Smudge on the ledge, not eating the babushka's offeringI am writing this in the second week of April. It is finally spring. No flowers or leaves on the trees yet, but last week’s warm temperatures quickly melted most of the snow. The man who takes care of the parking lot below me is chopping the snow into manageable blocks and spreading them through the parking lot so they will melt faster. Even though it is spring, I want to post this particularly snowy story which I wrote on February 25, shortly after I returned to Russia.

There is a little wild cat who lives under a building in my courtyard. She’s beautiful and unusually friendly for a wild cat. I’m sure she has lots of Russian names, but I call her Smudge because it looks like she dragged her tail along the underbelly of a car.

There was lots of snow when I returned in February, and I first saw her on the ledge where people feed her to keep her safe from a pack of wild dogs living in the next courtyard. She ran to me. Of course I was thrilled to see her and was crooning away, “How’s my little girl? I haven’t seen you in so long! How’s my sweetie?”

It was then that I noticed a babushka at the beginning of a snowy path near the police station. “What?” she asked sharply.

I looked up, startled. “Oh sorry!” trying to choose my next words in a way that wouldn’t make me sound absolutely crazy, “I was talking to the cat.”

“The cat.” she stated matter of factly. “Do you feed the cat?”

“No. But I love her.”

“If you loved her, you would feed her. I feed her.”

“It’s because I love her that I don’t feed her. I’m gone a lot, and I don’t want her to depend on me for food. Anyway, dozens of people feed her. I keep her company and pat her.”

“Oh. Yes, I see you love animals. People who love animals are good people. I’m watching her to make sure she eats safely. She’s very hungry.” she said. I cannot imagine that cat could ever be hungry with the number of people who feed her all day long.

“I will watch her for you.” I said. She nodded and went her way. Smudge jumped to the ground.

“No! You get back up there! Eat!” I said. She wound her way around my feet. “Get up here! Eat!” I scolded her. I had visions of the babushka coming back and yelling at me because Smudge didn’t eat all her food. Babushkas can be fierce and have no qualms about telling you exactly what they think! I called her with kissy noises (British cat-calling noises, which is the way I call her), then kss kss noises (Russian cat calling noises) – she jumped on the ledge, but just wanted my attention. “Kooshai! Kooshai!” I commanded her. (“Eat! Eat!” in Russian.) I am sure Smudge understood (she’s bilingual). Nope. She would have nothing to do with it. Everyone who visits Smudge has their own agenda. Mine isn’t food, mine is patting and playing. When she’s with me, she wants pats, not food.

She jumped back down and walked away from the wall. I knew where she was going. She always leads me to “our fountain”. I sit in a certain spot on the fountain, I give her a fuss and we play. The problem was the fountain was under about four feet of snow, and we couldn’t even get into the courtyard.

Smudge trying to take me to the fountainThis is what the fountain looked like that day (the fountain is the round “hat” thing sticking out of the snow) – the banks of snow were about seven feet high.That was indeed what she was doing – she walked right to what was the footpath leading to the fountain. She looked up at the mountain of snow. For a moment I thought she was going to jump onto it. I caught a picture of her a split second after she decided the snow was too deep, then she led me back to her little wall and I made a fuss of her there.

I am always so happy to see her. One of my favourite things about her is she still loves to play as much as she did when she was a kitten. She attacked the string on my camera, stuck her nose in my bag of groceries, sharpened her claws on my pants and tried to climb my leg. We had a lovely time!

These are some of my favourite pictures of Smudge:

As I was in the garden one day, weed-proofing pathways through the plants, one of the girls came to help me for awhile. We had a nice little conversation and I thanked God for it when we prayed after our talk.

The sun was low, and the light was beautiful. She said, “Neekola, you don’t have a Mama, do you?”

“No, I don’t.”

“You don’t have a Papa either, do you?”

“No.”

She was silent for a minute, then said, “I don’t either ... not a Mama nor a Papa. Do you have a babushka?”

“No.”

“Neither do I,” she said, “but I have an Aunt and an Uncle.”

“Oh, that’s good!” I said, hoping her Aunt and Uncle were good people. “It’s a blessing to have at least some family.” She smiled.

“Do you ever get sad when you think about your Mama?” I asked. She nodded, and I said, “I do too. Today when we drove back from shopping I cried a little bit because I missed my Mama.” She smiled again. I could see she liked that.

“That’s a special thing about God,” I told her. “People can’t always be with us, but He is always there for us and we can tell him how we feel about things.” She smiled. That night when we prayed there was a new level of closeness between us.

We were covering this tarp with soil to weed-proof the garden paths

Masha (L) prayed and my fever left

I love praying with the little girls at bedtime. One of the very little ones has a pretty strong will. The first night she waited and waited as I finished drinking tea for me to come and pray with her ... then when I tucked her in, she didn't want to pray. The next night, after tucking her in, I prayed with a girl in the next room. When I finished, there she stood in the doorway, all smiles. “Meekola!” she said, “Pray with me” (she insists my name is Meekola), and after that we prayed each night.

It is quite sobering to hear their prayers: “Lord, please help my Mama and Papa to stop drinking and smoking and arguing and beating (this is almost everyone’s prayer) ... Lord, please help my Mama and Papa stop drinking and come to know you so we can go back to them ... Lord, please keep this home safe so no bandits will break in (a possibility now with the upheaval in Kyrgyzstan) ... Lord, please keep the rabbits safe so nothing will break in and hurt them ... “ The first time I prayed with one of the girls, she prayed, “Lord, thank you for bringing Nicola here and protecting her along the way.” THAT brought tears to my eyes!

One of the older girls has chores to do each night, but she made it a point to stop and come to the girls’ bedroom for prayer, and then went back to finish her chores.

One night I was very ill ... hot and cold, hot and cold. My head felt like it was going to explode and I couldn’t think. As I was going to bed early, I met Masha in the hall. “Come pray with us, Neekola,” she said as she took my hand.

“Oh, Masha! I can’t. I feel so bad, but do you know what I would love? Would you please pray for me?” She was thrilled to be asked. I sat in a Volkswagen van seat and she prayed a beautiful prayer. The moment she began praying, my fever broke, and the next day I felt better! At dinner the next night I announced to everyone that Masha had prayed for me and my fever broke. She squirmed in her seat trying not to look too pleased with herself.

One night the girls asked me to read a story to them before bed. I said, “I’m sorry. I can’t read well enough to read that story.” From that moment on, every night almost all the girls' prayers went something like, “Lord, thank you for helping Nicola learn Russian more so she can speak better, and thank you that she already speaks it really well. Thank you that Mama will stop drinking, etc.”

One night I was about to leave their room when I heard my name, "Meekola! Meekola!"

“You’re supposed to be sleeping!” I said.

“I want to pray!” So I went back to her bed and she prayed, “Thank you, Lord, for this beautiful sunny day, thank you that my mamma will stop drinking and beating, and thank you that nobody will break in and rob us, that we will be safe, and the animals will be safe ..." Again my eyes filled with tears that this tiny girl would have to pray a prayer like that. It must break God’s heart.

One night at the orphanage in Kyrgyzstan I laughed aloud as I washed my blue jeans in the girls’ bathroom sink. Eight years ago when God called me to come to Russia, my #1 concern was that I might have to learn to wash them by hand. I saw myself in a bathtub full of sudsy water jumping up and down on my jeans to get them clean ... and here I was with my only pair, needing them tomorrow, calmly washing and wringing them out in the bathroom sink. No big deal.

Eight years ago the simple act of washing an article of clothing was almost the "straw that broke the camel’s back" for me. Making Mt. Everest out of a crumb, I could have missed seven years of God’s blessing in my life ... touching the lives of the wonderful people I am privileged to call my friends simply due to a silly fear because I had never handwashed anything larger than a shirt.

Standing at the sink, I thought about coming to Kyrgyzstan with the Bible school in 2005. Just days before we arrived they had a citizen uprising, deposed the president, and looted and burned the capital city. To be honest, it was the first potentially dangerous situation I’d ever walked into. Our director and her assistant were much more gung-ho than I, but after lots of prayer I finally had a quasi-peace. Despite my trepidation, it was a wonderful trip, and a step in learning to trust God through His peace.

This year, two weeks before I left for Krygyzstan, the citizens again rebelled, unseated the president, and looted and burned the capital city (do you see a pattern here?). They raided neighbourhoods of non-Kyrgyz people, killing them and looting their homes. Then the Mafia started its own war, shooting and killing people in the market all night.

My Russian friends called, emailed, and texted me saying, "Don’t go! It’s war there." They drug me to the TV to watch people being shot, trampled, and dying. The decision was more serious than washing a pair of jeans by hand - but meantime I had learned to let the peace of God rule in my heart (Colossians 3:15). If there is something I believe God wants me to do and others disagree, I listen to them because they love me and want the best for me. Then I go to God and if He gives me peace about it, I do it.

However, if I plan to do something and suddenly lose my peace, even with no good explanation I don't do it. That happened when I was planning to go with students on a trip to Africa. I lost my peace and canceled with no reason other than that (which sounds pretty feeble if people are depending on you). The day after I was to buy my ticket, my Mum fell ill and needed me.

After watching the news clips my friends showed me, I must say I was concerned, but when I went home to spend time with God, a peace that I couldn’t understand came over me and I knew I should go. It was a wonderful trip. Since my Russian is better, my relationship with the children grew immensely. Before going to the orphanage, I always stay a few days in Bishkek to prepare and buy things for them. I stayed with a friend whose brother-in-law was shot in the hip by a sniper on the first day of the uprising in Kyrgyzstan. This type of bullet apparently spirals in order to do the most damage. He had six operations, almost died, and now one month later is home and walking. By not giving in to fear I was able to be there as a part of the rejoicing at his recovery. When I left, my friends said, "Nicola, come and stay with us any time you want. You brought peace into our home and family."

My prayer for you and myself is that we not to be enslaved by fear for one moment, but be led by the peace of God, sensitive to His voice, and enjoy the journey!

Some of the girls from the family home were recently in two plays put on by the orphanage drama department.  The first was  “Snyegurichka”.  Since I know several versions of the story and my conversational Russian is pretty good I thought it would be simple to understand.   Here’s the gist:  a grandma and grandpa lived in the woods and didn’t have any children.  They were lonely and made a beautiful snow maiden who came to life.  They called her “Snyegurichka”.  She didn’t know what love was, then one day she fell in love.  The warmth of the love caused her to melt.  My Russian and Snegurichka knowledge didn’t help at all.  I was totally clueless almost the whole play.  Our girls were good, though!

Afterwards I asked the actors what it was about and they consoled me,  “Don’t worry Nicola, we didn’t understand it either.”

The second play was “The Little Prince”.  Zina and Luda were in it.  Zina was the Prince.  It was fantastic – much better than I dreamed it would be.  (I understood it too!)  Zina is quite the actress, and the props, although simple, were amazingly effective.  For example, each child wearing a glove on one hand became a very convincing snake, and small fabric bracelets added to their base costume made a believable tree and row of rosebushes.  Here is a photo.

 Zina (front) as the Little Prince