Here is a list of things you should never do if you ever find yourself in a foreign country working with a group of kids:
-let any kind of candy be seen that you don’t want to share
-start throwing balls at kids and let them throw ones at you if you don’t want to spend the next half hour as the object of a one sided doge ball game
-let the girls start putting make up on guys…..I’ll let you imagine how that can end.
-above all, don’t start tickling matches or piggy back rides, especially if you did not have enough sleep the night before……
I made that last fatal error the first day when I got in a tickling match with a kid them swung her up on my shoulder. Within ten seconds I had five kids grabbing my arms, hugging me around the waist, and trying to climb on my back. Then when I said no all they did was form an “orderly line”. It was insanity. I tried to swing all of them around a bit but the line never ended or even got shorter. Then just before they left, they all tackled me and I had five kids on top of me at once. Ever since then, whenever the kids are not in the classrooms, I almost always have at least one child begging me to pick them up or jumping on my back. It reminds me of two children from my home church back in Charlotte, North Carolina, named Ben and Patton. I don’t remember how it got started but virtually every weekend I had one of them on my back all morning. Patton was the one on my back the most. I would walk around setting up the cafe or helping in any way I could, and the entire time Patton would be clinging to my back like a monkey. I have gotten so used to it that it hardly wares me out any more. My back is certainly stronger for the exercise. And if it were not for that practice before coming here, I am certain that I would be ready to run and hide every time I see a child coming towards me this week.
So thank you Patton for helping me prepare for this trip. You have been a tremendous help even though all you did was have fun climbing on me. J
