Here at Shevet, we receive a work schedule to show each one’s serving assignments every day. Today’s biggest assignment of mine was going grocery. When I saw it, I did not think much of it, but after all it was an exhausting task.

First you take inventory of what we have in the pantries (we have two big houses, one for staff, the other for families of sick children). It does not go as easy as working on your own pantry home, with products labels all written in Hebrew and other unfamiliar/exotic food items. We also have to collect dinner recipes for the coming three days from dinner teams. We then come up with the long list of grocery, and then finally are ready to go to the grocery store. I went with Doro today, and she showed around the grocery store, where find items can be found, how to compare products and shop wisely. A friendly Israeli worker said something to me in Hebrew, I told him “Sorry, I don’t understand Hebrew.” He then said, “Oh English? Hello, hello!” Maybe he has never met an English-speaking Asian around here. First, I felt really out of place, but after a while, I was so much into finding items, my self-awareness disappeared.

We did two large basketsful of grocery, and total was close to 1,000 shekels ($300). We then come home, carry them in and put them in each place in the pantry. It was physically and mentally exhausting! Doro said lightly, “You will get used to it quickly,” To me, Doro (a young lady from Germany) who drives with such a confidence in Ashdod (oftentimes you need to be pretty aggressive driving here), and freely navigate through the local grocery store looks like a real hero, but she told me when she started with Shevet 4 month ago, she was very shy, did not speak a word of English (unbelievable now) and was very indecisive and unconfident! What a transformation God does!