My First Week Back in England

A norm of winter's tale is about to begin..

Gloomy grey skies , gushing winds, intermitten showers, freezing toilet seats, portable electric heaters, dressing up like a puff ball .....this is how it is in my first exciting week back in this country under the reign of Queen Elizabeth II.

Is there a pretty sight, you may wonder? Just one - the autumn leaves of golden descend!

With this, I started my 10 month journey a few days ago...but really, I only realised the reality of it this morning!! What I experience or saw or was taught the last 2 days were jsut snippets of what I had to do today..

Went into a comprehensive school today with great anticipation of meeting the school kids. Little did I know or was I informed of the nature of the school or the kids we were meant to be overseeing. Unlike Malaysia, the kids here don't just do what teachers or adults tell them to do. I was designated & allocated to the pupils learning support unit today with Phil. Learning Support Unit? Whazzthat? To put it simply, it is a place for kids (i'm talking about year 9-11s as in form 1-4 kids) who have been excluded & face being expelled from school come to for a set time to be with people like me who's task is to help put them into a programme in order to slowly assimilate & integrate them back with their peers in school. Well, u could call them the class trouble makers or just people who like to distract others in class. So, they get sent to something like detention (bcos they are sort of not allowed out of the unit) & we get a chance to do our part by taking a few lessons with them - lessons about behaviour & morals & values etc. So far so good.Sounds good rite?

Well...wait till you meet these kids...They are really like the ones you see in the movie "Dangerous Minds". Very rough kids evven those little ones- man, it was eye opening. I prayed so hard for enough love & grace to accept them despite their constant shouts of abuse & swearing. Of course, I needed to understand that it was apart of their lifestyle & upbringing. After all, I am in the 2nd poorest council estate in England! Today's lesson plan was on the subject of Bullying & initially it started off rather well....until some kid took a dash by making some crude comment on another kid's mom & before I knew it all hell broke loose -literally. A fight broke out...I got hit but slightly as I was trying to get this kid next to me out of the way but he was strugling to help his mate! Urgh...ugly indeed. Pray for them...Most of them beleive the best way to retaliate & stand up for their mates (esp when the other is being put down or bullies) is by fighting back. So hence, the lesson on bullying was appropriate ...yes we managed to calm them down & took the boy who started the fight away from the lesson. I won't go into what we did durign the lesson & all but, yeah....Man, I was freakingly shocked! You know how you see these in tv shows & read abt it but seeing it happenign right before your eyes ?? Well, like some wise friend told me , there is always a first time for everything!!

So, end of fourth period - now, off to another similar type class but only for 40 minutes. This time, it was the older kids - guess prob abt 16 or 17. And, there were 3 gals among the lot of the 4 boys who entered the room. Our role wasn't to teach but kind of supervise & watch them in place of them goin out of school wandering in the streets for their free period. Why? Well, the local authorities have said they can't loiter in the streets. Of course, I didnt' understand why. So I talked to this gal, faced covered with heavy make up, uniform not in order, reading some fashion magazine...it was hard initially but we found a common topic "david beckham"! Thank God, I found my breakthrough! Few minutes later I saw this boy nudging another boy in the far corner..I signalled to my team mate Phil to go check it out. Phil stood up & as he was approaching the 2 boys, one of them stuck out a knive at him & I realised aft that, the rest of the lot took out their knives...Oh no, I thought to myself, not another fight?!! Thankfully, they were just fooling around with each other ...so no fight ..But me, I was seriously scared. I mean, those were really sharp knives...So please pray for protection. I asked God to please just give me the courage to love them despite me being so afraid to talk to them abt their family & their life. This kid was telling me he was being locked up in a cupboard at home by his parents afterwards when I asked him why did he carry a knive around. At that point, I wanted to tell him, God values you and God thinks you are important...but very clearly during school hours, most schools' policy is that we are not allowed to preach abt Jesus or the gospel...so, I wasnt sure if that applied here...sigh...really regret not taking the risk to do so....but of well, will see how it goes next tuesday when i come back into the shcool...

God is indeed expanding my horizons in understanding the depth of His love for all man, esp these excluded ones....God's heart was always with the excluded people from society & I pray I will be able to mirror that when I'm serving the community of Wednesdbury here in a tiny weeny part of England...

Its time to go to my next session now - Children's Outreach Work with the main church at Junction 10 .....

May we all have the grace & love to be socially aware & revelant of the needs around us, be it in Kuala Lumpur, Singapore or London - in some nook & corner, someone has a need...we need to meet it, not ignore it!