SUNDAY FUNDAY!
seriously..
guess who got to celebrate their 27th birthday
in ETHIOPIA??
THIS GUY!
woop! woop!
so for cereals...
i was a bit homesick.
really missed my hubs.
but after i came downstairs to a chorus
of "happy birthday" from my team
and stuffed my face with Tsige's
banana bread...things started to look up.
our team split for church.
the men headed to the Anointed Word of God Church
{where we served the day before}
and myself and the ladies attended
the International Evangelical Church.
after service, we met back up with the guys and
had the most kickin', delicious indian lunch.
YUMMO!
after yummy lunch, we put on our
tourist hats and went to
entoto mountain to see the view.
on our way, we detoured through an HIV village
where people who have or are related to
someone who has HIV are pretty much ostracized
from everything they know.
it makes me sick.
with education, medicine and proper care,
HIV is legit not a huge deal.
it blows my mind how different
the third world is.
of course, the children are beautiful.
perfect.
absolutely perfect creations crafted by
the Hands that made you and me.
after some time at the mountaintop,
{oh hey, walsers.}
we headed to a place called the post office.
basically, the post office is in the general area
so they call it the post office.
makes sense.
it's a place filled with little shops.
your typical tourist trap.
the place is brimming with babies on the backs
of their begging mothers and
dirty, dusty school-aged children.
they surrounded our van and pushed whatever
they were lucky enough to
scrounge together to sell in our faces.
i noticed there were very few girls
and wheni asked why, i was told
"this is where the sex traffickers come".
basically in ethiopia,
a child is required by law
to attend primary school
until they are older.
{like middle school age}
after that, the family needs to pay fees
so their child can receive a "higher" education.
but most families cannot swing
the meager cost of tuition.
and besides, there's more money to be made
when a little kid is doing the begging, right?
why spend money and send your kid to school
when you can put them on the street for free?
have them beg and bring in
whatever money they can?
now precious, beautiful little girls
are ripe for the taking.
and if they are lucky enough not to be trafficked.
they will most likely prostitute themselves
because what other marketable skills do they have?
and the cycle continues...
another starving mother with a baby on her back presses
her desperate face against your car window
at the post office and when you
ignore her begging...
{as i have done...forgive me, Jesus}
she hopes with all her might that some other tourist
will relent and give her kid,
the eight year old boy who
carries the burden with her of providing
for their family by begging,
a few dollars for a pack of gum or toothbrush.
it's the way of life at the post office.
and yet...amidst the shattering of my heart
i fell in love at the post office.
a little boy...probably 8 or 9 years old caught my eye.
it wasn't anything silly he did or
anything he tried to say to me.
there was nothing magical or profound about him.
except that his face was completely
melted off on his left side.
his eye socket stretched and exposed.
his mouth sagged.
i only noticed him because i was curious
why he was covering his face as i peered
at him through the viewfinder of my camera.
most ethiopia children love having their picture taken.
but not this boy.
his name is "nata".
and i'm sure he notices that his picture
is taken more than his friends.
and i'm sure he notices the pity and horror
in the eyes of the people who take those
pictures instead of the laughter and joy
he sees when they take pictures of his friends
and their un-scarred, un-melted faces.
i wonder how many churches and organizations have
nata plastered all over their
walls and websites?
i did not have the heart to take his photo.
for one small moment, i was not
a photographer. i was a witness to a story
of a precious human being who had
something very bad happen to him.
whose pain goes much deeper than scars on skin...
i couldn't even bring myself to sneak a shot
when nata wasn't looking.
all i wanted to do was get out of our van and take
his beautiful, melted face into my hands
and kiss his scarred cheeks and tell
him how fearfully and wonderfully made
he is and how perfect i thought he was.
i am BEGGING you, dear blog reader...
pray for my nata.
pray that God will raise him up
to be a great cause for the Kingdom.
that nata's life will be a living
example of john 9:3. that the glory
and works of God will be displayed
through his life.
after goodbyes to my new friends at
the post office, we headed back
to our guest house for debrief and to
work on sorting through donations for Bring Love In.
OH! and my team surprised me
with a delicious tiramisu
birthday cake from kaldi's coffe shop
{OH MY LANTA!!! DELISH!!!}
No comments:
Post a Comment