The great router hunt and other stories

Hey there friends,

I hope you’re all doing good. So let me share with you my experiences over the past week from here in the Phils (yeah I’m down with the lingo now!)

Last week was pretty frustrating for me at school. I had this timetable where I was being asked to go here there and everywhere at all different times but because I was only going to each place like twice a week the teachers didn't know when to expect me and so had nothing for me to do. If you know me at all you will understand that this does not sit well with me. I like to be busy, busy, busy and I find just observing others teach tough. I think God is trying to teach me a couple of lessons.
1. Patience- I don't have enough of this, I tend to expect everything to be working well straight away without giving people time to get used to me and me to them.

2. My identity is not in being a good teacher; my identity is found in him. I guess at times I let my role as being a teacher kind of define who I am, and I think pride can slip in when I think I’m good at this. I need to remember my role as teacher is not who I am it's simply the job I do. I think the Lord is using this time to teach me these specific lessons.

So anyway I was feeling really frustrated and in the end went to see one of the teachers and ended up telling her how frustrated I was feeling and crying quite a bit. She was so supportive and said I should speak to the head. Amazingly a few minutes later the head asked to see me to review my timetable (I had said nothing to him at this point!) I explained my frustrations to him and he gave me the opportunity to re-write my own timetable putting myself where I feel most useful to the teachers here. This was such an answer to prayer and I praise God that he is always in everything, even these little things.

So now I’m in week 1 of my new timetable and it's so much better. Rather than being a general classroom support I’m taking out specific children during parts of lessons to support them where they have gaps, (kind of like what TA's do back home). I'm supporting one boy daily in phonics, 2 in maths and 2 in reading. I'm also still a general classroom support for grade 2 math’s and PE in the afternoons. I really thank God for this new timetable which gives me something I can really get my teeth into. Please pray for good relationships with the kids I am working with.

Outside of school life is going ok, but I have come to realise that things just don't work the same in the Phils and sometimes you just have to deal with that. First there is me and Meg's car. The gears stopped working a couple of weeks ago and we are told the transmission is shot. Now I’m no mechanic but I’m pretty sure that’s kind of important for driving. The lady who owns the car in the states and she may have to raise more support to fix it which means she probably won't do this until she gets back in January. This means for the time being me and Meg are carless, which is kind of hard when the place we live has very infrequent public transport passing by. We are at the mercy of others for lifts etc but this is hard when you have no food left and no-one is going to the supermarket. Let’s just say we've eaten quite a lot of Pizza over the last few days. Meg is thinking of buying a car but your prayers in this whole transport issue would be really welcome.

The second frustrating thing is that we can't get internet in our house. We have paid for the connection but we can't seem to get it. We've phoned the internet company but this just seems to result in crazy instructions from people who don't understand what I’m saying. When I call I have to refer to myself as Ariel (no, not the little mermaid) because bizarrely this is the name on the account. I was then asked to find the router in my house. After explaining that I did not have a router I was then given 5 mins by the man on the phone to go and search for it, (bear in mind I had already told him it did not exist), I found a box on the wall which I was pretty sure was not a router but was asked by said man if it was a dirty white colour, if so then it would be a router!
After a frantic evening of router hunting using a torch I still have no internet at my house which means I can only go online at school. This is ok, but we are paying for the internet at home so this is kind of frustrating. I did consider asking the internet guys to send an engineer out but a friend who has been here 2 months said he booked an appointment for an internet engineer to come and fix his on the week he got here. He is still waiting for the engineer to call him. Well that’s the Philippines for you!

Finally last weekend me and my friend Helena went to a mall, getting there was no problem, we took a jeep and were sitting pretty. The journey home was a different story. We took the Jeep to the bottom of the valley where I live and waited for the next Jeep. It did not come, in the end we decided to take a trike (this is a motorbike with sidecar) up to the gate but the trikes cannot pass through here so we planned to walk the last section. When we got to the gate we started walking but a security guard shouted us back. He then explained that if we walked we would be robbed; only Helena who is German thought he said we would be killed...needless to say after this news we waited with him until another Jeep came!

JeepneyTrike

All in all I feel more settled here this week but still have the tendency to feel lonely especially at the weekends when there is less to do. I'm so used to just going out when I want I find it hard to be confined to other people's schedules for transport. Please pray for continued strengthening of friendships while I’m here.

I’ve just re-read this and I hope it’s not too rambling and makes you smile in places. Thank you so much for your continued support in prayers and messages. I’ve inserted a picture of a Jeepney and a trike above just so you know what I’m talking about!