Friday, August 12, 2016

Is your schedule more important than your relationships?

What I learned about relationships while living in the Philippines.
During school, I often feel the weight of time on my shoulders. I run from class to class, from activity to activity, desperately trying to get everything done before I collapse into bed at night. It seems like an awful way to live when it's verbalized, but every single day I seem to repeat the cycle. I also continuously watch many of my peers enter into the same rushed lifestyle.
While spending time in the Philippines, the biggest culture shock to me was the relaxed attitude of the Filipino people. I could handle sleeping on the floor, cooking over a fire, having a very small house and bathroom (bathroom and house being a very loose term), even hand washing clothes, but sitting and waiting was awful. We would schedule a Bible study and an hour later, sometimes longer, it would finally start. Nobody seemed to care about the time or doing things in a timely manner. Everyone seemed to be oblivious to the urgency of our schedule. The first week in the Philippines I almost pulled my hair out. Read more of Cassidy's story....
-Cassidy W, 2016 Advance Team, Philippines