Just another day...

Well, the chilly days were nice while they lasted - it is 88 today in the office. :)

The day started early when some tribal people showed up at our house at 6:30 asking for some help for their daughter's school expenses. It has been very rainy lately so those who just look for odd jobs have been out of work and consequently out of food and out of money for school expenses. After visiting with them for about an hour and figuring out how we could best help, Steve and I headed into town to buy Christmas gifts for all the people in our Bible studies. Christmas gifts are a big deal here and are expected, particularly from those who are seen as well off. Well, we have 8 Bible studies in different villages (maybe 150 adults?) so buying Christmas gifts for everyone can be an adventure. We went with candy for the kids, then spaghetti (a popular party food), coke, and cookies for everyone else to have a Christmas party together. As soon as we arrived home with our several large boxes of food (still need to divide it up into boxes for each village), Mikayla gave us a message that the chieftain from Tiwi (the village we are working in that is 3 hours away) had called and was in town. So Steve turned around to go meet her to see how he could help (we are helping coordinate a mass wedding in her village - weddings are so expensive that many of the tribal people are not officially married). He called me at 11:57 and asked what I was planning for lunch. I told him I didn't have plans yet - (was thinking probably just peanut butter and jelly since the morning had been so crazy). His answer? "Can the cheiftain join us?" Well, those of you who know anything about Filipino culture know that you cannot feed a Filipino sandwiches for a meal - it has to rice with some kind of vegies or other "rice companion" to be considered a meal. So I said, "Okay..." and hustled down to the kitchen to see what I could throw together in 5 mins. The kids ran around cleaning up our Christmas decoration mess, Ben set the table, and I threw together some stir fried carrots with onions (all I had on hand!) while our helper made rice and chopped up pineapple. Then I called Steve to tell him to pick up a roasted chicken from a road-side stand on the way home. And that is how we put together a meal in less than 10 minutes so the cheiftain could join us for lunch. :) She stayed for quite a while visiting, then Steve helped her with some more of the wedding legal preparations (just the paperwork is so expensive!) and sent her on her way. Thankfully, I have the kids' school work set up so that they can work on their daily reading and seatwork without me, so they were pretty much done with their work by the time I came up to FINALLY teach them their math and language lessons. Now Steve and I are going to sit down with Megan to brainstorm options for how to get viable employment and livelihood skills training for the tribal people who so desperately need it. Thought you might like a glimpse of what a day is often like for us - a ministry of interruptions!