New Year - New Initiatives

First of all I want to say a big thank you to you all for the multitude of Christmas Cards and Greetings that reached our new home in Tallinn. Christmas was very different for us this year. Unlike in the UK, Christmas does not really 'happen' until Christmas Eve. It is even difficult to get a Christmas tree until about 2-3 days before Christmas. So for this year, our decorations were the many Christmas Cards that we received. I think the Eesti Post went out of business on the 26th December! Christmas itself was very quiet. We originally thought that we would be just ourselves. However, on Christmas Eve when we went to the Corps for the Watchnight Service, we were aware that twin teenage girls who are soldiers at the Corps were very distressed. When we spoke to them, it became apparent that they Christmas for them was going to be very difficult. Their parents were in great debt with their rent and were being removed from their apartment just after Christmas. There was no money for food or presents for the girls. So after the Christmas morning service at the Corps, we took them home for a traditional 'English' Christmas Dinner. Christmas Dinner in Estonia comprises of 'Black Sausage' (Black Pudding) and Sauerkraut. So roast turkey, roast potatoes, brussel sprouts and all the trimmings were very unusual for them. But we had a lovely afternoon with them, gave them a little present and they helped us open our presents from the family. We had lots of fun and laughter and at night we took them 'home'. One week later, their parents had 'disappeared' when they were evicted and the girls went to live with their older sister and her boyfriend. They didn't know where their parents were for at least four weeks. Things are now getting sorted out for them and the family again.
It was my intention to publish this New Year letter in January, but unlike our experience at home when everything 'dies' after the New Year celebrations, I have never spent such a busy January in my life!
1st - 2nd January - Derek and I drove through the snow to Narva to spend the week-end with Capts. Daniel and Anya Henderson and to conduct the meetings on the Sunday. We took them out for a chinese meal on New Year's Night and then joined them for the meetings on Sunday. We were so impressed to see Daniel conduct the whole Sunday School in Russian. He relates so well with his people. One lady who sat at the back through all the Sunday programme was obviously uncomfortable as her head was swathed in scarves and she appeared to be suffering from excema. Then a tell-tale sores on her forehead gave us the clue. She was HIV+ and earlier had asked Daniel to re-bandage some of her wounds. Daniel and Anya are so involved and so committed that I told him my concern for their own health and well-being. They have five little children to care for and the youngest is only 3 months old. After Sunday School everyone had lunch which Anya had prepared at home and then the main meeting of the day was in the afternoon. It took the form of a Dedication Service for their children - not just the baby! None of their children born in Estonia have been dedicated, so Anya sent out invitations to some of the Mums that she had spend ante-natal time with and the little hall was so full that people were standing at the back and in the corridor. In the end, all the children were taken to the YP room after the dedication and had their own 'meeting' while we finished the adult meeting. It was a great day and a great start to the New Year celebrating New Life and dedicated faith.
3rd - 5th January we held a Winter Youth Camp at our camp at Loksa and it was attended by 28 young people and staff. This is an annual event, but this year it was the start of a training and discipleship programme for the young people who will take part in the Territorial Mission Teams for the Year of Children and Youth. It was like the old Territorial Corps Cadets Week-ends that we used to have many years ago. The youngsters were taught how to prepare and give their testimonies. This was done by helping them create a 'time line' of their lives with special colour codings for happy, difficult, learning times etc. There was also time for singing; dance; drama; and music expression and rehearsal. The event finished with a time of worship and the young people were given the opportunity to 'give' their testimonies. What should have been a 30 minute slot, turned into one and a half hours of intense and emotional sharing as some of these youngsters shared some of the most incredible stories of family life. I feel it was a real cathartic experience for many of them and it bonded them together in a new appreciatation of each other. This camp was the catalyst for monthly Mission Team training activities which will kick start the programme of visits of the team to various Corps/Centres and Camps in Finland and Estonia throughout the whole year.
10th - 14th This was the time we were looking forward to. Alan came over to spend a few days with us and it was just so good to see him. Although we were working every day (we took one day off) we tried to schedule some visits that would take us around as well as in the city. Helen also took a morning off to do the 'tourist trail' of Tallinn. It was freezing! but at this point we had no snow. Only wet and windy but we had good fun together. Derek met up with us in the afternoon for coffee!! We've already sussed out all the good coffee shops in Tallinn. I have to say that one thing they are much much better at here than in England is the coffee - it is sooooo good. Thursday was our only day off and on Wednesday when Derek met us for coffee, he told us that he had to rush back to the office to take an urgent phone call from a UK Officer that he had been in touch with. He told us that evening that we had to be at the airport in Thursday morning (our day off!) to meet this officer who was coming over to see our Hostel and HIV Programme Plans. I was devastated! It was our only day with Alan and it was his last day before he flew home on Friday morning. Typically, Alan was so gracious. "Don't worry Mum, I know you have your work to do". Well we all trooped up to the airport on Thursday morning for the arrival of the officer from the UK. As we stood their, the automatic doors opened and out walked Lorna Tyrrell. Well my jaw just dropped with disbelief and Alan just stood saying - "Oh, my word..... oh, my word". Well you can imagine the reaction of us all as both Derek and Lorna had hatched up this surprise with clandestine phone calls etc. My immediate reaction was - "Oh no! Lorna is on the same plane as this officer" my initial joy suddenly took a dive, until I realised that the officer story was a hoax. Lorna said that her Dad would go to 'the bad fire' for telling so many lies! But what an end to a wonderful time. We had a great day all together. And this will probably be the only time that this will happen for us as a family, as the children both have their partners and usually we are all together with the extended family - which is also a lot of fun. But this was quite a unique and uniquely happy time. Lorna stayed until Sunday.
26th - 28th This was another of our 'firsts' of the New Year. Courtesy of a gracious sponsor and by arrangement with Col Dan Starrett who is the Sec. for Enterprise Development at IHQ, we took all our officer families away for a retreat at a spa hotel/centre in Parnu. The kids had great fun in the huge aqua centre and parents had time to play with their children. Also the mums and dads had time for some treats like a massage or a sauna etc. Not having any children, Derek and I acted as child-minders for some of the smaller children to give the parents a little time together. For me the best part of that event was swimming in the outdoor pool in the dark evenings under the black sky and the snow was falling on our face as we swam. It was majic!
28th - 30th This was our week-end called 'Days before the Word'. It was a mini Bible Convention. Our Leaders were Cols. Dan and Helen Starrett and they shared some fantastic insights of the growth and development of the work of the Salvation Army around the world. This was linked to Bible teaching examining our own spiritual growth and development and the dangers of 'stunted growth'. The event began with a 'Youth Bible Bash with Bangers' at the Camp when the kids had hot dogs and some fun together in the snow which had now fallen very thickly across the whole region.
30th - 3rd February This was the big event of the year! And another 'first'. HIV/Aids is a very big problem in Estonia and it is growing at a frightening rate. The biggest difficulty is access to treatment, information, education and support programmes. In Tallinn it is relatively easy to access the treatment, but nowhere is their information and there is no education at all. Neither is there a public awareness programme. The stigma surrounding the disease is reminiscent of the 1980s in the UK. However, it is outside of Tallinn that the biggest problem exists, as none of the treatments or support programmes reach the other towns. The problem came to light with our work in Narva where Capts. Daniel and Anya Henderson became involved in offering practical and spiritual support to a few people who came to them 'under cover'. It was soon apparent that in this town with very high unemployment, wide spread alcohol and drug abuse and a huge breakdown in family life. Some of the testimonies that were shared at the Youth Camp mentioned in January were from young people who had suffered unbelievable experiences at the hands of their own parents. The existence of HIV/Aids has already resulted in Daniel and Anya taking care of HIV+ babies whose parents are both drug users; offering welfare and psychological and spiritual support to families and sufferers alike. The age group involved is in the 15 - 30yrs age group. Most of those who find out that they are HIV+ do so either in prison (men) or when the girls become pregnant. The stigma attached is so drastic, that if it became known in the community that someone in your family was infected then others in the family (usually the girls' parents) would lose their job. There is no treatment offered and no advise on healthy living or life style. In most situations, when a pregnant girl discovers her 'situation' it is never spoken of at all and rarely do her parents know anything about it.
Derek took the bull by the horns, and with the visit of Dr. Ian Campbell and members of the Internatational Health Facilitation Team from IHQ, he organised a 3 day conference using two venues - one in Narva and the other in Tallinn. In Narva, we included as part of the project small group visits by the team to three homes of HIV sufferers. Derek and I visited a 20yr. girl with a lovely baby daughter. The situation is that when she was discovered during pregnancy, she is offered antiretroviral drugs for the duration of the pregnancy and then a cesarean section to protect the baby. The baby is given special formulae as her baby milk, but the mother is simply discharged with no follow up, no treatment, and no further information or support. In our conversation, she only referred to her illness as 'her situation'. She lives with her partner (a 21yr. old man) who doesn't know if he is positive - and her grandmother. No-one else in her family knows anything. I asked her if she would be willing to meet up with others in the same situation as herself to exchange helpful experiences and offer support. She replied, "Is there anyone else like me"? She had no idea of the extent of the problem. Before we left she asked Derek to take her phone number and that we would come and see her again. We promised that we would. Our next visit to Narva is in March to enrol three young girls as Senior Soldiers at the Corps. The visit to Narva was followed by a very high level conference in Tallinn. Courtesy of the manager of the Radisson SAS hotel (one of Derek's fruitful contacts) and with full co-operation of the American Embassy who provided us with a guest list of the great and the good, we convened two meetings. The first in the morning was attended by Ambassadors and high ranking diplomats from the various Embassies in Tallinn. This was an information exchange and an awareness/networking exercise to inform the embassies of the situation and the risks involved to visitors from overseas. Especially we were concerned as we know the reputation that Tallinn is acquiring in the UK for Stag Week-ends and we recognise the risk of infection with unprotected sexual contact. Visitors to Estonia are totally unaware of the potential risks as their is absolutely no information or warnings/help-line numbers at all. The second meeting was targeted at politicians, government ministers, NGO's and donor possibilites. The IHQ team were fantastic and have started the ball rolling in a big way for us here. Their being here has given the Salvation Army a lot of credibility and raised our voice big time. One of government ministers from the Social Services came from Riga in Latvia. As you can imagine, there is now a lot of follow-up to do so watch this space!

Other News As far as regional matters go, we feel that we are standing on the brink of real growth. Next week we are travelling to the south of the country to the town of Voru where we are about to take on the running of a Christian Community and Welfare Centre working with children and families at risk. We have been negotiating with the Town Council Social Services and the local groups working there. Although we do not have an Officer to work there, we will employ a Christian Manager and adopt the whole programme as Salvation Army and the work will be oversighted by us and visited also by the Capt. Tim Clark the Officer at Tartu. Close to Voru is a little town of 300 inhabitants called Hellenurme. We discovered quite by chance that although there is no church in the town, that a small Christian congregation has been in existence for a number of years and that a local farmer (now retired through health) has been the 'pastor'. He and his family have run the scout group, the sunday school and led the church services for over 10 years but the crunch is that a group of Officers in Sweden have been financially supporting this church all over this time. So now Pastor Peeter Salo says to us, "Would the Salvation Army in Estonia like to take it over?" Would we just! So next week we travel down to meet up with him again and secure the arrangements and his involvement as a 'lay employee' to continue the work there under our supervision and with the official support of the Army. Following this visit we will continue our travels down in the south and cross the border in Latvia to visit the Regional Officer in Riga and to explore the possibilities of shared experiences and mission. With this great surge of development, we feel that it is now time to formalise the running and organisation of our Regional Offices and to structure a regular working pattern which will involve strategy development, personnel and funding requirements. Up until now there has been no set system and decisions have been made as different things arose. We feel it is time to put in working system that is proactive rather than reactive to new challenges as they arise. However, we will never stifle ourselves with beaurocracy which will limit our work and development. The freedom of pioneering work is that you can go where the Spirit leads you and we have found that that is always quite different to the areas where we would have intellectually planned.
From a personal perspective, Derek and I are still enjoying the challenge and experience of the work here. We are also hugely encouraged by the frequent contacts often from unexpected and varied sources as Junior Soldiers and small groups or individuals from various Corps. The promise and knowledge of prayer support is a huge encouragement helps us to feel the 'connection' with home and family. Fortunately we keep well and have no personal or health worries. My biggest problem is trying to find a good hairdresser - and that is not an earth-shattering problem. We miss being near our family of course. Especially as Lorna is in the throws of her wedding plans. This is the one sacrifice that we feel as it is every Mum's dream to be around her daughter at this important time. The other great news is that Pamela our daughter-in-law is expecting our first grandchild due in August. Our brothers and sisters - and 'the Aunties' - keep in touch and distance only emphasises how important and loved they all are. We also have a fantastic circle of friends - of whom you are one - and we love and appreciate you all.
I am so sorry that this is not just an epistle - but our office assistant thinks I am writing a book!
I am sure that the next newsletter will not be quite so long. I will try to write more frequently with less to report. But that can only happen if I have enough time between events.
We both send our love and will keep in touch via the blog!
God bless
Helen and Derek