Team Chenzhou 2013

It's finally here!

I have been waiting all stinkin year for this!

Finally.

Finally.

In just a few days I will be in China again.

China.

I'll be in Chenzhou.

In the orphanage.

With the kids and nannies I have been missing so much since the moment I left last year.

I'll be "home"

Thank You everyone for all the prayers!

Keep Praying!

I will try my best to keep up on the blog.

Thank You.

Ummmm bye!

Reality

Reality.

It hit me.

And it hit me hard.

Not like a tiny push saying "your back home"

More like a total shove.

Falling head first back into, well, reality.

I had to get used to greasy, fried foods.

A big comfy bed.

AIR CONDITIONING.

The time change.

I mean its taken me this long just to write a blog about it! 

And everyone keeps asking "How was China?"

And every single time I hear those words about 200 different memories flash through my brain.

The orphanage building.

The amazing nannies, that work at the orphanage day after day never giving up.

The kids, who were excited to see us everyday just wanting somebody to hold them.

The tiny babies, who lifted our spirits every afternoon.

Our translator Fawn, who happened to be the perfect 11th member of our team.

The dirty streets, that we walked through everyday to get to the orphanage.

The hotel, where we would squish ourselves into one room so that we could have devotions at night.

The plane ride, that we all hated.

My team, who is more like a family to me now.

That's the problem.

How do I describe all that and SO much more in just a few words?

I can't.

I can't describe the feeling of loving being home, but also wanting to be back in Chenzhou.

It seems that everyone who had been on the trip before expected leaving the orphanage this year would be easier, including me. But we were VERY wrong. In fact, I thought it was harder. The last day is still kind of a blur to me. But what I do remember hurts. I remember looking around at my teammates, and seeing the tears streaming down most of there faces. I remember holding Avery in my lap as she messily ate her watermelon, smiling at me the whole time. I remember Gracie clinging to me, trying to tell me about my teammates who were all crying. She was SO worried about them and didn't understand why they were so upset.

 I remember waving goodbye, for the last time.

And it hurt, more then words can describe.

And every time I think about it my heart aches even more.

Because I WANT to be back there so badly.

I WANT to sleep on a hard bed.

I WANT to eat chinese food.

I WANT to be dirty.

I WANT  to be exhausted.

I WANT to be challenged.

I WANT people to think I'm completely insane for enjoying all of this.

Because I did enjoy it.

And I miss it so badly.

But the orphanage isn't the only thing I miss.

I also miss my team.

Team Chenzhou 2012.

Where 10 totally different people from all over America got on a plane to China as strangers and came back two weeks later as a family.

And I know I will never forget these people.



Shannon (Aka mom)

Molly

Karla

Monte

Amy

Charlie

 

Elyssa

Megan
 

 

 Annie 

 I got to know some more then others.









Elyssa, Annie, Megan, Charlie and I got along really well.

 Almost every day during free time Charlie, Elyssa, and Megan would come hang out in me and Annies room.

 









I had so much fun with these girls. And I don't think anyone will quite understand our inside jokes. I already miss them all so much.










I miss Elyssa.

I miss her sweet smile and funny comebacks.

I miss Charlie.

I miss exploring the Hong Kong hotel with her and always being there to make me laugh.

I miss Megan.

I miss goofing around with her and blogging together.

I miss Annie.

I had so much fun with Annie I don't even know where to begin. She was my roommate, my "true friend." She talked to me at the beginning of the trip, when I was shy. She broke my shell. And I don't know how to thank her. She was always making me laugh, and was always there for me. I love the way we can laugh over anything. I'm so glad I had Annie on this trip. She truly loves God and has taught me so much over the past few weeks.

I loved being with the rest of my group also.

I know God picked every single one of these team members for this trip.

I miss China so badly.

Everything about it.

But I know its going to be ok .

Because I  know God has called me to China.

And so I know I will be back.

Why?

Why?

That’s the main thought on my mind right now.

Why?

The question I keep asking myself.

Why are there orphans? 

 Why did God send this group of ten to this orphanage?

 

Why did these kids get so attached to us?

 Why did we get so attached to them? 

Why do I wake up every morning healthy, in a soft comfy bed, in my own room, full of useless junk.

Why do I have a closet full of clothes, half of which I don’t even wear?

Why do I have a pantry full of food and still complain about there being nothing to eat?

Why do I have a family?

Why did I grow up in church?

Why?

Why?

Why?

Why do these kids wake up every day sick and hurting, on a hard bed, in a room full of other kids? 

Why do these kids wear the same clothes day after day?

Why do these kids have to eat mush for lunch?

Why are these kids orphans?

Why are these kids so desperate for attention?

Why am I sitting here asking myself questions?

But even though I don’t know the answers to these questions, I’m not going to give up.

I can’t go home being depressed and without hope.

Hope is all I have.

Hope that I will see this orphanage again. 

 Because I know I will.

And even though I don’t know the answers to these “Whys?”

I can trust God.

That he has a special plan for each one of these kids. 

 So maybe I should stop asking God ”why?” and start asking him “how?”

How can I help these kids?

How can I help the nannies?

How can I be a better servant for you?

Day 7 Chenzhou

7:45am

It’s the last day.

Need I say more? Everyone is still refusing to think about that fact so I’m not going to talk about it either. Breakfast was the same as always, bread, rice, noodles. The team is REALLY starting to crave American food.  We start with the babies today so I’m interested to see how that goes.

1:35pm

Lunch at the hotel again. We had pigeon and it still had the head on it! I held the head in my hand, it was awesome!! But  the taste was nasty. 

There was lots of crying today. A lot of the team members were upset. Trust me, leaving is the worst thing ever. I guess I havn’t gotten upset yet cause I’m holding on to the fact that we are still going back. But that’s for only two and a half hours. I’m dreading saying good bye to the older kids. Because with the babies they don’t cling onto you, begging you not to leave. They don’t follow you to the door and then when you’re out the door, they scream goodbye to you from the window. They don’t constantly hold onto your hand, asking you to stay with them. And yes the older kids do that. It was pretty heartbreaking watching my little boy Jake cry when I laid him into his crib for the last time. 

 

Jake and I 

 

Me and Claire 

 

Group photo 

 

9:23

I’ve been sitting here looking at a blank word document for about ten minutes now and I just glanced over at Megan’s computer screen to see that hers is still blank too.

 I guess it’s hard to find words to describe how everyone is feeling right now.  I just don’t know where to begin. But I think a good place to start is the beginning. 

Well after our lunch break Monte, Mom, Annie, Fawn and I all ran over to a bakery to pick up two huge cakes for the party that we had with the kids tonight. When we got to the orphanage the kids were just waking up from there naps and the nannies were starting to dress them in there nice matching outfits. (This party was a very special occasion) We took all the kids down stairs to do crafts while the nannies got ready for the party. They got out some dress up clothes and the girls looked adorable dressed up like princesses. I tried to get pictures with as many kids as possible today.  When it was time for the party the kids got super excited. 

 

 

 

Me with Avery 

I should probably bring to your attention that the kids stay on floor five of the building but they have a play room on floor one. So every time we need them in the play room on floor one we have to try and get 20 kids down an elevator.  Many good storys about that. The kids know exactly which button to press on the elevator to get them where they need to go. So today when us Americans were all confused about where the party was, the kids just loaded us on the elevator and took us to floor nine. 

After a bunch of confusion we arrived at the party room. It was decorated all fancy, with us sitting at tables and the kids sitting in little red chairs in front of us.

 

 There was a stage and the kids did two songs for us, it was absolutely adorable. 

Then it was our turn we sang a song in English and then Annie sang the same song in Chinese with the rest of us humming along in the background. And to finish our performance we ended with the cha cha slide. The kids loved dancing to that. 

 

 

Singing 

 

And dancing 

 

Then all the nannies and kids got on stage to sing a song for us. By the middle of the song a few nannies were crying and most of our team was in tears. We have made such a bond with the kids and nannies here. 

But the party wasn’t over just yet.  To end we lit the singing candles and gave the kids cake. That was quite hilarious.

But after the party came the worst part.

Saying goodbye.

It’s not like the kids understood we weren’t coming back. We said good bye every day and we were always back in the morning.

But this time we aren't coming back.

Pretty much everyone was sobbing. That really confused the kids.

We have grown so close to them over the past week.

And now they are being ripped away from us.

I tried to hug every single kid before I left.  

And even now as I’m sitting here I can’t really explain how I’m feeling.

Angry?  Sad? Hurt? Bitter?

Maybe a little of all of those.

I didn’t want to leave.

I had to make myself pull their tiny hands off my legs so that I could leave.

They held on so tight.

Ugh!

I wish we could bring the whole orphanage home with us.

But I don’t think my parents are gonna go for that idea.

After leaving the orphanage, the director and a bunch of the nannies took us out to dinner afterwards. It was a little strange because they sat at one table and we sat at another but it was the thought that counts.

Tomorrow we say good bye to all the nannies.

Oh and to add to our sad night we also said good bye to Fawn our translator tonight. We brought her into my moms hotel room, gave her the gifts we had for her (Which included a bible that we all signed) she gave us some awesome maps of Chezhou, we took pictures with her and we even got a chance to pray over her. Fawn is so amazing and I know we all want her as our translator again next year.

Ok well we have to be up early tomorrow morning so that we won’t miss our train so goodnight everyone!

Please continue praying for those kids!

Day 6 Chenzhou

7:38am

Today we go back to the normal routine at the orphanage. Older kids from 8-11:30. Babies from 3-5:30. We are about to leave to go to the orphanage to work with the big kids. We are already bruised and battered from them. They just want attention so bad. And when 20 kids all want the attention it’s just hard. Yesterday I was holding one kid, another was hanging on my leg, and two others were yelling the Chinese word for hold me. It was pretty crazy!

12:48am

Just got back from lunch.  We ate at the hotel, we eat here alot. Nothing really that exciting to report. I can tell everyone is pretty tired of Chinese food. Everyone keeps talking about missing Chick-fil-a. I don’t really have a certain thing I miss, besides maybe  cereal for breakfast. But that’s not important. 

Cause we also went to the orphanage. It was pretty crazy as always. We took the kids outside, because they love to play outside. We were outside for a long time and it was pretty hot. We started by sitting in a circle with all the kids and sang songs with them. They liked the hokey pokey. They did chalk as usual, but today we had brought the kids dress up clothes. They loved it! There was sunglasses, capes, head bands, boas, little dinosaur tails, and head bands with long hair on them.  They had so much fun running around pretending to be super heros and rock stars. 

Us in the circle dancing

 

Hopscotch 

 

Mom, Charlie, and I 

Me painting Avery's face 

 

 

Kids getting tattoos 

 

Charlie and Collin 

Daisy the rock star 

And Leah the super hero

Today I got to play with a little girl named Hope.  At the beginning of the week we thought Hope had hydrocephalus, but the nannies said that it wasn’t hydrocephalus but something wasn’t normal  in her brain. Hope is very rough. She pinches, and a lot of people on the team have bruises from her. But today I decided to hold her. She squirmed a lot and didn’t want to calm down at first but after a while she calmed down and we sat and watched the other kids play. She really is a sweet loving girl. That moment didn’t last long cause then other kids came running over wanting attention. 

 

 

Cute little Hope 

 I also got to work with Jacob some more. I got to help him with his snack and drink. And we also did a puzzle together.

A little boy named Taylor fell down and scraped his knee. I got to help him clean it up. He was trying so hard to be brave and not to cry. And he did a good job, he only sniffled a little bit while I sat with him then he was back to being the rambunctious little 6 year old that he is. 

Taylor

Usually by the end, around 11ish the kids get really crazy. Because they know we are going to be leaving soon. So they all panic, wanting to be held before we leave. They just want to be with us so badly.  And I’m always scrambling around trying to hold each one of them before we run out of time.

9:11pm

We are back in our hotel rooms now. We had a nice quiet afternoon with the babies. Even though there are just to many babies and not enough of us. We are all holding at least one, and some of us two, and there are still babies that need held. We try keeping the ones that can’t be held busy by sitting them in bumbo seats or with toys. But it’s still hard especially before they eat cause they all wanna be held cause they are hungry and cranky.

So I switched between holding Jake and Claire today. Claire was strangely cranky today so Megan ended up holding her while I held Jake. This time he fell asleep while I was holding him and I got to put him in his crib.  It’s hard playing with the babies, because each day we have to pass by the older kids room and so they know we are at the orphanage and that we are just ignoring them. So every day they all sit in a line against the wall waiting for us to come out of the baby room, and when one of us does to get a diaper or something they all come running towards you with hugs and kisses.

We stopped by the teams favorite restaurant on the way back. It’s our third time eating there! The reason we keep going there is for the fried banana. It’s the only place that has it.

Heres the menu for dinner

*Potatoes and beef

*Soup (With corn on the cob in it)

*Beans

*Cauliflower

*Fried dough (Which was an interesting texture)

*Fried banana!!!!!

There are other things too, but that’s what I remember.

They came out with the fried banana tonight and it was white and normally its golden brown. That really threw us off. I ended up tasting it, and it tasted like a glazed banana. Like instead of a glazed donut it was a glazed banana. Fawn ended up talking to the waitress and she took the banana back. Fawn then said “They forgot a step when they were baking it”

The last thing we did today was devotions. Mom read a page from Katie Davis’s blog. And then we sang some worship songs. We ended with the song ‘Spirit and the Bride’ and there were many tears listening to that song.

We have been working on gifts for the director and nannies. We all hate to admit it but tomorrow is the last day. Every time someone brings it up we kind of just push the thought away. Tomorrow we will do the babies in the morning and then we are having a party with the older kids in the afternoon. Everyones pretty excited about the party.

I can’t wait till tomorrow, but I also am totally dreading it. Because so many people have gotten attached.  Please pray for us and the kids.

Day 5 Chenzhou

8:37am

We just ate breakfast. Breakfast is big here and most of us aren’t used to that. I think everyones kinda  getting tired of the breakfast.

We are going to the church today.  Everyone is dressing in their nicest clothes they have. Which in most peoples case isn’t very nice. And yes I am one of those people.  We didn’t even know they had a church in Chenzhou, and being able to go to it is even better! Even though we are pretty confused on how it’s going to work. It’s going to be in all Chinese. So we won’t understand any of it. But I was told it’s our presence that counts. That it’s for our guide, Fawn.  And the nannie that is going with us.

Ok got to go we are leaving for church!

1:32pm

Just got back from lunch.  It was good. One of the best foods in China is fried banana . I don’t know why it’s not famous in America, I mean it’s fried and unhealthy. It’s all American.

Anyway one of the sweet nannies that works with the babies gave us all gifts today. We each got a necklace and she gave the whole group a bag of fruit to share. I was the brave one who tried the fruit, it tasted like cantaloupe that was full of seeds. 

 (The fruit)

We went to the church. It was quite the experience. Inside it looked like a normal church. It had flashing rainbow lights on the steps which was kind of weird and distracting. But overall it was cool. When we went in there was a lady singing. She would sing one line of the song and then the congregation would repeat it.  We tried sneaking in to the back rows where no one could really see us. But soon a lady came over and told us to follow her. She ended up taking us to the very front pews and making the people in them either scoot over or move to sit somewhere else. Just so we could sit! The service was pretty similar to the services at our church. There was worship songs and a choir and then a sermon.  We couldn’t understand a thing they were saying though. At one point the preacher said something and everyone started clapping. So Megan and I started clapping along with them when all of the sudden Amy’s like “There clapping for us.” So we all had to stand up while they “welcomed us” The people were so excited we were there and I’m glad we went. At the end of the service some of the girls from the choir wanted to take pictures of us on the stage of the church so up we went onto the stage to get our picture taken. 

 (Us at the church)

After church we went straight to the orphanage to play and do crafts with the older kids. Today I got to sit with a little boy named Jacob. He is desperate for attention just like all the other kids, but his way of getting attention is by slapping or hitting you.  And he hits hard! He has something wrong in his brain and the nannies say that’s why his is so rough. He has calmed down a lot since the beginning of the week. The kids seem to pick on him a lot so he kind of keeps to himself. As I was sitting with him I noticed he refuses to look you in the eyes but when I was with him he just sits and smiles. He has an adorable smile. He loves getting attention just like every single kid in there. 

 

 

(This is Jacob)

I also got to play with the little 3 year old, Paul. He just came in like three days ago. He has down syndrome and is the sweetest thing ever. He is just so smiley and giggly. He was pretty scared when he was first brought in. But he is now starting to finally warm up.  He also loves getting attention just like every kid in there. 

 (This is Paul)

Some of the kids are pretty tricky. Macy has this little plan she does on me ALL the time and I still fall for it every time. First she asks for me to hold her and most of the time I say yes. Then she yells at one of the other kids and since I can’t understand her I kind of ignore what she is saying to them. Then every time I find out that she was telling them to jump on my back. And when I’m holding her and another kid jumps on my back its quite hard to keep my balance. I usually stumble around for a while and when I finally get my balance that’s when the other kid decides to let go.  And off they both go giggling away. 

 (Macy)

After we left the orphanage we were walking home and a huge rat ran right in between all of us. And a lot of the girls screamed VERY loudly. And no I wasn’t one of those girls. But I had to add that in there because everyone quite enjoyed that.

9:01pm

We went back to the orphanage this afternoon to work with the babies. There are a lot of little babies this year. For some of the time I held the tiny baby named Jake. He is a heart baby and is very tiny. His legs are like sticks and when you look at his chest you can see his ribs. He is so sweet and laid back. But his heart just pounds inside his little chest. 

 For the rest of the time I held my little girl named, Claire. She fell asleep in my arms today. So for about half the time Claire and I laid on the floor together while she slept.

  

(Jake, Claire and I)

It was Blossoms birthday today. (My moms baby she fell in love with) She turned one.

 

(Blossom eating her birthday cake)

After the orphanage we decided to eat at KFC which we had already eaten for lunch yesterday, but I think everyone is getting tired of Chinese food. When we walked in every person in the restaurants head turned to look at us. One little girl started squealing and jumping up and down in her chair with the biggest smile on her face when she saw us. The restaurant was packed and it took forever to get our food so we ended up taking it back to the hotel. I’m starting to feel bad for Fawn. It seems so hard to do her job. But she is very good at it. She is just so funny. 

 

(US at KFC)

Right after dinner the nannie Liz, who had given us the gifts earlier came over to show us where she had gotten the necklaces from. So the whole team piled onto a bus, which was defiantly a new experience for us and followed Liz. We ended up on a side walk by a lake that was full of people selling things. She took us to a little stand that her friend owned. All us Americans are ya know checking out the necklaces and slowly more and more people start sneaking over to see what is going on. And soon we have a whole herd of Chinese people crowding over us, watching our every move. Oh good times, good times.  

My mom got a chance to talk to Liz through Fawn. She found out that she goes to church and that she is Buddhist. So we are defiantly going to be praying for her.

Now we are back at the hotel, eating random junk food we found at the Super mart next door.  Tomorrow it is back to our normal routine with the kids. So for now I am going to sleep. Have a good Sunday everyone!!!

-Makenna