Children's Club! :)

I'm going to have to go through two days since we've been pretty busy since Sunday! Yesterday morning we went to Great Victoria Presbyterian church just a short walk from Friendship House. The church has a very low attendance of about fifty members, mostly the older generation. They were very welcoming, warm and excited to have us there. We introduced ourselves and each shared something that we've appreciated or something that stood out to us about Northern Ireland and the people. After a delcious roast beef lunch and mashed potatoes made by Eunice (the cook of Friendship House) we spent the rest of the afternoon practicing and planning for the Children's Club today!
So we woke up this morning and rushed around trying to clean up before 10am when the kids started arriving. The ages ranged from four to eleven and a wide range of personalities! We opened with a game, a skit on Jesus' love for us and we split the group into half, half playing games with half of our team and half decorating heart-shaped cookies that some of the girls baked last night! Some of the children were hard to control making things very difficult when leading games. Many of the children come from homes where they are surrounded by drug/alcohol abuse, lack of discipline and neglect so their upbringing is reflected in some of their attitudes. Often the fathers aren't a part of their children's lives or they may have children with different women (which is fairly common) so having the guys from our team around is huge! The girls are very attached to them and will stay around until they are kicked out of friendship house, cuddling up to the guys and talking their ears off! It's cute to watch! We were then treated to "chip buddies" ( french fries in between two pieces of bread, which tastes surprisingly delicious...and unhealthy). After lunch we were taken into Belfast to Shankill Road which is a predominantly Protestant area where there was alot of aggression (bombing and brutalities). We were introduced to a man who had been a part of the violence many years back and went to jail for owning a machine gun (he claimed it was for his own safety) but he became a Christian there when the jail was bombed and he realized how fickle life is. We were given more details on 'the troubles' by a retired minister from Shankill Road who then gave us a walking tour down to the "Peace Wall" separating the Catholics and Protestants in this area (which we had seen on our bus tour). It is incredibly tall when you stand under (about twenty five feet tall) it and it's a very sad reminder of the resentment both sides still hold to eachother. Grafitti and hand written messages from people who visit covers the entire wall some which are very moving. One stood out to me that was from a tourist from Germany and it read: 'We wish that this wall would fall like the wall of Berlin'. There seems to be constant practising and planning and the team has been very disciplined and eager to give their input! That's what they are up to now at 9:30pm. Please pray for much rest, especially as we go into tomorrow which is a long day (breakfast for the men's hostel, children's club and youth alpha in the evening)! Oh-and happy Valentine's Day! :P