Here is another update from Eunice!
Hello friends!!!
It’s me Eunice again =) I have so much to share! The past 2 weekends have been very busy. Last weekend on the 18th we had the DIF event that we helped out with and it was soo much fun. We drove 1.5 hours to Tecate and our kitchen staff prepared all the food and I set up all the murals for the different orphanages to paint. Omg there were so many kids, and they had so much fun with a ton of different activities, I wasn’t able to watch all of them though b/c cleaning up took a looooong time even with a lot of people helping out. I saw a lot of kids that I recognized from camp and they all came up and said hi, I even saw Susana from La Gloria…which is the orphanage that our church has been paired up with for the past 5 years. She moved to a different orphanage and she looked so different I didn’t recognize her at first. She kept on staring at me and then finally after like an hour she came up and asked “Are you Eunice??” hahaahhaha! It was really good to see a lot of familiar faces at the event.
So as soon as that event ended I had to prepare for the event this past weekend Los Colores de Mis Suenos. A church from Long beach California called Bethany came down and they were a large group of 130 people that were mostly families. It was all junior high students along with their parents and some younger siblings. It was really neat to see families coming down to serve these kids together. Well this event was specifically for the migrant kids in the area, and so we had roughly 250 kids that came and had fun with the carnival games we had set up at the school just a mile from our ranch. I would say the migrants are worse off from the kids in orphanages. Migrant kids have parents that work in different fields and we call them migrants b/c they move around when the seasons change b/c crops change seasonally. There are flower fields, corn fields, numerous different vegetable fields and they work all day in the hot sun for 11 hours 5-6 days a week and they make roughly $8 a day. It’s very hard manual labor, picking fruit or flowers isn’t easy b/c the bunch they make has to be PERFECT otherwise they won’t get paid for it. Since the parents work all day in the fields, the kids usually stay home by themselves so the oldest child usually becomes the mom. I know 6 year olds that have to watch their baby siblings and do all the laundry and cook for the family too. Some of the kids actually work in the fields too to make extra money and they start as young as 7. So for these kids to come and take part in this event was HUGE. They don’t ever get a chance to just be kids and have fun so it was really good that many of them were able to make it out.Well after the carnival, the church split up into different teams and they took part in food and prayer. Food and prayer is when we prepare food dispenses like rice, corn flour, pasta, beans and other main ingredients and we hand them out to the migrant families. Most of them are very very poor, and they have a difficult time affording even these basic items so the food dispenses are a huge blessing for them. The groups go out and hand out these dispenses along with blankets and teddy bears for the kids and they take some time to talk with the families and pray for their needs. I couldn’t participate in food and prayer because the group was so large they had to go in multiple rounds and I had to stay at the ranch to manage dinner for the groups that came in and out.
We had several different casualties this weekend, one guy broke his wrist falling off a ladder and a tire blew out on the way to food and prayer so we never made it to one area of migrants. Regardless, God was in control and he had different plans in mind. We were most excited about going to that one particular area of migrants but that van’s tire blew out. We don’t know what God has in mind yet, but an interesting string of events happened after the tire blew but I can’t write it all out b/c then this email would be forever long hahahhaha~ If ya wanna know then just email me. =)
It was really good for me to connect with some of the Americans that came down. I was really encouraged by them and had a chance to talk with them and share with them why I chose to serve with Genesis. It was interesting hearing their stories as well, one of the dad’s shared with me his story. He always had a heart for missions so he assumed that meant going out and doing the work, but whenever he went on missions trips he never felt right with what he was he doing. After praying about it, he decided to just work knowing that God had something different in mind. Once he started working, year after year he was so blessed financially and finally after praying about it found that he was meant to support. So for the past 20 years he’s been supporting different missionaries and organizations and they’ve been able to depend on him 100%. I know that financial issues for missionaries can be stressful because you don’t know who’s going to support you or how much they’re going to support you and to have someone that will support 100% is a God send. I can imagine how many people have been blessed through this one guy and he’s just a normal everyday kinda guy too, there’s nothing particularly special about him. That reminded me that we were all created to be used, to be put to work but it’s different for each and every person.
I also saw two of my staff friends from this summer so it was really good taking time to catch up with them. Well this email is getting super long so I’l end it with some prayer requests.
#1. I am constipated, my diet is really different from what I’m used to so I haven’t been able to go =( I want to be REGULAR!
#2. I need to commit more time to pray. Especially when it’s busy here it’s hard to find time to pray because then I’m so tired I just wanna sleep.
#3. I need friends. It’s been hard entertaining myself when I do have some free time.
#4. I want to serve with a JOYFUL heart. Sometimes….when i’m preparing boxes and boxes and boxes of activities it’s a lot of work finding all the right things digging through the sheds that have spiders and spider webs EVERYWHERE. I found myself a little unhappy that all that work was for the kids to play with for just 2 hours. And on top of that the cleaning up afterwards takes days. So yeah it’s hard to be joyful but I want to be joyful with whatever I do here.I think that’s it, so pray for me please! Email me! Everyone here has welcomed me with open arms but I still miss everyone at home. Keep me updated =) I keep forgetting to take pics but when I do get a chance to I’ll send some for yall to see! I love you all and miss you dearly~ Ciao!
Eunice
Related posts:
- Eunice July Update Hey everyone! I totally meant to email yall last weekend...
- Eunice November Update Hey everyone! This entire month all I’ve been looking forward...
- Eunice October Update Hey everyone! WOW this month has just flown by….so many...
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
