Meeting the girls

(Sam)
Since the elections are now over, Rita has had a lot more time and we've been able to talk a lot more about how to reach girls, which girls, and how the house will be structured etc. We have started visiting a few, which has been a real privilege but also heart-wrenching, meeting the girls themselves who are the faces of the stories we've heard. For each one it seems impossible that someone so young could have already lived through so much.

A fifteen-year old that we've spent quite a bit of time with, and wrote about in the last group email has now disappeared again, moving up and down the nearby towns along the motorway and staying with friends or anywhere she can find. Her family is distraught and desperately wants her to get out of this town and get help. We're waiting for her to appear again before talking through the possibilities with her. Please pray that she can believe just a tiny bit in the possibility of hope for her future and make the choice to get out...also that we can actually find somewhere that will truly provide all that she needs to be healed from past traumas and start to build a new life.

We met up with another younger teenager tonight and it was such a privilege to sit with her - she really is a very special one, has huge potential and an extremely likeable character! As I said before, it is beyond my imagination to link this lovely girl with all that we've heard she's been through already at her young age, and the way that she lives at the moment. We met the whole family, quite a mixed bunch, and then sat for a while teaching her a few chords on the guitar - it was great watching the transformation from frustration and lack of concentration to then being so chuffed once she persevered and learnt three all at once. My next task is to research her favourite artist so that I can teach her an actual song next time! It's going to be a funny moment!

While Rita is at work in the mornings at the Children's Council we have been given the go ahead to decorate and kit out the whole of the Pink House. The last few weeks have been quite a mix - frustration with the time it takes and the tedium or roundabout ways of getting things done!but also amazing to see things really coming together now...I think probably by the end of this week nearly everything will be in place. We've had Rita's nephew Washington helping us out, and here are some of the photos of the work in progress...

Claire in the hair salon

Sam painting the lounge

Washington fixing the TV in the dance room