First Vol Team

Just over a week after we arrived back in the Philippines, our first volunteer team for the term landed.  This particular team was comprised of my (Jen's) parents as well as one of the other pastors and wife from a key partner church (who also happen to be Steve's brother's in-laws...what can I say, we are from the Ozarks... :) ).

The first couple days was a team retreat for the Global Empowerment team here in the Philippines.  We had a great couple of days, and Brian encouraged us through worship, prayer, and sharing from the Word. Such a blessing!

We then flew down to Bicol to connect with our Bugkalot tribal partners.

 It was a wonderful time of re-connecting and hearing all the reports of what God has done over the last couple months.

 It was also really good to have my parents there for that time, and it is always such an encouragement to our partners when my dad can share his heart with them in Bugkalot (and my mom shared too! It was kind of funny translating for her because when she spoke Bugkalot, I did the English for the other Americans, but then she would switch to English so I would translate into Bugkalot...a little chaotic, but it worked! :) ).

 Steve is showing the team the map we have made on the back of the chalkboard. It has pins for where all the Agta churches and outreach groups are located.  Amazing to see all that God is doing in that area!

 We finished our time together with a sweet time of worship.  Brian led some of the worship time, and one of the Bugkalot guys led some of it.  Was really special when we were able to find some worship songs that we know in multiple languages.  A taste of heaven.

 After the day with our Bugkalot partners, we flew back up to Manila and drove north to visit the Bugkalot churches.  Was so cool to watch my dad and mom re-connect with old friends.  This old man was part of the group that swam across a flooded river to make it to the leadership seminar.

 Grandmas the world over love to look at pics of each other's grandbabies. :) 

The leadership seminar was a powerful time, and we are praying that God uses it in mighty ways in the months and years to come.

 We also got to check out the coffee plantation. 

 Coffee cherries!

 This is our house in the clouds.  Come visit, and we'd love to bring you here!

So thankful for this team that came to encourage us AND our partners, both down south and up north.

just for laughs

So the eggs you buy at the market here are not all sparkly clean like the eggs you buy at the grocery in the US - the ones here are dirty, sometimes with globs of...junk...all over them. So we often wash the eggs before we use them, but one night after the helper had purchased eggs and put them in the fridge, I went to get one out to fry it up for Steve and noticed that she had forgotten to wash them. I was intentionally avoiding several of them that looked particularly nasty, and reached for another one while still looking at the nasty ones (kind of that "can't look away" syndrome at accident sites). Well, once I had the egg in my hand, I noticed a movement in my peripheal so I very quickly refocused my attention from the dirty eggs to the egg in my hand. To my absolute shock, there was a TAIL sticking out of the end of the egg. And to make it worse, it was wriggling wildly!!! Not joking here. Somehow I managed to put the egg down on the counter without breaking it then went into a little "that is so disgusting!" dance in the kitchen. So before you all think i overdosed on my pain meds and am imagining things, what had happened was a small lizard had lost its tail (we have these small lizards everywhere in the house, and their tails easily come off then continue to wriggle for several hours afterwards - the boys love to play with them, much to my chagrin). ANYWAY, a lizard tail had become separated from its owner and somehow got stuck on the end of an egg - wonder if Zach had anything to do with that... - then put in the fridge for me to discover later. What fun.

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setting: small restaurant

Steve: "do you have hard-boiled eggs?"

waiter: "yes"

Steve: "how much are the eggs?"

waiter: "10 pesos each" (about 20 cents)

Steve: "great, we will have 8"

when the bill came, we were surprised to see we had been charged 30 pesos for each egg instead of just 10. when we asked about it, we were told that the eggs ARE p10 each - unless you want them cooked, THEN they are P30 each.

okay....how do you respond to that kind of logic?

Just Being Ben

Ben brought this piece of paper to his daddy last night and said, "I wrote this song. It is called, 'Jesus Died on the Cross'."

Daddy: "It's beautiful, Ben! Can you sing it for me?"

Ben: "No, silly, I can't read!"

Charry and the Offended Rats

Charry has been a huge help in our home since March of 2007. She helps with the laundry (no dryer), cleaning (things get much dirtier here much faster), trash (making compost, burning the rest), and many other things that take a LOT more time to do here. She is only 29 years old, but on Thursday while she was working in our kitchen, she collapsed. It seems that she suffered a mild stroke, and she has entirely lost the use of her right arm. Please pray that the feeling and mobility would return. If it is not God's will for this to happen, please pray that she would remain encouraged as she learns to live without the use of her arm. We are controlling her blood pressure with medication and have taught her some basic physical therapy, but she has a long road ahead of her. Unless things change, she will not be able to work from here on out. Thank you for praying for her family as they adjust to this. We will continue to pay her salary for the next month just to help out, but we are also in the process of looking for someone else at least on a temporary basis while she is gone. Please pray that we are able to find someone soon as I can't keep up with everything without some help!

On a lighter note, we thought you might enjoy this story. Just before we left for our meetings, we caught a rat in the closet on a glue board trap. I had Charry kill it and dispose of it. Then while we were gone at the meetings, the rats did a lot of damage in the house. When we arrived home, we did not have any electricity. It seemed like the rats might have chewed through an electric line. When we mentioned this possibility to Charry, she gasped and said, "That is because you had me kill that rat before you left! I should have just thrown it over the fence!" I replied that I didn't want her to do that because then it would just come back. She said, "But now we have offended the rats! Now the rest of them will rise up against you and destroy all your things. This happened once to us when we killed a rat - the rest were offended and began to destroying everything - even our clothes! You must ask forgiveness from the rats and leave some food out for them to show your change of heart." Steve's response when I told him this? "Well, I am planning on "offending" any more rats that get caught in our traps so looks like we are in for a rat war!" I am happy to report that we have "offended" 4 rats since we arrived home, and it looks like we are winning the war as we haven't had any damage the last couple nights. So do you think we should keep "offending" them or should we ask forgiveness from the rats and start feeding them?

You've got to be kidding me...

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Ok, so we drove a couple hours to go see a movie last weekend. When we got there, the sign said that it started at 11 am. We hustled and got in the theater at 10:58. We were surprised to see that the movie was already going but figured we had only missed a couple minutes. But as we watched, it really seemed like it was the middle of the movie. Steve went and asked about it, and we found out that on the sign that said it started at 11, it also had a little "R4" next to it. Come to find out, that, yes, it starts at 11 am - at "Reel 4" - 1/2 way through the movie!!! When we asked what time the BEGINNING of the movie starts, they looked at us like we were NUTS and informed us that it was playing all day long. We said we understood that, but that we want to watch JUST from the beginning to the end. After we convinced them that we really wanted to start at the beginning of the movie and were not just pulling their legs, they scrambled to try to figure out what time it would be on "R1". They eventually said "probably around 12".

So we left to try to find somewhere nearby to get lunch (a whole other story) then came back at 11:57. We caught the last scene of the movie, then the credits. The credits were not even finished yet when it cut to "R1" and jumped right into the beginning of the movie. It would be impossible to time your arrival so as to miss the end of the movie and still catch the beginning.

As it turns out, Filipinos just pay for a ticket, arrive whenever they want and start the movie at whatever point, watch until the end, THEN they watch the beginning up to the point where they started watching.

So not only were we weird when we wanted to watch from the beginning of the movie, we were also the ONLY ones in the whole theater who left when it was over - everyone else was sticking around to see up til the point when they started. It also means that people are coming and going throughout the movie since they arrive and leave at random times.

Always an adventure!

Funny Story - at Steve's expense!

Steve went to go to Ipil earlier today (that is the village back behind the lake). Well, we have had so much rain that the parking lot at the end of the road where we normally leave our truck is completely underwater. Has been that way a couple weeks. Well today it was up even more, and Steve was wading through the water when he noticed a lady off to the side of him walking kind of gingerly across one section. Well, he kept watching her and wondering why she was doing that – while he kept walking. Bad mistake. As it turns out, there was a large ditch full of water right there with a plank bridge to cross it – only the “bridge” was now also a foot under water and completely invisible! So the lady was crossing on the underwater bridge while Steve watched her – and walked right into the ditch! He went in up to his chest – not sure the cell phone is going to recover but thankfully the electronic remote on the keys was ok and he had left his wallet in the car… Anyway, then he was edging his way along a little ledge over the water when an old lady came along with 2 big buckets. So Steve balanced on the outside to let her pass – which went great until one of her buckets hit him in the gut and he went flying backwards into the water – again up to his chest! (One of our friends said this reminded her of the cartoon Robin Hood and Little John.) Meanwhile, the wind is howling and there are 3 foot waves on the little lake so Steve took shelter with a bunch of others under a tarp – until someone hollered that one of the boats just sank! One of the rickety ferry boats we normally ride in wasn’t able to withstand the waves and sunk to the bottom. Thankfully it was just tied at the shore with no one on board so everyone was ok. It was at that point that all the people taking shelter with Steve told him he really shouldn’t try to go across the lake because who knows if and when he will ever make it back across after the Bible study (which was a real bummer since it has been several weeks since we have been able to have a study there due to weather and other factors). So he came home, dripping wet and shivering. He seemed to enjoy his hot shower, dry clothes and hot coffee! Always an adventure!!!

I wrote this yesterday and sent it to some friends, then thought the rest of you may enjoy it as well. A few updates - Steve reminded me this am when he read it that he DID NOT get a warm shower - he was just stepping into the shower when the power went off! So he had a cold shower after all that. And the cell phone did not make it. We will hold a memorial service for it later today - then try to make it up to Naga to buy a new one tomorrow.

Hope you had a good laugh at Steve's expense!

Happy New Years!

I think a good way to start out a new year is with a good laugh. Over the last couple years here, I have been accumulating pictures of funny signs that we run across (while we happen to have a camera on us). A few of these were taken by friends, but they were all taken here in our new country or as we traveled around SE Asia. Enjoy... :)

Luca's pizzas are actually excellent - but that is not exactly as I would have chosen to describe them!

A durian is a very smelly fruit found here in SE Asia. Apparently, they are not welcome at the YMCA in Singapore - for which we were all very thankful!
A local "toll bridge". So close...
A Filipino version of Krispy Kreme? No, we only wish...
Ok, this is one of my favorites. They have some face cream here called by this "magical" name - I don't even want to think about if the content is consistent with the name... Doesn't it make you want to run out and buy some to spread all over your face?
Here are some very handy little boxes to grab on your way out of the store.
Um...I don't know what to say. King of what???
This one caught my eye as we drove through town here in Iriga. It's the same kind of banner they use for announcing a birthday party or family reunion that is going on. Huh. Maybe we will skip this little get together.
Let's have lunch!

Here is the label on a bag of chips we bought. Speaking of "Yummy Yes"...
Notice the last line - I didn't realize that costume designers had such great photo copy needs.
If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all... I don't even know how to determine the intelligence level of our vehicle. Is there an IQ test for that?
The long-lost fine art of wood curving...
Ok, hope you got a laugh - or at least a smirk - out of this post, and we hope your new year is a happy one! Keep your eyes on our Heavenly Father, and He will give you joy in the midst of any circumstances. Happy New Years!

Rodents, lizards, and ants - Oh my!

Ok, so the lizards are normal for around here (we always have little ones climbing the wall - which is ok with us because they eat the mosquitos), but I thought I would let you know about our recent adventures with rodents and ants. When we got home from our travels, our house was infested with ants. Every counter was covered with them. We had secured a tenuous victory over them before we left by practicing fastidious cleanliness. However, it seems our helper was not as fastidious while we were gone because the ants definitely overran us. After several "Raid" battles, we went to the city an hour away and got some heavy duty ant poison. Today the ant infestation seems much better.

As for the rodents, it seems that our giant monitor lizard (see the post about "Monty" below for details) was waging that war on our behalf. However, we have not seen or heard from Monty since before we left in June, and it seems that the local rodents have heard the news that our home is open for business once again. Our dogs have been doing a great job of killing any of the ones that try to make the mad dash across the yard (they have killed 9 large rats in the 2 weeks since Steve has been home!). However, a few have managed to make it into our house. We noticed the evidence of a few mice and began hearing rats in the attic (where Monty used to live). So we bought some weapons to fight this war as well, and we have killed 5 rats or mice in the last 2 days! All this rodent action has us wondering if it is possible to buy a monitor lizard to put in your attic to live. A thought I would never have considered until recently. I debated, but I decided to spare you the photos of the effects of our rodent war - they wouldn't be pretty, believe me! :)

Our friends Matt and Erin and their daughter Chloe are enroute to see us! We are unbelievably excited. Mikayla and Chloe became best of friends when they were 3 years old in Sparks in AWANA at our home church in Missouri. I can't wait to see their reunion. We adults are pretty excited as well to see some of our very best friends. :) In case some of you are wondering, no, the fact that I waited to publish this post about our rodent infestation until AFTER they left the USA was NOT intentional...but it sure doesn't hurt anything! :)

Here are some pics of the Price kids and Hagen kids before we came to the Philippines. They have had one more daughter since this pic was taken.

Best Friends Forever!

A Lizard in the Fridge - and Zach turns 5!

We have hundreds of small lizards all over our house. They climb all over the walls and the ceilings and sometimes startle you when you open a closet or drawer. We actually don't mind at all because they are harmless, and they eat all the bugs. Actually, the kids love to catch them and play with them (which is normally fine, but the other day they accidentally dropped one on my foot, and the scared thing went running - right up my leg! I was not too thrilled... On my walls is one thing, up my leg is another). Anyway, I recently opened the fridge and was shocked to see a lizard IN the fridge - no joke. I have no idea how he got in there, but he was not allowed to stay. Needless to say, he was a little sluggish when we pulled him out.

But on to more important things - Zach turned 5 years old! To celebrate, we went to a great little swimming pool near Mt. Mayon, "our" volcano with our friends, the Allens.

We had a cake made at the local bakery with a spiderman web on it. It didn't turn out as well as I had hoped (they changed the colors on us), but I also made a box with a city around the sides and suspended Spider Man over the cake. Zach loved the cake and promptly proclaimed this his best birthday ever.

These 5 kids are virtually the only caucasians in Bicol. We are so thankful for the Allens who live about 1 1/2 hours away, and we get together with them as often as we can.

Grandma and Grandpa Hagen sent a cool card for Zach that Mikayla read to all the kids.

Zach got some cool presents, but he really liked this super hero t-shirt from his buddy, Caleb. Some others were a spiderman thermos, 2 spiderman puzzles, some spiderman school supplies...are you sensing a theme here? He also got the game Clue Jr. from us and his grandparents.

We had a blast hanging out as a family and swimming in the pool. A torrential downpour actually started in the afternoon, but we still had a good time - the kids playing in a little hut and the adults visiting. Nothing like a cookout in the rain! :)

No, this is not a picture of a drowning child. I asked Steve to take a pic of Zach swimming (he has become a little fish in the last 6 months), but I forgot that he swims entirely underwater now. So here is the pic anyway... :)

As I glance by over our blog, it occurs to me it that it looks like all we do over here is play. :) Believe it or not, that is not actually the case - it's just that the pics of curriculum development are not as exciting as fun swim days. :) Actually, last week we did go as a family and visit a couple of Agta villages, and we had a blast. I would have loved to have taken some pics, but I didn't want to seem like a tourist with ulterior motives on our 1st visit. I will try to get some of those another time.

Please pray with us today and tomorrow (May 29 & 30) as we are very busy with the medical clinic. Today is prep day (we are feeding 500 people tomorrow in addition to the medical clinic!), and tomorrow is the big day. Please pray that all the planned details come together and that we are able to make some good relationships with the Agta through this clinic. Please also pray as there is a volunteer team from the States working with the Filipino medical team. They are here to share the Gospel, and their goal is 11,000 decisions for faith in 10 days. While this is a noble goal, it doesn't take into account several facets of the Filipino culture. And since it is a high goal, Steve observed some of them being rather aggressive, even pushy, in their style as they share the Good News. The Agta are already suspicious of outsiders and easily "turned off". Please pray with us that they don't "scare off" the Agta tomorrow; we are hoping to start some relationships through the clinic tomorrow that will grow into an opportunity to really teach them the Word. Please pray that we get an opportunity to share our hearts with the volunteers before the clinic in the morning in a way that will communicate clearly but not create tension. We truly appreciate them coming all the way over here to help the Filipino people; we would just like to help them communicate in a way that will be less offensive in this culture. We covet your prayers!!!

Scary Electricity: Take 2

Just so you don't miss it - be sure to check out my post from yesterday just below this one - The Grand Tour of our new home!

For all our "regulars" out there, you may remember this pic from a post last year. The state of confusion of the electric wires is unbelievable to us. It is also very common to see multiple wires draped all over people's roofs or propped up to allow cars through. The electrical infrastructure here in Bicol is even more exciting, and we are not at all surprised by the 6 brownouts a day (on average). Often they only last a few minutes but many last several hours or longer. We very quickly realized the futility of trying to keep the electrical clocks on the microwave, etc. set to the correct time. Here a few stories about our scary electricity:

1) Last week I reached up to turn on a lamp, and got a terrible shock. Apparently it had been plugged in "backwards" (don't ask me - something about the lack of a grounding wire). The shock was bad enough that it actually left 2 red, sore spots on my hand where my thumb and finger had touched the lamp. It was sore for more than a week!

2) Steve heard some commotion going on out front yesterday. When he checked it out, he was surprised to see our neighbor smacking the electrical wires along the street with a long bamboo pole. After several smacks, the power to his house kicked back on!

3) Mikayla came in the house crying yesterday saying she had been up in the tree when something jolted her body - like she had been shocked real bad. Now, you have the advantage of knowing the topic of this post so you are inclined to believe her. I did not have the same advantage and found it a little hard to believe that she had been shocked while up in a tree. I suggested to her that maybe the wind had blown the branch and startled her and she jumped. But she stood by her guns so Steve went out to check it out. He discovered that, sure enough, she had been shocked by full 220 current. Apparently, there was some wiring inside the wall next to the tree that had never been used. When Steve had mounted a "Welcome" sign to that wall a few weeks ago, he had accidentally put a screw threw the wires inside the wall, making all the bars on top of the wall (and the metal sign) "live" with electricity! Mikayla had bumped one of the bars and gotten the shock of her life. Poor kid.

A Trip to the Fortune Teller

Well, today has been quite the adventure. Yesterday we went out for the afternoon and left one of the housegirls alone in the house to finish up then go home. She then called some friends to come over and keep her company while she "worked". Going against the house rules, she invited them into the house, and - long story short - my new Ipod MP3 player (that Steve just bought me for our anniversary on Aug 22) was stolen. Steve went with our helper and her one friend to the school of the other guy, the one we don't know and suspect took it. He ended up in the middle of a big ordeal there at the school as the principal and guidance counselor got involved and ended up searching every student there. After that exciting cultural experience, Steve and the 2 girls left, and Steve thought they were headed to the guy's house to check his room. They arrived at his house, and there were a lot of people hanging around out front and in the foyer of their house. Steve kept asking these people questions - indirectly, in keeping with the culture - trying to get to the bottom of the situation. But he just got vague answers. He then asked what all the people out front were doing. He was told that they probably lost something too and need to know where it was. It ends up, our helper's friend had taken him to a fortune teller to find out who took it! So here Steve was sitting in the waiting room to have his fortune told to find out who took the Ipod! Much to the bewilderment of all, he walked out before it was even his turn.

The day continued to be a roller coaster adventure but with the end result being a missing Ipod and no hope to get it back. The guy has certainly sold it by now. Steve finally did leave (3 hours late) for Bicol for his survey trip there. I continued to try to track it down but to no avail. Today has been quite the adventure, full of language and culture exposure, one that we will not soon forget.

As for the Ipod, I am trying very hard to view it as "just stuff" (to quote my husband). While I know this in my head, my heart is arguing...

Please be thinking of us as we try to figure out how to handle the situation with our helper who asked her friends to come in when she knew better. She has now disappeared off the face of the earth. I am not sure if and when she will come back nor what I should say to her if she does. To top it off, our other helper is sick and Steve is gone and I have a big trip to plan and pack for! Life is an adventure...

A Lizard Pooped on Me!!!

We took a trip down to a nearby island by ferry this past weekend to visit some people who work in Bicol but were vacationing at a missionary guest house. We had a wonderfully relaxing time there - we even got to do some reading! Our kids played nicely with their 4 kids (there were 7 kids, ages 2 - 9, running around with relatively few disagreements!), and Steve and I enjoyed sitting on the balcony enjoying the beautiful view and amazing sunsets. We also took 2 trips to the beach and went snorkeling one time. It was a good visit with new friends, and we got to relax besides.
On one such relaxing moment while Steve and I were sitting talking, a felt something hit my arm in the darkness. I looked down, and it looked a little bit suspicious. My suspicions were confirmed when I looked up and saw a butiki on the ceiling above (BOO-ti-kee : a small lizard that eats insects so is welcome inside any home - we have dozens of them who make their home inside ours). A lizard pooped on me! That was a first.

Steve talking to Mariano while some of the kids dig in the sand. He was Romanian, raised by deaf parents so his first language is sign. She was Austrian. They had 2 friends with - one also Austrian, another Filipina deaf. There were so many languages flying around this weekend! It was nice to hear an unfamiliar language though and know that we don't have to learn it.

The gorgeous view from the balcony. Just feel your stress melt away...

The sunsets were an awesome reminder of our Creator.

A Cowboy Sighting

Zach made some random comments last week about having seen a cowboy. This seemed odd to us because we have seen no such thing in the Philippines. Then we were driving through Manila yesterday and came alongside a truck full of large pigs. Zach got all excited and said, "Look, Mom! More cowboys!" We were quite confused and reminded him that those are called pigs. To which he replied that in the Philippines they are called cowboys. We were still quite confused until it occurred to me that the Tagalog word for pig is baboy (pronounced bah-boy). Mystery solved!