Monday, January 31, 2011

Reflections on my Mission Trip to the Philippines

In the Summer of 1995 when I was 21 years old I participated in a 27 day trip to the Philippines.  The trip was through RHCC and I had to "raise" like $1500 dollars for it if I'm not mistaken.  The raising of the money involved me sending out a letter that said that God has given me a heart for the Philippines and was leading me to go there, please gimme some money.  Here now I am going to tell you some things you might not have known about this trip.  First lets meet the players.

Jenny- A girl in her mid twenties who was the leader of our group.  She would be described as "A very Godly woman"  She is a nice person who was carrying about 30 extra pounds, but she was a cute blonde.  When asked why she wasn't married she said, "God hasn't called me into the 'ministry of marriage' whatever that means.

Dwight- Dwight was an impish creepy guy in his mid twenties who lived alone with his mother in a one bedroom apartment and had a secret crush on Jenny.  Dwight had to deal with a homosexual Philippino boy named Digoy who used to sexually harass him much to Dwights dismay.

Scott-  A very nice guy and a confused homosexual who told me about his experiences making love with a man while in the "catcher" position.  Scott also liked to sleep nude.  I hope he is fully "out" now and enjoying life.

Rochelle-  A 19 year old Phillipino American who had family there, she was a typical teenager, nothing too interesting to report here

Erin-Erin was just a typical normal person who wanted to go on a mission trip.  She was cool.


If you have never had the chance to immerse yourself in a 3rd world country I suggest you do it.  The experience was great, from the insane humidity, to watching cockfighting, to having our hosts think they were reminding us of home by driving 1 hour to Bacolod mcDonalds and one hour back to bring us disgusting big macs.  The people who I was supposed to witness to would pretty much sit stonefaced as I would recite the basic four spiritual laws, and do evangelism 101.  But they were friendly.

Our hosts were very nice to us.  We stayed in the church which also had a house attached to it.  The Shower was a bucket and a faucet in an outdoor shack area.  We did have an indoor toilet and running water, just no shower for whatever reason.  I got to see a part of the world I would have never got to see...I got to ride a WaterBuffalo through town....I got to eat some pretty delicious mangoes....I was woken up every morning at the crack of dawn to the sound of roosters, or a pig being slaughtered.

It was a unique and beneficial experience for me.  If you are reading this and you are one of the people who gave me some money so that I could go, I offer you a heartfelt thanks!

4 comments:

Bible Thumpin' Mike in Utah said...

HA!
I went to Villa De Los Palmos in High School. My group was a typical youth group. Kids pretending to be good for church to fulfill their parents phoney outward life was real. They were sneeking off at night doing who knows what, talked about drugs and drinking when the "godly adults" were not around etc.
Typical spoiled American kids. I really enjoyed the time with the mexican people that had nothing though. We had a cold shower and a pot of boiled water. And awesome tortillas. Oh and a trip to the horrible Pizza Hut in Encinada.

Mr. Jacobs said...

Goot,
I also had a weird time with my missions trip to Russia. It gave me a little insight into the real world of hardship. I would say, make Kev and zack do something along these lines, missions trip or not. It puts things in perspective.

dole2obama said...

Goot-
I did not know that gay demons were active in the Philippines.

Pauly said...

Goot-

So was it a "Mission Accomplished"?