Day 5 Adventures

This morning we all woke up ready to go work. It was our last day working and we were going to volunteer at all three organizations. One group went to Bay Area Rescue Mission. While the other group went to Project Open Hand. A few days ago while working at Bay Area Rescue Mission wemet a huge African American man named Reggie. Anyone who spoke to him couldn't help but smile. He was at least six feet tall and insisted that we all sang worship songs with him because we seemed to be the only people around that would. He shined God's light more than anyone else I know. I think we will all miss him when we go back to Utah.

We left both organizations around 1:00 then went to the City Hall to meet up with the other group. While arriving at the capital we found that there was a huge gathering about proposition 8 on the city hall steps. It was a truly unique experience to observe the events, a pretty new thing for a group of students from Utah!?!?

We arrived at GLIDE at three thirty, where we served somewhere between 700-900 people. We were all pretty tired by then but still found ways to make each other laugh and keep busy. I think it was really a new experience for all of us. One that we will probably remember for a very long time.

After we were done God continued to poor out his blessings on us by giving us the tools to continue to bless the people in the area. We all had the opportunity to give a Mountain Dew to someone in need. It was truly a blessing to see there faces and reactions when they figured out that we were giving it to them. We all discovered that Gods blessings are everywhere today, from a man blowing bubbles, to people in McDonalds asking for change.

Posted by Whitney Hall (9th grade)

Day 4 Adventures

This morning provided some much needed time off for one group but was another work day for the other. The group that served at Project Open Hand yesterday got the morning off while the other half of us went to Bay Area Rescue Mission for our second day in a row. In the afternoon we all headed down town to experience Glide Memorial - A center dedicated to serving and helping the homeless. It is located in the heart of the tenderloin district (not the nicest area) and the amount of homeless people in that small area is astounding. Glide serves about 3,000 to 4,000 hot meals a DAY. They are the only organization in the U.S. that serves THREE hot meals a day, 365 days a year. Tonight we were involved in serving dinner and it was like nothing any of us have seen before. The line of people waiting to get their food seemed endless. We had an assembly line of dinner items going, people giving the trays out, and people filling water and coffee and clearing tables. After all that was over we made our way back to the vans and then back to the church where we are preparing for tomorrow which will be another double work day for all of us.

Day 3 Adventures

Today we worked with an organization called Project Open Hands; their goal is to feed people who are too sick or otherwise disabled to feed themselves-many of their clients (the people they serve) are people who struggle with AIDS and its related symptoms. Walking through the volunteers' entrance is like walking into the kitchen or delivery area of any restaurant with people scrambling to get everything ready for the lunch rush. Our group was put to work right away, some of us moved big crates of fresh vegetables and others stocked the refrigerator with necessities and frozen Indian dinners donated from Trader Joe's. In addition to serving people in their homes and from within the facility itself; Open Hands operates a free grocery store, out of the facility, for their clients. Necessarily, much of our time was spent stocking the shelves so the many clients could all get their food for the week.

Open Hands is an organization driven, almost entirely, by volunteers. It has a smaller, paid staff who cook all the food for the 1000+ meals served each day and who manage the confused teenagers which made up the temporary staff. It's easy to let the scope of their activities slip by you. Working in an environment of this kind can only be experienced in a unique culture like San Francisco's because of the multi-cultural, sardine-tight atmosphere; the volume alone of people served by Open Hands would be a difficult thing to find in Salt Lake City. It was a different experience from one of working at a soup kitchen or rescue mission, everyone there was ready with a job to do and the rushed feel was unlike anything I'd ever experienced in serving around town at home.

Our group was only able to serve for the first part of the day so we spent the rest of it playing around at the beach near the church. Being San Francisco, the water was too cold to be approached safely and the air temperature could be described as arctic. But everyone had a lot of fun and it provided a much needed break in the last two days hectic activity.

Day 2 Adventures

As we drove to Bay Area Rescue Mission this morning, we had mixed emotions. We were excited to be there but also anxious for what the morning was going to look like. As we walked in, people immediately opened their hand and their hearts to us. We helped in the kitchen to make delicious chicken, potatoes, and corn for local families. We met many memorable people that were so happy that we were giving our most valuable asset....our time.

We had people let us know how blessed they were to serve next to youth that loved Jesus. We were also able to help sort out notebooks for the school program that they host for broken families. Surprisingly, most of the paid staff that worked there were people that had gone through the program. One person told us that when people ask him "How he's doing" for the first time in years he can honestly look them in the eyes and say, "Never been better"......God is good.

After our day of serving and sharing our group headed downtown to visit Coit Tower and China Town! A great time was had by all and many fond memories have already been forged in our hearts and minds.

Day 1 Adventures

23 students and leaders from Good Shepherd and Mountain Vista arrived safe and sound in San Francisco late on Saturday night. The drive was uneventful but long and everyone was glad to settle in at Geneva Avenue United Methodist Church. Our host church has been incredibly gracious and we are very blessed to have such a great place to stay.

Our first full day in San Francisco began with a worship service at Geneva followed be an amazing lunch. This congregation is primarily of Philippine descent and they created quite a feast. The students were a bit taken aback when they walked into the lunch room and found a huge roasted pig on the counter, but the excitedly got in line for food. Some additional meal delights (or challenges) came when we discovered that the menu also consisted of quail eggs, ox tail, pig intestines, and a variety of unknown fish. It was a truly awesome experience to begin our mission experience.

After our feast we traveled out as a group to Bernal Hill (not sure on spelling, sorry) and reached an amazing overlook of the entire city. From there we began a full afternoon of prayer walking through the city. We walked a total of 10 miles before we were done and closed our night with some wonderful worship, discussion, and prayer.

We are looking forward to serving tomorrow at the Bay City Rescue Mission, visiting an AIDS Memorial Garden in Golden Gate Park and checking out China Town.