Art at the Father's House: Session One

The Father's house is a home for single mothers with babies up to 2 or three years old. We planned three sessions of our version of "art therapy" tailored to the needs of this group of women. Art therapy at the Father's house started off with a relaxing session of using brushes and stamps cut from potatoes and peppers. We chose to have the women do this as a way to encourage free expression as a way to relax, something these Mothers do not get to do.

let's be honest--nothing could have prepared us for real life in Da Nang!

Let us introduce you to a bit of the craziness we have been living in.

First off, here is a lovely treat called Chè. Apparently it is a dessert--after taking a few daring bites of this smoothie-like treat, Matt concluded it was a lovely blend of, well, "PF Changs and Dairy Queen." Let's just say we are glad we tried it but we recommend the Mango Sinh To (Smoothie).

We have found some favorites, including my favorite, Bún thịt nướng (a noodle dish with greens and peanut sauce) and some delicious noodle and vegetable dishes. But just in case...


...we stocked our mini fridge with yoghurt in case of emergency or for a cheap breakfast.


as for laundry, we learned to do it in buckets and scared the cleaning lady with the maze of clotheslines in our room.


Last, but possibly most important, we have paid about 5 visits to the local bike fixer, considering our bikes are in use every day!

Week 1: Part II: Promise House

The rest of the week we were at Promise House doing crafts and playing Duck Duck Goose (which became an all-time favorite-bordering-on-obsession with the kids).


We also decorated the walls of the girls' bedroom with outlines of each girl, and painted handprints of the boys on the walls of their room.

A Crazy First Week: Part I: Dai Loc Orphanage

Well, culture shock has finally dwindled and we are feeling acclimated to the crazy moped traffic, the smells and the heat here. It's been a crazy week and a half--last week we spent working with Orphan's Voice. We biked to two different orphanages in Da Nang and did art, played games, and gave much needed attention to the children there.

Being immersed in the culture here is amazing and varied--we have already had tons of adventures and hilarious mishaps and learning experiences which we will update you on in a future post!

First, here are some pictures to fill you in on our life this past week:



At Dai Loc Orphanage we brought supplies for everyone to make and decorate a mask. They kids here are amazingly talented and put us to shame with their art.




We also prepared journals for each child and created prompts for everyone to reflect on and write or draw in the journal.


It has been so rewarding and so humbling to work with kids who are so open to learning and who (usually) are patient with our almost nonexistent Vietnamese vocabulary (so far we know "hello," "thank you," and "no problem")!

We are heading out to Vietnam!

Please pray for us as we depart from LAX tomorrow at 1:30 a.m. In just a few hours we will be flying over the ocean heading to Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, and then on to Dá Nang, our final destination!

Thank you so much for your support and prayers--we are so excited for the next month and will keep you all updated with stories and pictures!

Blessings,
The Awake Team

a change of plans.

A few weeks ago as we frantically tried to fund-raise, we had to come to terms with the fact that we still did not have sufficient funds to purchase tickets to South Africa, let alone pay for food and housing once there. We were devastated, yet as we were asking God what the plans were for our summer, we were presented with an awesome opportunity in Vietnam.

After getting in contact with an organization in DaNang, Vietnam, we are excited to announce that God has provided a place for us to employ narrative and art therapy with a group of women who desperately need it.

We know that is is a surprising change in plans, yet we are all learning that God’s plan is often very different from ours, and we are excited to see where God is leading us. We believe that this opportunity in Vietnam is exactly where we should be, and we are continuing to prepare and pray about our trip. It is so close! Please keep us in your prayers as we prepare to take off on the 28 of June for DaNang.

More updates to come!

Blessings,
The Awake Team

Haircuts for South Africa

We are one step closer to being able to purchase tickets, thanks to everyone who came out to get a trim or cut by Kari and Laura Jane. We've been brainstorming creative ways to get the APU community involved in Awake's ministry, so the last two days we hung out on campus offering to cut hair for a small donation! Everyone who sat down with us left smiling, and we were glad to be able to provide some summer styles and trims for you all!

Also, Endofit.org made us a sweet video depicting the last two days. Check it out!

coming together.

First, thank you so much to everyone who has already contributed to our team! We have about half of the funds needed to make it to South Africa--airfare is our biggest financial hurdle, and we are getting to watch how God meets that need!

We are so excited to launch a series of fundraisers to help get us there--and we hope you will participate with us in any way that you can. In the next few weeks we will be fundraising on campus, from cutting hair to providing a fun photo booth to cleaning your apartment or dorm for a small fee. If you are in the area, please attend. Or please feel free to contact us with any news or ideas you have that would be helpful!

There is a bigger picture here and you are all involved in it--God is working in ways that none of us can even conceive and we are excited to be a part of that!

Dreams and Excitement

We, Kari Bixby, Nicole Dines, Rebekah Falkenstein, Laura Jane Kenny and Amanda Kretzmann, have a dream. A semester studying abroad in South Africa showed us a culture both beautiful and broken. Working in the townships there, we saw a lack of purpose and an overwhelming amount of stories with no audience.

Many of the people seemed to be trapped in their township, trapped inside their own homes without any hope for change. We talked to one man who was severely depressed due to being diagnosed with AIDS. He could no longer work because he was so weak and all he was left to day after day, hour after hour, was to sit and dwell upon his hopeless situation that he could do nothing about.

We see more than just the need for monetary support. We want to give that man a pen and paper and have him tell his neighbor, his country, his world his situation and his story.

That is why we are returning to South Africa in the summer of 2010.

We want to create a book full of art, poems, short stories, narratives and any other sort of self-expression that would not only inform the world of the South African situation, but would give a narrative and art therapy to those who contribute to its pages.

We will work with the people whom write for our book on a weekly basis and teach them how to express their stories and their feelings through these different facets. Our team plans to return to South Africa this coming summer to help compile these stories in hope of presenting them to a publisher to produce the collection we have gathered.

Our hope is that you will come along side us and assist us in anyway possible. Primarily, we just wanted to let you know about our dream and would love if you would be praying for us and keeping an eye out for any opportunities that you know of to help us. We are quite excited to see where God is going to take us and this dream.



Sincerely and with hope,

Kari Bixby, Nicole Dines, Rebekah Falkenstein, Laura Jane Kenny and Amanda Kretzmann