Colombia

Even though Friday is my longest day, even though it takes me an hour to get there and an hour to get back, even though there is a crazy amount of kids which results in a crazy amount of noise, to me Friday is a day of rest. Friday is the day I work up in Cazuca instead of at the school.   Friday is the day that I don’t have to worry about disciplining kids to get them ready for a “normal” school, Friday is the day where I don’t have to constantly tell children to sit still, not to fight, to get into a line, where I don’t have to talk to them about respecting others including teachers or not to lie, Friday is a day where I don’t have to hold my breath and have to remind myself to have patience. Don’t get me wrong I love what I do the other days and the “discipline” with the children is necessary. But Friday is the day where I get to color with kids, Friday is the day that I get to play legos with kids.   I have played countless games of snakes and ladders, coun...

Once again I sit knowing that it has been way to long since I last blogged and updated you about life in Colombia… Well life in Colombia continues to be life in Colombia.   Truth be told I had a couple hard months.   Looking back I say it was homesickness.   It confused me a little because I love life here in Colombia and I have no doubt that I am exactly where I am suppose to be, but it has been 16 months since I have set foot on Canadian soil, and for me that is a long time and I have decided that I am allowed to love Colombia and love being here and miss home all at the same time, its allowed.   I am doing much better though. Things at the school have been pretty tough as well.   The situations with our families just keep getting worse and at times their situations seem hopeless.   One of the continuing ed kids is being suspended, another one failed 6 of his classes and just doesn’t really show up a school and was recently expelled because ...

Life does go on, yes indeed and life with my continuing ed kids has been mostly good days which has been nice, but there for sure has been some frustrating days in there to.  We had an awesome pizza party and only three didn’t come but it was really hard for me not to let those three come and I still wonder if maybe I should of let them, I can be a big suck sometime to so I never really know if its me just being a suck and I should suck it up, or if I should have let them come… anyways its over and done with. Something else I have been doing with them is taking them for ice cream on their birthday.  It was Erika’s 15 th birthday which is REALLY HUGE here, and she is one that I have been having a more difficult time with, but the ice cream was a break through for us, since it was her 15 th birthday I let her pick whatever she wanted and we had such a nice time and we had such a nice talk.  A couple days later I saw her mom and her mom told me that she couldn’t stop t...

So once again it has been forever since my last post.  Before I was using the excuse that I didn't have internet and well it has been out for a little over a week I really have no excuse.  So this morning I read James 1:2 Consider it pure joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials I think God knew what kind of day I was going to have… If I am honest working with the continuing ed kids has been challenging.  There are 12 of them and for the month of March I thought it would be a good idea to reward those with good behaviour with a pizza party at the end of them month.  Well the end of the month is almost here and I think that I will have # of them at this part.  So yes it has been challenging.   I try to remind myself that most of them are between 13-15 and we can all remember being that age and how not fun it was…. I also try to remind myself that they have built walls around their hearts as a survival technique. I have to remind myself that ...

It has been to long, way to long and for that I am sorry. I had and an absolutely amazing time with my family in Switzerland and feel so incredible blessed that I got to spend time with them, just hanging out with my niece and nephew was pretty special, they are stinkin' cute.  I also went snowboarding in the Alps and snowshoeing, which was AMAZING ate fondu and a lot of chocolate.  Leave to Colombians honesty, when I got back I was told that I got fat in Switzerland.  Anyways it was a really really special time.  I have a darn good family. Another thing I am thankful for is that I have internet in my house (another Colombian honesty thing, when the computer guy met me face to face he said "I'm surprised your so young, you sounded like an old lady on the phone.)  So that also means more frequent blog posts…. Anyways another year has started so I will give you guys a little glimpse of of what a typical week looks like. Mondays: team meeting Tuesdays : teach ...

So here I am sitting in the airport in Bogota waiting to go to Switzerland to visit my family.  My brother and sister in-law are there on a teachers exchange and my parents are in Europe right now travelling around and we are going to meet up in Switzerland, I am sooooo excited and feel so blessed to have this opportunity, I do miss my family a lot, especially my niece and nephew. I have to admit sometimes that I do get lonely and do miss my family and friends, I do really love all my friends in Colombia, but it is not always the same.  I just have to say that I am so thankful for the peace that God has given me, that I am exactly where I am suppose to me.   On Halloween, a family came who I know quiet well from last time I was here.  Last time I was here they had 10 kids and that has now increased to 12 with twin girls.  Anyways, I was holding one of the girls, while talking to the mom and her youngest son came running up and gave me a huge hug (it was the fi...

Thank you again for all your prayers. The Halloween night was a success.  There were just under 200 under kids that came to our Halloween alternative.  At around 3pm our team met and made up 200 bags of candy to give away to the kids, we filled their bags and had candy left over. As far as I know there were no more kids that went missing and little Daniela was found.  Apparently her father was really abusive so she ran away.  She is now living in one of the homes run by the Colombian social services.  I am thankful that she wasn’t used as a sacrifice and I am thankful that she is no longer living with an abusive father.  Some kids do run away from these homes, stating that they are being abused there.  So a better alternative then the first two situations she was in.  Sometimes it is so easy here to lose hope, or to not have hope.  To look around and see these kids and the situations they are in and where their lives are heading....