Meal Time!

It's been a good week for the most part. It was exhausting, but good. I am starting to feel like I am getting somewhere in the medication room. I've been doing inventory of all our meds and organizing them in a way that seems to work best for me. As most of you know, I am somewhat of an "organized person" ok ok so that is an understatement. I am totally obsessed with things being in their place. So, organizing the medication room has kind of been a fun project for me! There were several moments this week that reminded me why I love being in a place like this and especially working with kids who are just happy to be alive and have no concept of the materialism and greed that takes place in so many parts of the world. The first of these moments occured earlier this week at Jerusalem! Most afternoons after I eat my lunch I head over to the childrens' home to help with feeding. Now, keep in mind there are hundreds of kids living in this home and a large number of them are unable to feed themselves. Not to mention it takes a decent amount of time to feed some of them because they have trouble swallowing, or because they have constant involuntary movements of their body, or (my favorite) they refuse to open their mouths for you...even though I know for a fact they are all hungry at meal time! So on top of all this the childrens' homes are seriosuly understaffed because it is not easy to find someone willing to do this kind of work everyday of the week. But to get back to my "moment." The other day I walked into the large area where all the children sit and looked around and saw so many of the higher functioning children feeding those who cannot feed themselves. It was so beautiful. Stuff like that happens all the time here. For instance, everyday I look out the clinic door after school gets out and I see the children who can walk pushing all the children in wheel chairs back to the childrens' home. Nearly all the higher functioning children and the children who can walk have their own disabilities, but in a place like this the kids just see each other as a huge family. It's really awesome to watch and even more awesome to be a part of! My second moment also involves feeding time! But it's a much shorter story. I promise! The other morning the kids were eating poridge for breakfast (what they eat almost every morning). One of the girls said "Auntie Sarah do you like poridge?" And I said yea! And about 5 minutes later a different girl was eating hers and I asked how it was and she said "Good! Do you want some?" I know that doesn't sound like much, but think about it this way...an orphan who gets just enough food to keep her healthy and probably not enough to keep her from being hungry offered me some of her breakfast! I of course said no that I wanted her to have all her breakfast. But it really reminded me how selfless these children are. Ok, and I think I will tell one more story! Only because it happened at yet another meal time! Yesterday I went to help feed the kids lunch. And after I started feeding the first child I realized it was chicken neck. Which is quite possible the most difficult meal to feed children because there is barely any meat on the bones and the bones are really weak and break easily and I am always afraid I am gonna cause a kid to choke on one! So, I got through two of the children without too much mishap. Then I got to Andrew. He is one of the kids who is in constant motion. He has the most amazing smile :) But he has little control over his head, arms or neck and they are constantly moving. As you can imagine this makes feeding difficult. So I gripped his head and started feeding him some of the rice and beans. I got to the chicken neck and stopped to try and pull some meat out and leave the bones in the bowl. Then I got side tracked by a couple other children trying to steal extra food from the cart and then there are others trying to steal the food in the bowl you are feeding from! Anyway...all the while Andrew is just sitting there quietly and patiently waiting. I decided in that moment that he is one of the most patient people I have ever met. He completely relies on another person to put food in his mouth and I know he was hungry because I could see it in his eyes as I fed the child sitting next to him first. But he never once cried out as I over and over again stopped putting food in his mouth to tend to something else! He just sat there and when I would apologize for stopping he would just smile :) Absolutely beautiful! So, as you can see I really love these kids. On the bus ride home from work yesterday I sat staring out the window thinking I could not imagine what it would be like if I had not come here and met every single one of them. My life would forever be missing something. I know this was a long one, but I wanted to blog all these stories in more throughout the week, but I am always exhausted onceI get home from work so I saved them all up! As always, I hope everyone is well. Peace!