We had nothing to eat, and I had to go into the village and knock on people’s doors and ask for bread. Some children threw stones at me when they saw me coming and shouted, ‘Beggar, beggar, don’t play with him’. The rejection made me feel so alone.
When I was 10 I was at a boarding school throughout the week, but I was often bullied because I still couldn’t read or write. I don’t know why, but I started to pray that God would give me my memory back so that I could read and write and be like others, and amazingly it happened. I started to improve and became one of the best in the class. All the other children at school looked forward to weekends, but I didn’t. My stepfather used to beat my brothers and sisters and I, and we’d run away to the cornfields and sleep there all night.
I remember how someone from Mission Without Borders would come and visit the school. We’d jump all over him when he came in. We knew we could talk to him and that he was our friend. At 17, I gave my life to Jesus at summer camp. Looking back to when I was in boarding school, I never dreamed that my life would turn out the way it has. The day when I was baptised was the happiest day in my life.
Victor, who runs the sports activities at our summer camps in Moldova, having attended the camps as a child
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