Summer Mission Trip Ft.Worth: World Relief

Stand/ for the vulnerable 
Coming in to this mission I didn't know what to expect. I had no idea what I would be doing here, but I did know I'd be working with an organization called World Relief. I now know that I am one of 3 summer interns working at World Relief here in Ft. Worth. This past week, we interns had multiple orientations or debriefings about the company and its departments. After the morning meetings we would hang around and see what and who needed help. We have done a little bit of everything so far. From taking an African family of 8 to the TB clinic for about 4 hours(turned out to be a long day) to apartment set-up and airport pick-ups for new families.
 Our first week went a little like this:

 

Monday, May 21st

9AM Wes Toland- Office walkthrough, volunteer orientation, cultural training. He gave us an overview of the company in general and what World Relief does exactly. He also talked a lot about the cultural profiles of clients they receive. Mostly talked about why they are refugees and how they get here. 

10:30 Micah Berry,our roommates Sara and Liz, Jonathon, Jason, and Khai. - Reception and Placement (R&P) They each spoke a bit on what goes on in R&P. They are the first people in the office to deal with the refugees before they even get to America and for the first 30 days. They "receive" information about a family or person coming. Usually if they have U.S. ties whether family or not they try to house them close to their ties. If not then they just get them an available and appropriate apartment, one of the caseworkers do that (which would be Jason, Jonathon, or Khai.) Then Sara or sometimes someone else goes to do a Wal-Mart and Fiesta run to get them the essentials for apartment living and food for at least a week. After that is apartment set-up before the refugee(s) get there, then someone picks them up from the airport. The refugees then go through detailed orientations to show them basic ways of living here in America. R&P also helps them apply for social security. 

12-1 Lunch

After lunch- shadowing (We set up an apartment and picked up a family later that night) 

Tuesday, May 22nd

9AM Becky Sayavongsa-Refugee Cash Assistance (RCA) It is a state funded program that is a cash only assistance. It is an 8 month long program that has a set amount of money for the family depending on how many are in the family. After the first 4 months the money is cut in half. Also, there is no caseworker to help them and the refugees have to pay all their bills on their own with that money. Honestly, this program is not good for families, especially with little kids.   

10AM Courtney Bryant- Employment. Works with RCA to help clients find jobs.

After Lunch- Set up another apartment.

Wednesday, May 23rd

9AM Andrea Frick- Match Grant. This program can be chosen instead of RCA, which would be the better choice for families and/or people who would have more difficulty finding a job right away. Match Grant lasts for 6 months. Match Grant pays for rent and utilities along with giving them cash assistance for the first 4 months. After 4 months the cash assistance stops and if the client still hasn't obtained a job then Match will continue to pay bills for the rest of the 6 month period. A caseworker works with the client to assist them in anything they need help with, like setting-up and taking them to appointments and any other important things to live efficiently in America. It is called "Match Grant" because it is a federally funded program that takes any money raised for the Match Grant program and the federal government matches that amount. The funds are raised through gift in kind, which can be donations or help/services from volunteers that will be converted into cash value. 

10AM Gina Godfrey- Preferred Communities. Communities that help the mentally challenged refugees come to terms with living in a new country. People suffering the effects of culture shock, PTSD, or anything else that causes them to be mentally unstable. 

Rest of the day- Helping/ shadowing people. Another apartment set-up.

Thursday, May 24

9AM Bethany Toland- Human Trafficking. Learned how they handle these types of clients and what to look for. 

9:30AM Evangeline Baker- Case Management, Elderly

10AM Wes Toland- Church Engagement. Getting the local churches involved. Not just to help, but to form relationships that will last long term. 

Around 2ish- Airport pick-up for a woman from Ethiopia that we reunited with her husband. They had been apart for a year and 8 months. It was such a sweet reuniting and they talked and laughed the whole way home. 

Friday, May 25th

Made cookies for the whole office and surprised everyone with them and thanked everyone for a great first week for us.

 

After all this meeting, Laura and I had to pick between R&P and Match Grant to intern with for the rest of the summer. It was a hard decision, but I finally had to make a final decision and pick Match Grant so Laura will be with R&P (this was on Sunday that we picked). At the end of this week I will talk about my first week with Match Grant and some of the things I did.

Until next time!~

~Meliah

 

Summer Mission Trip Ft. Worth: Diving Right In

Settle in and take time to figure out how this mission trip will go or how we will meet people? Not us. As soon as Laura and I arrived at Ladera Palms Apartments right after Go Now Orientation we were met in the parking spaces by Sara, one of our other roommates that works a World Relief, and an 8 year old Nepali girl named Asmita and her 9 year old brother, Niraj. Asmita and Niraj helped us carry in our luggage to the apartment, and then it was play time. We learned very quickly that these kids are blunt and not afraid to ask for something. Laura had a box of stationary that she had left in her car and the kids went with her to retrieve it. Using her cards and envelopes they wrote drew pictures and wrote notes to Laura’s and my moms.

Niraj

Laura, Asmita, Niraj

 Asmita notice my nails painted and wanted me to paint hers too. I painted her nails and she kept asking me to add nail art stickers and jewels, but I did not have much and didn’t want to run out. I finally had to put my polishes away. They did not take long at all to open up to us and immediately starting making us play made-up games with them.  For a while it was just these two that stayed in our living room, then a little four year old boy named Samir came for a bit. Not too long later Asmita and Niraj’s cousin, Samikchhya a 7 year old girl, came to play too.  Samikchhya wanted me to do her nails too of course.

Asmita's nails

Samikchhya's nails

                                                                                                                                    

These kids have so much energy. They run around and wrestle and are just so rough with each other.

Also, I have already had some talking about Jesus. Supposedly Niraj believes in Jesus, but the two younger girls don’t. The little girls even said that their god is a cow and that Asmita accidently ate cow when ate school and didn’t know.  On Sunday we met some older kids. Three girls in eighth grade, one of them being Samikchhya’s older sister started fighting for our attention. I also did these girls’ nails. (But I didn’t get a picture.) The older girls all tell me that they love Jesus and wanted to know if I love Jesus too. This made me really happy to hear. I love that people have already been working this hard to bring these girls to Christ. Hopefully, they will have influence on their families and friends that may still be rejecting the Gospel.

These kids have been here close to three years, so their English speaking is fairly well. There are some words and phrases that they don’t get right yet, but that is understandable. I haven’t really been able to talk with the adults yet, but I think the kids have better English skills anyway.  They also seem to come at the most inconvenient times. We finally have started making them wait outside until we have finished eating or tell them to come back later because we are busy. I am so glad that they want to be around us, but we can’t spend all our time with them.

Anyway, that’s all I really have for now. In my next update I will talk more about the apartment and our first week at work with World Relief.

Until then, GOD BLESS!!! :D

Meliah