of el ed majors that had classes together, but didn't really know each other really well. At first, my homesickness was BAD. I was kind of discouraged with my classroom placement, and for a couple days I couldn't really see what my purpose was in Manila. But I kept praying and journaling (I started writing in a prayer journal again) and I kept reading my Bible. As I've mentioned before, almost every Psalm I read while I was in Manila dealt with the weak, poor, and needy, and the fact that God is big and awesome and he's got everything under control. It was so great to see him work in my life as I was in Manila and as I was trusting in him and relying on Him. After one day with the street kids, I knew without a doubt that THAT was where I was supposed to focus my time. It was also really great to see how God put each person on that trip for a reason, and how he made all of our relationships so much stronger. I'm so blessed to have gotten to know so many people on that trip, and I don't know how I wasn't friends with some of these people before! There's definitely friendships that were made and strengthened on that trip, that I know I'll have for a very long time, and I couldn't be more thankful for that.
3- That teaching and working with kids is DEFINITELY my calling.
So many times on this trip, God confirmed the fact that working with kids is definitely what he wants me to do with my life. I'm still not sure what that means exactly - whether that means teaching in a public school, teaching in a private school, or doing some sort of children's ministry at a church - I know that this is what God wants me to do. Everyday when I went out to play with the street kids, I knew that it was going to be impossible to leave them. And it was. Saying goodbye to those kids - especially Alexandra - was easily the hardest thing that I've ever had to do. I hate goodbyes in general, but usually they're the "goodbye, see you later" kind of thing. But this was a goodbye that I knew was forever. After I said goodbye to Alexandra, I started crying the second she turned away. I walked inside to find a few other girls that had just said goodbye to "their" kids, and all of us just sat on one of the girls' beds and cried. After we finished having our little pity party, we told stories about our goodbyes. All of us had gotten to see our kids families that day, whether we actually met them or saw them from afar. The kids seemed excited about their families, so we knew that they were taken are of. We knew that God had them in his hands, and that he was going to keep people in their lives to love them. All of us felt this amazing peace about leaving after we said our goodbyes to the kids, and we knew that it was definitely a God thing. It still hurts that we had to leave them, and after looking through pictures it kills me that I won't ever see them in person again. But I still have that peace that God loves them, and I got to show them the way that God loves them while we were there. So even though I can't physically be with them, there's always a part of me that will be. :)
It's still kind of hard to be home for me. For one thing, it's SO COLD here. We've all gotten used to 85+ degrees all day everyday, so the fact that it's like 20 degrees with snow right now is killing me. Also, there's no street kids for me to play with. And on top of all that, it's the first time I've been completely alone in a month. It's definitely going to be an adjustment, but that's to be expected. It's always hard to come back to America after spending a month in a place that had more poverty than I've ever seen...so prayer for that adjustment would be great!
Thanks so much to everyone that followed my blog, and for all of your prayers and support. We could definitely feel those prayers while we were in Manila, and they were SO appreciated. I love you all, and I'm so lucky to have such a great support system! If you wanna hear stories or anything else about my trip, don't hesitate to ask. :)
Love,
Kristen
"To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, 'If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.'" (John 8:31-32)
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