EXTREME MAKEOVER HOME EDITION - Pastor Steve overhaul

Steve Boettcher of Nevada doesn’t fit the typical image of a minister – he looks more like a Viking warrior. He’s a tall dude with intense eyes and a wild man’s beard who spreads The Word from the back of a motorcycle. Pastor Steve has a heart of gold under that tough exterior though, and he and his wife Mary have turned their garage into a teen community center where kids from all walks of life can hang out safely and enjoy a hot meal.

Of course, their makeshift community center could use and extreme makeover, to say nothing of their small house, which they share with their daughter Stephanie and her baby Joshua, who was born with a serious medical condition that requires he be on oxygen. These people need a bigger, better home.

Fortunately, building bigger and better homes is what Ty Pennington and his crew are all about. They ship the Boettcher’s off to Hawaii, destroy their house, and in one short week they’ve replaced the old double-wide trailer with a full-on Palace of Awesomeness.

The best EM:HE episodes are the ones that balance the human interest elements with the neat-o home building. Don’t get me wrong, I find the family stories compelling, but I’m equally interested in what kind of house they’re building the family and what bells and whistles they’re putting in the house. This episode had all that. The new house was very cool – I particularly liked the “daylighting” tubes that they placed in the roof to take advantage of Nevada’s sunshine. Daughter Stephanie’s private suite was decorated like a castle, with a few rock walls and exposed timbers, to reflect her Irish heritage. I was worried that it was going to come out looking cheesy, but they did a fantastic job – she even got her own veranda. The best part was the new and improved kids’ community center (pictured above), which was a 500% improvement over Pastor Steve’s converted garage.

The Boettcher’s were PSYCHED to see their new abode when the big EM:HE bus finally moved.  Pastor Steve physically picked up Ty, who is not a small guy, and spun him around on his shoulders. I was half-expecting Steve to execute a bone-jarring inverted suplex, but the Pastor held off on the wrestling moves and returned Ty safely to Earth. Phew. 

This episode didn’t make me cry (a first since I’ve started this blog!) but it did warm my heart a little. This home makeover not only had a huge impact on the Boettcher family, but on the community as well. Not bad for a week’s worth of work.
 

--Dave Campbell

 

Comments

[pookie7]

Indian Slave to American Slave

This is the way my story began. I was living with a wealthy family in India. They told me that my mother died in childbirth and my father gave me to them. I could not believe my father gave me away like an old rag. I figured that he needed the money more than his own flesh and blood. I will never understand what kind of human being could do that to their own child. I will never know if that’s what he really did because so many lies were told. How I came to their house and why I don't have a family. Every day I wonder if somebody would tell me who brought me to this scary world. Life is very difficult when you don't know where you come from or who brought you to life.
The family my dad gave me to treated me like their own at first. They had three of their own kids, one girl and two boys. I wish I could remember something about when I was a baby but I don't have any recollection about being a child. I have no baby pictures of me. I have no clue who really cared for me. I slightly remember when I was seven years old they decided they better train me as a servant.
One day, Indira, the lady I lived with, told me I wasn’t allowed to do any family things or allowed to come inside when guests were in the house. She told me I should learn from all her servants. That was the real beginning of my new life. I was so horrified and mad all I wanted to do was run away from this crazy place. I remember when I was about seven years old I started to live where the servants lived. I prayed and wished somebody could come and rescue me. I hoped every day that my father would come back and say he made a mistake. Then he would take me back with him.
It is an Indian custom that if you are a servant you do not have a bed or any kind of furniture. You sleep on the floor. You eat on the floor. I was so scared and horrified. It finally hit me that I was a servant and I would never get out of this horrible place. That’s the way my life went on for years. I started learning from all the workers what to do and how to cook and clean. I was no longer Indira’s child. One of the servants took me under her wing. She cared for me and helped me get along. She told me not to cry and took me to the Hindu temple with her. I worked like this till I was nine. I still didn’t understand why they took me into their home if they just wanted a servant.
Indira’s daughter Asha got married and moved to Houston, Texas. Years later she came to India with her baby girls and left the babies with her mom and dad. Asha went back to Houston, Texas, to study to become a lawyer. In India, I was taking care of Asha’s little girls. They noticed how well I got along with the babies. I helped with the care of the two small girls, an infant and a toddler. The plan to send me to America was created. Many lies were told in order to get my passport. They signed papers as if they were my real parents. They took signatures from school officials saying that I was in school. I really had never been to school at all.
I arrived in Houston, Texas, on June 30, 1989, at the age of eleven and a half. Both women promised me that I would be going to America to go to school. I did not realize that I came to America to continue as a servant. To be honest I wasn't really surprised that the family was doing this to me again. But this time I was all by myself with on one to cry to or no servants to comfort me. I was going to take care of two children when their parents were working. They said I couldn't get out of there because no one would speak my language. My nightmare began all over again. I was an Indian slave before and now I became an American slave.

[pookie7]

A New Beginning
I was sent from India to America to care for two young children. I was still a child myself, an orphan, but that didn’t matter to Ashia. She was the daughter of Indira, a wealthy woman who raised me only until I was old enough to be taught how to be a slave for her family.
My life in America turned out to be just like it was in India. I was nothing more than a servant. The only thing that mattered to Ashia and her husband was the fact that they didn’t have to pay a caretaker for their girls? No one cared about an orphan. It didn’t matter that their servant had no clue where she came from. No answers needed to be given to an orphan servant about why and how she became a possession of their family.
I was abandoned by my father; betrayed by Indira; unprotected by the Indian officials who accepted a forged birth certificate and signed documents saying that I was the Indira’s daughter in order to get a passport and ship me off to America where I would continue my servitude; and finally sent to a place where the only people that I could communicate with were the people who owned me.
How could God do this to a child? How could God do this to me? I began blaming Him for everything. I hated the life God had placed me in, but how could I change it?
My days were filled with cooking, cleaning, and taking care of the children. After eight months of my daily routine I finally decided that it must be up to me to try and improve my life and in order to do that I needed to have enough courage to talk to Ashia. I would tell her that I needed clothes because the only two outfits that I had were becoming ragged. I would ask her if I could go to school, after I had finished all of my duties of course.
I was terrified as I walked through the house to her office. What if she becomes angry at me for wanting those things and decides to throw me out of her home? I spoke no English. How would I survive? I began to get second thoughts about making my wishes known, but something inside of me was pushing me to do it. I felt brave. Even brave enough to talk to Ashia.
As soon as I saw her my body began to shake, then I started to cry and it became harder for me to tell her what I wanted. She had no heart because she just stared at me, an eleven-year-old child then she said, “Renuka, you are here to work for me, not to go to school.” I was still crying when ran out of her office. Would there ever be someone to rescue me from this prison?