Thai, Parks and Cemeteries


Newtown round 2.
With the same people + some new people.
We spent the day having $6 (delicious) Thai
and wondering around streets, parks and cemeteries,
just enjoying each other's company.

Letters From Kids at Yarrabah


To Josh.
I hope You have a safe trip on the Bus.
You are like a brother to me,
and God Bless you when you are on the Bus.
From Japheth, Treston

(8, 9)


Dear: Josh
you is a happy boy
I will remember you
I hope you love it in Yarrabah
I know you don't wanna leave
I will keep you in my hart
Just like Michelle you this best!!!
From Ada

(15)



Green Island



After five days of being in Yarrabah we had a day to wind-down before coming back to Sydney.
During this day we took a rivercat to Green Island on the Great Barrier Reef.
The weather was a mix between sunny and overcast,
and the water was a mix between cold and freezing.
It was what we all needed before we came back to normality after a remarkable week.














Kids of Yarrabah


The kids in Yarrabah have such pure hearts.
It doesn't matter what you look like or who you are, they will love you no matter what.

When I was there I gave the kids some disposable cameras to share around,
this is Yarrabah through their eyes.





See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are!















Yarrabah



29/6/11 --> 6/7/11

This week was easily the best, most profound and impacting week of my life.
Each year my school gives the option for year 10 and year 11 students to spend a week in Yarrabah Aboriginal Community, 37km south of Cairns.
I really had no idea what to expect,
but that was probably a good thing.

Over the past six years my school has had a special bond with this community and each year around 40 students and teachers get the opportunity to visit, build friendships and share God's love. We come in their to try and make an impact, yet by the end of the week we seem to be the most impacted.

Yarrabah Aboriginal Community was original a 'mission settlement' established in 1893, where Indigenous Australians were segregated from a white Australia and forced to adapt to Western culture and customs. Not only was their history, culture and language wiped, but so was life as they knew it. A horrific, horrific act of prejudice. This type of prejudice continued and intensified up until the late 1960s. While today Indigenous Australians have the same rights as non-Indigenous Australians, there's understandably still a lot of hurt and brokenness.

Yet at the heart of this community, is just that: community.
Everybody looks out for everybody else, every person knows every other person's name.
Love and laughter is never scarce and I experienced  more of it here than I have anywhere else.
Sharing is just what you do, no one question about it. People share everything from food, clothes, phones and even houses.
The children made me a bracelets, gave me their toys and beautiful beach shells which they had found. On the last day one of the parents gave me one of their t-shirts and asked if I could be in their family photos.

I have never before seen this amount of love and generosity.




We stayed in Cairns and drove to Yarrabah everyday, which was about an hour's trip of driving past sugar cane farms.


We stopped off here for lunch. It was usually raining at lunchtime, but amazingly it never once rained when we were in Yarrabah doing Kids Games program.




Our first glimpse of Yarrabah.


Playing in the mud.



About 150 metres out on the mudflats was a magnificent shipwreck. Some of the kids went out to climb it.


Treston




Writing our names in the sand.



Japheth & Treston



Rodina & Japheth



There is neither Jew nor Green, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.



Japheth made the bracelet on my wrist.



Our flight was cancelled, which means we got to stay in Cairns for an extra night... I wasn't complaining.




The sunset that night was magnificent.



Seeing Yarrabah for the final time in a while... I'll definitely be back though!
People might say a week can't change much. 
It can change everything; God is working miracles here.

Yarrabah is home.