We've been painting at Onesimo for 3 days. The first day was a blast - I had an awesome time partnering with the youth and really accomplishing something. We were energetic and excited. Day 2 was not as much fun. We lost our energy and excitement and we were doing it just to do it. We still talked with one another but it wasn't what we wanted to be doing. We painted at the drop-in center... i thought we'd be at the house facility and that we'd still get to see and play with kids. There area few kids hanging at the drop in center, helping paint... but they're not interested in interacting with us no matter how hard we try. There are 4 or 5 boys, coming from the streets. The oldest boy is very aggressive to the youngest (JM) - he hits him and pushes him. JM takes it but you can tell it hurts him. It breaks my heart for both of them - both probably have very difficult backgrounds. One of the 10 year olds has a six pack - I mean this kid is built in a way that would make a college guy jealous. We talked about it and he's just a hard worker - does very physical labor to support himself. I think of 10 year old boys at home and what their childhood is like. It's drastically different here, esp in the poor areas. The third day (Friday) we started refreshed again. I was super tired but we were painting murals, which is more fun than touching up the seafoam-colored walls :/ Pastor Stan came to draw the murals and then we painted them in. It was fun to bring color and life to the room. The two paintings were of animals reading - its a classroom.
While they were drawing the murals some girls came to the door to watch, saw me, and wanted to meet me. The whitey always stands out, haha. So, I went outside and spent probably 30-40 minutes talking with them. The oldest (11) was named Amira and she spoke very good English. She pointed to her covered head and said, "are you familiar with the muslim religion, with islam?" I said kinda and so we talked for a long time about our religions. She was very open and honest with me and was accepting of my sharing with her. We didn't talk about our holy books but we talked about customs and holidays. She comes to Onesimo for Christmas (today she came b/c they were giving free school uniforms) and loves it but her favorite muslim holiday is Ramadan. We talked about our families - she was very interested in mine. Her dad is a leader in their church - a 'father of our muslim people' she said. Then we started talking about her and school. She said she loves school but she gets picked on a lot - the kids make fun of her because she's just a poor muslim . The foreigners and Filipinos make fun of her and don't believe she's a scholar (78%+) because she's just a poor muslim. She said she tells them, "but I know English and you don't, so you're the stupid one!." I couldn't help but laugh...
I realized that Amira was the first muslim i've ever engaged in conversation with. I have been around them before but never on such a personal level. She got her cousins and little sister and introduced me to them all - one of her friends came by who's father just passed away the day before. We talked about that in a very solumn manner for awhile, I'm not sure how the religious differences realte to that issue.... Amira repeatedly told me how beautiful and nice i was. I would in turn say the same to her, she was an absolutely beautiful girl but wouldn't believe me. She would just respond and say "yes, all muslims are nice people..." I'm not sure why she thought she had to emphasize that to me so much... :/ If anything it made me feel optimistic that I could be a positive example of a "foreigner" to her. When we leave Onesimo to go to lunch we walk through a muslim neighborhood and market. Some of the people have said, "watch your stuff, there are a lot of muslims." Its just been hard to digest... especially because i experienced it from both sides of the fence today.
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