Journal entry ---June 15

Journal entry June 15

Ariel felt sick last night, we prayed for God to heal her, and he did. By the time we needed to leave for the children's home she was feeling a lot better, good enough that we felt we could continue with the day. Praise God. We went to a market on the way. The amount of things to buy was overwhelming, and we were harassed to buy many things and some we bought - 2 fans and collection of note cards, 3 dresses and some shoes.( of course we had to get shoes) Then we went for lunch to an Indian restaurant, we had to spoon feed the girls so they'd actually eat. Ben and I loved the food. After "full" bellies we drove a long way to get to the children's home. As we drove the city turned into villages, and then to farm land between villages, with a little jungle here and there as well. Rice fields went by, lots of dogs(108 according to the girls count), goats and shacks selling everything from crackers to clay pots. Lots of jeeps stacked with people or bamboo or bags of rice passing by. We drove on and on. Joelle and Seraya chatted the whole way. Ariel slept. We drove and drove some more. My sense of time was way off and I thought we had been driving way too long I was sure we were lost. Though I was kept entertained by the people I saw and the new environment plus the girls did so great with the long hot drive.(very hot and humid) They(the girls) didn't complain at all. Maybe the fact that they didn't have to wear seat belts helped them enjoy the ride. Soon Ton, our driver, slowed down, he drove more unsure of where he was going. Eventually he stopped to ask for directions(something I thought he was never going to do, and should have done an hour ago). We had driven too far. So we went back quite a way and after a few more wrong turns we made it to the road we needed to take to get to the home. By now it was pouring rain(as it usually did in the afternoon there) and the children were all coming home from school. We could see some waving at us from their "school bus" I was sure it was the kids from the home. So here we were stopped at this road, honestly I thought "if we go down that road we'll get stuck for sure". The driver was unsure too it took him a long time to decide to drive down that road. He drove cautiously, it was full of water filled potholes and was very rocky, almost like a river bed. he stopped to ask for more directions and the rain was still pouring down...... (not going into detail but I really had to go to the the bathroom right about here :$, Ben and the kids had a good howl at my expense) ..... Our driver found the place. We walked down a muddy path to the home. It was so beautiful and the kids were very excited to see us. We met them all (8) and tried to remember their names. We sang songs for them and they sang for us. We played games and talked about what they like. Then we did puzzles and drawing in their sketchbooks that we brought for them. At the end we prayed and it was time for us to go. Our driver was waiting for us by the main road so we walked out to meet him. It was very crazy driving home as it got dark, we won't do that again. Praise God we made it home alive.

For the protection of the children we are not posting pictures of their faces on the internet so the few photos I show are either not showing their face or of random shots of people and places along the way. If you want to see some great photos of the kids I can email you(in which case you'll have to send me a message) or you will have a chance to see some in church.

Eating Indian food for lunch at the Nila Birani Shop

some houses along the way



The muddy road just before we got to the home

Puzzling with the children