Saturday, April 26, 2008

An Honest Petition

I am experiencing 8 different flavors of writer's block right now, so my apologies to all of you. The most frustrating thing about blogging from this side (or color I guess I should say!) of the world is the restrictions on pouring out what your heart really needs to say. I have a point to get across, a spirit to express, and a list of about 100 words I should never use. So I am counting on my poor ability to express a subtext, and your impress power to read between the consonants.
First, I need to answer the probing questions of your inquiring minds. I have informed the inner circle, but now its time to alert the masses. I will be returning to Shiyan for the 2008-2009 school year. I made that decision a few weeks ago, but was hesitant to put it out there too soon. There were grandparents and best friends to console! In all honesty, it was not too hard of a decision for me to make. I am convinced that G-d's purpose for us is to work for the r-d-mpt--n of His people. While its true that we can and should do that anywhere, He has asked me to work for the r-d-mpt--n of these people here and now. We are in the midst of a fierce battle and while it will in no way affect the outcome of the war, this battle ground must be defended, these soldiers are too precious. (I realize you are reeling in allegories, but its a useful deception tool) Angelyn will be returning to this school as well, and we are on our knees, petitioning you and the Father for your sp-r-t--l support throughout the next year.
Which brings me to my next point, the one on which I want to dwell (and the reason many of you have been tagged in this note). If being on our knees doesn't give you enough of a mental picture of our stance...please, imagine us face down, prostrate before our needs. We have a need here in Shiyan, specifically at Qi Yuan, that must to be met. We NEED strong male leadership for our family. Our family is struggling - young Chinese men with no example of how to be a man of G-d, and young Chinese women with no knowledge of the blessing men can be in the ch-rch. This is bigger than gender roles, bigger than Sunday morning doctrinal requirements, and much bigger than a romantic breeding ground within the fold. Its the intention of the Father to have men and women working together to transform His kingdom, and its the lack of that ideal combination that is poisonous to our family and work.
This is by no means a problem exclusively in Shiyan; around the world His family is composed and often led predominantly women. This is a statement that would have shocked me living in the states, though I think the evidence of it is overwhelming there as well. But it is an undeniable truth in the fields around the world. Women are responding to the call, and joining families with incredibly skewed ratios. Our family is full of powerful women who have a hearts of service, but their hearts are tired from carrying the burden alone. They are crying out to be led by the Husbands of the ch-rch - to truly be the Brides of Chr-st that they were meant to be. Its a beautiful picture that they are missing...that Angelyn and I are missing as well.
I was told recently that the expectations I ask men in the ch-rch to meet are unreachable, and unfair. Thinking about that, I didn't feel the shame I think I was intended to (that, oh you little man-eater, whittling away at the measuring stick of a man until he's left sniveling in a corner shame), but anger and sadness. The only expectation I have for men in the ch-rch is for the Father and His m-ss--n to be their number one priority, and to live that out each day. How utterly sad that the bar has been lowered so much in our community of f--th that one would consider that standard to be ludicrous. Are they so content in their complacency? How angry I became, thinking of the young men in our family looking at THAT as their standard and model. And how enraged I become at the insinuation that I am in the wrong for asking a man, any man, to stand up and meet not MY expectations, but his G-d's. I will never stop striving to be the woman that He has asked me to be, and I can't imagine getting permission from anyone to defend my acceptance of myself at less than that.
So I am laying our cards on the table, asking you to look within yourself. We need men with a heart for discipleship, who are on FIRE for the L-rd and long to spend each day fulfilling His m-ss-n for the world. We need couples who can take advantage of the unique opportunity that a partner in this field is, who desire to mirror the relationship of the Father to his ch-rch. China needs this, Shiyan needs this, our family needs this...I need it too. I am asking you to get on your knees for us today, and in the days ahead. Please lift up this incredible need to the Father. If someone pops into your head while you are reading this, forward it on to them immediately. If you feel something stirring inside of you, ask Him if He is calling you to be the one to fill this need. If you don't know what else to pr-y for, Angelyn and I could really use some strength. We are getting tired and discouraged, Satan's demons are using our exhaustion and other extremely powerful weapons.
I know I have gone on and on; I promise I am almost finished. I just wanted to say, that I was told not to frighten any interested parties away by expressing some of our needs to them. Apparently, it could be overwhelming to ask someone to live up to a G-dly standard in the midst of the work. The only response I have is no, ridiculous. We were not given a spirit of timidity, but HIS spirit. One of boldness and ferocity. If you answer this petition, you have been prayed over and longed for - its true that you will face vicious battles every day, but you will not be fighting alone. However, if you are not aflame with the fire of G-d, if you are not prepared to pour your heart out, if you are not willing to step onto the battlefield - then this is not the place for you. We are looking, begging and pleading...but we will continue to fight alone before we welcome more complacency.
Thank you all for your continued support. I feel the power of your pr-y-rs every day, and I am so grateful for them on the many days where my own are so small.

Thursday, April 24, 2008

China Daily - not just a newspaper

Every once in a while, we foreigners are lucky enough to experience what we lovingly refer to as a "China Day". You know you have had a China Day if at the end of it you realized you uttered the phrase, "Such is China..." at least 5 times. I had a particularly potent China Day earlier this week that I would just love to share with you!
*6:00 am wake-up, this unholy hour was chosen as a good faith attempt at getting back on the Active April horse after a nasty cold (from which I was still sniffling throughout this China day) knocked me off. There is a trail that winds up the hills behind
our school that offers a little bit of fresh air and solitude in the midst of the city. I had begun running up this trail in the mornings, thrilled with the return to nature and the Father that these morning offered. The day before this China Day, I had been stopped on the trail briefly by a drive by hello-er who just couldn't believe his good luck at an early morning foreigner citing. No problem - a quick hello and I continued on. But on this particular China Day I found that same man sitting on a rock along the trail with an anxious grin on his face. (WARNING - I recognize that grin...that is the grin of death) He jumped in front of me and launched into a 15 minute question-answer session which ended with his intent for our relationship...I'll sum up: I can barely speak English, you run here every morning, each night I will spend two hours preparing my oral English, each morning I will sit here on this rock and wait for you to come, we will have entertaining conversation for me and horrifically-mind-numbing conversation for you, my oral English will improve. Grrrrrr...such is China...
*My China Day moved on from there to my 8 am Freshman English Majors Class, upon which I entered to find 3 imposters. Senior
Non-English Majors whom I had never met, who planned to sit in my class, glean wisdom from me, distract my freshman students, attend all of the outside events intended for my students, send me emails, call my cell phone, and improve their oral English. To which I replied...Bu Dui! Such is China...
*By 10 am I stumbled home from class to fall into my bed, exhausted from the 4 hour China Day I had had thus far. I was just about to drift away when I heard a knock at the door. Prepared to landblast whoever was on the other side, I opened the door to look directly into the eyes of the most adorable random puppy I had ever seen! I had been hit with a random Puppy drop off - a student of mine had a friend who needed a favor. Watch her illegal dormitory puppy - heck yes I will! A puppy was just what I needed to brighten my China Day! I fell in love instantly and began to act like a total moron, gurgling I shall call him Gremlin and he shall be mine and he shall be my Gremlin. I mean, he was wearing a sweater for Pete's Sake! His real name is Xiao Bao , which means small cherished thing. Of course...Such is China...
*After they pried Gremlin from my
clinging hands, I had a weekly lunch appointment with some former students of mine who I swear to you couldn't stand me at the time of my teaching, but now seem to relish any time we have together. We talked the big three over friend rice: Olympics, Movies and Examinations. (Not the big three I would choose...but Such is China...)
*Priscilla and I made our way to Chicken Strip Market after lunch, named for their to-die-for American-wanna-be dipped slices of ji. The shopping trip was undertaken on a roll mission, but turned into an all out adventure. As a friend of mine says, "Never say I can't get it in China, only that you haven't found it yet". Wise words, as we came upon (ta da!) hazelnut coffee creamer. That's right people, that is cause for celebration. Amid the overwhelming smell of freshly slaughtered meat and pig faces, there can be found shining western lights...such is China...

*Still high on Gremlin and Coffeemate, Priscilla and I went to hail a taxi back with our goodies. We had to cross the street, and at this point I have to preface the story with two points of information.
1) Jaywalking is not only legal in China, but expected, if not required. If one is going to cross the street, we will weave our way through multiple lanes of traffic amidst cars driving in no possible pattern of prediction. "No Hesitation" is our motto! This motto inevitably leads to us standing in the middle of the street like a Frogger scenario, waiting for our next small break. 2) The tune of Shiyan is an ominous sound - an ice cream truck jingle that does speak of creamy delights, but of a truck that spews China water from its tail end. The street cleaner...you can see where this is going. So this moment finds Priscilla and I standing in the middle of a multi-lane street, toting bulging bags of groceries, with that music floating to our ears. We turned our head to see the street cleaner of doom approaching. Picture: 4 lanes. Street sweeper driving down Lane 1, Lane 2 empty, Priscilla and I between Lanes 2 & 3 on the line, Lines 3 & 4 filled with cars. There is no going backwards, there is definitely no going forwards! We analyze the situation, and see that if we just stay where we are the water will miss us by inches. Flooded with relief, we wait it out. Suddenly, the street cleaner driver spots foreigners dead ahead, and in his delight began to CHANGE LANES to get a closer look! He got a front row seat, we and our groceries got a China water shower! It was Christmas for the Chinese gleefully taking in our plight and Tomb Sweeping Day for us. GRRRRR...Such is China...
*Soaked and bitter, I headed to English Corner - the bane of every English teacher's existence. Its a time when we stand in a room full of people who want to ogle the foreigner and have the opportunity to pepper us with questions for an hour or two. Highlights include the umpteenth time you are asked if you know how to use chopsticks (no, I just stare at my food), can speak Chinese (no, its impossible for foreigners to use due to our lower IQ level), what your impression of China is (big, communist), and if you have a boyfriend (no, am hideous to all members of the opposite sex). I usually don't often mind it, but it was a China Day. But China Day's wait for no man, and so 8 pm at night found me standing in the cold next to Communist Joe defending my right to learn Spanish in high school instead of Mandarin. Such is China...

*I crawled home, longing to wash the China day off my body and mind in a hot shower. Another preface: Hot water is a precious commodity here, one we receive at 7:30 pm at night to anywhere from 9:30 to 10:30...you can see where this is going. Soaped up, one shaven leg, spirits beginning to lift...hot water shut off...shivering in the cold... Such is China's - Six, make that Seven
China Day...check...

Monday, April 21, 2008

Protests of the West Spread in China

So we have had some local excitement (by local, I mean provincial, of course) this week that made national news. Maybe you heard about it? This is an article from the New York Times - a little bit of semi-unbiased reporting (by semi-unbiased, I mean "at least its not Chinese", of course). If you haven't been watching the PRC lately, you really should...please lift up the foreigners in the midst of all this contention.

Protests of the West Spread in China

BEIJING — Nationwide demonstrations against a French supermarket chain spread on Sunday as thousands of people protested what they said was France’s sympathy for pro-Tibetan agitators. The protesters have also been singling out Western news outlets, especially CNN, for what they said was biased coverage of unrest in Tibet.

In a sign that the government was still allowing anti-foreign sentiment to spill over into rare street demonstrations, thousands of people rallied on Sunday in front of Carrefour markets in six cities, including two, Harbin and Jinan, where there had not been protests earlier. Demonstrators carried banners saying, “Oppose Tibet Independence” and “Condemn CNN,” according to the official Xinhua News Agency.

The rallies are the largest public outpouring of nationalistic fury since 2005, when tens of thousands of people took to the streets to denounce Japanese textbooks that omitted any mention of Japan’s wartime atrocities in China. Those protests, in which eggs and stones were thrown at the Japanese Embassy in Beijing and the consulate in Shanghai, ended abruptly after the authorities clamped down on the organizers and blocked the anti-Japanese Web sites and message boards that were fueling the campaign.

In recent days, the government has called on citizens to temper their fury at the West, but it has not acted to halt public demonstrations, which have been stoked by newspaper editorials, Internet postings and text messages sent to millions of cellphones.

On Sunday, the state-run People’s Daily newspaper called for a cooling of passions, although it stopped short of condemning the demonstrations or the spreading boycott campaign against French goods. “As citizens, we have the responsibility to express our patriotic enthusiasm calmly and rationally and express patriotic aspiration in an orderly and legal manner,” the newspaper said in a front-page editorial.

According to the official news agency, 2,000 people, many of them students, gathered in front of a Carrefour market in Wuhan, where they sang the national anthem and waved the Chinese flag. Similar scenes played out in Xi’an, Qingdao and Dalian, as well as in Jinan and Harbin. The authorities maintained a heavy police presence but did not interfere with the demonstrators, according to wire service reports.

The public anger has been percolating since mid-March, when disturbances in Tibet killed 19 people, according to the government’s official count, and Chinese security forces began a crackdown, in which Tibetan exile groups say more than 140 people were killed.

Most Chinese view the unrest as an outburst of hooliganism and wanton violence, and many have been infuriated by Western news accounts that portray the rioting in Tibet as a revolt against oppressive rule. The dismay turned to indignation after the Olympic torch relay became a magnet for anti-Chinese protests, especially in Paris, where pro-Tibet demonstrators attacked a Chinese amputee athlete in a wheelchair who was bearing the torch. The woman, Jin Jing, has become a national hero and a symbol of resistance against those who are seen as seeking to disrupt the Olympics and sully China’s reputation.

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Master and Commander of Small Talk

As I was walking home last night from a particularly enjoyable dinner with one of my freshman students, Marilyn, I was struck with a thought - the most unfortunate and unenchanting aspect of my personality has begun to melt away. Yes, the girl who once viewed unnecessary conversations as just that, unnecessary, has become the master and commander of small talk.
To analyze myself, I think my aversion to small talk grew out of my insecurity. I almost never had conversations with acquaintances that did not serve some purpose, and that was probably due to the fact that somewhere in my self-conscience I believed my presence to be undesirable to them less it aided their needs in some way. Perhaps if I came to them with a reason for my blabbering, it was less offensive and gave them cause to welcome me! I was a hit-and-run communication assailant. I kept phone calls under 3 minutes, ending them as soon as the 2 second pause became unbearable. I wrote emails when I could have spoken face-to-face. I invented excuses for absences when there were none. I was an individualist's darling. As exhausting and unfulfilling as that was, I rarely knew how to behave otherwise!
Then yesterday...break through! China has cured me. I am now the Supreme Pontiff of unnecessary communication. I don't even know how it happened, I just realized that the Chinese have created this monster who can have the same mindless conversation a dozen times and feign the same level of interest in each one. I hardly recognize myself. I can now sit on my couch and talk to a student for an hour and accomplish absolutely nothing. We will just run through the cycle of America-class-family-America-friends-movies-America-Chinese food-QQ-America until we reach then end, then run through it again. I would have found this impossible in the past, now I find it merely mind-numbing! I am both terrified at this realization, and reveling in it.
The run-ins on the street are glorious as well. In the past, a quiet "hey" and wave to each passerby got me through the day - but no more! Now each run in has a routine to follow as well.
Let me give you a glimpse into an Zhongguoren - Waiguoren conversation:
Z: Oh Hello
W: Hey, how are you?
Z: Fine thanks, and you?
W: I'm good!
Z: Where are you going?
W: I am going to eat.
Z: OOOOOOHHHHHHHHH
W: What about you?
Z: Oh yes, I am so busy. I have much class today
W: How is your class?
Z: Very boring!
W: Like my class?
Z: Oh no, your class is so interesting! I like your smile very much
W: Oh thank you! So...
Z: I have something important to do.
W: Oh, okay. I'll see you later!
Z: See you later. Buh-bye!

So for all of you at home, be prepared. I am now fully able to sit in front of you with a big grin on my face for hours on end...talking.

Monday, April 14, 2008

Did You Know...

I read this on my friend Beth's blog the other day, and you can ask anyone - I have not shut up about it since. I just think its a need to know, so I have copied this from her blog. Thanks for keeping the masses informed Beth! (Hong Kong 08)

The other day Brad (another foreigner who lives in YiChang) went to lunch with one of his 4,000 students and noticed that the kid pulled out chopsticks out of his bag. They said "Greenpeace" on them and when Brad asked about it, the student told Brad that he carries them so not to waste disposable chopsticks. Each time we eat at a restaurant, 9 out of 10 times we use disposable chopsticks. We have all pondered the problem this could cause, but it was not until the student said something about it that we looked at it a little closer. After Googling, Beth found this from the Washington Post
"China now produces and discards more than 45 billion pairs of disposable chopsticks every year, cutting down as many as 25 million trees in the process, according to government statistics. Another 15 billion pairs are exported to Japan, South Korea and other countries. At the current rate of timber use, environmentalists warn, China will consume its remaining forests in about a decade."

Wednesday, April 9, 2008

A Window into the Chinese Education System

If you're a fellow Dave Barry fan, you will appreciate - this one's for you.

Very rarely do we foreign teachers make use of the textbooks we are given for our courses. They are illegible and brimming with grammatical errors at best; at worst, they are 208 pages of the most incredibly glorious propagation you have ever seen. Every once in a while, we crack one open and are given a treat into the mind of the party. Once you read what I have copied below, you will be racked with the same questions I have. Mainly, "How DID people who grew up in THIS education system lead this country into world power?"

I just could not resist sharing this with you - I only wish you could have heard by debate class actually arguing this point. Perhaps if you pay very careful attention, you can guess the gender of this extremely "experienced" writer. Phenomenal...

Debate: Who is More Intelligent - Men or Women?

Part A (Men) - Women contradict themselves much of the time. Perhaps this is why men question women's intellect and reasoning. For one, women have fought so long to achieve equal rights. But, women don't want to be treated equally. Women still want those perks that they've enjoyed before being "liberated," such as a man opening a door, a man paying for a restaurant bill, and so on. Men, does this make any sense? And, how often do women complain that they can't find nice guys? If they really want a nice guy, they should stop dating good-looking jerks. Another thing that surprises men is, if a woman gains weight during a relationship, why does she decide to lose that weight after her man leaves? Also, she complains that you are looking at other woman. As if she never looks at other men, especially ones that look better than you. Finally, here's common sense advice from some guys to the rest of the guys: never flatter or praise her. If you flatter a woman, she'll convince herself, "If I'm all that, then what am I doing with a loser like you?" Then she'll go off to find someone better.

Part B (Women) - Men are basically simple creatures. Or, do they just have simple minds? For example, women contemplate and ask questions about the inner secrets of like, "am I in love?" Men ask simple questions like, "Honey, can you get me a beer?" Many women believe men will never grow up. Since childhood, men have always loved toys. As adults, the more beeps and buttons it has, the more it is treasured: computers, TV's, digital cameras, and so on. Has your man ever forgotten your anniversary or Valentine's Day? Men have such short memories. This is why they need so many replays when watching sports. Other times it seems that they don't seem to have a mind at all. If you're tired and your boyfriend doesn't want to help with the housework, he's not being thoughtless. He just doesn't care. That's not his job. but what puzzling is, men construct skyscrapers, rebuild engines, yet can't separate white colors from red when doing laundry. And what probably puzzles women the most is, why a guy does not call after your first date, even though he said he would.

Saturday, April 5, 2008

Introducing...Active April

You may have noticed that I have been an overactive blogger this week. Its true, I have been bursting with news and unable to speak with you the last few weeks, but that is only a partial reason. The reason you have been hearing so many of my lovely thoughts as of late is in fact our latest alliteration month: Active April. (ta da! I felt the need for a ta da there. Too auspicious? It felt a little auspicious.)
We thought of Active April a while back. We thought it an appropriate follow-up to Meager March; once our bodies were emaciated, they would be easier to heave around the track on a midnight jog. In Active April, we will do something active everyday. So far, AA has been a success. Days 1-3 we played badminton (The unofficial sport of the Chinese, badminton is a war of Def Con 5 proportions which I am now fully addicted to), day 4 we climbed a Niu Tou Shan, and today dragged my poor defeated body on a crosstown trek. So now that we are fully, physically active... we have of course decided to evolve the idea further.
We are now actively tackling EVERYTHING. Here is a short list:
  • Actively sitting in a tree
  • Actively spring cleaning
  • Actively studying chinese
  • Actively speaking chinese at least once a day
  • Actively getting our hair done
  • Actively pursuing new relationships with students
  • Actively purchasing a ladder so that we can actively have parties on the roof of our building
  • Actively securing our financial situations
  • Actively planning another family vacation
  • Actively and systematically eating all the expired items in Angelyn's pantry
  • Actively writing home more often
  • Actively having a poker party
  • Actively seizing new opportunities that come our way
  • Actively meditating (which seems like an oxymoron now that I look at it)
  • Actively remembering to take my medication every day
  • Actively developing my plan B for when the chinese government kicks all the foreigners out and we have to return to the states for reading Tibetan news
  • And...actively blogging more often!
So you can see...we can do nothing simply, but thats the way we like it. So we here
in Shiyan challenge you to take control and actively pursue some course of action this month. We are also taking early suggestions for May. Right now, my personal favorite is "More-of-a-good-thing May" Thoughts?

And if you are wondering how we passed a meager days, check out my photo album below:
Album #1: Meager March

Thursday, April 3, 2008

A Fresh Start

I got down and dirty today, spring cleaning my dust-bunny filled apartment. I thought I had left that immovable filth behind in Lubbock, but turns out China might actually be worse. Anyway, this sweeping away of the old filth made me think of fresh starts, and I wanted to share with you all some of the new approaches we are taking to the same-old, same-old here in Shiyan. You know how we feel about constant improvement…

I came back from Southeast Asia really feeling renewed and vigorous. I had spent 4 days learning about CPM, and read Rivertown, so I was ready to get serious with my students. It makes me crazy to keep falling more in love with them, and then being constantly reminded that they are lost. I feel more and more convinced that we have been too careful in the past, to wary of toeing some imaginary (and I often think exaggerated line). So I decided that with my English majors especially, I was going to do my best to speak truth at all times. Regardless of the circumstances, this is what I believe, and I have the right (and according to His word, the duty) to say it. I am really striving to be more open with my students. I have made a promise to myself that I will bring Him into the conversation each week, in some way. Whether it is with the constant reminder that I am in fact a Chr-st—n, or that couples wed in Ch-rches, or even that r-l-g---s high schoolers may pledge not to have sex before marriage. Anything that gives me a reason I can tell them WHY is a small ray of light. Easter brought a particularly great opportunity for me, because Megan’s mother brought Resurrection Eggs from the states! I thought this was a staple in r-l-g---s households, but I have found out they are not quite so common. Anyway, it’s a carton of plastic Easter eggs that holds inside each egg a symbol of the crucifixion so that as you open each egg in a succession, you reveal the story of the resurrection. So I was able to take that carton of eggs to class and tell the story of J-s-s to my students! AMAZING. I had such a high, and watching some of them smile, gasp, and drop their mouths in awe was indescribable. I wish I could spend every minute I have with them revealing more and more of the mystery. I have had more fruitful, revealing and thought provoking conversations in the past few weeks than I had in months of the fall semester. I also have them keeping journals now so that I can see more clearly who may be open to hearing the truth. I feel a new spirit of boldness thanks to the conviction of the Father and I am anxious to see what He will do next.

I usually love my students, and I always love my coffee…so when an idea formulated around the two, I had to jump on it. In the spirit of continuing openness, I have begun a tri-weekly discussion group with my English majors in my living room that we are calling “Coffee Talk”. After the first month, there are only a few standing strong with me in the arena of “caffination”, the others have reverted to their old “hot water” staple, but we are all really enjoying the time to just be together. We have had some great conversations, and I am thrilled as I discover more and more how amazing some of these kids really are. I also have really wanted to learn more about the city I call home and the people in it, the culture of Shiyan. So I am forcing my students to spend even more time with me, like the evil Miss Jessica I am, and have instigated an out-of-class activity we are calling Seeing Shiyan. (You know how I love my alliterations) My freshman families are taking me out in the city each Saturday. The Hopper’s showed me all the cool places to shop in Wu Yan, the Clarks rented a car and took us out to Moon River Valley for a day of zip lines, boat trips, and nature walks. This week the Bells will be introducing me to a local temple. It’s awesome getting to hear them tell me about China in English, sinisterly awesome!

Our family is undertaking some new approaches as well. We have begun something I stole from Jingzhou called All Day Sundays. It’s been fantastic! We have a meeting in the morning, go out to lunch together, play sports or games in the afternoon, cook dinner together, and then having a singing or study in the evening. It’s a l-o-n-g, eventful and rewarding day each time. Some days we have 5 of us, some days 15. They have been inviting friends to come and spend time with the family, and that has led to some interest. Angelyn and I have also been able to invite some students we know love singing, and they were really intrigued by our family – and natural accapela talents! We are continuing the weekly seeker study, but now I am meeting with the family members before hand, and they are teaching our seekers in an all Chinese study. (This is the ideal situation, though we have had some troubles getting this moving) I think it’s going to be great for them, both the family and seekers. The way that the Word moves when it’s spoken in their own tongue is so far beyond anything we can do, regardless of the passion we may preach with.

Please keep lifting me, the other foreigners, and our family up as we are all in the midst of difficult decisions, and new paths are being made before us. Please also keep my students and our seekers on your heart. We know He can do all things, and his timing is perfect. But it can be hard to see them so close to the truth, and so desperately in need of a salvation we know is right there.

Oh yeah…it only took me 7 months, but I finally woke up one day and realized, “Hey, I actually live here” and perhaps I should begin to take my Chinese studies a little more seriously. After being left in the dust by my language school attendee friends, my pride was in need of a boost as well. So thanks to the God-send that is wode Zhongwen laoshi, Di Cui, I am now studying Hanyu for an hour a day. It’s been fantastic; I am actually learning to WRITE. The language is opening up to me, its excruciatingly difficult, but so rewarding when I take that bus down the street and can recognize 2 characters out of a sign. Glorious Victory!

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Meager Memories

Meager Memories

Though many of you believed me dead from an earthquake that occurred some thousand miles away in Xinjiang (ironically: we experienced an earthquake here in Shiyan last week, which we all felt and were anxiously awaiting the inevitable justified phone calls from the states…of which none came), I survived both earthquakes and the meagerness of March. I come to you now full to the brim of stories that I have been holding in my cheeks like a chipmunk anxiously anticipating the moment when I could release my store…enjoy!

Angelyn’s Cat: For weeks we have been plagued with the sounds of a cat so miserably searching for her soul mate that we have all begun to lose our fragile minds. Somehow…this cat got the idea into her poor demented mind that Angelyn is the love of her life. So each morning we awake to her calls, and each evening we go to sleep with her mournful song the last things on our minds. Well, it appears that meagerness drove me to the brink of insanity and so I found myself stalking through the bushes with a sling shot and dried dates in hand – plotting the sinister end of her misery. I thought myself a humanitarian, she needed release that Angelyn could not bring and the only way to ease her spirit would be sweet death. Looking back on that moment, and the photos that prove my madness, I can’t help thinking that there were days in my past where I was more logical/mature/intelligent/choose your adjective…and believed myself to be a pacifist…

Gobbling Goodies: Brian often touts these words of wisdom: Don’t gobble your goodies! Goodies being defined here as the American treats our loving mothers send us throughout the year. We hoard chocolates and coffee bags in our cupboards, trying to make the sweetness last. Well, turns out there is something to be said for gobbling your goodies – as the pantry grew scant we began to open saved goodies in desperate moments. And we learned that if one would only gobble their goodies before the 2 year expiration date, you would not find yourself eating moldy packaged mashed potatoes. You would also be saved the embarrassment of dragging January 2007 Starbucks Coffee beans across town with a note scrawled in Chinese, “Please help these pathetic weiguoren ground their expired, bark-like coffee beans”.

Baseball: From time to time, we foreigners experience a little something the experts call Culture Shock. Symptoms include hatred of pictures that are supposed to be words and the overwhelming desire to punch anyone in the face who has the audacity to say Hello to you. Though Brian and I have both come close in recent months to clothes-lining hello-offenders, we held our arms at our sides, and were finally rewarded when William’s mother brought us two baseballs from America! We took to the school grounds and wacked heads-masquerading-as-baseballs until we felt such delicious relief. Thank the good Lord for the great American sport that is baseball!

LOST & Pizza: There are few things that we foreigners hold sacred here in Shiyan. The first is LOST, the second is arguably pizza. We are a six hour train ride away from a supermarket where you can purchase cheese, so you guess how we crave the gooey deliciousness that is a slice of pizza. I tell you this only so you can consider how serious an offense it would be for any foreigner to eat pizza without inviting another foreigner to join in. While LOST, the addictive television show that is a cult favorite among us, is something that we watch as a family. I do not want to go into detail, or name any offenders, (John, Megan, Andrew, Jaime, William, Priscilla) so I will leave it at these two words, LOST & Pizza, and allow my own memory to conjure up those painful moments where friendships were severed forever.

Liars: We recently celebrated April Fool’s Day…in the span of just a few hours I was told that Hillary Clinton had died, and that Barack Obama had chosen his running mate under my radar… As I was born with more than a shred of intelligence, I will not believe such atrocities. Just as I did not believe these outlandish claims, I would not and will not believe that Beijing creates its own weather, that Chinese babies get mischievous moods and begin winking, and that some dogs pee while doing hand stands (yes, hand – not hind legs). The point here is: Mama didn’t raise no fool.

Wink, wink, nudge, nudge – know what I mean?