Archive for February, 2011

Cat, Lauren, and Bridgette

So this week the team has decided to go and live with the people! The Kauluwela boys (Michael and Steven) are sleeping on the streets of China Town and the Waianae crew are sleeping at Keaau beach park. We’ve kind of got in mind that it will be for two weeks (we started on Wednesday night) but it could be longer depending on how we’re feeling. So far it’s been a challenge! There’s been a lot of rain all over the island, and last night we were flooded! We got back to camp after worship practice to find that out tent was getting filled with water, so the boys had to rotate it in the downpour! We had leaks in every corner and I pretty much slept in a puddle of water! I woke up, felt freezing cold and wet but didn’t know why, so I felt my pillow and doona and sure enough they were saturated! But there was nothing I could do so I just went back to sleep. We’re all a little delirious, tired and definitely sore from sleeping on the ground… Steven is like a zombie! But we are still so lucky and privileged that there is an “end date” to our homelessness, so really there’s nothing to complain about.

We’re hopefully going to get some excellent quality time with the people and families that are living in the beach park over the next week or so. We’re taking out pancake mix, bacon and eggs to have breakfast with them tomorrow – we’re only getting enough money to buy staples and using what we already have so that we can share food with the people out there. We’ve already gotten food donations and a cooler and lantern from Angel (she goes to The Salvation Army “The Rock” church) and lots of invitations to go and have dinner with our congregation members… But we mostly want to spend our free time with the Keaau residents.

Apparently there were gun shots over in the bush area (next to where we’re sleeping) over the past week or so, but “nothing that we should worry about” according to Uncle Bert (he’s lived at Keaau for 3 years) and there are psycho dogs near us that were chasing some guy down as he road past on his bike…So Bridgette and I decided it was safer to drive to the toilet block rather than get eaten There is only one toilet that works in the bathroom, and you don’t really want to touch anything in there! The showers are taps outside (like what surfers use to rinse off) so were probably going to shower when we get back to the dorms in the mornings because all of us girls are already sick and we don’t want to get worse by having freezing showers in the rain!

At the moment, we’re all kind of smelly, sleep deprived and hungry… but surprisingly in good spirits! It’s all an adventure and I honestly feel lucky to be doing it!

It’s definitely going to be an exciting and challenging experience and we would all really appreciate your prayers! But God is good and so faithful, we know that He’ll provide and we’ll be safe