I am home. It feels nice to be back under my own roof with Melissa and our stinky little dog. I am still trying to adjust to the time though. I was wide awake at about 5:30am and fell asleep at about 9:15 last night. It was fun seeing everyone at church yesterday and it really reminds me of how fortunate I am to live where I live and to have the friends and family that I have. Over the course of the next week or so I am going to write entries about the various experiences and thoughts we had on the trip. You can check out the online photo gallery from the trip here. Overall it was a lot of fun hanging out with Gary and Chris and the people that we met along the way. I really appreciated all of the stories and wisdom that Chris and Gary (switching up the name order for posterity) that they shared with me throughout our adventures. Chris has a lot of "good ol' boy" country sayings that I loved. For example...we walked by a really tall guy in Budapest and Chris said: "That guy is so tall that he could hunt geese with a rake." Amazing.

I think I will start off by talking a bit more about the orphanage situation and what we are talking about doing. I feel like I am in that sled dog movie, Eight Below. The main character has to leave his sled dogs behind in Antarctica when a big storm hits and he is forced head back to the states. He does everything he can to make it back to his dogs, against all odds, and with little resources to do so. This is a lame analogy but its kind of how I feel right now about leaving Ukraine. (No, I don't think orphans are like dogs). The first orphanage/hospital that we visited was filled with children aged 3 months-3 years. It was in a dumpy run-down building (right) and the kids were all malnourished, dirty, and slow developmentally. Some stared blankly at the ceiling, some cried, and some just raised their hands, begging to be held. Mothers in Ukraine get $2000 over the course of the first 6 months of their child's life. Many mothers use this as a way of making money and end up abandoning their baby at 6 months only to repeat the cycle again. It is a horrible cycle established by a corrupt and helpless government. As I said in a previous entry, it was horribly sad. The hospital barely had any supplies, the beds were dirty, and the staff was underpaid and neglected the children. The babies receive one meal a day-a concoction of cold milk, flower, and sugar. Not even baby formula. We left there feeling helpless, upset, angry, and confused. How could a mother (and father for that matter) abandon their child? How could a government allow this cycle to continue? What could we do to help?

The next day we visited another orphanage about 2 hours away. It was an all-girls orphanage established by a Dutch Christian church. Here the girls were treated with love and it showed. This orphanage doubled as a working farm and ranch, where the girls learned life skills, grew their own food, and created a self-sustaining living environment. Here there was a sense of love and safety that was completely absent from the other orphanage. We hung out there from almost the entire day. We got a tour of the facility and spent time with the girls. Gary and I played basketball with a few girls and they started calling him "Popa." We found out that this meant grandpa. Though it appeared to be a sweet gesture of love and innocence, they were in fact making fun of him for being old. It was great. These kids were being exposed to the love of Christ and also got to experience a sense of community, family, and love. It was still a sad place to be, knowing that these girls were abandoned, and in many cases, severely abused, but I left feeling hopeful that these girls would have a chance to live a good life.

So where do we go from here? That is the question at hand. Gary, Chris, and I talked a lot about what we can do to help the orphans of Ukraine and Hungary. We know that something more needs to be done and hopefully, as a church and as individuals, we can make a difference. We are looking at potentially buying a plot of land in Ukraine (ridiculously cheap) and building an orphanage (like the one I just talked about). It would require a lot of prayer, man (and woman) power, finances, and planning, but even the prospect of it is really exciting. Melissa and I are praying and discussing what our involvement may be and we are excited (and scared!) at the various possibilities. God is good and we know that whatever he has planned will be the best case scenario for us and the children of Hungary and Ukraine.

Pray for these plans and how you may be involved in them. I will be impressed if anyone actually reads all of this. Sorry its so long. I had a lot to say!