Skip to main content

What do you give a kid who has nothing?

This past Christmas, we gave out photo albums of all the kids in the orphanage in Komarivka.  It took a lot of time to sort through photos for 100 kids, but we did it, and a bunch of the albums had 25 pictures (that was the max).  A lot of people we told us that this was a really good gift, because most of these kids never get any pictures of themselves. 

christmas present 044.
Sasha, Zhenya and Alina right after they got their photo albums.

But something happened with the pictures that we didn’t expect.

A couple of weeks ago, Janna had the kids help her make a “We miss you” card for Andre.  Andre used to visit the orphanage with us every week, but now he is working with a different ministry north of Kiev.  A few of the kids really miss him.  While we were working on the card, Artyom brought us a picture of himself that we had given him for Christmas, so that we could give it to Andre.  And he asked us if Andre could send him a picture in return. 

komarivka and the I 176
Vita showing me the closet that 9 guys in this room share.  They really don’t have anything.

Later that day, I was being dragged around by Vita, because … well … she loves me, and I am defenseless against her charms. I saw her photo album and thumbed through it.  She still had several of the pictures we gave her, but most of her album was full of pictures of other kids. 

The kids have all been giving away pictures of themselves as presents. 

komarivka 174
Me and Denis. 

They always like to give things.  Without fail, some kid in the orphanage will give me a piece of candy.  Regularly, someone will sneak a part of their lunch out of the cafeteria to give me.  (The super dry bread is my least favorite, but I try to act like I enjoy it). When we do a craft with one of the classes, about half of the crafts end up being given to our team who brought the crafts in the first place. 

We love to give.  We love to find something that is just right for this kid and make him feel special. 

They love to give too.  It makes you feel good to give something that you think will be appreciated by someone else.   The kids want that just like everyone else.  It’s a God-given desire. 

easter and lavre 586
Sasha just graduated.  He kept reminding me that he really wanted this picture of him and his little brother Vadeem before he left the orphanage. 

So when we gave them photo albums we gave them that they can keep and treasure as well as something that they can give to the special people in their lives. 

The kids have been asking when we’ll give them more photos.  We tell them next Christmas.  You’d think from their response that Christmas only happened once every four years.  It make us really happy that we can give them something that they value, and we have every intention of continuing. 

Comments

  1. UnknownJune 24, 2013 at 8:51 PM

    Oh, dear. This is precious. I try to keep up with you guys, but I fall behind. Then I come back and my heart yearns for Ukraine again! Knowing that you guys are back at Chernigiv makes me miss it! God bless you guys! Miss you! Thank you for the opportunity you gave my mom and me. We will never forget it.
    Love,
    Kristian

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Freedom in losing

The last day of our summer camp, I told the kids about my first tennis game in high school.   It was a game that skill-wise I should have won, but I was so nervous and afraid of messing up that I totally blew the game.   It was only after I was one game away from losing the match that I relaxed and just played, after all, in my mind I had already lost, there was no stress.    And then I started winning.   But after winning four games in a row, I thought, “Wow, I might actually win this game.”   Then the stress returned … and I lost.   I focused on that time in the game where I had pretty much lost, but the game just wasn’t over yet.   There was an awesome freedom that comes when you know you’ve lost and you just get to play.   You can experiment, and if you mess up; who cares you’ve already lost.   If you do good, it feels good and you can enjoy it without worrying if it’s good enough.   Life is a lot like that tennis matc...
1 comment
Read more

Anya’s operation “The whole story”

Brace yourselves:  This blog is 3309 words long.  Honestly, I cut a lot of information out and simplified it so much to keep it short.  But the story of Anya’s operation is a monster and I wanted to tell it start to finish so that you have one place to come learn about Anya and what she’s been through these past months, as well as what it has taught us about the lives of orphans here. The core problem:  Our helplessness to help Anya A few weeks ago a friend from the states wrote me a few emails asking about Anya’s situation.  At that point Anya had been in the hospital for almost four weeks … waiting.  Her operation was first scheduled for the day after she was checked in, but it kept getting pushed back again and again.  It was incredibly frustrating, mainly because no one in Kiev had the authority to check her out of the hospital, and so she had to stay there for four weeks..four very boring weeks.  I would have gone crazy. Normally, the par...
2 comments
Read more

Tevye the Milkman's Museum

Tevye is the main character from Fiddler on the Roof and he’s based on a guy who lived not far from Kiev. For a while Doug has been trying to put together a group of people to visit a little museum that is dedicated to him near Boyarka (and when I say "a while," I mean for about 9 years). We heard it wasn't really a museum, just a room set up with some displays and so we weren't expecting much, but we thought, “Hey, when in Ukraine…” So, about 15 Americans, mostly missionaries and teachers, hopped in a few vans on Saturday and took a little trip out of the city. After getting lost a few times, we finally arrived at the public school where the museum is located.  Imagine our surprise when we walked into the building to find about 30 kids dressed up in traditional Ukrainian clothing! Once all the Americans were inside, the group started singing us a welcome song! You can watch it below; sorry it’s a little shaky, I was just trying to get the...
Post a Comment
Read more