Ni hao (“hello” in Chinese)! Month 10 in China has come and gone on the race and it was unlike anything I had yet experienced, which made it new and fun and unexpected. This is one of the first months that I felt almost like a real person; I wore normal clothes and had a 9 to 5 job and lived in an apartment. So not a typical month on the race, but still good nonetheless, full of adventure, blessings, and God’s goodness!
This month we worked at Roundabout, a charity thrift shop, that resold donations in a predominantly ex-pat suburb of Beijing.
Our charity store, inside and out!
From 9 to 5 we did anything and everything from sorting and pricing books, to checking DVDs, to sorting and hanging clothing, to counting puzzle pieces, to making sure games had all of their pieces, to moving truck fulls of boxes, to writing a volunteer handbook. It was an eclectic month and everyone got a taste of everything that Roundabout had to offer. Some of us even got the chance to see some of the children that the profits of Roundabout go to support, mostly children with disabilities and orphans. Roundabout supports them by paying for surgeries, doctor’s visits, and medication among other things.
Pictures of some of the children that Roundabout supports.
Evangelism and outreach were really hard this month. Though Roundabout is not openly a Christian organization, Christians founded it over 10 years ago. So everything that we did had to be pretty discrete. That was unlike other countries we have been to so it just made it much more difficult. To go from places where you can be open and honest and share your testimony and tell people about Jesus, to somewhere where you just have to live out the love of Christ without words was a hard transition but ultimately was a realistic reminder of the struggle that missionaries in closed countries face. I believe that the work that we did planted seeds in our coworkers and even just our presence brings the Spirit into a place where for so many years it has been unwelcome, and for those things alone I’m grateful for the opportunity to go to China!
Here is the book room where we sorted and priced thousands of books!
Some days we drove boxes to the warehouse and used dollies to move those boxes into storage and sometimes we used those dollies to move each other.
Here is the section of the store where I spent the most time. On the right is the DVD section, where we had to divide the DVDs into categories and then open every box to make sure the actual DVD matched the box. And in the back is the puzzle and game section where we had to check to make sure every piece was present and accounted for.
We spent most of our time at Roundabout but we also had some time for amazing and memorable adventures! I can’t even begin to describe the feeling I got walking the Great Wall. The stunning beauty, complexity and shear size where astounding and breathtaking. From ever angle it looked different and through every tower it was more and more mesmerizing.
Even got the chance to alpine slide down the mountain from the Great Wall, our contacts wouldn’t let us leave China without trying it!
China is also full of crazy foods, so to embrace the culture I tried as many as possible…although some where much better than others!
Everything from sea horse to snake to scorpion to starfish to dog to car. It was a culinary experience that was exotically taboo to say the least.
I even got to celebrate my first international birthday and I got to share it with one of my teammates!! I turned 23 in China and the thrift shop bought us a cake and crowns to wear. One of my most memorable birthdays, and we went to Papa Johns for birthday pizza, it’s nice to have little reminders of America on your birthday after you’ve been away from home for 10 months!!
My teammate, Edie, and I posing in our crowns with our cake!!
Overall China was an incredibly rewarding month!! Combined we went through thousands of DVDs, CDs, books, clothes, puzzles and games, walked over 4 miles on the Great Wall, ate countless creepy crawlers, and so much more. The Lord was really faithful this month to provide us with blessing after blessing and amazing contacts especially when we were all starting to feel the effects of being gone for 10 months. Though the spiritual climate of China was difficult to be in, I firmly believe that the Lord is working through missionaries there currently and missionaries to come in the future to bring His Kingdom there. And I feel incredibly honored to be an insignificant blip in that!!
