Ayubowan!

(Ayubowan is a formal greeting in Sinhala, the language the people speak in Sri Lanka. It literally means "may you be blessed with long life.")

We finally arrived in Sri Lanka at 10:30 last night (which was 10 am Monday morning for all you Californians) and got to the place we are staying, Ape Kadella, at about 1 am. We are staying at "the farm" and we got a tour today. We saw some pretty HUGE pigs and really cute piglets, lots of chickens, quail, dogs, coconuts, exotic birds, ate some delicious pinapple, curry, and green bananas, and saw some of the children for the first time. We are actually going to go meet to boys (who will be home from school soon) in about 35 minutes! Pray for the little girls, because 22 out of 30-something girls are sick with the flu, so we aren't able to meet or play with them yet. It was REALLY interesting to see that one of the girls we met, who was 15, looked 10 ten years old. We would have never guessed her real age, because all of them are really malnourished. That is one of the focusses of the ministry we are working with... they really want to help get these children healthy, and educated, giving them a passion for life and redirecting their focus and their future into one that is God-focussed, and not just karma based. These children are not taught to think for themselves, and therefore have been indoctrinated to think that what their current situation is like is based off of their previous life. They have been through so much and we don't even know the half of it, but it is definitely culture shock and I am realizing how privileged we really are! We have learned so much already, and we haven't even been here for a whole day yet... I am expecting my eyes to be really opened by the end of this trip.

On another note, it is really humid here, and we are sticky all the time from the mixture of humidity, bug spray, and sunscreen. But it feels surprisingly comfortable! Not sweating too much.... yet haha. But today has been a day of rest and we have construction and Kid's camp to run starting this week. Also, i don't know if it was from the 36 hours of traveling getting here (and the altitude on the plane) or from the humidity here, but i lost my ankles... i think i left them in Hong Kong..... no but really... my legs and feet (and hands to a lesser degree) are so swollen that i literally have kankles and balloons for feet. I wouldn't be surprised if i could walk on water with these things. I am the only one on the team who has had this problem so far... it is really weird. Hopefully the swelling goes down soon and i am not left with floaties for feet for the rest of the trip haha.

I can't upload pictures from this computer, but as soon as i get the chance, i will update the blog, so look out for those!

P.S. Keep praying! :)