Resolved. To give.

I have struggled with how to handle "beggars" for years.  I remember when I was a youth minister in Aberdeen our youth group used to help out at a local community center where we distributed clothing and food.  We used some sort of voucher system to keep the same people from always coming in to get stuff and it was irritating when they were obvious playing the system.

A few years later I was Associate Pastor at Bayou View Baptist Church in Gulfport.  When you're church name begins with the letter "B", and you live in a Casino town then you end up pretty high on the list of scammers going through the phone book.  

A Deacon friend in Aberdeen taught me a valuable lesson way back then.  I remember Lynn saying that he'd rather err on the side of giving.

I found this quote online attributed to the great CS Lewis: "It will not bother me in the hour of death to reflect that I have been 'had for a sucker' by any number of impostors; but it would be a torment to know that one had refused even one person in need."

I've probably struggled more with giving to strangers since the World Race back in 2007.  It became apparent to me on several occasions overseas that many of the "beggars" are "slaves".  In Thailand and Cambodia beautiful children sold trinkets and my first thought was that they (and their family) were being industrious but then you find out they were not going to school and were in fact being "pimped".  Organized crime uses old grandmothers and little children, broken old soldiers and deformed kids.  Watch the bad guy burn-out the kids eyes in Slumdog Millionaire in order to make him a more effective revenue producer.

I don't want to contribute to or perpetuate that.

But there's this one kid.  I met her probably in February.  I gave her some money but felt bad about it because I just don't like giving money to beggars.  It was colder than ice that day and I didn't see a store nearby to buy her anything so I handed her a couple dollars.  After that I resolved that I would carry some juice or something with me (I almost always carry a small backpack) and I would give her juice or food in the future.  

Today I got caught short.  I didn't have anything with me.  And I didn't give her money.  And I felt bad.  I feel like- it's bad enough that I'm perceived as a rich American...I don't want to be perceived as a rich, greedy, stingy, mean-spirited American...a Missionary to boot!

Even if this kid is being effectively pimped-out by her mother or worse, I want her to light up when she sees me walking down the street and not just because I'm a great guy with a lot of money and a generous spirit.  I may not be able to have a long conversation with her but I can remind her each time that Jesus loves her.  But I can't do that if I ignore her and walk away.

So.  Resolved.  From now on when she approaches me I will not leave her empty handed.  I will still try to always have a juice or something with me to give her but if not I will at least give her something.  I will err on the side of giving.  I will not be a rich, greedy, stingy American Missionary.

Castles, Caving, Cycling, and Camping

I spent a long weekend (Friday evening- Wednesday morning) traveling with a couple of the teen small groups from our church (most of the youth group, actually) on a camping trip.

We first traveled from Uzhgorod to Khmelnitsky, an overnight trip.  We arrived at 5 am or something and napped in the train station until about 8 when a hired mini-bus (Marshrootka) picked us up.  We met Doug (My team leader and husband of Marina, the youth director) and spent the day Castle hopping.

Our first stop was Medzhybych Fortress, built in the 1500's.  The founder of Hasidism (Judaic sect) is buried in the same village.  Incidentally, there's a long history of Jewish occupation and persecution here.  During WW2 Nazi's first incarcerated over 2000 Jews in the Castle...and then murdered all of them.

The Castle is also home to Ukraine's Holodomor Museum.  The Holodomor was a forced, man-made famine created by Bolshevik Russians to starve and eliminate middle-class Ukrainians in 1932-33.  Something in the neighborhood of 8 million Ukrainians starved to death.

Our next stop was Sutkivtsy Church Fortress, also built in the 1500's.  This Church was part of a much larger complex of walls and towers but yet still a church.  It struck me that this is a church built to keep people out.  I wonder how many churches we inadvertently build today the same way?

Our next stop was the town of Dunaivtsy.  Doug had previously coached the Baptist Church there in our Youth Ministry Strategy so they arranged "home-stay's" for us all and provided meals and a joint fellowship time with some of their teenagers.  I have to admit that in my "introvertness" I wasn't looking forward to staying 2 nights with strangers.  One of our kids, Vitalik, who speaks pretty good English was with me and after it was all said and done I must say I really enjoyed my time with Andrey and Valya and their sons Fenya and Tim.  

The next day was huge.  First we visited Khotyn Castle.  You can't see it from the road.  It's gloriously revealed only after you walk through the earthen gate and then, "BAM!" there it is.  I said aloud when I saw it that if it had been sitting on a hill in Vicksburg back in the day then the South might have won the Civil War.  Doug followed by saying that if it wasn't for this Castle, there might have never been a Vicksburg!!

In 1621 as many as 250000 Turks left Constantinople with the intention of invading Vienna and establishing a foothold in Europe.  Had they succeeded, Europe may have become a Muslim entity more than a hundred years before the US gained her independence.  But in what is probably a case of Divine Intervention a greatly outnumbered force of 75000 Poles and Cossacks defeated the Turks on this site long before they reached Vienna in a battle where it was said that Cannon thundered for 3 days without a break.

The next stop was pretty awesome too.  We went to the touristy town of Kamyanets-Podilsky and the Kamyanets-Podilsky Castle.  It's the most Disneyesque/fairytale-looking castle in Ukraine and probably the most famous.  The river makes a huge u-turn creating a mushroom shaped peninsula in which sits the old town.  The Castle sit's on the "stem" of the mushroom protecting the town.  

We then returned to our families in Dunaivtsy where we enjoyed "Family Day" at the "Fan Zone"...a big screen viewing of a Eurocup Soccer Match at the local Futbol Stadium.  The highlight was a Ukrainian "strongman" who lifted kids, tore phone books in half, busted bricks with is head, drove nails with his bare hands and twisted rebar all while very effectively sharing his testimony and the gospel.  He was sponsored by the Baptist Church.

The next day we hit up a couple more historic sites before arriving at a "Dacha"- a farm house owned by Marina (Youth Director)'s Aunt and Cousin, in a tiny village in the middle of nowhere.  They called it "camping" but I teased the kids that for them it was another "homestay" because they slept on pallets inside the house.  Doug slept in his tent and I slept out under the stars.  It was in the 60's at night so the bugs weren't bad.  I saw a dozen satellites and at least 4 shooting stars,  It was an awesome night.  Ukrainians are funny...they endure ridiculously harsh winter's but last week when it cooled down to the 50's they were cold...and they thought I was crazy for sleeping outside in that cold, night air.

Our main purpose for "camping" was that Marina's cousin Vitalik is an Adventure Guide.  So that first night we took a 5 hour spelunking tour of a local cave...the Atlantis Cave.  He claimed it was the largest cave system in the world but there's no way.  It is, however, really cool.  It's a lot like the Lost Sea Cavern in Tennessee and we had a blast crawling around in the clay and rocks.  There were some pretty tight spots!!

The next day, our last, we mountain biked 40 km through villages, wheat fields, and forest, over pavement, gravel, cobblestone, dirt paths and no paths past horses, cattle, geese, rivers and ruins.  I'm way to old for that stuff!  

We also enjoyed some swimming and Bible Study while at the Dacha.  We finished the trip by going back to Khmelnitsky that night in time to catch the midnight train back to Uzhgorod.  I got home about 10 am the next day and slept till 7 pm!

Eurocup 2012

EuroCup is a big deal.  It's like the World Cup but smaller, right?  I'm glad to say that I went to an actual game- Portugal vs Denmark.  I can tell you that people-watching the day of the game was a lot more interesting than the actual game.  And the game, with a final score of 3-2 in favor of Portugal, was a relatively high-scoring affair.  Still I prefer American Football where guys hit guys and where if the score is low it means there was a lot of hitting and if the score is high it means there was a lot of action.  I watched one of the Eurocup matches on TV the other night and it ended in a 1-1 Draw.  I say, if the final game ends in a draw then neither team should get the "Euro Cup", rather they should both get Certificates of Attendance.  If they want the Cup bad enough, then strap on some pads and fight for the dang thing!

I went to a game at the newly constructed Lviv Arena.  

It's the smallest of the 8 venues used for Eurocup, seating about 35000.  They had an entire middle section (50 yd line) blocked off for 150 or so media-types.  What a waste of good real-estate!  

The new stadium is alright.  The rest-room and concession facilities were great.  Every seat in the house was a good seat but it didn't seem optimized for revenue...ie, better seats, skyboxes...the things we would do back home.  The pre-game announcer several times directed our attention to the "giant" video screen.  I'm sorry, I graduated from Mississippi State and the "giant" video screen at Lviv Arena looked like a color Etch-a-Sketch compared to Dogzillatron!

I was impressed with Security and Customer Service Stewards.  There were LOTS and LOTS of yellow-shirted volunteers, many who spoke English.  There was LOTS and LOTS of uniformed policemen.  I know there were a lot of concerns before the games about safety and it appears the Ukraine hosts made every effort to alleviate those concerns.

I read about different ministries serving in Kyiv (lot bigger venue) but I didn't see anyone in Lviv other than a couple of Mormon Missionaries that appeared to be "working the crowd".  I was on the lookout all week in Lviv for evidence of trafficking and anti-trafficking work.  If it was going on (and I'm sure it was) it wasn't obvious, at least not to me.  The times I spent in the Fan Zone (downtown, away from the arena) appeared family-friendly even late at night.  

I think the thing is, without a highly distinguishable red-light district, it's hard for someone like me to be aware of something like trafficking or even prostitution.  I wasn't in the "right" place (I guess that would really be the wrong place) and I probably wasn't out at the right time either.  The only two girls I thought might be prostitutes were talking to uniformed security guys...hmm!  A lot of the yellow-shirted "Stewards", the volunteers, seemed ridiculously friendly.  Maybe they were trained to be exceptionally helpful which to me is a new concept in Ukrainian customer service; maybe there was more going on than I was aware of.  I mean, heck, if I were a young guy looking for someone to spend some time with, a disproportionally large number of volunteers just happened to be very attractive. 

The First Camp of the Summer

This past week I worked 1/2 of a Day Camp at Nehemiah International here in Uzhgorod.  I say 1/2 because it's a 2 week-long camp and I could only work the first week.  Nehemiah is an international network of ministries that began in Germany I think, in the late 80's.  Here in Uzhgorod they have an incredible Guest House/Hotel/Conference Center which enables them to be a hub for a lot of different ministries in the region.  When the World Racers were in town we worked through them in our ministry to the Abandoned Babies and some of the Roma (Gypsy) outreach.

The Day Camp is from 9 am - 6 pm.  The kids are fed breakfast, lunch and a late afternoon snack.  The facility can easily accommodate about 85 kids plus workers (although we only had about 30 kids for the first camp).  There are classrooms and conference rooms and auditoriums for teaching English (which is the primary "draw" for the kids who attend), Worship, and teaching "track-times" like Drama and Art.  There's enough room outside for free time and organized sports and a soccer field in the woods nearby.  At some point in the heat of the summer the camps will include short excursions to the river or a swimming pool.

My "job" this past week was to teach English to the highest level kids at the camp which as you might expect were also the oldest kids...mostly 11-13 year olds.  I also helped lead worship in the mornings and I taught one of the Bible Stories during the week.  The Rec Leader recruited me to help out on the Futbol Field when we were able to go there.

I've probably said this before but it bears repeating.  English is crazy.  That so many people around the world speak English is amazing because it just doesn't make sense!  I'm not a terrible teacher in general...but teaching English is hard!  I was reminded throughout the week that I really want and need to learn at least an intermediate level of Russian.  It was hard not being able to communicate beyond the surface even with kids who spoke English equivalent to my Russian!

By the second day I feel like "my" kids had warmed up to me pretty good.  By the third day most of the kids at camp were calling my name every time they saw me.  But it was still a very different experience than my experience 3 years ago working in a residential camp with orphans and extremely low-income children.  The kids at this camp were driven to camp by parents.  They were signed-in and signed-out everyday.

You might remember this orphan at the camp in Lugansk 3 years ago...Lana.

She was holding my hand during walks the first day I met her.  There might be some degree of "learned behavior" among orphan kids when they are around Americans (or anyone else that cares enough to visit them)...that they are so affectionate.  But of course, a lot of it is real and felt need for love and care.  In Haiti...I didn't have to woo and win-over the kids... all I had to do was look at them and stretch-out my arms.

I didn't sense that or receive that kind of affection this past week.  I'm glad for that.  I hope it's because these kids are loved and cared for.  They are in a good place.  I don't think many of them are Christians or come from Christian families.  They have parents that value learning English (sometimes despite some Evangelical "indoctrination").  Again...a good place.  An effective ministry.  An awesome opportunity.  And I'm glad to have made some new friends this week.  I hope I'll see some of these kids again around town.  I'm glad to have worked with the Ukrainian volunteers this week too.  I knew about half of them before the week began but I got to know some of them much better.  And finally, I really enjoyed helping lead worship for children!  That was fun!