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Out and about Four street kids in particular have become good friends of mine. They spot the white guy in the white t-shirt and orange backpack. The locals know my face these days and one guy I call Oliver smiles from ear to ear when he sees me. He always greets me with a handshake while covering my wrist with his left hand. When I first met him I thought he was on drugs- he was so joyful! I'm not sure why he likes me, probably because I'm nice to him. He's the poorest of the poor yet the happiest of the happiest.
Mission revised and Susan There are three different kinds of street kids: Those who live on the streets, those who live at home but work on the streets, and those who go to and fro from living on the streets and living at home. Despite what the BBC potrayed, I'd be suprised if there are fifty kids living on the streets now.
The Lotus Home, Lifeqwest, WorldVision, Save the Children, Unicef, Christina Noble Foundation, Center of Disciplining/Educating Children, Desert Rose Foundation, Flourishing Future, Rinky Dink Travel, and Mongolian Youth Development Foundation are all here for the kids.
I've either contacted or met with all of them. I've even been to places with no name- just a lady letting the street kids sleep on the first floor of the apartment she owns. Though it's a joy that these many organizations are here, a part of me feels my mission here has fallen through. Mongolia doesn't need another street children organization or orphanage. The organizations that are here simply need more administrative assistance. They have either not needed my help or turned me away because I don't speak Mongolian.
Because of our prayers, I met a woman named Susan who oversees a travel group called Rinky Dink (www.rinkydinktravel.com) who organizes tours for charity and humanitarian groups where they serve street orphans and nomads on the countryside; repairing fences, digging wells, assisting on the farm, etc. I set up a meeting with Susan at a coffee shop called Chez Bernard (For you Mongolian backpackers and travelers reading, this is the place to go on Peace Ave to meet other travelers) When I entered the cafe, a red-headed woman in her mid-thirties greeted me with the lightest and joyful countenance. She was meeting with a Shaman leader, organizing charity work for
Anicent Mongolian wax figure
And people don't believe Native Americans might have come from Mongolia?a group of Shaman leaders meeting at a conference in Ulan Bator. (Fun fact: The Navajo Indian language is similar to Mongolian and both Navajo Indians and Mongolians share the original religion: Shamanism. Makes you wonder how long ago it was that the Navajos traveled from Siberia into Alaska and then down into the southwestern States.) After her meeting with the Shaman, Susan and I sat as I listened to her story in coming from Illinois. "I've been here nine years," she said. "I adopted three street kids and they taught me Mongolian. I did an internship with YWAM (Youth with a Mission is a Christian missionary training organization for high school and college students) back home and then came here."
Susan took and showed me their inner-city work where they have a school for children in the slum where they organize projects to teach and build outhouses for the poor. Susan married a Mongolian and is living in the slums to be near the poor. We went to her house and she served me tea while I played with her two kids. She organized four weeks of service projects in July for me and Kat (since the other two
students had to back out for different reasons): Three weeks geared toward street orphans on the countryside for summer camp and then one week serving a nomad family. She'll provide jeeps to pick us up from the countryside every weekend and bring us back to the city for showers and rest. Then she set me up with my own personal translator who accompanied me to a shelter for street boys and girls. Susan and I talked for over three hours!
Speaking to the youth One of the church leaders asked me to speak at a youth devotional one Saturday night. I came with a speech prepared but when I saw the intimate atmosphere as twelve of us gathered around a table of biscuits, cake, and tea, I changed my plans. Instead, I went around the room and had each teenager tell me what drew them to Jesus and what they like about the church. The leader, Byara, is fluent in English and translated the conversations. They all spoke of the love Jesus showed all people, that he was "fair" (I didn't fully understand what they meant by that term), and that they were drawn to the church because of
the love between the members.
I told them to remember that when we say we are Christians, what we mean is that we are disciples of Jesus, and "disciple" means that you try to become just like your master. I pointed out that what shocked people about Jesus is that he reached out to those who the rest of society rejected. In Judaism, it was believed that if you were poor or diseased, it was because you had sinned or an ancestor had sinned and the punishment was being pronounced on you. Therefore if you had leprosy, they believed you somehow deserved it. This is kin to the "bad kharma, good kharma" in the Hindu/Buddhist beliefs. Orphans, in the Jewish mindset, were a burden to care for and must have done something wrong to have no parents, thus they were ostracized. Yet James, the brother of Jesus, wrote in James 1:26, "Pure and undefiled religion is caring for widows and orphans in their trouble."
Since God created us all, God loves the child in the street as much as He loves me. He wants that child to have a warm meal as much as He wants it for me. When
we begin to see that God loves each of us equally despite what humans claim, then our minds in how we see people will change. Lepers had to scream "Unclean, unclean!" everywhere they went and it was against the law for a leper to allow anyone to come within ten feet of them. Therefore lepers were ostracized, untouched, and people literally ran away. Imagine if you went an entire day where people would run from you, not talk to you, scream at you to get away and even accuse you of deserving your disease. After days, weeks, months, years, it would have a serious effect on your mental state. But it was these very people who Jesus accepted and told by words and actions, "You are loved by God, you don't deserve your suffering, God is for you, not against you, and your pain reverberates in the depths of His being. You don't have to be ashamed any longer because He loves you."
One of the Mongolian Christians, twenty-seven years old, asked, "How do you get your funding to work with the orphans?"
I answered, "Money isn't it. Jesus never gave the people money but He did provide food for
them when they followed him for days without eating. He spent time with them and accepted them as friends and loved them. It doesn't cost anything to sit with the orphans and listen to them. It doesn't cost money to be their friend. What they need most is attention and love. Do that, take those first steps, ask God to guide you and God will open doors for you and show you what to do next. If fifty Mongolians out of the 1,000,000 who live in this city took the time once a week to go and sit with the children, find ways to keep them from fleeing to the streets, there wouldn't be a single street orphan in all of Ulan Bator." (UB is the only city in Mongolia with street children.) But the Mongolians aren't helping. It's foreigners who are helping. Every non-profit organization I've contacted here is overseen by foreigners. I then laid it on thick to the youth group and Byara saying firmly (keep in mind that most of Mongolia claims Buddhism, thus the good kharma/bad kharma mindset), "Mongolia must help Mongolia. Who will care for the street orphans? The Buddhists? You say that you're disciples
Anha befriends street kid
Planting seeds...one seed at a time! of Jesus- then act like it. You do as Jesus did." Following the devotional was a two hour question and answer session with even fourteen year olds paying close attention. Afterwards, Byara looked in my eyes with a smile and said, "Good."
The next week at church, a college student named Anha, who walks with two limps due to a birth defect, asked if he could join me the next day on the streets. I said, "Of course." But the next day, only the street girl Tabitha could be found. When I asked her where the other three were, she just shrugged her shoulders. So Anha and I took Tabitha to lunch, and after an hour, Anha and Tabitha were in non-stop conversation.
Dave and Kelly After a hard and discouraging day due to another street children organization flaking out on me by not returning a phone call or email, I went back to my apartment and crashed on the couch; bored, discouraged, having to wait two days before the next step- Susan providing my own personal translator to visit the boys and girls shelters. I laid on the couch for thirty minutes staring into nothingness, then got up
and said, "Nope, I'm here in Mongolia, I'm going to do something." So I journeyed to an Irish pub on the other side of town and met two Americans from Michigan named Dave and Kelly. Their American boss sends them to Mongolia every summer to work in a restaurant that partners with their restaurant back home in Michigan. Get this: The Mongolia boss man owns most of the restaurants in Ulan Bator and provides summer camp for kids. One month is for the rich, the next month is for the middle-class, and the next month is for the poor including street kids. And he is the only Mongolian I've heard of who's began an outreach like this. He was inspired after hearing about the Boy Scouts in America. Dave had befriended and provided some meals for some street kids during a trip to India and Kelly had served with Habitat for Humanity in Michigan. I've hung out with the Dave and Kelly numerous times and they've become very dear to me. And so here goes an example of a conversation:
Dave said, "I'm glad my boss works with those kids. He's a good guy." I tell Dave and Kelly about
the different organizations that are working with the street kids and what is and isn't working. Dave answered, "It's overwhelming."
I replied, "Every morning I pray that I meet the people I'm supposed to meet and that the conversations will go the way God wants them to go. You're working for a man who has a heart for making a difference in the lives of children, then your experiences in India, Kelly's past in working with charity and non-profits, then we randomly meet at a pub in Mongolia, do you think our meeting was by chance? Maybe God's knocking on a door. I know it's overwhelming. But when you spend time with the kids and they become your friends, it's not overwhelming anymore because it's you're friends that you're helping get off the streets. Then it becomes a joy."
Montsook and Ocktooch Walking down the street on my way to meet Dave and Kelly for dinner, I came across two friends of mine- the very first two street kids I had met in Mongolia. Ocktooch was clean that day and was begging on the street while Montsook had his mind on drilling a wooden stick into the concrete sidewalk.
Montsook laughed at seeing me and made a cross with his arms saying, "Yesoos?" I smiled and rubbed his head and pointed to the cafe. They ran in front of me, and the waitress, the only waitress in the cafe, SMILED at seeing the street kids- very abnormal. They told the waitress what they wanted while pointing to different pictures on the menu, laughing, ecstatic that they were about to be fed. And then the waitress handed me the bill before preparing the food. 29,000Tugriks (about $23.00). That is the amount expected from three full meals at a nice cafe in this country!
"Ummmm, let me see what they ordered" I said. One large pizza, an adult size order of fried chicken, TWO WHOLE birthday cakes! And they ordered the most expensive soda on the menu! Hahahaha! They crack me up! I scratched off the fried chicken- they can split the pizza. I took away one of the birthday cakes- I let them have one in case they never get to celebrate their birthday. And I let them keep the sodas. I cut the bill in half. Those two boys might be one of the highlights of the trip!
(PS-
Because of your financial donations, twenty-seven street kids have been provided a warm meal.)
There are times, though, when I'm eating with the kids, that Mongolian adults will stare at our table with disgusted facial expressions. The street kids are either oblivious or they're use to it. And I've had plenty of imaginations of walking over to those adults, dumping their food in their lap and throwing their drinks in their faces and screaming, "You're disgusted? Then DO something about it! I think it's absolutely PATHETIC that foreigners have to come over here and take care of your own people!"
Closing Given my three hours every morning before the businesses and buses open their doors, I spend that time in reading, prayer, and in reflection. And through it all, I feel God saying,
"Russell, do you see all these leaders of these street children organizations and ministries? All these founders of these NGO's? They're all at least forty years old. You're not even twenty-eight yet. Jesus didn't begin His ministry until his early thirties. You still need more wisdom and understanding which can only come through life experience. It's not about Me not using you. It's about colleagues and governmental officials not respecting you because you're still a kid. You need to do your three year internship, finish your PhD, then get some life experience behind you, and when you're ready, I'll call you and we'll do something together. It's not about you finding great and world-saving projects. It's about being faithful to Me. Remain faithful to Me so I can mold you into the person I need you to be." Confident that these words are from Him, I feel content. I am very happy to do that three year internship, finish my last stretch of graduate school, and continue teaching at Lipscomb.
Robert Moehr, one of my friends said to me before I left the States, "Russell, what is it that breaks your heart? I was told by a wise spiritual leader that when we answer that question, that's what we're supposed to dedicate our lives to."
I replied immediately, "The unnecessary suffering of the innocent."
It's not about going across the world to help people. It's about being faithful to God and loving the person beside us wherever we are: In the shop, at school, at home, in the cafe, in Africa, in our backyard, loving God and the person beside us.
I think about all of you often and look forward to the next time I can see each of you face to face.
Blessings,
Russell
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Keith Maxwell
non-member comment
Great Report
Russell, This was a great report, as always, of your work there. Give one of the kids a great big bear hug for me because that's what I'd do if I were there. Oh, wait, I am there. You're there for me. Actually, you're there for Jesus, but I feel like I'm there with you when I read about the impact on the kids. You're right about them not needing another NGO. Keep encouraging the Mongolian Christians to reach out to the Orphans. That's the only way it's going to sustain itself. That's what we've found in many countries. We have to teach them how to help themselves, not do the work for them. Keep up the good work. Keith