My Singaporean Saga: Middle School Service Trip to Indonesia

So I was fortunate enough to get to chaperone the Middle School service trip to Indonesia. We stayed at a beautiful Island called Telunas, and we went to Moro Island by way of boat each day to spend time with kids at a school there. It was such a neat experience getting to learn a new culture, especially one with so many particulars as the Indonesian culture. There is a certain hand that is exceptable to eat with, different ways to shake hands with people depending on who it is you are shaking hands with, exceptable rules about how you interact, and not to mention a completely different language!

The first day, we left school and headed to Telunas Island. The first night was just for the students to get settled in at the place we would be staying. This place was beautiful, as you will see in the pictures, and was such a nice change of scenery from the big city of Singapore. The students swam, jumped off of a high dock, played on the beach, and just had fun.

The next day we got up early to go see the school at Moro Island. The students had spent the past two months planning English lessons that they were going to teach these students, and I was so excited to how they were going to do! When we arrived at the school, it was so heart-warming to see the Moro kids lined up at the gates of their school waiting to meet all of us. We walked in, shook a bunch of hands, and my students began teaching their different lessons. My students did such an awesome job, and really interacted well with the Moro kids, despite only knowing a few Bahasa words. Meanwhile, I was walking around taking pictures. After the lessons, we had a little time to play with the kids and they were so happy to play with all of us, each one trying to show off a little bit. Sadly, due to the Muslim holiday, the school day was cut short and we couldn't stay very long.

The next day we went back to the school to do some construction projects. We had been warned that due to the holiday and no school, that there would likely be few if any students at the school that day. HOWEVER, when we arrived there were almost just as many students there as the day before and it was awesome to see how excited both my students and the Moro students were to see each other again. The construction projects we did were painting some walls, and plastering some other walls with cement. Again, my students attitude in serving and doing this HARD work was so impressive and such a pleasure to see.

Now back in Singapore and reflecting on my thoughts from the trip. I word first say that I am so thankful for the time to get to know my students better, thankful the reminder as to how blessed we are to have the things we have, but the most important lesson I learned from the trip is that you do not need to speak the same language in order to show them love.