a Moment for Tea: A Long Story But A Good Story

**Repost from my Facebook**

Hi everyone,

So this photo album is like the big reveal of my story about my classroom this school-year. I’ve been holding off from telling this because, as my friend mentioned, I wanted to do the story some justice and to include photos with it. I’m so excited to finally share with y’all! So, here goes!

At the end of last school-year, my principal told me that he was going to move me from my classroom. I honestly was ok with it except that I felt some attachment to my former room. I’m a VERY sentimental person, you see? Anyway, once the idea sank in, I thought that the move was really for the better. The new room was much larger and the air-con was working much better than at my previous room. Believe me, with the recent fickle and HOT weather, air-con is a necessity that you’d really consider as a teacher.

When I was moving my things last month, I found out that the air-con in the new room froze over and broke. With its last, shuddering breath, it decided to spill its insides and create a puddle in my room. My friends who were helping me move my stuff, teased me that I would be giving swimming lessons in that room and how they were hoping that there weren’t any tadpoles in that pool. I could only give them a face like this: (-_______-) (kind of looks like a frog, yah?) I tried to be positive though, saying, “It’s gonna be ok! They’ll clean it up.” But deep inside, I felt pretty embarrassed because one of them is a teacher at a new school, so I was imagining their beautiful and pristine classrooms as I was blushing at my super old, puddle-in-the-middle-of-the-room classroom.

So, I decided to wait for a couple of weeks before I come in to clean and decorate my room, because I’d figured (and this is solely my opinion) that the school would take a while to clean up the puddle and to install a new a/c.

By the time I came back, the puddle had been mopped up and I’m happy to say that there weren’t any frogs that grew in the room so there goes the tadpole theory. But the air-con remained broken, so another type of organism was growing prolifically in that dark, warm, and moist environment. Molds! And plenty of them.

But you know, I’m Filipina, so I was not too frazzled by the molds and cleaned them out. I ended up throwing away a lot of old books and papers infested by them. Then I began decorating although the room was warm. My SWEET mother and father even helped me out and we painted the walls a lovely shade of mint green and yellow

That’s when more problems happened. You see, one should never paint wet walls. It really doesn’t make sense. I look back and wonder why in the world I had my parents paint my classroom walls when they were wet. I’ll tell you the method behind my madness. I thought that the walls would eventually dry. With a little bit of wiping, everything should be ok. I was wrong. Everything was not ok. Later on that day, when we watched with horror the paint drip off from the walls and make yellow and green puddles on the floor (puddles haunt me), I remembered my science lessons:

The warmth of my no air-con classroom mixed with the coldness of the adjacent classrooms created precipitation on the walls- hence making them very wet. The only solution was to regulate the temperature in my room to make it as cold as the other rooms. And that would need an a/c.

Of course, I told the principal about the situation. Of course, I bothered the head secretary to call downtown to do something about it. Then he told me that the maintenance crew came in to check my air-con. “And?” I asked. “They said that your air-con is broken. It cannot be fixed. It needs to be replaced.” As clueless as I am with much of this world, I figured that getting a new air-con would be a longer process than getting it fixed. The following day I asked him if they were coming in to replace it, the head secretary said, “They came in to check it again.” Hmmm… didn’t they already do that yesterday? I was really hoping they would pause from checking and actually do some replacing. I was really hoping that this situation would be resolved before the school-year started. It was definitely crunch-time. I had one week left.

When I came in to continue working on my room the following day, I started to feel so sad about the ugliness of my room and the situation. It was no one’s fault, really. I would not blame anyone because things like these took time and money- the system is not a genie in a lamp- I understood that. But I still cried. Why? Because it’s one of my hobbies, that’s why.

Throughout this entire situation, I was praying to the Lord to help me, with the things that I could not control and especially with my attitude and responses toward people. After my cry fest, I said to God, “It seems like the hands of the people in charge at my school are tied until the headship of the system gives them the means to help me. Abba, what should I do?” Then an idea came to me.

I wasn’t sure if it would work but it wouldn’t hurt to try. I brought the issue directly to the one in charge. And to my surprise, the person responded. I really wasn't expecting anything but I am proven wrong again

Within three days, a new air-con was installed in my room. The puddles on the floor dried up as the walls did also. Last Saturday, my family came again to help me repaint and give the room its final touches. I have such an awesome family! And even today, maintenance people are going to my room to paint the ceilings.

I can surely attest that my God is good. Yes, I give credit to the leadership at my school and the system for the support that they have given. But I know that none of these would have happened in that short amount of time without God involving Himself in my life. Therefore, I will not call this a random coincidence. Anyway, if it is then, I am reminded of a certain quote that says, in a sense, “It’s amazing how many coincidences happen when we pray.”

Would I call it a miracle? I would like to say so because I’m a happy person like that but I’d like to be mindful of those who consider miracles to be something loftier and less common (wink* wink* Philip Yancey). Therefore, I would call it- and although it may seem like a trivial thing to do for such a grand person- God, the Creator of the universe, allowing Himself to be a Papa to me- to us.

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. “ Romans 8:28