Playing and Packing

Today was a day to rest up from the work of the week. Most of us slept in to catch up from the week spent in Brooklyn. We spent quite a bit of time shopping today in Macy's and nearby stores. We also went shopping on Canal street and in Times Square.

Tonight a couple of our folks went to catch another Broadway show, we had dinner of leftovers at Metro Baptist or dinner out on the town. We also got to ride the bus to Secaucus, NJ to pick up the church vans. We are going to get an early start to try to beat the traffic (we imagine that we won't). We'll call parents when we get into Virginia and past the Washington DC metro area (somewhere around Dumfries, Va).

Thanks for all your prayers and for checking the blog site this week.

The team

Graham, Lulu, Terri, Carrie, William (aka Billy), Dave, Briana, Oriana, Casey, Emily, Grace, Jordan, Lindsey and Kenley

Coney Island and Balloon Peace Signs

The subway system for the most part is back to normal after a day that was best described as "Chaotic" by one of the dailies handed out to commuters. We arrived at GRBC around 9 am and played games with the kids until 10:00 AM when we left for Coney Island. We got to Coney Island with no problem. Some of the group ate at the original Nathan's hot dog shop and others ate at some other local restaurants











Our wristbands became active after 12:00 and we entered Astroland which is the home of the world famous Cyclone roller coaster. Most of us got a chance to ride the coaster if we wanted to do so. We also road the log flume, played carnival games and spent lots of time in the kiddie ride section. One word of advice, watch out for the bumper car ride. They are much faster than you have in VA.










Here is the post-Coney Island photo.








Here is a photo of the team after our final day at GRBC in front of the church. Most of team headed back to Manhattan while I stayed to make a few balloons for those who remained. It was around 5:00 o'clock.





Here is a photo of the peace sign balloon sculpture that Dave made for the camp before he left for today.







Tonight we had dinner in Little Italy at a place called Amici II. The food was really good. We then spent some time walking thorough Little Italy and visiting part of Chinatown. Tomorrow is a day of fun seeing the city. Check the site late in the day for photos and updates.

Photos from the last two days

Here is the park when the festival began setting up. It got much more crowded than this picture shows.







Craft time on Wednesday








The ceremonial first pitch at Shea stadium. The Braves won.








Thursday morning required a lot of time waiting in line. Here is William by a sculpture in the Port Authority bus terminal



More photos this afternoon!

Storms, tornadoes, and floods, Oh My!

If you had not heard some major thunderstorms and a potential tornado hit the NY metro area this morning. (see story on cnn.com). The storms came through midtown Manhattan about 5-6 am this morning (waking us up). We left the church around 7:45 to head towards Brooklyn where we were going to meet the girls for breakfast prior to heading to the church. The first subway entrance that we saw was closed. In fact due to flooding in the subway system almost every line was not running. We checked the news at the Port Authority and then started making phone calls. The girls had the same experience on their line.

We finally met up with the girls at their hotel and waited until around 10 AM when the subway seemed to be coming slowly back to life. Most lines were running on different sets of tracks than normal. Ourusual route is to go downtown on the D line and then transfer to the 3 line. Today we took the D uptown. We tried to get on the 1 but the cars were not moving and had very poor A/C. Finally we ended up taking the A line to Brooklyn. We met the kids from GRBC at the school around 12:30. So, what is normally a 30-40 minute commute turned into a 2 hour plus odyssey on the subway system.

In spite of all of the troubles, God has been with us today. Graham confessed to me this afternoon that about 10 AM he had thought to himself that we might not make it out to Brooklyn today. So he prayed and left it with God he came through

As a result of our delays we did not go to Coney Island today. We ate lunch with the kids, took them for some rec in the park's playground. After rec we worked on the peace poles craft, did some large group activities and had some ice cream. We will go to Coney Island tomorrow instead of today.

The ride home was not much better. We took the 4 line from Brooklyn to Grand Central station. The ride started out great, but when we hit Manhattan all trains changed from Express to Local service. The ride home was very crowded. As I was standing near the door I felt I was in the middle of one of those college stunts where you see how many people you can stuff into a VW Beetle.

Tonight we're going out to see a show on Broadway with dinner after. We're not going to ride the subway tonight!

And we thought rain could make a day tough...

Today brought better weather but new challenges. Since we are staying in two locations the guys and girls start on different subway lines in the morning. Graham, William and I got to Brooklyn a little early. We stopped at Bobby's diner on the corner of Kingston Ave and St John's Place. We discovered Bobby's on our last trip to NY. They have the best sweetened ice tea in Brooklyn.

We spent the morning in the park but it was a tough day. The local precinct was having a community day in the park. Imagine about 400 children, BBQ grills, a massive sound system, clowns, and about 10 inflatable play areas (think July 4th on steroids). Most of the park was unavailable for us for rec and it was a challenge keeping kids attention focused in the Bible Study and theme interpretation stations. It was also really hot. We persevered until the sound system began to take over the park. We were pretty much ready to go back to the church for crafts anyway. We made a lot of progress on the three quilts that the children were making.

Tonight we watch the Mets play the Braves. Tomorrow is a field trip to Coney Island. Photos later tonight if we don't collapse from exhaustion.

Photos of the day

Here are a few photos from today

This is a view of the playground at the park we are working in.






Casey and Emily on the way to the Staten Island Ferry. Don't let the red-eyes scare you, they are really very nice!!







Waiting for the Staten Island Ferry









It was too dark to get good pictures of the Statue of Liberty, so we provided a substitute.







We visited the WTC site this evening. It is now a very busy construction site. The goal is to have the memorial, subway station and the new Freedom tower completed by 2010






This is a team by the Bull on Wall St. Hopefully stocks will not crash due to our visit.

Rain, rain, go away

It rained in Brooklyn this morning so the team had to readjust our plans on our feet. We spent the day inside GRBC running the camp. The rain did break in time for lunch and we were able to go outside for some recreation in the afternoon.

This morning we arrived at GRBC before 9:00 and joined in with the children in playing games on the sidewalk. We had sidewalk chalk, jump rope (including double dutch) and some serious four-square games. The rain ran us inside for our morning break. We led the children in some songs and then we began our first rotation which was the bible story. We studied the Good Samaritan this morning.

After we had lunch at a nearby middle school we went to the park for some fun on the playground. This park will be our primary location if the weather is good. After rec we began our two craft projects for the week. We are making peace poles (we'll get a photo online) and peace quilts that are decorated and put together by the children. Craft time was fun and potentially very messy since we were using latex primer to paint the poles and fabric paint pens to decorate the quilt squares. We survived without too much mess.

After crafts the team split the children into two large groups, one group did a theme interpretation and story time while the other group participated in recreation. We used some of the games that the youth have learned on previous youth trips.

Tonight we will head out again for the Staten Island ferry (last night the trains were not running all the way to the South Ferry terminal) We'll have dinner out on the town and have some fun together as a group. We'll get some photos on later tonight.

Here are some photos from today

This is a photo of the team taken via a mirrored ceiling at one of the theaters on Broadway. We'll see the show Curtains here on Wednesday night. Mission work can be fun too!






Getting ready for worship at GRBC.

The camp theme for this summer is Peace Peeps. Notice that the "time out" corner in the far right is called the "Shalom Zone"





This is Pastor Ken Bogan during the service.








This is some of the team at dinner.

Worship, Lunch and Planning

The team traveled to GRBC this morning to attend worship. GRBC is a storefront church in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn. The church has moved around the corner since our previous trip in 2002 and is working towards raising funding towards purchasing their own facility.

Worship began around 11 AM when the worship band completed their setup. The band consisted of two electric guitars, bass, drums, various wind instruments, and vocalists. During setup I was moved when I saw the drummer anoint his drums with oil prior to the service. The bassist was the twelve year old son of one of the guitar players and was had very impressive technique.

After several praise songs, Pastor Bogan spoke on chapter 14 of Revelation. He spoke about how John was encouraging his readers to endure and perservere in the midst of persecution. We ended the service with communion. Following church we had a catered lunch with the church and camp staff where we learned about the history of the church and their mission in Crown Heights. After lunch we had a planning meeting with Taisha Rose, the camp director, and other staff to talk about this week's camp. We will have around 32 children ranging from kindergarden to 6th grade this week. Tomorrow is day 1 of camp.

After dinner tonight at Metro Baptist we will ride the Staten Island ferry to see the Stature of Liberty at night. Maybe we will have some photos later.

Dave

The team is here

After a day on the road the NYC mission team arrived around 5:00 PM in Manhattan. We found Metro Baptist and the hotel and everyone has a place to sleep for the night. We parked the vans in New Jersey enabling us to go through the Lincoln tunnel for the third time today. We did get to visit the Port Authority's bus terminal which has the feel of an airport.

We had dinner with Tabernacle group and made some new friends. We had some ice cream after dinner and walked through Times Square to get the girls back to the hotel. The guys are staying at Metro Baptist which is about a 10-15 min walk away.

Tomorrow, we will worship tomorrow with Greater Restoration Baptist Church and share a meal with them as we meet the church and program staff. We'll do some planning in the afternoon to make sure we are ready for Monday morning and then we'll set out to explore the city.

Tomorrow we should have some pictures to post.

Youth NYC Mission Team leaves tomorrow morning at 6:30 AM

The Youth Mission Team to New York City meets at the church tomorrow at 6:30. We will be working in partnership with Tabernacle Baptist of Richmond to run two day camps in the NYC area. Tabernacle will run a day camp hosted at Metro Baptist Church in Manhattan and WHBC will run a day camp at Greater Restoration Baptist Church in Brooklyn.

Come out, see us off and then go have breakfast!