Love is as Love does

One week left

Sat, 13 Nov 2010 04:14:25 -0800

I realize I have been neglecting this blog for the last 3 weeks, so I promise to try to put some thoughts together within the next few days. I have reached my final week in Vietnam. I am SO excited to be coming home, but I will greatly miss this place and the people who have become my family these last 5 months. Here are a few pictures to hold you over until my next post:

My closest Vietnamese friend, Carol.

Rainy day in Hoi An.

Audrey and me treating ourselves to some deliciousness in Hoi An.

Last class with the munchkins. Very bittersweet.

Sat, 23 Oct 2010 21:02:14 -0700

Last class with the munchkins. Very bittersweet.

And the diagnosis is in...

Thu, 21 Oct 2010 03:39:05 -0700

I took a little visit to the doctor this morning and it seems that I have bronchitis again…this time with the added bonus of a throat infection (not really sure what that is, but that’s all the doctor could explain with limited English). So I’m trying out a different antibiotic this time. We’ll see how it goes. Prayers are always welcome :)

I am sick. Again. Luckily it is not as bad this time, at least so far. Kind of the same sickness...

Tue, 19 Oct 2010 04:55:53 -0700

I am sick. Again. Luckily it is not as bad this time, at least so far. Kind of the same sickness minus the fever. Although I’m very glad not to be as sick as the last few times, it is still pretty frustrating being sick here. I really just wish my mommy could appear and make me some chicken noodle soup :) Aside from my current sickness, things are going well here. I am really enjoying helping out with homeschool. It is great having such a structured curriculum, where the assignments are already chosen for each day and I just get to explain them, do fun activities, and help them improve their writing skills. By the end of my time with the girls they will have published an issue of their own newspaper. They are great kids and I love spending time with them. I work with them from 9-10 in the morning and they beg me to stay for lunch everyday. It is pretty adorable. On another note, I am beginning to understand what the other foreigners meant when they talked about hating the rainy season. Aside from the occasional day or two of sunshine, it just rains all the time. Your house and everything in it is in a constant state of dampness. Driving is a pain since driving a motorbike leaves you completely exposed to the elements. It is really tempting to curl up in bed and never leave. Of course once you muster up the courage to venture out it’s not actually as terrible as you made it out to be in your head. Sure you might get a little wet, but even just getting out and going to read at a coffee shop instead of at home is so much better than being cooped up in your house for days on end. I admire the Vietnamese people very much for what they deal with weather wise. Us Californians are incredibly spoiled.

Photo

Fri, 15 Oct 2010 02:46:01 -0700

Notice the kid in mid air

Rehearsing their play

Performing the play for parents

And Group 2

Wed, 13 Oct 2010 09:42:35 -0700

And Group 2

Group 1 of my students performing their skit.

Wed, 13 Oct 2010 09:41:59 -0700

Group 1 of my students performing their skit.

Photo

Sat, 09 Oct 2010 11:04:22 -0700

I seriously cannot believe how fast time is passing. I have been here for about 4 months already and...

Tue, 05 Oct 2010 23:53:53 -0700

I seriously cannot believe how fast time is passing. I have been here for about 4 months already and as the end of my time here gets nearer it seems to go by even faster. I booked my flight home so I will officially be landing in LA on November 20. AND my friend Kaitlyn is going to be coming home for the holidays so we will be on the same flight back! I am very excited to have a travel buddy this time around. In my last post I said that my last day at the English school would be October 5, which was yesterday…but a few days ago one of the directors talked to me again and said they really want me to continue with one of my classes until the 23 and then a new teacher will take over…so I agreed. Although I was really looking forward to being done, I am glad to have a little more time with my students because they are just so lovable and I am really going to miss them. This past month I have been able to get more involved in the international fellowship here. About three weeks ago they started up a young adult Bible study on Saturday nights. We are doing a manuscript study of Galations and have had some really good discussions so far. It has been great to get to know more of the young adults and feel more a part of that community. We have all been going out to lunch or coffee after church on Sundays, and this past Monday a group of us got together to learn some salsa dancing from one of the guys. We couldn’t get enough guys to come for all of the girls to have partners so we had to improvise a little, but it was so much fun! I have such mixed feelings about going home relatively soon. I miss my family and friends so much and am really excited to see them. But at the same time I feel like I am finally starting to feel at home here. I have finally gotten to the point where I can drive around the city without getting lost (most of the time), driving in the crazy traffic seems normal, I know of quite a few good food places, and I know where to buy all the things I need. I have great friends and get to work with some great kids. Living here is still a million times more difficult than back home, but I have reached a point where life here has become normal. There are so many things that I am going to miss. Although I definitely will not miss the giant cockroaches and rats.

Next week I will begin helping out with the homeschooling and I am really excited that I get to spend the rest of my time here helping out this family. Their organization is doing some really great things and I am happy to be able to support their ministry in this way. Well, I think that’s all I have for you today. I’m still working on the whole taking more pictures thing so stay tuned :)

Ready for the rainy season.

Thu, 30 Sep 2010 11:09:53 -0700

Ready for the rainy season.

A quick update

Fri, 24 Sep 2010 23:28:49 -0700

Sorry it’s been a while since I’ve written. Here’s the latest. I had my cell phone stolen and had to buy a new one. Good news is I got a phone, a sim card and about half a months worth of credit on my card for about $35. The stolen motorbike has been returned!!! I met with the owner yesterday to settle the money situation and we decided that since the bike was gone for 3 months and during that time I would have been renting it from him that I would pay for the 3 months…which is AWESOME compared to having to pay the full price of the bike. Praise God! My official last day teaching English will be October 5 and I am still very happy with my decision to quit. And I have found some volunteer work! Previously I was teaching dance classes through an organization called Orphan Voice…the directors of Orphan Voice are an older couple from the States, Cindy and Tony Brewer, and they have 5 young daughters (all of which are adopted I believe). Cindy home-schools the girls and it is just becoming too much for her so she has been looking for some help, but can’t pay anyone to do it. Enter me. I will be volunteering my time teaching Language Arts to Jillian and Anna May, who are in the 6th and 5th grades, for the remainder of my time here. It is interesting how I thought the best thing I could do was something working with Vietnamese kids, but since my time here is relatively short it is probably even more helpful to support those who have been here for years and will be here after I leave. And lastly, I will be booking my ticket home within the next week and I will be coming back just in time for Thanksgiving! Originally I wanted to come home just before Christmas, but my Visa expires the week after Thanksgiving so I have decided to leave a little earlier and be back in time to see more family all at once. Well, I think that’s all the news I have for today. Time to finish up some of my last English lesson plans. Peace and love from Vietnam.

p.s. I promised my mom today that I would be better at taking pictures so I’ll post more pictures soon.

News and Epiphanies

Mon, 13 Sep 2010 01:00:49 -0700

My current courses at the English school finish on October 2. I had originally committed to then teach the next courses that go through December, but today I gave my official notice that I will be leaving the school. I have been asked to begin the new courses with my classes and teach until mid-October when several new teachers will arrive and someone will be able to take over for me. All of my time here thus far has been a great learning experience - learning more about what I don’t want to do forever. I’ve never been a fan of the idea of a career and am enjoying trying a little bit of this and that, especially since my interests are always changing as I get older. But most of my exploring over the last few years has lead to discoveries of what I don’t want to do, not what I do want to do. I have enjoyed my time as an English teacher and I will be incredibly sad to leave my students, but I feel very much at peace about my decision to quit. I feel like during my time here in Vietnam I am being given the opportunity to really explore and seek out what my passions are, what breaks my heart, and what my role is in trying to repair our broken world. Through many conversations with my friend Kaitlin (whom I have found to be somewhat of a kindred spirit), I have had some “light bulb” moments in regards to all of this. The reason I wanted to come to Vietnam was to work with orphans, and the reason I wanted to work with orphans was because of my past experiences working with orphans in Ukraine. During those trips to Ukraine I felt like I was doing exactly what I was created to do, like my passions and my work were finally aligned in those moments spent playing with the kids. So I thought I had figured out what I was supposed to do. But this time has been different. My time spent with the kids at the orphanage here has not given me that feeling. I no longer see the individual kids when I go to the orphanage, I see the orphanage itself and the systemic problems that created the need for it. One day recently Kaitlin and I were talking about this and how when it comes to solving the world’s problems there are two approaches and two kinds of people to go along with them. These two approaches are charity work and justice work. Charity work focuses on meeting direct needs, treating the symptoms of larger problems like poverty or human trafficking by giving out food or clothing or building shelters. Justice work focuses on the root of the problems rather than the symptoms. It is about transformation on the systemic level. Both charity work and justice work are important and necessary, and different people are better suited for the different types of work. In the past, I was perfectly content to be involved in charity work. But the past few years have changed me so much and I now find myself on the other side, as a justice person. This is why I haven’t had that same feeling of purpose in my work here. This realization was so important for me to have because I had been feeling sort of guilty and wondering why I didn’t seem to care more about loving these kids. But I don’t need to feel that way. I do care about loving these kids, just in a different way than before. This may not be making any sense to you, but it has been a huge epiphany for me in my search for a place in the bigger picture.

So now I have 4 more weeks of teaching English, which means 4 weeks to figure out what I will do next. I have begun the search for volunteer work once again. One possibility is working with an organization called AOG World Relief, which does a lot of work in community development. Kaitlin is currently volunteering with them so she is my connection to seeing if they need any more help. As always I will keep you updated on whatever I find. Sorry for the long ramblings. If you made it this far I am very impressed :) Thank you all for your continued prayers! Peace and love from Vietnam.

A visit to the Vietnamese doctor's office

Sat, 11 Sep 2010 06:15:46 -0700

As you know if you read my last post, I have been sick again - sore throat, cough, congestion, fever, body aches. So after 3 days of this I decided it was time to see a doctor. I really had no idea how to go about doing this so I called Teresa, who is also a teacher at the English center (and is the director’s wife so she has been here for a long time, and is a mother so she’s always the one to call at a time like this). She told her husband, Mr. Hai, who set up an appointment for me at the doctor’s office where he and his family usually go. I had talked to Teresa on Thursday, so on Friday morning I get a call from one of the Vietnamese girls from work, Xuan, who tells me to meet her at the school in half an hour and she will take me to see the doctor. It was 10:00 am when she called me which, obviously (if you know me well), means I was still asleep. So I jumped out of bed, brushed my teeth, threw on some clothes and drove to school. When I walked in all of the girls asked how I was feeling, which I thought would have been pretty obvious what with the fact that I pretty much looked like death. I went upstairs to the teachers’ room, found Xuan, and off we went to the doctor’s office, her driving my motorbike with me on the back holding on for dear life (Vietnamese people are crazy drivers!). It’s only about a 10 minute drive and we arrive at what appears to be a house, much like many of the restaurants and stores here. The bottom floor of a house is often used to run the family business. The front room is set up as a waiting room where at least 10 Vietnamese people are already waiting to see the doctor. I sign in, collapse into a chair, and try not to breathe too much in order to prevent getting any more germs. No one asks for any form of ID, needs to see my insurance card, or gives me massive amounts of paperwork to fill out about myself and my medical history. So I just sit and wait. An hour later, just like my doctor’s office back home in the states, it is finally my turn. Xuan and I go into the very small back room where the doctor is sitting at a computer desk. There is one extra chair for me to sit down. Luckily, the doctor speaks some English so I am able to tell him my symptoms with a little translation here and there from Xuan. He nods his head, looks down my throat, up my nose and in my ears. Then he pulls out the stethoscope and listens to my lungs. More things to note: I was not first seen by a nurse who weighed me, took my temperature, blood pressure, heart rate and other such things. After listening to my breathing he determines it to be acute bronchitis and proceeds to find me the appropriate medications. Another interesting fact: in Vietnam all medications seem to be for one purpose only, so if you have a cold with a stuffy nose, sore throat, cough, and headache you will get at least 4 different kinds of medication. So the doctor begins explaining to Xuan in Vietnamese how often I am to take each of the medications, puts them in a bag and hands them to me. Since I know that one of these has to be an antibiotic, and I happen to be allergic to penicillin, I open the bag to find out what I have just been given and so that Xuan can explain to me the doctor’s instructions. I pull out the first box of pills, reading the name of the company, blah blah blah, and then there it is - amoxicillin. I momentarily freak out and then explain to Xuan that I can’t take this medicine because I am allergic. Note: if there had been some sort of paperwork filled out the doctor would have know this ahead of time. So she explains to the doctor who nods, digs through his pills once again and pulls out another antibiotic - clarithromycin. I remember that back home my doctor would always prescribe erythromycin which must be related to this one. Ok, so this one seems safe. More explanations about when to take all the pills, Xuan pays for the visit and the medicine (the school covers doctor’s visits for teachers) and we are off. After dropping Xuan back off at the school I somehow managed to get myself some lunch and make it back to my house without collapsing. It was quite the interesting experience. 8 days later I am doing much better, but this pesky cough doesn’t want to go away. I’m sure it is probably a combination of the sickness and the horribly polluted air I breathe every day. Anyway, that’s my latest adventure, and the end of my desire to continue writing tonight.

Such fun...

Wed, 01 Sep 2010 02:49:39 -0700

…it is to be sick. Again. I just love having a fever…burning up and then suddenly getting the chills. Laying in bed all day. Such fun it is.

Photo

Fri, 27 Aug 2010 01:38:14 -0700

"Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day I can hear her breathing."

Mon, 23 Aug 2010 23:27:09 -0700

““Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day I can hear her breathing.””

- Arundhati Roy

Some more pictures for you

Sun, 22 Aug 2010 03:27:46 -0700

Here are some pictures of my house that I share with my friend Ashleigh and an older woman, Karlee.

These are the front doors and the front room which we just use as a “garage”

The downstairs hallway leading from the front room to the kitchen.

The kitchen.

Downstairs bathroom and laundry area.

Upstairs living room…in case you haven’t noticed, we can’t afford furniture :)

Upstairs hallway. The first door is my room.

My room.

Upstairs bathroom.

View from the balcony out the front of the house.

View out the back of the house.

So that’s my house :)

Aren’t my students adorable?

Thu, 19 Aug 2010 10:28:07 -0700

Aren’t my students adorable?

Being sick this past week and confined to my house has given me a lot of time to reflect. Since I am...

Wed, 18 Aug 2010 09:53:24 -0700

Being sick this past week and confined to my house has given me a lot of time to reflect. Since I am not spending anywhere near as much time volunteering as I thought I would be, it has started to feel like I am wasting time. I know that this is not true. I know that the kids at Promise House are having a blast with my dance class. I know that I can have an impact on my English students and that the relationships I have built here are important, but sometimes it just doesn’t feel like enough. I am still trying to get in contact with the right people to start volunteering at the baby orphanage and I really hope that works out. Even just a few hours a week there would make a huge difference in how I feel about being here. I pray that God would continue to affirm my place here and remind me daily that my life here has purpose. That I’m not crazy for leaving everything I know and moving to the other side of world. I need to be mindful daily that sometimes the smallest things can make the biggest difference.

So the story of the stolen motorbike continues...

Wed, 18 Aug 2010 09:46:52 -0700

Well, the good news is that my stolen motorbike has been found! Pretty unbelievable. Apparently whoever stole it sold it to a motorbike shop, who then sold it to a girl, who was then seen driving it by a friend of the owner, who followed the girl and called the police. Here comes the bad news: the police have the bike and told us that they won’t give it back until they find the thieves…which could be tomorrow, next week, next month, or never. It is so frustrating knowing that the bike has been found, but I still might have to pay for it if the police won’t give it back. Please pray that they catch whoever stole it and soon! And thank you SO much to everyone who has given so generously to help me in this situation. I will let you know how things pan out. Peace and love to all back home :) Good night.