Team Reactions #3

Red Rocks Team Reaction #3

Below is a post by Rick Messer, part of our Red Rocks Team that just got back from South Africa. You can read the rest of Rick and Jenny's posts on their blog.

I chose this post from Rick because it is very real. Not every moment was full of meaning and inspiration. Sometimes the kids we came to love and serve were a little annoying. That's just the real world.

Rick's Post:

I worked in Phokeng the whole day today and felt pretty useless most of the time. I also felt very selfish when the kids arrived because I was tired of some of them. Some are sweet and kind but some are kind of demanding. One boy climbed all over me for hours (literally). I didn’t know how to to tell him to stop without being mean.

There was no point in time that this kid wasn’t on somebody’s back or grabbing on to their leg!! (gotta love ‘em)

Says it all… Ha!

Amanda showed me how to make swords and dogs out of balloons and that was until some of the kids got a little grabby. We got swarmed!

Ended day at Martha’s playing soccer. We played with about 12 of us in the street. Troy, me and Lincoln were on a team with a few kids from the neighborhood and we played against 6 more. They won some “Coke Lights” from Lincoln (They don’t have diet coke there, just “Coke Light” -minor cultural detail I thought I’d throw in).

For the second time, I noticed a boy who was playing soccer in the dirt streets in just his socks. I learned his name and sort of became friends with him. He’s called and text messaged me a few times since I’ve been back! He wore his school uniform when he played soccer. One time he kicked the ball hard and said his foot was hurting. I asked why he didn’t have shoes and he said they were too big and when he kicked the ball his shoes would fly off. I showed him a better way to tie his shoes, but they still flew off! I decided I would just get him a new pair, so we got some at the mall (yes there’s a mall nearby, I was really surprised too!) and Jenny gave them to him the following Monday.

Me and Lincoln loosing badly in soccer, you can see the kid in the white shirt playing without shoes:

While we were playing soccer I saw a little boy that we all had noticed over the past few days. He lived next door to Martha. He is probably about 2 years old and is alone, outside all day.

The whole yard is dirt and fenced with barbed wired. Some of the team saw him eating some orange peels that we had thrown away. He was reaching through the fence and eating them off of the ground. Troy went over the fence and gave him some fresh fruit that we had in the van.