So, I wouldn't desire the subject of my first post after nearly a month's hiatus to be feces, but when life dumps such a lesson on you (da Dum dum) you run with it.
I have stepped in poop three times in China. Three. That is almost once per month. I'm getting a little tired of cleaning the crap off my shoe. When I stepped in it today getting onto the school bus, several staff members made jokes about me not learning from mistakes one and two. It's not a problem that everyone suffers from - seemingly just me.
And because my mind loves making connections, it just took that idea and unraveled it a bit more. Even though I seem to be the only one suffering from an obnoxious oblivion to what I'm stepping in (poo), I am decidedly not the only one suffering from an obnoxious oblivion to what we all are stepping in (foolishness, pride, selfishness, etc.).
We are broken people. We have hurts and pains of our own. Our loneliness often overwhelms us. But none of that excuses us from our prideful hearts of stone. So many times we, His children, think we know best, and we continue to walk in our own way until we step in it. And then we have to deal with the mess we made, while He was telling us not to step there in the first place.
The longer I am alive, the more I am frustrated my own faults and weaknesses. The more I see how clean He is, the more I see just how much poo I have slathered all over myself.
But what a blessing that he has a cross-shaped hose that blasts me clean with high-powered jets that clean me inside and out. And even though I will certainly continue to step in it (both literally and figuratively), what peace to know that I can be clean again.
. . .a taste of life for an expat in qingdao, china
Friday, November 18, 2011
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Chapter 25: On Squatties, Yaks, Ranch Dressing, and Roller Coasters
Before you travel overseas for a vacation, short-term habitation, or long-term settling down, here are some things to keep in mind. If this is supremely irrelevant to you, I'm giving you permission to stop reading this and jump back into the hustle and bustle of your everyday life. But even if you aren't planning on doing any of the things mentioned above, it can still be helpful to understand what expats (those who live away from their home country) go through.
(One quick word of warning: I am not an expert on this topic by any means. Many people have much more experience and are far wiser on this topic, but these are some things that I have noticed/"borrowed" from others.)
Be Ready for the Squatties
Low expectations = high happiness. "Oh, there's no toilets here except squatty potties? Well, I was expecting no toilets at all, so thank goodness for the squatties!" This attitude is hard to have, but if you can culture it within yourself, it is really helpful. It will help you deal with many frustrating circumstances, of which you will have many. The higher your expectations are for a place, the harder you will fall from your sunshiny rainbows and happy little clouds of idealism into the grungy, pungent, and stressful realm of reality - unable to see the positive and beautiful aspects of a culture because you are so upset that it isn't what you wanted it to be.
That being said, once you get over your disappointment (which takes about 9 months), you will grow to love your host culture and really start to see its valuable contributions to your life and the world.
Know that You Are NOT a Yak
When yaks enter the world, they are able to stand almost immediately. They need some help from their parents, but they are fairly self-sufficient.
You are not a yak. Whenever you enter a new circumstance, you will take time - a lot of time - to figure out how to simply live. All that wonderful ambition about making a difference in the world will come in handy, but it must be tempered with patience. For the first few weeks/months/years, you will be a fleshy lump of a baby, just soaking in the culture well enough to communicate effectively. So keep up your dreams of making a difference, but realize that they will not be realized immediately (or ever in some circumstances).
Reach Out to Others
It's really great if you can get to know someone in the place that you are going before you go there. This will help you understand what the place will be like and give you a new friend. This will also help your expectations to be more realistic.
Also under this category: make friends once you get to your new location. (Um, duh, Warren.) Sounds obvious, but one of the things about being in a new situation is that your personality characteristics are exaggerated. If you are an introvert, you will be a super introvert. If you are an extrovert, you will be a lot to handle in your first few months with all your extroverted energy. If you are an extrovert, try to cool yourself down a little so people get to know the real you. If you are an introvert, step out of your comfort zone and reach out to those around you.
Bring Some Powdered Ranch Dressing Packets
Believe it or not, other places are not America. And even though we Americans are doing our best to spread ourselves over every possible inch of this world, many of the things we assume are standard are only standard in America. This is both good and bad. It is good in that we can empathize more realistically with those who live "without", we can see where we have been wasteful and extravagant, and we can enjoy living in a different style than we are used to. It can be bad in that this makes it that much more difficult to transition to a new place, and we are "forced" to live in a different style than we are used to. It helps a lot to bring things that will make your new place feel like home.
Be Prepared for the Roller Coaster
Even if you know all of these things and more, you will still have to experience them for yourself. And you will have some days of rapturous joy and other days of complete frustration. The key is to remember that eventually, things will even out and the emotional roller coaster will eventually lose its chutzpah. Life in your new location will become more "normal" (By the way, once this happens, you will be perfectly set up for a whole new world - one you may not have known existed: reverse culture shock. But that is another topic for another time).
What else is helpful for someone moving or traveling overseas? Please contribute ideas freely! Like I said, many of you know the expat game better than I do. I would love to hear your thoughts.
(One quick word of warning: I am not an expert on this topic by any means. Many people have much more experience and are far wiser on this topic, but these are some things that I have noticed/"borrowed" from others.)
- - - - -
Be Ready for the Squatties
Low expectations = high happiness. "Oh, there's no toilets here except squatty potties? Well, I was expecting no toilets at all, so thank goodness for the squatties!" This attitude is hard to have, but if you can culture it within yourself, it is really helpful. It will help you deal with many frustrating circumstances, of which you will have many. The higher your expectations are for a place, the harder you will fall from your sunshiny rainbows and happy little clouds of idealism into the grungy, pungent, and stressful realm of reality - unable to see the positive and beautiful aspects of a culture because you are so upset that it isn't what you wanted it to be.
That being said, once you get over your disappointment (which takes about 9 months), you will grow to love your host culture and really start to see its valuable contributions to your life and the world.
Know that You Are NOT a Yak
When yaks enter the world, they are able to stand almost immediately. They need some help from their parents, but they are fairly self-sufficient.
You are not a yak. Whenever you enter a new circumstance, you will take time - a lot of time - to figure out how to simply live. All that wonderful ambition about making a difference in the world will come in handy, but it must be tempered with patience. For the first few weeks/months/years, you will be a fleshy lump of a baby, just soaking in the culture well enough to communicate effectively. So keep up your dreams of making a difference, but realize that they will not be realized immediately (or ever in some circumstances).
Reach Out to Others
It's really great if you can get to know someone in the place that you are going before you go there. This will help you understand what the place will be like and give you a new friend. This will also help your expectations to be more realistic.
Also under this category: make friends once you get to your new location. (Um, duh, Warren.) Sounds obvious, but one of the things about being in a new situation is that your personality characteristics are exaggerated. If you are an introvert, you will be a super introvert. If you are an extrovert, you will be a lot to handle in your first few months with all your extroverted energy. If you are an extrovert, try to cool yourself down a little so people get to know the real you. If you are an introvert, step out of your comfort zone and reach out to those around you.
Bring Some Powdered Ranch Dressing Packets
Believe it or not, other places are not America. And even though we Americans are doing our best to spread ourselves over every possible inch of this world, many of the things we assume are standard are only standard in America. This is both good and bad. It is good in that we can empathize more realistically with those who live "without", we can see where we have been wasteful and extravagant, and we can enjoy living in a different style than we are used to. It can be bad in that this makes it that much more difficult to transition to a new place, and we are "forced" to live in a different style than we are used to. It helps a lot to bring things that will make your new place feel like home.
Be Prepared for the Roller Coaster
Even if you know all of these things and more, you will still have to experience them for yourself. And you will have some days of rapturous joy and other days of complete frustration. The key is to remember that eventually, things will even out and the emotional roller coaster will eventually lose its chutzpah. Life in your new location will become more "normal" (By the way, once this happens, you will be perfectly set up for a whole new world - one you may not have known existed: reverse culture shock. But that is another topic for another time).
- - - - -
What else is helpful for someone moving or traveling overseas? Please contribute ideas freely! Like I said, many of you know the expat game better than I do. I would love to hear your thoughts.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Chapter 24: In Which the Writer Comes to an Understanding about Personal Stress Levels and How They Can Negatively Affect One's Social Life
Holy overload, Baman! This has been a crazy couple of weeks, and will continue to be so. We had a week break last week for Chinese National Holiday. We went up to Beijing for a teacher conference. The day after we got back, we took a staff retreat to Weihai on the north side of the peninsula. Fun, but really busy. And not allowing time for getting my teaching stuff done.
And hooray! This coming weekend we have another trip around the province. With the quarter end next week, I'm starting to wonder why the timing was so close for all of these trips. . .
BUT, even though it's stressful, I'm enjoying my students a lot, and one of the main reasons for my stress is that I'm taking the time and effort to make my teaching more effective (which is rewarding).
At the Beijing conference, a good friend shared about stress as a first year teacher here. He mentioned that we all have a certain amount of stress that we can handle and when that overflows, we snap. The stress overflows. For me, that comes in the form of me dumping mounds of frustration on whoever happens to be within earshot (not a fan of this personal characteristic).
I can sense that I am too close for comfort to that stress line. It might be time for me to take a step back and do that which I hate to do: say no.
I'm not the kind of person that easily says no to social events. In fact I have to basically be at the point where I currently reside (at the borderline crush-your-spirit-and-hopes-for-life stress level (that might be a bit over-dramatic)) to even think about saying no when someone wants to do something.
But I think that the next week and a half will be a time not of sharing laughter and joy around a dinner table, but of sitting down and powering through the stacks of papers that have been building up (That's right. I'm a bad teacher. I don't hand my students' homework back immediately.), planning lessons that still reach every student, and writing a report card paragraph about every. single. student. Uffda*.
*The spell-checker for Blogger clearly isn't from Minnesota. Also, I have taught this word to four Chinese people.
And hooray! This coming weekend we have another trip around the province. With the quarter end next week, I'm starting to wonder why the timing was so close for all of these trips. . .
BUT, even though it's stressful, I'm enjoying my students a lot, and one of the main reasons for my stress is that I'm taking the time and effort to make my teaching more effective (which is rewarding).
At the Beijing conference, a good friend shared about stress as a first year teacher here. He mentioned that we all have a certain amount of stress that we can handle and when that overflows, we snap. The stress overflows. For me, that comes in the form of me dumping mounds of frustration on whoever happens to be within earshot (not a fan of this personal characteristic).
I can sense that I am too close for comfort to that stress line. It might be time for me to take a step back and do that which I hate to do: say no.
I'm not the kind of person that easily says no to social events. In fact I have to basically be at the point where I currently reside (at the borderline crush-your-spirit-and-hopes-for-life stress level (that might be a bit over-dramatic)) to even think about saying no when someone wants to do something.
But I think that the next week and a half will be a time not of sharing laughter and joy around a dinner table, but of sitting down and powering through the stacks of papers that have been building up (That's right. I'm a bad teacher. I don't hand my students' homework back immediately.), planning lessons that still reach every student, and writing a report card paragraph about every. single. student. Uffda*.
*The spell-checker for Blogger clearly isn't from Minnesota. Also, I have taught this word to four Chinese people.
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Chapter 23: Of Momentary Yielding, Volume II
These last few weeks have been crazy. So busy with school and life and extras (it's getting to be a bit stressful). But one of the coolest parts in these weeks happened yesterday.
We have this program that encourages students to think more deeply about life and truth. They go away for the weekend and open up and share with each other. Even though this event is only for high schoolers (and I teach middle school), I was invited to lead a section of the weekend called The Hootenanny. Really fun.
One of the skits that we did was about a girl who had invited Him to take the wheel (I know, flashes of Carrie Underwood just traveled through all y'all's minds). Even though the girl had originally asked him to come, she kept pushing him out of the driver's seat when something "more exciting" came along.
As I was watching this skit, I felt like a hypocrite. How many times do I take over instead of letting him be in control? 'Far too many' is the answer to that question.
It seems that I am living two different lives: the life that he wants where everything is good and pure and it is easy to do the right thing, and the life of selfish disobedience where I choose to take control of my own life and immediately run it into the ground. But then I remember what I honestly want - to follow him. I abdicate and allow him to rule, only to snatch power back when I see difficulty coming.
Stupid old man within me. Why can't he stay dead?
We have this program that encourages students to think more deeply about life and truth. They go away for the weekend and open up and share with each other. Even though this event is only for high schoolers (and I teach middle school), I was invited to lead a section of the weekend called The Hootenanny. Really fun.
One of the skits that we did was about a girl who had invited Him to take the wheel (I know, flashes of Carrie Underwood just traveled through all y'all's minds). Even though the girl had originally asked him to come, she kept pushing him out of the driver's seat when something "more exciting" came along.
As I was watching this skit, I felt like a hypocrite. How many times do I take over instead of letting him be in control? 'Far too many' is the answer to that question.
It seems that I am living two different lives: the life that he wants where everything is good and pure and it is easy to do the right thing, and the life of selfish disobedience where I choose to take control of my own life and immediately run it into the ground. But then I remember what I honestly want - to follow him. I abdicate and allow him to rule, only to snatch power back when I see difficulty coming.
Stupid old man within me. Why can't he stay dead?
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Chapter 22: Of Momentary Yielding, Volume I
I'm in a strange place. I'm new to China but not new to living apart from my passport country (as we say here), family, and friends. Part of me is still super excited to be in China, but part of me is also really tired of being far away from people I know and love.
One of the major differences between China and Nigeria is that China has a lot more. There is constant electricity; there are stores like Wal-Mart, B&Q (British Home Depot), and Carrefour (French Target); there are paved roads without potholes; there are multiple Starbucks, KFCs, and McDonald's; and there is a fellowship of expats that is phenomenal.
But sometimes having all of those things just makes me miss the things I don't have - namely, important people in my life.
I got an email the other day from a friend back home and, honestly, the first thought that ran through my head was, "Whew! He still remembers me." This is not to say that I haven't been blessed by friends who are good at keeping up with me, or with a family that is patient with my poor communication skills. This was, however, a momentary yielding to a heavy thought that seems to be pressing more and more against the edges of my consciousness - this isn't a short term trip anymore. It has become a lifestyle, and one which I don't see the end of anytime soon (though who am I to say?).
And even though I have been expecting this since the fourth grade, it is still a weighty realization to come to.
One of the major differences between China and Nigeria is that China has a lot more. There is constant electricity; there are stores like Wal-Mart, B&Q (British Home Depot), and Carrefour (French Target); there are paved roads without potholes; there are multiple Starbucks, KFCs, and McDonald's; and there is a fellowship of expats that is phenomenal.
But sometimes having all of those things just makes me miss the things I don't have - namely, important people in my life.
I got an email the other day from a friend back home and, honestly, the first thought that ran through my head was, "Whew! He still remembers me." This is not to say that I haven't been blessed by friends who are good at keeping up with me, or with a family that is patient with my poor communication skills. This was, however, a momentary yielding to a heavy thought that seems to be pressing more and more against the edges of my consciousness - this isn't a short term trip anymore. It has become a lifestyle, and one which I don't see the end of anytime soon (though who am I to say?).
And even though I have been expecting this since the fourth grade, it is still a weighty realization to come to.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Chapter 21: About the Author's Sister on Her Birthday
Reasons My Sister Is So Great
5. My sister is legitimately fun! We always have a good time when we are together, whether that's going hiking, kayaking, or simply going out to coffee and talking.
4. She is easy to talk to. She really listens (and helps me to do the same;). And she has good insights into other peoples' problems.
3. She has loads of self-discipline and motivation. I am so proud of the ways that she works to change her life for the better as a mom, a daughter, a sister, a friend, and a person. And she has dealt with some hard issues and circumstances in her life and handled them amazingly well.
2. She is a wonderful mom. I am amazed by her children, and that speaks loads about how much effort and love both she and Chris are devoting to their kids. And now little Natalie has been blessed with a mom who has loved her for months before she was even born.
1. My sister loves Him a lot. None of these reasons would mean anything in the long run if she didn't. I love seeing how He keeps changing her heart to be more like His. And I pray that she will continue to be as open to his molding.
Saturday, September 3, 2011
Chapter 20: On His Niece, Natalie Aubrielle
I spent the past two days with middle school students in a city called Weihai. It was really great, and I had some fantastic moments, but that is not the point of this post.
In Nigeria, I found out that my sister was pregnant and due on September 2. Part of me was hoping that the baby would come while I was in the US, but (thankfully) she did not come. So I moved to China and knew that I would not get to meet this little girl until she was almost 2.
Back to Weihai: I was hoping that I would be able to Skype with my family when Leann went into labor. If not that, I was hoping to Skype with them pretty soon after the baby was born. Unfortunately, I was at fall camp when little Natalie was born, so I still have not had the chance to talk to my family. It's hard.
Now, I'm not the hugest fan of babies (though some of the staff babies here are doing their best to change that!), but as soon as I saw my brother-in-law's picture of my niece on Facebook, I was a fan of her.
I'm not sure how blessings work, but I couldn't help but kiss her digital forehead and say a prayer for her.
I am sure the good Lord can transmit the blessing of a kiss even through an avenue such as Facebook.
Natalie Aubrielle Symons, I wish I could hold you, but that day will come soon enough.
In Nigeria, I found out that my sister was pregnant and due on September 2. Part of me was hoping that the baby would come while I was in the US, but (thankfully) she did not come. So I moved to China and knew that I would not get to meet this little girl until she was almost 2.
Back to Weihai: I was hoping that I would be able to Skype with my family when Leann went into labor. If not that, I was hoping to Skype with them pretty soon after the baby was born. Unfortunately, I was at fall camp when little Natalie was born, so I still have not had the chance to talk to my family. It's hard.
Now, I'm not the hugest fan of babies (though some of the staff babies here are doing their best to change that!), but as soon as I saw my brother-in-law's picture of my niece on Facebook, I was a fan of her.
I'm not sure how blessings work, but I couldn't help but kiss her digital forehead and say a prayer for her.
I am sure the good Lord can transmit the blessing of a kiss even through an avenue such as Facebook.
Natalie Aubrielle Symons, I wish I could hold you, but that day will come soon enough.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)