Friday already!

I'll echo everyone else in saying that I've been a pretty horribly inconsistant blogger throughout this trip... It's tough to get internet since our modem (or cord for the modem? or something else technologically-too-advanced-for-me-to-be-sure-of?) kind of died... So I'm blogging at the Hyodo's while all the youth are watching Lion King :) We've been looking forward to it..

Well it's been a crazy week... I kind of had this mid-trip breakdown and wasn't feeling too well physically, emotionally, and all that... I was super exhausted and got really moody and anti-social (ha) and was feeling frustrated at how not-well-focused I knew I was being... But after a 3 hour nap in the middle of yesterday and a really really good team meeting last night, I'm feeling much much better. Praise God.

We've been getting to go so many amazing places... that lots of other people have already told you about.. A highlight was definitely the Farm, where we got to do some work with the kids and play some worship/do our drama for the first time. The kids (well, teens) were so great... I got assigned to a different group while pulling all the dead grass/weeds where I was the only Seattle-ite, and I really got to know some of them. We bonded over the songs on the radio that we all knew :) Some Chris Brown... Rihanna.. Beyonce.. there's pop culture for ya... I even got to tell them that my sister met Chris Brown.. to which they responded "Your sister sang with Chris Brown??" hmm... (You're still cool, Rache.) Eventually that led to trying to find out which worship songs we all knew (we found more than I'd expected!) That was fun.. Then on the walk back to the main building, some of the girls taught me a simple song that had both a Swahili verse and an English one. I basically worked on it the whole day and still don't think I was pronouncing it right =P But they were great, and so happy to teach me anyway :) Hearing their stories and seeing their joy and hope in their new lives was inspiring. The work that's going on at the Farm is so amazing.. I was talking to some of the girls about possibly coming back to see them again next year, but some of them won't be there because they'll turn 18 and go out and find a job. But with the education and training that they're getting in their specific field, they don't seem scared at all. They're getting so well equipped and you can really see how much their lives are being changed by this ministry. Very cool.

During our worship "concert" I wanted to throw Lord I Lift Your Name on High in because it was one of the songs I'd found out that the kids on the Farm knew... and so we brought up some of them to teach the motions and that was fun :) got them more involved.. I'm not really sure if someone else has written about this yet but God definitely helped us out in our first drama performance by having all our props show up at the very, very last minute! We went to go set up for the drama while Trenton "stalled" and coudn't find the prop gun, the signs, or Steven's Jesus robe... So that didn't exactly help to calm any nerves we were already feeling. We prayed before going out and then just went for it. Thankfully, the signs showed up before we needed them and the gun and robe showed up mid-drama so that we were able to finish the drama with all props present. Kind of crazy, and very cool. Thanks, God.

There have been so many other amazing experiences... I know already that this trip is going to take a lot of time for me to fully process.. I'm looking forward to getting all the team's pictures compiled and getting to share them all with all of you :) I can't believe it's Friday already! As we're winding down, pray that everyone's energy and health would stay up and that God would bless the rest of the ministry we have yet to do in Kenya! Thanks!

bekah