A LETTER FROM JACKIE PULLINGER

A Letter From Jackie Pullinger

I got this email today from my hero, Jackie Pullinger. She's our main keynote speaker for next year's NON-CON '08 (http://www.non-con.com) and the author of "Chasing the Dragon" from Regal Books. She's a missionary to street children and drug addicts and prostitutes in Hong Kong.

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Dear Keith,

Thank you for your email. Yes, I am still planning to join you next year. I will be in San Jose 14th - 17th September and Fesno 21st and 22nd September.

Here is some of our news.

I have a frequent dream. I mean it is really a dream. At least twice a month I dream of the Walled City. It is never quite like the Walled City was but similar, as the whole place looked like a parody of a film set. I always seem to be walking down yet more dark lanes and I'm always doing the same thing - looking for rooms or little apartments to rent. This is either for me to live in or for poor people to live in or some of our teams to live in to reach the poor or a place for people to meet in. My latest one was last night when I was in a very dark place and for the first time I was rather afraid it might be filled with cockroaches, but it was so dark, I wouldn't be able to see.

My fortieth anniversary and the musical dance production of Chasing the Dragon have stirred up many of these Walled City memories, so I did a count. Since I've been in Hong Kong I have personally lived in 29 different places and the last one is nearly 10 years so you can see how often I moved. We then did a count up of how many my friends and I have rented to help addicts get off drugs or rehabilitated families or send teams out in this country alone, we've counted up 159 and we may have forgotten a few.

The latest one is we need to move our factory. As you know we have up to 65 teenagers with us at any one time called 'GoGetters'. They are called non-engaged youth in Hong Kong. That means they have fallen out of the school system and no school will take them. They are considered delinquent, but have actually been neglected and certainly disparaged. They come to live with us and after a few days will all believe in Jesus and then they want to stay for a long time. When they have settled down, and have started to feel safe enough, we send them back to our own school programme, as the Hong Kong system has not helped them. Right now our lease is up and we cannot continue to rent that place, so we are looking for a new place, factory or warehouse. Pray that we'll find the one.

Tenders for the construction of the next phase of Shing Mun Springs should be going out in the next month or two. You know Government wheels move extremely slowly, but we desperately need more places for these teenagers to live in. We've got Probation Officers and Social Workers queuing up and as yet have not been able to take many girls.

Our India team set off last Thursday for Mumbai, where they'll start by learning Hindi and getting to know people and seeing what Jesus develops. Eventually we hope to have teams placed in the countries that go along the Opium Trail to China. On the China front we can't report any official news still, but unofficially there are some wonderful openings and stuff going on and lives being changed. So maybe we'll never be officially within the system but we are still hoping and praying.


This comes with much love

Jackie
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