i received the BEST COMPLIMENT today…
“you use chopsticks good!” saaaahweeet!!! and let me tell you…it is a stinkin struggle. especially when you have no other option and they are staring at you. you are sitting there thinking, “oh please Lord, please Lord…just let these noodles stay in between these wooden sticks for once! please!!” and then once you lift from the bowl, you continue the prayer…”please let them not slip out before they get to my mouth!” the funny thing about chinese people is they put the bowl right up to their mouth often and just scoop it in. and SLURP it in. woah. that’s a cultural difference right there.
so maybe you are wondering what exactly we did today. well, this morning we were to be out of the hotel by 12, and on our way back to meet up with everyone else. tomorrow we were supposed to head to another city for a week that is near tibet. around 11 this morning we began packing and at 11:45 we all met in friske’s room to pray before we left. we prayed for the city, our friends we had met, and a few other things. when we were finished, we all went to put our bags on and kim said, “hold up guys…i think the Lord is telling us we need to stay here instead this week.”
so my first thought was…”and why couldnt He have told you this an hour ago?” hehe..jk. so we all got together and prayed about it again. our decision was we would stay another night and see what we thought tomorrow.
God definitely pulled through today and made it very clear to us we should stay to continue to develop these relationships. He also opened a huge door for us…
so our friend (we gave him the american name paul) came to say goodbye at 12. we told him we were staying and he was sooo excited! he told us he would be back at 4:30 and wanted us to go to his school with him. so like he said, he came back to our hotel and picked us up. we entered through this little alley way into this amazingly huge school. 2500 kids attend there and he introduced us to his english teacher. “mr. d” (the names here are impossible to try and spell).
we followed him inside and went into the teachers lounge. there was another teacher in there making lesson plans and a few minutes later, about 6 students came in to ask us questions. they were all learning english, but never have the opportunity to practice it. they were between the ages of 16-18. so they asked us a few questions…name, age, do we like their country, our job. kim told them she was a manager (used to work in a clothing store) and they said, oooohh….you are a rich girl! and we are thinking…if you had any idea what a missionary budget looks like! hehe.
mr. d then asked us if we would be willing to come back tomorrow and give a “free speech” to his class of 30…which we of course glady accepted. he told us a bit about another girl who had visited them a while ago and told them about “the american holiday … Christmas” so, we got the idea since its almost Easter, to touch on the Christmas story to stir their memory…and then explain Easter!! you need to be very respectful in your approach because 99% follow the muslim religion.
we decided tomorrow morning, we would go find hard boiled eggs (i know…but God provides right?!!) and color them with my sharpies. we also are going to go get some candy and come up with something sort of like an easter basket…maybe. mr. d thought it would be fun to take them outside…(which works PERFECT with our easter egg hunt)! PLEASE KEEP THIS IN YOUR PRAYER!! 🙂
the people here are also fascinated with hearing us sing. “you can sing? you can dance? we have party!” and anyone who knows me…knows they should not ask such a thing. 🙂 (katy and christy…shut it!) so we told them we would bring friske’s guitar and teach them a few songs…of course being worship songs. 🙂
they also have a globe in their room which will be a perfect visual for our explaination on what we are doing this year! God really has given us so many perfect confirmations today and i’m sooo excited for tomorrow!
after we visited with the few students, mr. d invited us back to his house. we followed him and his little son home and he led us into his living room to sit down. him and his wife prepared a great meal for us. and literally it was so homemade. we watched them roll out the dough for the noodles! i just laugh as i type this because some of the phrases they use are so cute.
after you say thank you…he would say “dont mention it”
its constantly… “please lets go” (which is fun when he wants you to go first, but you dont know where you are going!)
oh, and they constantly want you to eat more. “please keep eating!” (and this is after a MIXING bowl full of noodles) my body nearly exploded. its fun watching them stoop up your dish too. they usually have odd bowls and containers with stuff in them on the table. (vinegar is also very popular to pour on any meal) mr. d would just take the container and pour some into our noodles. or he would use his chopsticks (showoff 🙂 and scoop some colored veggies? on top. we would just laugh and be like “oh, oops, uh, ok…thanks!”
these people are so generous and although he even talked a little about how poor the city is and how the wages they make are really tough…he graciously offered us so much food, his house, and invited us back to be his guest again! i love it!
oh, one more thing. the funniest part was when we first got to his house, he made us tea and pulled out some “snacks.” these snacks included some form of black sunflower seeed, and these little brown balls. we weren’t sure how to eat them so we were trying to bite them. rock hard. so we went for the brown things…they were beans. so funny. then, as we were leaving…he insists on giving us HANDFULLS of these seeds to take back with us as a snack for later. we couldn’t even figure out how to eat one, let alone 100’s. so we just opened our hands and he filled us up. sometimes you have to just to laugh and completely submit to whatever they want you to do. what a night though…
sorry…this is too long 🙂
“Be an example to all believers in what you say, in the way you live, in your love, your faith, and your purity.” -1 Timothy 4:12
all my love <3
