Monday, February 26, 2007 

It Was Nice Knowing Me

During the past couple of weeks, I've started noticing some differences in yours truly:

Cigarette smoking doesn't bother me nearly as much as it used to. Everybody smokes here, I guess I'm finally getting used to it. I couldn't stand to sit within 10 feet of it back in the day. Nowadays I'll second-hand huff and puff with the best of 'em.

I don't mind crowded buses anymore. And I do mean crowded buses. Nuff said.

You really have to live here to know what I'm trying to say here, but I've started grunting like them when I understand something, and I've started shaking my head like them when I don't. It's just natural now, I've found myself doing it with both locals and Americans.

My speech is different even when I try to speak English now.

First Case: I was having a completely English conversation the other day and tried to say the word "Wow". I seriously tried to say the word, but I ended up saying a mixture of the local word for wow and the english word. It came out sounding like "whyyy". The guy stared at me for a second and went on.

Second Case: Again, I was having a completely English conversation, this time with Mr. K. I tried to give him some sugar cubes, and I said "Here's some sugar coobs". Yes, I failed trying to say the word "cubes", and it came out "coobs", like the local way to pronounce a "u".

I won't even go into my mixed vocabulary when I speak English anymore. I talked to Mr. K about all this, and he hit the nail on the head: I'm becoming bi-cultural.

I'm picking up mannerisms, habits, and local ways to the point that it's becoming somewhat sub-conscious. It's not like I've gone native by any means, I wear an "Old Navy" sweater most days for crying out loud, but some things are becoming natural. To be honest, it'd probably be good to lose some of my Americanness. Who will I be after a few years here? We'll just have to wait and see...

11:46 AM | |

Thursday, February 22, 2007 

Heavy Thoughts

I was taking the subway to school one morning and sat down next to a family of 3: a father, a mother, and a boy who was maybe 4 years old. As we rode along, I watched as the father pointed out the mosques to his little boy as we passed them. (Yeah, our "subway" goes above ground some too.)

"Do you see that one? Look at that big one, son..."

I heard it over and over as we went along, and I just felt depressed. What was this kid being taught? What was his father modeling? In all fairness, maybe that guy never goes to the mosque and is just pointing them out to his son for a vocabulary lesson. If I had to guess, though, I'd say it goes much deeper than that.

How many children in how many countries around the world are taught lies? How many kids are being trained into pagan worship? Whole generations of people taught lies from birth...how hard that must be to overcome! How are they to change when they have never heard the truth? All their lives they hear lies. They'll grow up, worship whatever they've been taught to worship, and teach their kids to do the same. It's a horrible cycle.

I watched the dad and his son for a while, said a prayer for the kid, and got off the subway to go to school.


What a blessing, what a BLESSING to grow up in the truth. Pray for those that don't have that blessing.

12:04 PM | |

Monday, February 19, 2007 

F.Y.I.

I learned the other day that people here only have 2 names. They don't have a middle name. I never imagined that some people didn't have middle names, I just assumed everybody was like me. It's weird, those things we take for granted...

12:34 PM | |

Saturday, February 17, 2007 

Valentine's Day

It could've been worse...


I hope everyone had a good V. Day, mine was pretty nice. First of all, I was surprised to find that they celebrate Valentine's Day over here, too. They don't sell as many cards as in the states, but they make a good effort. How did Valentine's Day start, anyway?

Being the single that I am, I figured I'd help out one of the married guys on the team by watching their kids for him while he and his wife go out. (Plus, I was pretty much guaranteed a free dinner in the bargain.)

So I ask Mr. B if he wanted me to take care of his 4 kids last Wednesday. (I like a challenge.) He told me that he hadn't even thought of V. Day and probably wouldn't do anything. So, I called up Mr. K and asked if he wanted to head out while I watched their 2 kids. He said that'd be great, so I made plans to head over there Wednesday after school.

Then Mrs. B calls me and tells me they would love to go out for V. Day, and thanked me for volunteering to watch their kids.

That makes 6 kids, 4 under the age of 6.

I'm as responsible as the next guy, but 6 kids is a lot, especially young ones. I really had no choice, so I agreed to watch them too. I thought of calling in a friend to help, but the only friends I have are non-believing, non-English speaking single guys, not exactly the kind of help you need in a delicate situation like this.

With no other viable options, I would have to go in alone.

I got to the K's house (the drop zone) around 5:30 that night and sat in the bathroom for like 20 minutes just enjoying the silence, knowing it would be the last bit of that I would get that night.

A few minutes later, the families showed up, the parents left, and it was just me and the kiddos.

First problem: The youngest B kid is still in diapers and is still working on that whole "potty training" thing. I've never changed a diaper in my life, and I don't plan on starting any time soon. The solution? I put the 8 year old on diaper duty. If anything goes down, she's in charge of cleaning it up. Fortunately, it was a quiet night on that front...

After taking care of the diaper situation, it was down to business. My plan was pretty simple: Wear the kids out early, and pop in the kid movies for the rest of the night. After an hour or so of wrestling, dog-piling, sword fighting, and hide and seek (in the dark mind you), the kids were wearing down. That was a good thing too, because even with my wrestling and sword-fighting prowess 6 on 1 is pretty bad odds.

I locked up the weapons in the K's bedroom, assembled the kids in the living room, and rode out the rest of the night with Veggie Tales, Jungle Book 2, and old Popeye cartoons.

The parents returned (almost 11 at night!) to find their kids sitting calmly watching some Popeye or playing with some blocks.

That, my friends, is a job well done.

9:34 AM | |

 

Back In Form

Well, the B's moved out last week to go back to their newly-working apartment. I kind of missed them the first night by myself again, it was weird to hear silence. But, it was a good time, and the B's were more than a little cramped at the bachelor pad. Plus, now locking the bathroom door is optional. Shoot, I don't even have to close it if I don't want to...

(Cue the "Wonder Years" theme...) I've gotta say again that living with the B's for that week really raised my respect for mothers in general. From the time those kids get up to the time they go to bed, she is teaching them, feeding them, cleaning them, disciplining them, and anything else that needs to be done. There are no days off from that job. I have a newfound respect for motherhood and homemaking.

9:19 AM | |

Saturday, February 10, 2007 

Thanks, Moms

So I was sitting in the living room with the 4 B kids one morning before heading out to school when the 3-year-old started getting choked up. It was pretty obvious the kid was going to throw up, so the other 3 B kids ran away screaming while I sat frozen in terror of what was about to project out. As I sat helplessly, I spied Mrs. B running toward the splash zone just as the kid was coughing it up.

It was at this moment my respect for moms everywhere took a giant leap.

She caught the little guy's puke in her hand!

She cupped her hand in front of his mouth, caught all he could spew up, and asked him if he was okay.

That was pretty much the most hardcore thing I've ever seen, and I've seen all the Rambo movies and 5 of the Rocky movies.

1:26 PM | |

Sunday, February 04, 2007 

House Party!!!

There's a water problem in one of the team family's apartments, and the plumber is going to have to turn the water off and tear out their bathtub and stuff...which means the B's are moving in! It should be a fun time with them and their 4 kids, as long as I put all my valuables at least 5 feet above the floor and out of kid range. Wait, I don't have any valuables...

1:35 PM | |

Friday, February 02, 2007 

Trip Story #3: Local Church

I arrived in the second city of my two-week, two-city tour (I'm like a rock star) on Saturday evening. After hanging out with a great family there for a while, I went home with CS to spend the week.

Sunday morning, it was time to go to church. In my city, church consists of the team getting together and doing a house church. For CS, though, church is getting together with a group of locals downtown for a full-fledged local church service.

Just getting there was quite a trip. CS and I headed to a bus stop and were waiting for a bus to come when a guy and his wife pull up on a motorcycle and nod to CS. CS nods to me and we head over to the hog. Fortunately, there was a sidecar attached, or we'd have had to go 4 on the bike itself. We piled in to the sidecar and got a first-rate tour of the city on a beautiful sunny day. And yes, that was my first time in a sidecar...



We pulled up to the building and headed in. Inside there were a dozen people or so with Bibles in their hands talking with others about God, the gospel, and truth. To really get how big that was for me, remember that I've been here the last 6 months and haven't seen any body of local believers at all. I think I've seen 5 total local believers, all isolated. To see a group come together and share truth with each other was awesome.

After a while of talking (or in my case trying to talk) we all headed in to another room and sang songs and heard a sermon, all in the local language. It was good, I could understand what some of the songs were saying, but most of the time I was just singing along none the wiser. The speaker spoke a lot about faith, but I really don't know the specifics. It's hard to understand what a guy is saying when you only understand 2 or 3 words of every sentence.

As we left, I felt like I had seen a small part of what we're working for here. That's why we're here, after all, to see local believers join together and worship God and spread the news.

10:50 AM | |