When I was little I remember my dad saying, “Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not break.” If ever that applied, it was this last Wednesday.

Last Wednesday I coordinated a visit of the student council of one of the international schools here in Jakarta to come and visit the kindergarten we run in one of the trash dump communities. They were going to come and visit with each of the two kindergarten classes. During the visit they would do an activity together and have snack time. The purpose of the visit was to begin to form a partnership between the two schools.

Well, I’m beginning to learn that here in Indonesia, like the rest of the world, things don’t always go exactly like you planned. The driver who was supposed to bring the international school students canceled last minute, so they had to find someone else to drive the little bus. The person they did find ended up getting incredibly lost and arrived two hours later than planned. By then the first class had already gone home and the second class was about to leave.

By this point I was in salvage mode. Thankfully the second kindergarten class had not quite left yet, so we were able to get them to perform “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” and stay just a little longer for snack time. After that we had just enough time to take the international school students up part of the trash mountain to give them some context about how these children live.

Though the visit did not turn out the way I had planned and envisioned for it to go, it was a success. The international school students (and myself) were able to see how life really works…things don’t always go as planned, but not going according to plan does not mean they don’t work. And because we rolled with the punches, so to speak, they were still able to meet and talk with the kids–which had been the whole purpose of the trip to start with.

So, I guess what I’m saying is that my dad was right, blessed are the flexible, because they shall not break.