Before arriving in Malaysia, I truly had no idea what to expect. All I really knew is that Malaysia is comprised of primarily three main people groups: Malays, Chinese, and Indians. And I was also told that it is predominately Muslim. Kuala Lumpur (KL), the country’s capital, is your typical big city (with about 10 times the number of malls you would expect a city to have…not complaining about that), complete with a Starbucks, monorail system, and lots of construction. But sooner rather than later, God allowed this big city to become like home to me and allowed me to love people who were once strangers with the same kind of love I have for my own family. In a city of a million different faces, God revealed to me how precious the lives and the stories are of each and every one of them.
To make a long story short, due to some remodeling at the first hostel my team was staying in, we moved to another hostel with the help of our kind friend, Mac, who ran the first hostel we stayed in. Shortly after moving in to our new hostel, we realized that we were now in a very different part of the city. We lived in an area called “Arab Street” due to the high Arab immigrant population. After talking with several different people, we realized in this little section of KL there were immigrants from Syria, Egypt, Iraq, Yemen, as well as many people from Bangladesh and other countries. And if you know me, you know I was all about this.
With so many refugees and immigrants, I soon came to think of KL as “Malaysia’s Waiting Room.” So many people crowded the streets and so many people were clearly not from Malaysia. So many of these refugees were just waiting for their opportunity to be settled in a new country and to restart their lives. They were simply waiting.
How easy is it to be in such a ginormous city and be so completely overwhelmed by the crowds, the smells, the sounds, the stores? But in a city full of 1.7 million faces, there are also 1.7 million precious stories. I say precious because I believe that’s how the Father sees them. He doesn’t view these people’s lives as just a tragic story, like a family being torn apart from war. And He doesn’t view the man who is addicted to alcohol on the street as just a wasted life. Because how easy is it to walk by street vendors without even giving them a simple “No, thank you.” How easy is it to not even make eye contact with the homeless man on the street that you pass literally every single day? The Father’s heart is full of compassion for every life, and I’m thankful that through the hustle and bustle of life in KL, I too was able to view these precious people this way.
I want to share with you about how doing Ask the Lord (ATL) ministry in KL forever affected the way I want to live my life. I was mostly affected by the refugee population that I came to know while I was in the city. There were Nepalese security guards, men from Syria who were separated from their family and working in restaurants, 20-year olds from Bangladesh handing out menus on the street, only planning on working for a few years before they could go back to their country and continue helping their family, and Nigerians working in hostels waiting for the day when they could finally be reunited with their wife and daughter.
Well, if there’s one thing I have been learning how to do this year, it is to truly see people. So while our team walked the streets of KL every day, that’s what I tried to do. And it was so worth it. The friendships I made, just through a simple smile that started conversation, were incredible. And I want to briefly share with you one of these stories:
Nick sold perfume on the street that we walked on every day. One day as we were passing by Nick, he made a comment to one of my teammates about how great her smile is and that she should keep smiling. Let me just say that being a group of 7 American girls walking around in an Asian city, we naturally tend to have a lot of people say things to us in passing. We tend to stand out. But Nick was different, and he was so kind. So we remembered Nick and made it a point to visit him the next day, and the days to follow. This sparked a new friendship and we would stop and talk to Nick every day as he stood outside of his perfume shop. One day, we mentioned to Nick how we were wanting to visit the national mosque that was a bit of a drive away. Nick quickly offered to take us there and show us around. We had only known Nick for about a week at this point, but decided to take him up on his offer. Nick told us that his brother would come as well. We weren’t sure what to expect, but that week we headed to the mosque with Nick, his brother, Ali, and their friend, all who are Muslim. This day sparked such a special friendship between our team, Nick, and Ali.
We couldn’t figure out why Nick and Ali were so incredibly kind to us, or what we had done to deserve their favor, but they were. After stepping out and getting to know this incredible pair of brothers, we were privileged to hear their story, how they came from Iraq, were currently separated from their family, but had hopes to one day be reunited. They were simply waiting. We were able to meet Ali’s eight-year old daughter and even spend the day with her and take her with us to a Hello Kitty Café (my dream). On our last night, they treated us to a five-course Iraqi meal, which was incredible. What did we do to deserve such a friendship? Honestly, all we did was take the time to see Nick. To get to know him. But the way we were blessed by him went above and beyond.
By choosing to see, by choosing to ask questions, by choosing to stop and talk on my way to do something else, I not only got to know such a kind friend, but also his family. We never knew how much our smiles, or the simple act of stopping to talk to Nick, would mean to him, but he told us it meant an incredible amount. He thanked us for trusting him and thanked us for his friendship.
Jesus loves Nick more than I could even imagine. Jesus adores the man who bombards me with a menu every time I walk by his restaurant. Jesus is crazy about the woman at Starbucks who I can so easily not even give the time of day. And each one of these people have an incredible story and want to be heard. Each one of these people long to be seen and known. So the question is: Am I going to do that?
