Sosnova 10.21.06

Today we went to a little town about 60KM outside of St. Petersburg called Sosnova. John has been coming out here for a couple years now to partner with a Christian day center and orphanage in this town. For today we were only meeting with the day center.

We road train to get here and let me tell you that was an experience just in itself. These trains are no frills, wood benches for seats, no heat (it was about 35 F in the train), and no bathroom. It stopped about every 10 minutes it seemed as we inched our way over nearly 2 hours to Sosnova. For entertainment I watched the various vendors pedal their wares up and down the aisles. Sergey bought some chocolate and a bag of crab flavored Lays potato chips. Let me tell you that eating crab flavored Lays is something that I will not do twice. It took about an hour to get that taste out of my mouth. Did I mention it was cold!?!

The day center was a very small shack for lack of a better term about the size of half a portable building you might find at your school or church. Inside however was a group of about 20 kids ranging in age from about 6 to 14 who all seemed bright eyed and happy to see us. John and Sergey went to have tea and meet with the director of this facility and I had tea with the kids. I had no translator and of course the kids spoke no English. I won't lie, it was very awkward and uncomfortable at first and I was really at a loss as to how to connect with these kids.

However, after tea we all went into another small room where they play games etc and things started to warm up. I brought out my pictures of my family and shared them with the kids who started asking me all kinds of questions which I was able to answer most of with my limited Russian. I pulled out my Russian to English translations to try to ask more in depth questions beyond the usual "what's your name" etc. but what happened was surprising. The kids all swarmed me to look at various phrases and the whole time evolved into a very fun and interactive English class. I taught them English and helped them with pronunciation and they did the same for me with Russian. It was a blast!

So why are these kids here and what is the need? Well these kids are classified as "at risk"for a variety of socioeconomic reasons. Some have parents who are alcoholics, some are physically abused, some are very poor, and some live in spaces so cramped it is unfathomable as an American. Think about a family of 8 living in a space that is about 12 square meters and that is what some of these kids deal with. It is basically 1 room and everybody eats, sleeps, and lives there. Privacy is non-existent and from what I understand the parents show little to no discretion around their children.

As a result you have many girls who are a little more mature than they should be for their young ages. Their behavior is a little inappropriate at times and there is a great concern for many of these young ladies. We were asked on more than one occasion to pray for guidance for these girls. That is why our presence and the presence of others is so important over here. The more positive role models the children can be exposed to the better their chances will be.

I leave Russia on 10.22.06 and it will be sad to leave all these kids behind, but I am continually encouraged by the work we are doing here.