Nearing The End

This last week has been crazy.  We had a wonderful time in Poland.  If you ever get a chance to visit Krakow, take it.  The people are friendly and courteous (something that is badly lacking here in Ukraine), the food is terrific, the sites are beautiful, and it is rich in history.

Unfortunately their history is, in large part, about the horrific treatment the Poles and the Jews received from the German army in WWII.  We spent an entire day visiting the death camps in Auschwitz.  Call me naive.... I honestly had no idea that mankind could be so cruel.  The German's killed 1,500,000 people in these camps in 5 years.  That's over 820 people a day, every day, for 5 years.  Most of them had done nothing wrong; they were just simply Jewish.  We also spent a day visiting a pharmacy that was in the heart of the Jewish Ghetto that the Nazi's established in Krakow, as well as a tour through Schindler's factory.  Fascinating, and sobering.  

Our trip back to Ukraine was a long one.  We started at 3:00 a.m., caught the hotel car to the airport at 4:00, and then sat in the airport for 3 1/2 hours because our flight was delayed.  After arriving, we caught a cab to go get our car, and then had an 8 hour drive to Kherson.  After 16 hours of travel we were "home".

Since we were unable to obtain our Visas in Poland, we've searched our hearts, and prayed for God's direction.  It has become increasingly difficult to accomplish much of anything here because of the resistance we face from the house parent (who also happens to be in charge of all of the houses).  He clearly resents the fact that we are here, and has tried to impede our influence on the Agape ministry.  We learned to deal with that weeks ago, and decided that as long as we could continue to love on the boys we would stay.  Unfortunately, he has now made it almost impossible to do even that.

So, we believe that our work here is nearly done.  We will leave the day after tomorrow for Kramatorsk, to visit the house that the Green children own.  We hope to meet with a builder there, and get a comprehensive bid to remodel the house for its future use as a transition home for orphans.  We will then drive to Berdyansk and spend a few days at Mel's and Ruth's houses.  We've been told by Alex that they are completely different than the Joshua house we now live in.  We certainly hope that's the case.

We will then drive back to Kherson where, after a day or two, we will catch a train ride to Kiev, and then find a flight home.  This should get us home by Easter Sunday, which we look forward to spending with our family and friends.

Sorry this is so short.  I'm not nearly as long-winded as my bride.  That being said, I'm sure Karen will post some good stories in the next day or two.

God Bless,
Bill