MEET THE PARENTS

During my stay here  - I have for much of the time, been alongside some wonderful young people (and myself still only twenty several!). 
Sarah's Covenant Homes is helped at various times by such groups and this one is certainly amazing - they raise their own funds to travel, over 11 months, to 11 countries - such as Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, Africa...and of course India.
The itinerary for these guys is to spend each month working in small teams of 6 and be involved daily in serving whatever needs are asked of them. I have met, worked, and 'lived' with some of them and I have been so impressed by each and every one. They are working through, and out, their relationships with God and are so serious about trying hard to get it to be where HE wants it to be.
 If you have seen my earlier blogs you will have 'met' some of those I have grown so fond of and who were always so willing to do what was asked of them (and to do it with a smile ).

So - scene set, it was time to MEET THE PARENTS!

As a bit of a respite, for the parents who wish and are able to,  they get to fly out to meet up with their offspring, spend some time over a week with them and also to join in with the sort of activities that they have been doing.

Cue me!

Sarah asked for me to find and organize some of the sorts of practical tasks that I have been doing - so this will be a great boost to me to have someone do all of the nasty and smelly jobs that I've been putting off (only kidding!)
Anyway - there's only so much cuddling and cooing of kids that a man can do - Right guys?
So the last couple of days I've been buying plants and wood for the roof garden (to be) area here; sorting out paint and materials for re-decoration, shelf construction and so on. (Whilst writing this I was thinking that for the next few days I could head back to that beach and leave them with a list!!).
So, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, I got to meet up with them in 3 separate groups and explain  what was lined up for them. 
I'd done my research on them (failing to plan is planning to fail, right?), and have a good idea of what I had to work with. So it was interesting to learn what the parents were really like after getting it from their kids standpoint (please don't anyone ever ask mine of me!!!). 
What a great bunch. They were, to a man (and woman) so interested in Sarah's work and at the start when Sarah introduced and explained about it, they made the fatal mistake of asking her how she started in her ministry. It's a wonderful question to ask - but if you ever do, stand back - Sarah gets soooo excited when she tells it and it is amazing and powerful and I reckon that she must breathe through her ears when she does because she never pauses to breath normally for the next 15 minutes!

Then they were let loose on the poor unsuspecting children. It became necessary at the end for me to conduct a bag search and do a head count of the babies before we let any parent out of the building and onto the bus back to their hotel!
They left behind some great work (the men that is) and they really took to drilling, painting, sawing (for which they marvellously went out and bought a power saw to speed things up), hammering, planting, and building. They really rolled up their sleeves and attacked the tasks with a passion.
I answered many questions about my reasons for being there and hopefully inspired some of them to also consider doing something similar and wherever their skills and qualities lay - there is a real need for men to come and help and also engage with the kids.
 And here's an example of how:

One of the things that was completed was a large wooden stand for plants which you can see to the side of the kids who live on the top floor and the 'ABC' tree that it encouraged them to make to put by the side of it:

Those three days were a wonderful and tiring time - I've had some lovely feedback from some of the teams as to their parents' thoughts and I now have high hopes that there may well be future visitors returning to stay for significantly longer.

After the three days, I had high hopes that I could make a dent in my plans for a number of tasks - BUT - this is India and how could I have been so naive???? 
Can you guess what happened next? 
Well you'll have to see the next blog for that and I can safely offer the whole of my pension to the person who guesses correctly! Never in  a month of Sundays.

One of the things that I'd hoped to do out here is to establish an online (Skype) contact connection between the class of 9/10 year olds back home for whom the teacher is a close friend. The intention being that her pupils might engage with the children over here in India, to help them get to know and understand other children with needs such as theirs and also to provide a stimulus for the children at SCH, especially when they are live-linked with them. I did a couple of such link-ups in Ongole and have also had two such sessions back here with the children of Nikki and Tori.
Since returning to Hyderabad home, there are 2 fantastic young foster mums, Nikki and Tori and theirs is the family of children in the ABC Tree picture above.
I have stood and watched these 2 lovely, dedicated, caring ladies whilst they work and interact with 'their children' - they are 24/7 with them and the next link gives a lovely insight into some of wehat they do, how deeply they care and how passionately they do their very best - please take the time to click on it and read:

http://hisstrengthnotmine.blogspot.in/2014/03/kidihou-childrens-museum.html


Important information for future visitors to India:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oa4V3p5vY6o


And finally - as we have entered a new month:

 February Milestones
 http://www.schindia.com/2014/02/23/february-milestones/