Ucluelet Reserve Visit

Suddenly I have gotten a holiday, suddenly I was on my first ever mission trip, suddenly I was living in a Native Reserve for the first time, suddenly I found out there would be no shower for the next 3 nights, suddenly I was sleeping on hard floor in the community hall with no bed for the next 3 nights, suddenly my cold or flu that I was having for the last 2 weeks were gone, suddenly I was the only 2 persons in the team who spoke fluent English, suddenly I was evangelizing!

It was a tough and hard core trip, but when everybody was working just as hard, it just made it much more easier to bare. We had so much laughters, we experienced so much together, we experienced victories, and we also met persecutions. Sometimes I feel, if we have to chase down to black and white, who is right and who is wrong, who deserve more care or not, ultimately our conclusion would be no one deserves our love, including ourselves. So at the end, we just have to love, no matter who that person is, how thankful that person is. I feel there are things I didn't do as well as I could. When I was tired, I lost focus and I shied away from approaching strangers, and wasted some opportunities. But it was my first time, and I just have to do better next time.

My feeling for this trip is mixed, full of contradictions, and questions. I don't know how to describe it now, there are so much things I have yet to learn. All I can say now is people there are living a very different lives than all of us. Ucluelet is a tourist town, and its not a bad town at all. But if you travel 5 or 10 minutes pass the main town area, there is a back road, with no street light, and almost no sign at all, is the entrance to the Ucluelet reserve. After 10 more minutes drive through this back road, a residential area with no pave road appears. It seems like a hide away, forgotten little old town. Not all the houses there are old and broken, but just the feeling is so deserted. I then found out that the people and resources in reserves are governed in very different ways than other places in Canada. Together with their history and culture, not only they are living a very different lives, but their thinking is very different. As I said there are still a lot of things I have yet to learn. I just hope more Godly love will come to these places, and will make things right.