I am currently up in Port Hedland finishing of the last part of outreach. We have been up here for almost three weeks now and only have a couple more days left until we head back down to Perth. Port Hedland is a two day drive from Perth... two days through the outback of Australia. There is pretty much NOTHING along the way - basically only enough gas stations to keep you going. Although, we did run out of gas the first day. The gas station where we needed to fill up was closed, so we had to drive for over an hour on completely empty.. while pulling a trailer. We just got into cell phone reception when we ran out of gas. We had to call our contact in the city to come bring us some gas. It was a miracle we got as far as we did, adn that we were able to call someone!
Our main ministry here is presenting seminars in the high school. We have been talking to grade 9 and 10 students about self-worth and value as well as about relationships. We have had about one class a day, so not a lot, but some. It has been really cool to be able to go and talk to them as a class, but also on an individual level. I really like working with that age group, so it's been a really cool opportunity for me. The kids are pretty open and like to talk, so I have had some good chats with them. Because it is a public school, we can't talk about God and everything, which is kind of hard to do, but it is good in a way as well. We can just talk to them about important things without any pressure, and then if they want to talk to us more, they can. I actually would love to get invovled in something like this back home... We have also been connected to two of the churches here.. just getting to know members of the congregation and hanging out and stuff. They are very hospitible and have invited us into their homes and over for dinner and things. i have felt very welcomed here! We also spent four days camping at a place called 80 mile beach where we helped out with a family camp run by the church. We were responsible for the children's program so we planned games and songs and stories for them. I really enjoyed it - the youth are awesome and we had a lot of fun! 80 mile is a 3 hour drive from Port Hedland, so it is literally an RV park in the middle of nowhere. It was really cool being in the Australian outback, surrounded by red dirt, seeing the most amazing stars ever and hanging out with amazing people! We also saw the most amazing sun rise and sun set I have ever seen... imagine 80 miles of beautiful beach and then add the most stunning colours in the sky - perfect. I loved it! We also watched this hilarious skit night things, which involved some improv skits with different members from our team. Camping was one of the highlights for sure! There is something about getting back to nature with amazing people in another country - I just love it :)
This town is tiny. And it is not only tiny, it is so isolated! There really is nothing to do. And, unfortunately, that is kind of affecting our ministry opportunities here. We haven't been super busy, and spend a lot of time just hanging out at the church watching movies and stuff. I would like to be a lot busier, but a lot of it is out of our control, and there isn't a lot we can do about it. It's alright though - I am really grateful for this experience I'm getting. I don't know very many people who are able to live in a tiny little mining town in the middle of nowhere way up north in Western Australia. It is a really different life up here! This town brings in the majority of the wealth of Western Australia, and even the whole country, because of the mining boom, so people make a lot of money here! Most people come up here just to get a job and make money. Everything is also really expensive - try $7.50 for an iced coffee. And the people here are very Australian.. thick accents, very laid back, very friendly, dry humour... it's great. I feel like I am experiencing something a lot of people don't get to experience.
So, outreach is almost done. Then it's back in Perth for our report back week, where we rap everything up! And then it's over! I am kind of ready for it to be done, but I will miss people like crazy! I have extended my trip though.. I'll be in Australia for a couple more weeks. There is a camp in the middle of July that I will be staffing before I come home.. There might also be a trip to Bali happening.. we'll see. Anyways, I hope you are all good! Thanks for reading :)
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