Rehoboth

Rehoboth – God has made a place for us… Genesis 26,22

A place full of laughter and joy: Rehoboth is a children’s home, early learning center, soon-to-be medical clinic and a lot more. It is a non-denominational ministry with a clear mission statement: “Transforming families and providing alternative futures for children in crisis based on God’s model of love and care through child and family oriented programs, projects and services.” More than 30 children from age 0 to 14 live there at the moment and Rehoboth is working tirelessly to either reunite them with their birth families or place them for adoption. We found our way there through Sarah, a friend of our Aussie friends. She works and lives at Rehoboth and has a passion for all these kids.

Visitors at Rehoboth literally get devoured by the children. Every single one of them is full of energy and longs for attention and the risk to fall in love with them is high. Rehoboth has a guest house and welcomes volunteers from all around the world. There is always something to do: We went swimming with the kids, built a bike track for the recently donated bikes, fabricated a basketball ring, celebrated Valentin’s Day (a big big thing in the Philippines), sang karaoke and, most importantly, spent hours playing around with the kids and toddlers and babies. I am so thankful for people like the Rehoboth staff, who devote their time and abilities to children in need and make the world a better place.

By the way, they have lots of ongoing projects, and are always in need of funding. If you feel that supporting 31 of the cutest kids ever is something that you’d like to do, check out their homepage: www.rehobothsampalocministries.com. And you’re more than welcome to go there and make sure your money is well spent, by the way…

 

One month in the Philippines

After spending a month in the Philippines, I’ve come to the following conclusion: Filipinos are warmhearted and genuine people. They live in a very beautiful country with stunning nature. Their food culture includes a few funny dishes like the “halo-halo”, which means nothing else than “mix-mix” and is a desert of evaporated milk, a lot of ice, jelly beans, red beans, banana, corn and some indefinable ingredients. Markus even tasted the Balut, a half-fermented and mostly rotten ducks egg, which instantly made it to first place of the worst foods of all times.

The trip from Pamilacan to Sampaloc turned out to be quite interesting, by the way: It was probably the most intense travel day so far (right up there with Indian trains, probably). It started at 7am when we left Pamilacan island with a boat that was so loud that we felt numb for a few hours afterwards, followed by a breakneck tricycle ride to the airport of Tagbilaran, where we boarded our plane to Manila. From the airport in Manila, a taxi drove us to the FX station (some sort of taxi van for 14 people, although there are only 11 seats…) in the city. After 2 hours sitting like a sardine in a can (especially Markus) in the FX, we took a jeepney for the last few kilometres to Sampaloc. The driver allowed us to sit on the roof, and we could not help but to think of the faces of our parents and grandparents if they saw us traveling like this… We arrived in Sampaloc around 7pm, where we were warmly welcomed by Sarah and a large plate of food.