Notes From New York, pt. 3

• At this point in the trip, my feet have begun to understand that we aren't in Kansas, anymore. 
• It's HOT!  I mean...HOT!  When you stand still and the only movement is the rise and fall of your chest, purely as a function of respiration, and you still break into a solid sweat....it's HOT!
• Getting ready for our Harlem ministry with The Dream Center.  Pretty much like what we did in Chelsea.  A few of the girls and I helped Mo the intern pull items for folks in Harlem...diapers, clothing, play pens.  Then we made phone calls to let the folks know that we'd have their items with us.  Left voice mails at each number.  Mo said that the clients often screen their calls and sure enough, within about five minutes of making each call, it was returned.
• We took our lunch to Central Park!  Wow!  First off, I'm not sure our fellow subway patrons appreciated our humongous box of fried chicken.  Seriously...a box filled with 100 pieces of chicken.  Chips and fruit and L*ittle D*bbie desserts.  I'd have been happy with just the ice in the cooler!  Big thanks to the boys who manhandled that box...they were the first to eat and rightly so.
• Central Park was beautiful!  We only saw one portion of it.  That's not exactly true...we saw more of it than we needed to on our walk to the restroom...it was just over the hill from us.  Instead, we followed a group of our students in the opposite direction.  And when we finally got to the bathroom, the ladies' had a line coming out the door....of course!  Then a helpful NYPD officer, assigned to Park Patrol, kindly informed us that there was another ladies' room on the other side of the building.  One of our sweet girls said, "Do you think it's a good one?"  My reply?  "At this point, I don't care!"  It wasn't a good one...there was water all over the floor, but the turnover rate was much quicker than the other one.  I didn't get in a hurry, either...mostly out of spite toward the maintenance man's announcement "Ladies, I need to get in here and clean.  Please hurry."  Sorry, pal....you're going to have to wait YOUR turn.
• Evidently, people in NYC were very happy that warm weather had arrived.  Central Park was filled with sunbathers.  Most were decently clothed.  We saw a whole lot more of one "gentleman" than I would have liked to have ever seen...at anytime...particularly, while eating my lunch!  No shirt.  VERY hairy.  Some sort of rash...that he kept scratching.  At one point, one of our girls and I got an eyeful of Itchy McScratchy, we looked at each other and yep, we were done eating!
• Totally different vibe in Harlem.  Harsher.  Grittier.  More desperate.  When we came up from the subway, we saw prostitutes and drug deals out in broad daylight.  A couple of our kids saw a guy being mugged.  No wonder Weezy and George were in such a hurry to be movin' on up!
• Met a wonderful family...Sandra and her daughter and the daughter's children and Sandra's aunt Savannah.  Sandra shared that her aunt was the last of her family.  All the other siblings had passed away.  Savannah was the only one left.  You could see it weighed heavily on Savannah.  So we prayed that she would have grace and strength and courage for whatever lies ahead.
• Sandra's baby grandson, Dane...by far, one of THE cutest babies I've ever had in my arms.  He just stared and stared at me while I was talking to his mama. He kept leaning out of her arms to get to me.  I was surprised when she asked me to take him.  We danced and laughed.  Aunt Savannah watched me dancing and said that I must have "gone out" when I was younger.  Not really...just can't keep still when good music's playing.
• We prayed over baby Dane and his big sister, Davina.  Davina was a pretty thing...her hair all twisted up and braided into something that looked like a bow on a Christmas package.
• We left the park and headed to the next stop at 125th and Lexington.  This was for the homeless outreach.  When we turned the corner and came to a stop in the middle of the block, it was NOT what I was expecting.  I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn't that.  I've never seen such a forgotten looking street.  There was a man sitting on the stoop of a building and he had his shopping cart.  On the ground next to the stoop was a man sleeping on a mattress.  That mattress was beyond filthy.  Most dogs I know sleep on nicer beds. 
• Word quickly spread that we were there and folks came from all directions.  We handed out noodle cups, bottled water, personal hygiene packs and there was even a rack of clothes folks could look through.  Of course, we were also handing out the Gospel of Christ to anyone who would listen.
• Y2, ever inquisitive, started rooting around in a small pile of rubble.  He saw the bristles of a broom and was trying to find the handle.  Trying to get him to understand that the trash on this street was potentially deadly was difficult. 
• Jesus came pouring out of our kids.  Everywhere I looked, there were Jesus puddles.  One of our girls sat with the man on the stoop for more than thirty minutes.  She couldn't make him understand that a life with Jesus is better than a life without Him.  She got up from the conversation with him and sat on that nasty sidewalk and WEPT for that man.  A man she had only just met; she wept for him with truly broken heart.  Y1 gave his Bible to a man named Michael.  He sat and shared Christ with this man and denied my help when I offered it to him.  He prayed for Michael with such love and compassion.  Y2 wanted to give his money to the man on the mattress.  "But Mama, he needs this more than me."  Almost had church, right there on the sidewalk!  He needs Jesus more, but my child knew that the money in his pocket might do something to help that man...even if it was temporarily.
• Met a man and his wife...Carlos and Francine.  PRECIOUS folks.  Living in a local shelter because they'd been left homeless by an apartment fire.  Carlos said he grabbed Francine and his phone when he realized what was happening because he knew God would take care of the rest.  This was the second time Francine had been burned out of her home.  Carlos used to be a building superintendent.  He was on the roof of his building, sweeping, when the planes hit the Twin Towers.  I don't know where his building was, but he said he saw it happen.  Can't even imagine seeing it in person...it was bad enough on TV.  Francine said that she felt like they were falling through the cracks of "the system."  We shared a sweet time of prayer and fellowship.  I introduced them to Y2 and Francine informed me that I needed to keep eyes on him.  Where we were was no place for little ones.  That took my breath away.  When the locals, the folks who live in the neighborhood, tell you it isn't safe, it must be bad.
• Visited with a man named Johnathan.  He was very curious about our group.  He was very impressed that we would travel so far to share Jesus.  He was encouraged by us.  He said he'd had a run of bad luck, but was starting to make his way back up.  He didn't look like he was homeless...he was clean and neatly dressed.  His teeth were good and he could carry on a lucid conversation.  He let me pray for him and he got in line to get some of the things were were giving away. 
• The Dream Center staff was generally amazed by our kids.  They didn't have to be told what to do....other than being assigned specific tasks.  Once they had their tasks, there was no direction needed.  Evidently, this isn't the case for every group.  What The Dream Center doesn't know about our kids is that community outreach is something that comes very naturally to them.  We do big outreach events at our church several times during the year.  This is at the molecular level for our kids...it's something they know as well as they know their own names.
• Thankful to see Victor the Icee man.  Not sure if it is ice cream, sherbet, gelato...WHATEVER!  It's cold and fruity and $1 will buy you a D*xie cup sized portion.  Oh...and Victor was led to Christ by our little Jesus freaks!  Ice cream and salvation....what else is there?
• Made the trek from Harlem, to Chinatown for supper.  So much to see along the way.  All of the beautiful buildings in the very center of NYC.  A couple of fruitcakes, don't ask, along the way.
• Couldn't tell you the name of the restaurant where we ate, but it was good!  They served us family style...each table got a plate of spring rolls, fried rice, lo mein, garlic chicken with green beans, beef and broccoli and this sort of mildly spicy sweet and sour chicken.  It was GOOOD!
• The group split up after supper...some wanted to go into Manhattan and play....the rest of us wanted to go back to NYSUM and die rest.  Mr. Snark and I took the group who wanted to go back to NYSUM.  Much to my dismay, the party animals happened to stumble upon Dylan's Candy Bar...a three story candy store.  Thankfully, our one student who is an absolute candy fiend, was kind enough to share her gummy peach rings with me.