This is a glogster. Click on this link to go to it: Glogster
Enjoy!
Kylee

Many Things to Say

Hi this is Kylee. I wanted to give you an update about what we are doing here. I want to start by telling you about a visitor we had last night. One that crawls on eight legs and likes to sneak around beside you when you are not looking.
I had been sitting down for a long time and then finally got up when I realized that there was a spider literally bigger than my hand. I ran down stairs and told my Dad. He was like, "Great! Where is the camera?" He grabbed the camera ran up stairs and told me to get a piece of paper and a  bowl. He got the bowl over the spider and put the paper under. We think it is called a huntsman spider. They eat mice and small animals and it bites. He brought it down the street and let it go free. That night I was so spooked that I checked, double-checked and triple-checked my bed for another one. I was really spooked. Here are some pictures:

Up Close

For Perspective

Another thing I want to tell you about is chapel. We have chapel every Friday. Most of the time Siann, Tesha, and I run it. We do a prayer, a skit, than worship songs. Their favourite is Jesus Love is a Bubbling Over.

They do other songs too, like Peace Like a River, Deep and Wide, John 3: 16 (a song made by camp leader), Jesus Loves Me, etc. One of the chapels we did was Zacchaeus.


Last week was National Hand Washing Day. The Philippine Red Cross came to the school and taught everyone how to wash their hands properly. At first I thought, "Why make all this fuss?" But then I remembered that if we don't wash our hands properly we could spred Tifoide, or other bad diseases. Here are some pics:

Someone I want to tell you about is a girl who we met on the beach. She was 8 years old and she didn't have a mother. She only spoke a little english (lamang ng kaunti Ingles as we say here on the island.) and was so cute. When we saw her we offered her some food. She sat by us then saw we were going to swim. She took off her shirt and pants and went swiming in just undies. She hopped in the water and spent the rest of the day with us. I would like to ask you to pray for her. Her name is Mary-Rosan. Thanks. Here is a picture of Siann, Mary-Rosan, and me.

Swimming and finding shells in the beach.

Laughing and playing together.

 So to wrap it up I am so amazed by everything here and I am excited to tell you more as I stay here longer. This island has helped me grow as a Christian, person, and servant of Jesus.

We gave her a sand mermaid fin.

Being a mermaid with coconut shells.

Always Something to Miss by : Mair

On a regular basis, as one of my children is mentioning something she misses about home, I am heard to say, “No matter where you are and what you are doing, there is always something to miss.”    I don’t know why this statement stuck with me from some movie or another, but I ponder it often as we adjust to our new normal. 

I have come believe missing something or someone cannot be equated with regret.  Missing can be the same as treasuring , taking the time to notice how important something is to you.  And I think we can all afford to treasure our blessings more.  At the same time, missing should not replace the value we put on our current circumstances.  The statement “There is always something to miss.” says to me that we need to look around and appreciate what we’ve got, when we’ve got it, because when we move on in this journey of life, we will regret not noticing it when we had it.

So my blog today is about missing… what I miss currently and what I will miss when we leave.  What I currently miss will be the treasure component of the blog… what I will come to miss will be the daily gratitude part.  These lists are a kind of extended, more-thought-out version of my “First Impressions” list from August.

What I Miss: (The Treasures of Home)

- those boxes of fresh salad that have been pre-washed three times and you  just rip them open, dump them out and EAT!  (I know I should have said “Friends and Family” first… but it is hot here and I really miss SALAD!!)

- bags of raw carrots and you just rip them open, dump them out and EAT! (I know, I know, continuing on a theme is all.)

- Friends and Family ;)

- dependable electricity

-  hot showers

- hot water that can actually cut through grease while washing dishes

- my dishwasher

- clean streets

- wide sidewalks that don’t have giant, unmarked caverns in them, barbeques springing up unexpectedly in the middle of them,  or roosters lining them. 

The Boracay Sidewalk

- Northern Ontario in the summer time

- fresh water lakes – parasite free

- good sewer systems

- immunizations for all (we have already had friends with Typhoid and Mumps since we have been here)

- universal health care

- being able to flush toilet paper (here it goes into a garbage can beside the toilet… I know… UGH!)

- toilet paper (here you have to bring it with you… and it is called “toilet tissue”)

- Children’s Aid

-  the changing leaves of Fall

- being able to wear jeans, a thick sweater, and hiking boots

- being able to talk to my family on a phone that doesn’t fade in and out

- being able to wear my hair down

- worship time at our church

- sermons in English

- being at the entrance of our trusty Zehrs, shopping cart in hand, money in pocket,  with an endless plethora of good, clean, food surrounding me all for the picking

- freshly harvested corn on the cob and strawberries

- homemade (by someone else) preserves

(Okay… I shouldn’t have written this when I am hungry!)

- a big school photocopier ,you know the kind that can copy 100 pages both sides in 3.6 seconds flat?

- dependable school computers (yes, I said dependable… it is all relative)

- small class sizes for all (yes, I said small… it is all relative)

- educators who are paid a living wage (see above  :)  )

- a refreshing absence of security guards with rifles in the banks and other public places

- being able to sleep in a bed without this impending sense of doom that some kind of creature is going to land on me in the night… or burrow in my ear or get tangled in my hair

- no roosters crowing… all DAY LONG

-a blessed lack of ants, ants, ants, ants, ants

- Friends and Family

What I Will Miss When I Leave: (The Daily Gratitude of my Heart)

- the people… the warm, friendly, kind, helpful, Godly, humble, loving, gentle, always laughing, randomly singing, people

- looking out my living room window and seeing palm trees, beach and ocean

The View from our Deck

- being able to swim in a warm, blue, beautiful ocean whenever I choose

- walking everywhere I need to go

- mission groups that come, support, inspire, pray and share

- big parties of love, singing, worship and celebration as a way of thanking those mission groups

- wearing nothing but summer clothes and sandals in October

- cheap anklets and earrings

- the adventure of newness

- typhoons (not the scary, dangerous type, but rather the crazy, windy rainy type that closes the school,  cools things down slightly, but doesn’t  cause any real damage)

- the 20s (this is a group of young, energetic, happy, service- minded,  full of faith, inspiring, fun missionaries that we work with and who live in the apartment below us)

- the peaceful whirl of ceiling fans

- being daily amazed at the feats of strength our Filipino neighbours perform on a regular basis- everything is done manually and when you are surrounded by constant construction you see some pretty incredible things… pretty incredible things done by men - average height of probably 5’5”- average weight of maybe 140 lbs (this guy below is carrying a washing machine … up two flights of stairs… then back for more!)

A Man Carrying a Washing Machine

- being able to get a pretty good therapeutic massage for 10 dollars

- white, soft, warm sand as far as the eye can see

- living in a more spontaneous, flexible, laid back (well… I’m trying anyway) manner

- Cracker Nuts (a delightful combination of peanuts surrounded in a crispy, light cracker shell in various yummy flavours… not sure why we don’t have them in Canada!) Big bag - one buck

- Butter Coconut Cookies  - a wonderful little, sweet cookie/ cracker kinda thing… super yummy with a cup of Green Tea (the only hot drink I can tolerate in life) on a “coolish” typhoon day (where it might drop to 24 degrees)  Twenty cookies – twenty cents.

- Mario’s Pizza on the beach

-Mario’s Mocha Shakes

- Fruit shakes… four fruits, a little sugar, ice… pure bliss - available EVERYWHERE

- Mangos… best in the world… period. (This from the Lonely Plant travel series books.. .and they should know.)

- the children in my class – the sweet, curious, big-smiled, loving, laughing, enthusiastic, grateful, fun children (especially now that we have a common understanding of how to behave in school !)

- people spontaneously pulling out acoustic guitars, singing, clapping, praising God, laughing and dancing

-Laughter.  Everywhere.

- lots and lots and lots of time with my children and husband – they come to work with me, they eat with me, they walk with me, they shop with me, they live with me, they socialize with me… and I LOVE it! (except of course when I need space.. but that is surprisingly less than one might think!)

The Family Walking to the Jungle Barn

- challenges in work, challenges in living, challenges in mind, challenges that require me to grow as a person, as a servant of the Lord, as a lover of mankind

-hearing cheesy music from the 80s and 90s everywhere – Flashbacks! – better yet, hearing cheesy Filipino versions of music from the 80s and 90s everywhere – distorted Flashbacks!

- meeting interesting, inspiring, wandering people from all over the world

- going to Panay island on a trike, boat, bus and looking out the window at the Filipino country side – completely beautiful

- never really having to think about what I need to wear when I leave the house.  I mean it is either going to be hot and sunny or hot and rainy.  When it is hot and rainy it is usually too uncomfortable to wear a raincoat and too windy for an umbrella… therefore we often just get wet… or wait it out.  So basically I just need to make sure I’m dressed modestly for stinking hot weather, wearing sunscreen, sunglasses, and a hat – and I’m good to go.

- Sundays spent at the “Jungle Barn” – the mission building on White Beach where many of our Filipino friends work and live.  We love to go there on a Sunday afternoon following church and play cards, swim, and visit.  The children love to play with their new Filipino friends, cuddle the babies and paddle around on the surf board that is stored there.  Sometimes we even get to go sailing.  Sailing isn’t really in a boat, as you might think about in Canada, but rather this vessel has two large netted arms on either side that you balance people onto according to weight.  You zip through the water, getting soaked to the skin as you dive in and out of the waves.  It is a blast! It makes me whoop!  We all need more “whooping” in our lives.

Tesha and our Friend's Sweet Baby

The Children and their Friends

The Jungle Barn where many mission groups stay

The Children at Sunset

The Children and their Friends

- the wonderful animated conversations that ensue when I am being accosted by locals on the beach wanting us to buy whatever they are selling “ Sailing? ATV? Buggy Car Mam??” and I whip out my ID bag from the school, explain in Tagalog that I live on the island and am teaching the local children.  (Don’t be too impressed by my speaking Tagalog… I really only know a couple things… but one of them is that I live here!) 

- the people… the warm, friendly, kind, helpful, Godly, humble, loving, gentle, always laughing, randomly singing people

So, there are my two lists as they stand this sunny, hot October 15, 2011.  I wonder what you might put in yours?  What are you grateful for today? What specific, little simple things warmed your heart?  Put them on the blog (we will post them after reading) or send them in an email if you are too shy to share publically. (You had to know there would be homework at some point… I am a teacher!)  Attitude of Gratitude.  I am constantly working on mine.  God Bless, Mair

A Typhoon Adventure

            It was lightly raining as Mom and I headed out for the school. Mom told me and the 20 year old that live down stairs that she had checked last night on the internet (Wow, tec. these days) and it was just a tropical depression (A.K.A. Just a rain storm), so the schools would still be open. We got to school and the guard (who doesn’t do just guarding, that is just his official title) was walking down the stairs. He informed us that he was going to Mam’ Teresa’s house (the administrator), to see if schools were still open. He and Teresa came back and told us that only preschool would be going home. Mam’ Teresa said she saw that it was just a tropical depression. Then we heard the ding ding of Teresa’s cell. She looked down, read the message, put her hands on her head and said “Mam’ Tomaob just texted me to tell me that public schools are closed so we should close the schools.”

            So Mom and the rest started getting a hold of kids parents telling them to come and pick up their child/ren. The 20 year old foreigners  found a way to occupy the kids who were still there. I went in to join them. My mom called me out for a second. She wanted me to see………….. a big waterfall on the staircase. It was about a foot deep and flowing down very rapidly. At that point I was thinking to myself “How are we going to get home?”                                        

The flooded staircase of our school.

            Well, we walked. We went down the road we take to church. It was flooded. So Mom and I trudged through almost a knee length of water. We heard that many people's houses were flooded. We ended up on the beach. Most of the restaurants were scooping out water that had gotten in. The beach flood water was at our ankles. Mom and I had to hold our breath as we walked through the so called “water” that turned out to be people’s sewage. It smelt kind of like horse’s number 2. Then we got to the outdoor mall. It was completely flooded. There was water everywhere. It was again up to my knees. We were looking for somewhere to eat. We were planning to go somewhere that is deep inside the mall but we decided to go to the closest restaurant. We finished our meal and trudged through the wetness, got some groceries and went home. When we got home there was no power. (That was our 16th power outage here.) Mom and I used the water that Tesha had saved in a bucket just before there was a power outage to have a sponge bath to get the dirty water off our bodies. My first flood was a day I will never forget. 
Love From: Kylee :-)