Day 12- Max, Geoff, Kristi, Peter, Scotti and I took a ferry to Dumaguete on the Island of Negros. There we were greeted by Wes and Judy, who began an organization to help the disabled in the Philippines, and some of their team. It was such a warm welcome of hugs and hand shakes and sweet smiles. They even gifted us with beautiful shell necklaces.

Fruit Bearers Ministries is an organization dedicated to providing “educational, medical, vocational and spiritual resources to the deaf, blind, crippled, and otherwise disabled children in the mountains and far-flung places of Negros Oriental, Philippines”. Wes and Judy are a sweet older couple who have listened to God’s calling and travel back and forth from Washington state to the Philippines to provide for these children and life according to God’s Will. They are very inspiring in the way they give God the glory, no matter what, in all things. These two do so much for these children and have extremely generous hearts, and it is because of God that they are there.

Wes and Judy brought us to three different schools where we sat in on the SPED classes or met with the principal. The children that Fruit Bearers helps to sponsor are not only deaf, but also blind as well as mentally and physically disabled. The first we visited was an elementary school. The students gave us special performances including a blind student named Paul who has a beautiful singing voice. We were served treats and spent time with the children before we went to the high school. The last class we visited was a school in San Jose. The students performed their interpretive dance they have been practicing for the upcoming festival. Our team taught the children how to play duck duck goose. There was a rain storm outside, drenching the ground and filling the air with thunder and lightning. Though inside the classroom, the air was filled with squeals of laughter, giggles and smiles. Whether you played or not, everyone had a good time; the deaf, the blind, a boy waiting for another surgery for his club foot. The expressions of the student’s faces; their excitement and joy was incredible to witness. A simple game turned into a beautiful sight.

Later that night we walked the boardwalk along the ocean. The skies were painted black with streaks of lighting to illuminate the water. The clouds were empty from releasing their rain a few hours before, so the night was dry and allowed for a peaceful stroll. You could not hear the thunder, but the lightning struck far out at the horizon. God was filling the night with His mighty presence, and His loving mercy. A mix of peace and power. His reflection was everywhere.

Day 13- The next morning we drove up to the Hill Side Chapel where we sat in on a bible study. We heard the testimonies of some of the Filipinos who had been praying for God to send someone to help them. The daughter of the mother speaking had run away and been gone for six years. While away, she gave her life to Jesus Christ and had been praying that her mother and family home would know Him too. God answered all of their prayers and brought people as well as Wes and Judy and the Fruit Bearers Ministries to be a part of His plan. They helped to rebuilt her home, prayed for her and were able to raise enough funds to pay for her son’s stomach surgery. The mother was praising God in her language and crying as she told her story. God had shown up in divine appointments in her life and others. Weaved between the lines of her story, He had placed people there to help her, those who were willing to step out and follow Him. And He had used them in amazing ways.

Myrna, a teacher at Talibon, the last school we had done physicals at, shared her story with me. She was hard of hearing and was able to speak a little, but I had a interpreter able to translate the signs I didn’t understand. When she was seven months old she had become severely sick and had a high fever with no medicine to take for it. As a result, she had become deaf and was living in silence. She was placed in a mainstream school where she was the only deaf student. Myrna didn’t understand what she was being taught, she couldn’t hear well and she wasn’t able to communicate with the others. She didn’t speak for four years and it was unknown why. When she was four years old, she fell from the stairs and broke her back. She was taken to the hospital and it wasn’t until then that it was found out that she was deaf. At age eight, a teacher named Ellen found Myrna and encouraged and convinced her and her parents to allow her to be enrolled in the Sagbayan deaf school. She lived in the dorms, learned sign language and had many friends. She loved learning. In 2006 Myrna graduated from the high school, Bohol Deaf Academy, at twenty years old. She continued education at the Cebu Normal University where she earned a degree in teaching and graduated in 2011. Although she has her degree, Myrna is unable to be licensed because she is deaf. If it wasn’t for IDEA providing a job for her, she wouldn’t ever receive a paycheck.

Myrna is not the only deaf member of her family. She also has four deaf sisters. Her younger sister Danielle is currently an eighth grader Bohol Deaf Academy and she is also hard of hearing as a result of her mother overdosing on medicine while she was pregnant. Marylane was born profoundly deaf, and her sister Arlyn sufferend from a fever just at Myrna did. Her older sisters did not go to a deaf school but remained in the hearing schools. By the time the deaf school was started and known about, her older sisters were already far enough along in their education that they stayed among the hearing. Myrna has taught her sisters sign language as well as their parents so that they can all communicate. Family is very important to her. While raising nine children, her parents were very poor and still are. Her mother keeps the house while her father climbs trees collecting Tuba to make and sell coconut wine in the markets. Now that Myrna has a job, she supports her family and is her sister Danielle’s sponsor while she is in school. She makes about 7,900 pesos a month which is equivalent to about $200 per month. This amazing woman is helping her parents build a home with the money she is earning, and she bought a pig for a feast on Danielle’s birthday. She explained that she is not married and has no boyfriend because she has chosen to focus on and help her family. Family comes first.

Now, Myrna is twenty-seven years old and is a teacher. She was able to overcome the obstacles and the people that told her she wasn’t normal and she wouldn’t ever make anything of herself. That she wouldn’t ever get a job or be good enough. Her experience in a deaf school changed her life as she gained a broader vocabulary and is now happy to teach children. She would have never had the opportunity to teach and to stand in front of the children and teach them what it’s like to live deaf while in a hearing world. She is able to be an example to her students and everyone around her and be proof that even if you have what is considered a disability, that doesn’t have to stop you from pursuing your dreams. Because of IDEA, she received the financial support to go through elementary, high school and college and earn the education and degree she has today. Myrna went from living in silence, having to write down what she said and point in order to communicate to now teaching other children how to be the best they can be and embrace who they are and how God made them.

God has been teaching me and showing me a direction in which He wants me to go while i’ve been here in the Philippines. I am praying about it and want to seek Him more in this before I post it. I appreciate all of the prayers and support I have been receiving on this trip. You are a part of why I am here today.

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Blessings!

Athena Balles