Many of you may remember reading about Alina. It was on our mission trip last June that we met her and many other older Orphan girls through the ministry of my good friend Anya. Anya has been working with children in the Orphanages around Donetsk for several years. She is now seeing the children grow up and move from Orphanage to Trade School which is generally the next step for an orphan. She is seeing wave after wave of the girls leave the orphanage for the trade school and many of them become pregnant right away. Which changes an "against the odds" situation into a nearly impossible one.
Trade School Dorms 101
The above picture is of a typical Trade School Dorm room.
When we visited that day we were met out front by a young man named Dimitry. I think Dimitry was curious about Americans. I took a liking to him. We talked only a few minutes with Dimitry with him asking most of the questions. He asked me, "Do you drink"? I said, "I have an occasional beer but never to intoxication". He then said, "Oh, here we drink to unconsciousness"! I felt like i wanted to help this young man. I believe if i were there full time I could. I hope to see him again on our next trip.
We were there to visit a young friend of Anya's who was having a birthday that day. It was her first year out of the orphanage and Anya tries hard to give them some happiness. So this day, we took her a cake complete with candles. I could see that this small effort really made her feel special. We spent about two hours with her just talking and laughing.
I wanted to write about the situation at the Trade School Dorms, but there is just no way of doing it with offending. So, I ask you to trust me that it is a very bad situation. It is not a good place for a teen. But we are talking about a teen, freshly set out from a orphanage, unprepared to meet the world and who now has nobody to guide them or love them through the toughest years of their lives.
Having experienced this mission field that seems to be wide open, just leaving without acting just wasn't an option. So, just prior to the start of the School year, with the financial help of some generous friends, we opened a small transition home in Donetsk, Ukraine. Let me drift here a moment to make the point that Jesus does not always request or require that our efforts be grand in scale. And sometimes the thought that we have to be a blessing on a grand scale can hold us back from being a blessing at all. It is through a collection of small efforts that this transition home was made possible. And that i believe is God's plan, that we all come together, add our small part and that we learn to love through it! So, for a little less than $600 a month here is what we are doing. We have two full time volunteers in Anya and Olya. Anya does outreach to the children in the local orphanages and trade school dorms and Olya is our resident house mother. We also have three full time residents that i will blog about in the near future, but i can rarely talk about them and the progress they are making without tearing up.
So, we are a small transition home, that does outreach as well as we have many visitors during the week. We have Bible study and classes that teach them life skills.
We have regular visitors, occasional visitors and then we are always excited to have new visitors! This week we were visited by Oxanna and Olya, first year students in a trade school who came to experience "a family atmosphere". It was a very good opportunity for them to learn to cook. Their school provides meals for them, so they don't know how to cook and they don't have a way to learn. So we teach them this life skill as well. Oxanna and Olya say they can't wait to be back with us some day soon!
It is usually Saturday that is the busiest of all at the Transition home. It is a day that most of the young people have free and our place is a good alternative to all the un-healthy draws that seem to call out to them. I think that the kids that drift in to us are looking for a chance and the help to make their lives better. So Saturday night several young women stay the night so they can go to Church with the group on Sunday morning.
We are in need of financial support to keep this operation going and expanding. Right now we are renting an apartment. We are praying for the blessing of a house to be able to help more young people in the future. If you feel so lead to help you can give by clicking the DONATE button at the top right.
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