Walking

So yesterday I was immensely bored and complained about it to anyone who would listen. Wally decided to do something about those complaints and gave me a list of things to do today. Writing a new blog was one of the things, two other things were "Go for a walk" and "take some pictures" So I'm going to kill Three birds w/ one stone and I went for a walk and took pictures and now I'm going to post them as my blog entry. 

The list was a wonderful addition to my day. It forced me to get up and move around and do things so thanks Wally.

Here's what I saw on my walk:

love

lanterns 

luck

pretty mural 

Exercise

Tranquility

This sign confused me, What's w/ the bird and the letter? Why is the umbrella different? Why is there a Dr. Next to a phone, then a phone by itself? 

Old men playing croquet

Important information.

"I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go..I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you"

 - Genesis 28: 15

Water

Recently I have spent a lot of time in thought and discussion with the way God effects our lives. Discussions with others about who Christ calls us to be and how we should perceive doctrine. I feel like these moments are the true moments of life. I feel as if in all these instances there have been points where my words have left me and Christ has spoken through me. These moments in silence are where the spirt blows over me like wind.

I spoke recently to someone about how God called me to China. The best way I could find to explain this was water. Sometimes water comes in so slowly, small audibly noticeable drops, or constant streams, floods. Water effects everything, every part through movement, physical change, or any other number of ways. For me China was like a small drop of water, a constant reminder that I was to move for the spirit when the time was ready. Something I was always aware of but had to wait for it to overtake everything before I could release. Years I was effected by this small drip, this acknowledgement of coming change until one day the flood rushed in. No longer was I able to ignore this change, this movement. God flooded in rapidly and effected every part. Maybe this is cliche maybe it's absurd for me to compare a movement that so far has been slightly small to a flood. Maybe the change was me, maybe the flood effected me and brought me here to change me and mold me to prepare me for bigger callings. Possibly not bigger, but different. More difficult moves, more nights alone in foreign places. Difficult explanations to the people I love that I cannot refuse this call and prayers for them to understand something I have no way of accurately describing. This is the most challenging of everything for me now. I have accepted that the Lord may continue to call me to go in his name to every corner of the Earth, or that he has called me to be here in this place in this time for longer than previously anticipated. How can I expect the ones that love me the most to fully understand that movement of heart? I cannot. That is too much to expect for people to hear and feel the water that pours though me. 

Recently John and I did a devotional about this exact thing. "God providentially weaves the threads of His call through our lives, and only we can distinguish them. It is the threading of God's voice directly to us over a certain concern, and it is useless to seek another person's opinion of it." - Chambers. 

"But when God, called me by his grace, I did not consult any man." -Gal. 1:15-16 

It is all in a higher plan that we must follow and it some instances means that we must disregard the emotional connections we have to this world.

Silence

After saying goodbye to John in Beijing I depressingly put myself on a plane and flew up to Hailar. My intentions were to go help at Shamineau again. They run a two week winter camp for kids during their winter break. Turns out Inner Mongolia... way cold. Who knew!? So the first week I was there I prepared all the activities for the camp that later we discovered, would not be happening due to lack of campers. I stayed in Hailar for three weeks anyway. A majority of the time I spent at Jessy's where I watched TV online, emailed Rufio crazy long emails, IMed Wally, and talked to John on the phone. Busy Busy Busy! However in the process of all that business I learned to cook some Chinese dishes, learned to crochet, attempted and failed at making my own skirt, and took a short trip out to the camp. The trip to camp was amazing. It is beautiful out there as always. I have never seen a place that looked so vastly different by the season it was in. As different as this place seemed this trip around it was still just as breathtakingly beautiful as it had been before. This sense of smallness, that always overtakes me when I'm at this place was overwhelming this time. Seeing the earth blanketed in gleaming white snow creating this congruency of newness. What a blessing to witness this first hand. Aside from just being there we all took rides on the camel drawn sleigh. Which was crazy fun and crazy cold! Jessy and I both thought our toes were going to fall off, but what are a few toes when you think about having the experience of a camel sleigh through the grasslands really?!? Priorities people! haha

I came back to Changzhi last week. All the students have gone home for the spring festival. Campus is really quiet and the market is closed so I've been forced to cook everyday at home. Which I'm so great at let me tell you! wait... thats not true at all. I did make some peanut butter cookies that turned out pretty good last week however PB is in short supply here so I probably won't make those too often. 

Chinese new year was this past weekend. I spent it at Hellena's ho

me with her family. I had a great time! It was very similar to our Christmas. I learned to play Mai Jong and we shot off fireworks at midnight.. along with 1.3 billion other people. The next day we went to her sisters home where we ate a nice lunch with her whole family and I spent the afternoon w/ her nephew Jackie who speaks fluent English. He's very kind just like Hellena so I was happy to be in their presence. 

Today I went shopping with Sue, her boyfriend, and his friend Ken who are all from Kenya. We got suckered into singing Karaoke in the middle of this huge shopping center. You can't get the true China experience w/o KTV haha We sang "Right here waiting". Good times, then I got yelled at by a worker for trying to carry my shopping bag into the grocery store. Less good times. We walked home together because it wasn't so cold and they taught me some Swahili which turns out is much easier than Chinese. Bring it on Kenya! Here I come;-) haha 

All the lands are at rest and at peace; they break into singing. 

- Isaiah 14:7

June 9th Journal Entry

Dusk to Dusk I rest alone

Lost in fleeting thought

Transpiring to prayer

'Oh my King where do you lead me?

No longer waiting on your calling

Embracing your guidance

Following your will to go

Oh my King how heavy your name sits on my heart

How worthless I feel

to be called to it.

My king you chose me and I you.

Never alone again will my thoughts rest.

Never alone will my pains fall on empty ears.

Never alone will I ever be

for I carry the love of MY King with me.

Oh my King I will never forget 

what pain my salvation brought you.

Never will I forget the day you called me child

and spilt your precious blood for my empty soul.

What can I do to repay this gift?

What can I do but go and live and breath

Exactly where you send me.

Send me by sea or by air or by foot and I will go.

Train my ears to hear your pleas.

Train my eyes to see the needs.

These needs you built my heart to reach.

Train me now my King.

For your battle alone.

Train my soul's blood to be spread in your name.

Mine, that would NEVER reach the price of yours.

Yet still let it be opened by your love

to speak to those who need to hear.

Be with me now and always

Amen.'

John's travels into Eastern Christmas.

Big Buddha Statue, Lantao Island, Hong Kong

So John arrived on Dec. 5th and we have been very busy ever since. It's been so great getting to spend time with him over here and showing him what my life is like. I was really busy these past weeks finishing up my classes for the term and preparing for Christmas. We decorated the apartment and it looks really great. I showed him all around my city, to the lovely market, and to church. The sisters gave him a warm welcome of course. 

The second week John was here we went to Hong Kong for three days which was an amazing trip! The weather was perfect and traveling around down there was not difficult at all. We took a plane to Guangzhou then a train into Hong Kong. We stayed at an Oh so interesting Hostel and took ferry boats to other islands. We went to Disneyland just for the heck of it and we saw the Big Buddha statue and found this remote beach where we walked all around. We saw a random yak on the beach (only in China) and we also came across this restaurant  right on the beach where we sat and enjoyed the sunset and ate western food. Delicious! 

This week we had a Christmas party at the house. John cooked enchiladas. I made taco sauce from scratch. We had salsa, chips, and fruit salad. I also made a chocolate cake and Ann sent us a lot of Christmas candy. It was a great time!

Then we skyped for christmas with our families today which was hard to be away but a blessing in itself to have that technology. My dad got me this super fabulous necklace with our family crest on it! How awesome is that?!? (if you're reading this you should be jealous). Mom got me a great new watch. John got me Lost season 4 so we've been watching that today. Good Christmas. But I do wish I was at home.

Tomorrow John and I will travel to Beijing for the weekend and then he will leave and I will continue on to Mongolia again. Pray for me it's insanely cold there! I don't do well with cold. 

Disneyland Hong Kong

Christmas!!

Teaching together in Changzhi at a Middle School

Buddhist monastery, Lantao Island, Hong Kong

Secluded Beach we found :-)

Christmas Dinner Party. Enchilada's cooked by John

Below is the gift the sisters got John and me. It's mittens that we can wear together to hold hands during the cold days! TOTALLY USEFUL! 

Thanksgiving meets spiritual giving

So last week I was going to cook for the sisters and I was really excited about it but I was also really exhausted from the week and these American's in my town invited all of us to dinner at this nice restaurant so I decided to go there instead with the sister because he was going to have turkey, and they'd never had turkey before. It was a bittersweet day. I was busy with class and it was great to be with my friends, but it was different. The first year away from home for Thanksgiving. I missed it. 

Thanksgiving Dinner!

Cold, but pretty Mashed potatoes

Vera, Eve, and Me

Thanksgiving Toast!

I knew coming here would be a different experience for me. I felt closed in before I left. As if I was in this sealed up box. That the me I was suppose to be was outside the box waiting for me to connect with it but I was missing it. I was holding myself inside this place and not allowing growth on any level to occur in myself. The me I was called to be, the me I was suppose to be outside the box, waiting, was dying. I was letting this happen. Coming here, being in this place, being with myself, breaking out of that sealed up box has been this enlightening experience. It seems for this whole change to occur in me, for me to become the woman the Lord wants, and needs me to be I had to completely leave everything behind. Anything that could possibly keep me in that box, I had abandon. What a wonderful gift, to come to this place, to begin to become this person that I always knew I was called to be. To know I am being used as his tool. To realize that maybe I'm not called to be his voice but his feet, his hands. To know I am called to do, to go, and show all of the graces that have been given to me by the gift of this place, this opportunity. Pure undeniable gladness. 

John will be here tomorrow night. I'm excited about showing him around and letting him see my life here. I think it will connect us more if he can tangibly know the place I am in when I tell him stories. We're going to travel some while he's here and spend Christmas together. I'm excited about all this. Then after that I'm going back to Mongolia for a short time, hopefully, and then it will be time for the spring festival. I'm still not sure what my plans are for that time. We'll see! 

Side note: this is the funniest misspelled bag I've ever seen!

Time well lost.

So it's been over a month since I've written on here. Which is somewhat pathetic. So my reasoning behind this is that the first half of this time away literally nothing happened. I went to work, I ran in my tiny shoes, and I watched TV online, and frantically cleaned my apartment in preperation of my mom's arrival. THEN My momma came!!! I was so excited to have her here, though I did run out of shiny things to entertain her with but she still said she had a good time. During her first week here (which was the last week of October) We took a night bus to Xi'an to see the Terra Cotta Warrior

Which was a really fun experience. 

The first week she was here Kelly came over with her boyfriend and they cooked us authentic Chinese dinner, and the next day the sisters took us out to lunch at the noodle shop where the nice lady made us a special dinner from her hometown which the sisters and I thought was delicious but mom probably would have prefered a cheeseburger. (Just be honest) ;-)

Mom and I also spent the first week of her visit seeing the booming city of Changzhi, it was cold but the weather was still really pretty. 

After seeing pretty CZ sites mom had to go "teach" at the medical college where it turns out she was giving a big lecture to over 500 students. SURPRISE! 

The second week of her stay I had a halloween party for the sisters and Jenny. Which was really fun. I laid out a bunch of stuff for them to dress up in and I cooked spaghetti and we watched I am Legend together, which was the closest thing to a scary movie that I had. 

The final weekend of her stay we went to Beijing together where we did super fun shopping and I may or may not have yelled at a lady for grabbing my arm and pulling me. She wouldn't let me go otherwise! It was a justified response. We traveled around the city and saw the Great Wall, where it snowed!! First snow of the year and I saw it on the Great Wall with my mom. Good memory.

Mom left and that was difficult. But her visit was wonderful and I am glad we had that time together. I hope she enjoyed herself too. I think she did.

These past two weeks I've been kind of lazy. I ran a little I read a lot and have taken on an extra class on the weekend. Also I started my Chinese lessons finally. So I have two classes a week. It's a long road.

John will be here in two weeks! Next week I'm going to try to cook thanksgiving dinner for the sisters. I made a little list of foods I think I can learn to cook by then so we'll see how that goes...

I can't believe I've already been here for almost 5 months. It's gone by really quickly. What will happen when it's all gone? What will I do? Who will I be? I've found myself asking many questions about who I am in this changing image. I see my purpose here and I see God's hands at work all around. What a blessing to have these questions.