Stories never told

Nai Nai is one of those lovely graceful old ladies. Every day her hair is done up in her traditional head gear and in her ears she wears pretty earrings from her minority group. Nai Nai is Xu’s grandmother on his father’s side and came with his parents to visit them.  Xu’s parents have already returned to the south of Yunnan, but Nai Nai will spend the hot season here, where it is not nearly as stifling as in the south.

“How many children do you have, Nai Nai?” I asked while I visited with Yana, Xu’s wife, this afternoon. I was curious about her life, which stretched over some of the most tumultuous years in China’s history.

“Oh” she said, “I had ten”. “Well, I was pregnant 16 times, but I only raised ten. And only eight survived to adulthood.” 

At least, that is what I thought she said. Nai Nai’s Mandarin is not very standard and she has lost most of her teeth, which considerably changes the way she pronounces her words. I started asking more questions, about how old her oldest is, how many boys and how many girls she had. Karl and I had speculated about the changes she had seen, but I did not really think about the implications of living through The Great Leap Forward and The Cultural Revolution. I soon realized that the stories I read, the stories nobody speaks about, are the stories she lived through.

“Ah yes,” she continued, “Chairman Mao wanted us to have lots of children and not prevent pregnancies, so every year or two, I had a baby. The problem was that we were so very poor later and we didn’t have food for them. But I kept getting pregnant. So grandfather took some of the babies outside when they were born“.

Yana tried to stop the conversation: “Let’s not talk about that Nai Nai.”

“I know about this time, Yana.” I said. “I have heard about it and read about it”.

“Oh, no-one knew any better. And there was no food and they didn’t know Jesus.” Yana replied, embarrassed.

“I know. It was a very hard time. So much suffering.” I replied. Millions of people died during the Great Leap Forward and the horror stories speak of a desperation that very few of us in the west have ever known. 

And then Nai Nai shared her stories. She told me about the time she was working in the commune, eight months pregnant, and had an accident, which lead to the baby being born early. “Miscarriage” she said at first, but then she explained to us how the little baby’s cries sounded like a cat. “The strangest thing… It didn’t even hurt when he came out. And then he cried. So strange that a baby that little can cry. So strange that he was even alive.” 

“How long did the baby live Nai Nai?” I asked “Oh, he died that day. Grandfather took him outside because he would have died anyway. A little boy. Beautiful child.” Her voice trailed away. “I really couldn’t bear when he took them outside. I really couldn’t. He was determined though. We couldn’t care for them. Didn’t even have food for the children we had.”

“So many years ago and I still feel so much pain when I speak about that time. Many people died. Children were always hungry. We had no food in our homes, but only ate at the cafeteria that was in the commune. If children didn’t eat at mealtime, they would go hungry until the next meal. It was difficult. And even then, there was not enough food to feed all of us. We were always hungry. Not enough food, no clothes to wear, so much work to do.” 

Yana and I just listened. What can you say to someone who has lived through so much pain?

“I still dream about those days. I dream about being hungry. Of all the things, I fear an empty stomach the most. I see on the news how people suffer in these countries with wars, and all I think is how hungry these people must be. An empty stomach… such a terrible thing.”

Nai Nai continued to tell us about how everyone got a share of food, but that their family didn’t get what they should have, because they were counted as family of landlords. I assume this is part of what lead her husband to want to get rid of their babies. They went into the mountains and collected every kind of plant that was edible. People ate tree bark. There was hardly any wildlife left and most of the mountains of Yunnan was stripped of its trees. 

We listened, Yana and I, while cradling our healthy toddlers who would continually run inside for a hug, a kiss, milk or water. Our children, who argued about toys, not food scraps. We thought about our full tummies. We thought about the blessing of our children. We thought about the horror of taking a baby “outside”. We thought about the pain of being so trapped by circumstances, so hopeless, so desperate that you lose your very humanity.

So much has changed. China opened up to the outside world and most people don’t even remember the time when you had to have ration cards to buy food, not to even speak of communes and famines. Now everyone wants a new car, a bigger house and overseas trips. Children complain about their old cell phones and young people feel entitled to find a “suitable and likeable” job with a good salary. Some families even have more than one child. All the while the old people watch. They very rarely share their stories, which no-one wants to hear. Maybe they can see how full tummies don’t change our hopelessness. Maybe they remember that it doesn’t take much to lose one’s very soul.

For many years Nai Nai was “crazy”. She couldn’t talk and only giggled when anybody tried to communicate with her. Xu’s family started to pray for her after they got to know Jesus and she slowly got better. I would never even have suspected that there was a period of confusion in her life. “How else do you heal, but by prayer, if you have gone through a life like that?” Karl said when he first heard her story. For her, it does end happily. She has a caring family and she is well loved. Most of all, she found the One who was with her in all of her guilt, shame and pain. The One who tenderly embraces each of her babies for her to hold when she gets home.

For so long Nai Nai carried a heavy burden on her narrow shoulders. This is the burden the women of China carry. It turns out that they hold up more than half the sky.

Farm Photo

This is a panoramic view of Green Acres Farm here in Lincang. We are living in a building on the left side of the picture. As you can see summers are very green but now that winter is here we are surrounded by brown.

Brown sugar... and why I don't write

A friend of mine tried to encourage me to write more often. I have had the best of intentions to send pictures, videos and emails in English and Afrikaans. But in reality an email update in one language, every few months is more than I can manage right now. So, this kind friend suggested that I write about what our lives look like, to give an idea of what we do all day and where my time and energy goes. I spoke to another friend, one who lives here, about this and she thought we should all make lists of what we actually do. On those lists would be bizarre things that take incredible amounts of time while being completely unknown to our friends and family back home. So, over the next while I will attempt to give you a glimpse of my daily life. Sometimes I will speak of what Karl is up to, but this will mostly be from my perspective. In our family the communication aspect is my responsibility, so I guess our sparse communication will make more sense then if I share about my life. Also, I am sure that I will sometimes sound whiny. I most probably am. But, we know that the life we live is our choice and we still find joy in it, even when it seems very odd and at times overwhelmingly tiring. 

Yesterday it was my mission to make chocolate cookies. We were going to friends’ house and I was taking dessert. I have a fantastic recipe for Mud Slide Fudge Cookies, which uses egg whites. My fridge is overflowing with egg whites because my daughter can only eat the yolks and I have guilt issues with throwing food out. So, I got the egg whites, cocoa and other ingredients ready, just to find that we are out of honey (one of the few allowed sweeteners on our diet). I decided to cheat and use brown sugar, which when you buy it in the market, is about one step away from cane juice. This would have been a fine idea, if I actually had some ground brown sugar. Turns out that all that was in my cupboards was a solid block, which is the traditional way of selling it. So there I was, chopping pieces of brown sugar off with my cleaver. A simple task turned into an ordeal. All this I was trying to accomplish with my toddler around my legs, sticking his little fingers in my cookie dough. In the background my daughter complains that I haven’t played with her in “days and days” and that she is very bored. The dishes had to wait until this morning and are still not all done... and now I have to go make dinner. We have joked about the blocks of sugar since when I first came to China (it tastes like black Wilson Toffees, by the way), but I didn’t think then that I would still be hacking away at it thirteen years later. 

So much has changed here, gotten easier and more convenient, but here in the “Wild West with Cell Phones” we still have some progress to make. All that to say that there are some things that take more time here than they would back in our home countries (paying the water bill can take a whole afternoon, and sometimes needs a follow-up trip). It is just how life is. But it leaves less time for other things, like e-mail and blog updates… and doing those in two languages. So, if you haven’t heard from us in a while, or are upset because I only ever write in English these days, please forgive me. I was hacking away at brown sugar.   

Learning to live loved

This morning while Karl and I were praying, I became so very aware of the love of Jesus.

Anyone who knows us even just a little, knows that we are not “super spiritual”, if that is the right term. We don’t pour over the Bible for hours on end every day, we don’t pray constantly and we definitely don’t walk in submission to the Holy Spirit in everything we do… and we don’t “feel” His presence with us very often. I personally am also not always gushing with love and adoration for Jesus. I read books like Brother Lawrence’s or Watchman Nee’s and they often make me feel pretty stupid and inadequate. Not the fault of the books or authors, just my own insecurities and habit of comparison. But this morning it was just there. His love. Just pure and true and believe me, not on any account of my own. I woke up grumpy and mad. Ezra had a bad night of waking constantly (and when I say waking constantly, I don’t mean once or twice, I mean 7 or 8 times in one night). I am also mad at someone who seriously harmed and slandered our family (of course all in the name of Christ and His love) and woke up with vengeance in my heart and a complete lack of desire to forgive. So, before the kids got out of their pajamas I had already yelled at the both of them more than once. We are sleeping in our living room, which is a whole different blog post, but suffice it to say that it does not do much for my attitude to have a chaotic house. I stumbled into our moldy, freezing kitchen, had a cup of tea and a cup of instant coffee, because we are out of the real stuff and we haven’t made the trek to the market to restock yet. So, tired and grumpy we huddled by the fire and decided to pray while we wait for morning to kick in. And then Jesus just… I don’t know… showed up? I know He is always present and always the same, but He just stepped into the chaos of a Monday morning and made me experience His love. It was pretty fantastic. And then, through this, I realized again what I often confess – that it is all about knowing God. Seriously. That life is a journey to bring us to understanding that we are the siblings of the First Born. That when Paul says that we are fellow heirs, it is less heady theology than just plain old truth that uneducated people like me can grasp, and LIVE! I HAVE A NEW HEART! A pure heart. A heart that actually desires God, who is my real Father. Not just positionally or “adopted” or whatever, but my real, true Father.  All of the Life that resurrected Jesus is in me. Really, completely in me. Craziness! Now that is Good News.

So, wonderfully, mysteriously, the Holy Spirit breathed freshness into my heart. Forgiveness seemed so simple and freedom so logical. And I fell in love with my kids and my life again. And I remembered that nothing we can accomplish, nothing we are part of has any value other than knowing Jesus. For real. That it all amounts to nothing. We are not driven to serve because we are saved; because so many people have never heard of Jesus and are doomed; because hordes are starving; because people get trafficked and exploited and someone should do something; or because we owe it to God. We serve because we love. And we love because He first loved us. Yes, I know all of that is in the Bible, plain to see. I needed the Holy Spirit to make it alive in my heart. For me, this means that I am leaving behind obligation and the yoke of performance. It is a constant journey for me, so you will hear me say that again. If I don’t feel like serving or caring, I will not carry the burden of “must” but ask Him to remind me again that I want to. To remind me again that He loves me so, to remind me that Jesus is my brother and I have a new, beautiful heart. And in spite of my fear that I will forget, He did say that this is the Holy Spirit’s job. 

Here is our new prayer card photo, we have prints for anyone who wants one or I can email it to you.

A Traveling Circus

I wrote this two weeks ago but did not get an opportunity to post it. We did delay our travel plans but still got to see almost everyone we wanted to see in the Seattle area. We still have a lot of traveling and visiting to do, so most of what I wrote still applies. And at the moment getting to sit down and write something happens rarely, so why waste a perfectly good, mostly finished post.

The day is halfway and my children are watching a DVD. Again. I am scrambling to pack clothes, sort through our foodstuff and make sure that I have toys and snacks somewhere that I can reach it. See, we are on our way again. This time we are heading to the west coast of the US. Except that there is a tremendous amount of snow everywhere on every road and we don’t really feel comfortable driving in these conditions with our children. This is the only week-end in which we can see a very dear friend of ours. He is an old China hand as well and is planning to drive up to Seattle to see us. If we get there. So, while Karl runs some last errands (we hope) before we leave for the coast, I shoveled snow for the first time in my life and yelled at each of my children numerous times already. I hate traveling. Really, I do. I hate having to try and get ready, with all of our dietary restrictions and consequent food boxes. I hate the long time in the car with my children complaining, crying or shrieking at the top of their lungs. I hate having to stay in a new place every four nights. And as much as I am blessed by seeing different people every day and catching up on all that happened in the past three years, I do not enjoy having to navigate conversations while keeping my kids from destroying the house of our host, because yet again they are not sure what the boundaries of this new place are. And besides the boundary issue, they just act up in general. Look, my children are probably wilder than the average American child, what with growing up in the Wild West, I realize that. But, they are not brats. And when we travel, they act like brats. They throw tantrums, are purposely disobedient, cry, scream, whine and speak disrespectfully… or more so than what they usually do. Some days they are sweet and charming, because they both like making new friends, but not being stable does take a toll on them.  I try to keep perspective and not cave under my perceived pressure of other people’s judgment. I try to remember that my worth as a person and parent is not dependent on my children’s behavior and I try to not flip out myself. But some days I crack a little. Today is one of those days. So now I am taking a minute to breathe, drink some tea, write and get perspective. I pray that Father will take my heart and remind me that I am not a raving, yelling, angry lunatic, but that I am a loving, caring mother. I need His help to calm my frazzled nerves and be the calming presence my children need to help them through this transition to the new place, new people and new experiences. I need to thrive and rest, today, in this craziness so that my children can thrive.

So, if we visit you and my children’s behavior leaves much to desired, please be patient with them. They miss our home. They miss their Nana and Papa’s home. They are transitioning.  And if you can spare a prayer for them, please do.

Awakening to Reality

Three Saturdays ago we were on the last day of our "there and back again" visa run. It was a loooong day, but I felt mostly good, even praying in my heart as we drove through the beautiful valleys that our accidental detour took us on. We have driven on the road we were supposed to take so many times before, but there is so much construction and we lost the landmark to the turn off, so we completely missed it and found ourselves on our merry way to Lijiang, the nearest town to us, but in a slightly different direction than Shangri-La itself. Oh well, longer, but less mining trucks and the road actually has a shoulder, which is a huge bonus, seeing that Chinese roads are built about a meter off the ground. The last hour of our trip was a little less fun, with Alianna screaming from the back "my bum hurts, my bum hurts, I want to be home, I want to stop (seriously, you cannot have both, but this does not compute in the mind of a travel weary five year old) and Ezra just doing his banshee shriek because he wanted to say the same as Alianna, but cannot speak yet. So, I was not a happy mama when we finally got home, but we were safe, which is a huge grace.

On the Sunday I found myself tired, cold and mad. At God. Because that makes a lot of sense. Our good friends stopped by to say hello and ended up staying for lunch and most of the afternoon. At one point I blew up with my annoyance at how I feel God is ruining my life. Making promises of healing, guidance and provision and then just not making good on them. My daughter's skin is worse than ever, we have blown through our savings with having to make these idiot visa runs (and hello, He hasn't provided a visa yet!) and He is basically as talkative as a stone when it comes to guidance. Bless Phil and Bren, they are so gracious. They listened, saw through the anger to have compassion with my pain and disillusionment. I would probably loose my faith if not for saints like these. In the end it turns out that God is hard at work chiseling away at my idol. The one I made and called "God". The one that makes everything tick along smoothly and do what I ask after I do my version of killing a chicken, doing a rain dance or making a pilgrimage. Turns out I am more animistic than I thought. And God, the real God? Well, turns out that He is a lot less predictable than I hoped. What with not being stuck in time, having an eternal perspective and being a lot less selfish than me. Also, He is a lot more faithful than I bargained for. I have prayed so many times in the past that I want my life to be reflective of who He is. I want to experience the fulness of a real, living relationship with Him. I want to live a sacrificial life, a life in a sharing community. But to experience that, so much of my way of thinking (and consequently my way of living) needs to change. I would love to see the signs and wonders of Acts (especially when it really benefits me or the ones I love), but I realise that the thing that changed the world right from the beginning was how the Christ-followers loved and cared for each other. And a greater sign of power is the wonder of a new heart, a new nature and a new inheritance. Somehow through all the un-fun things that I experience, He is making the freedom Christ died for a reality in my life. Freeing me from my debilitating fear of what others think, from the despair of feeling that I have nothing to show for my life and all the things I "feel" I sacrificed (what, after all, did Jesus have to show at the end of His?) and from the hopelessness of the deep pits that my immaturity and issues bring in my life and the lives of those around me, especially my children.

So, to make a long story short, I feel better. It only took a few days and several tantrums... and a few ups and downs over the past three weeks, but I feel a bit more back on track. Grace alone. Thank God He does not loose His temper and leave me the heck alone like I have asked Him to do so many times. Thank God that He is the only God who calls the prodigal home, who always forgives and restores. And always, always brings hope, even when my circumstances scream "HOPELESS!!". Most times I don't experience this as reality, but it doesn't change what is. So, I guess most of life is a process of growing into what is already true, what has already changed, what has already been accomplished. I think. Or something like that.  

Now I am trying to maintain some sense of peace while I frantically do laundry, clean our house and pack for our big trip to the US. We will be in Coeur d'Alene in December, then in Park City around New Year's and a little after that. We also plan trips to eastern and western Washington, but are not sure about dates yet. In there somewhere Karl also plans to go to Denver. We fly back out to China at the end of February. We still need a vehicle for our time in the US, so if anybody has something with four wheels that doesn't need a horse to pull it and that you aren't using, keep us in mind.

We are praying to connect with people and share what is really in our hearts. We need more support - for us and the work we do. Our deep desire is to partner with people with whom our vision resonates. And we would love to keep things real and open. Karl and I are both, uhm, proud people, and it has taken us a while to realise that we do not do a good job of making our needs known. Now we are learning to communicate our very real needs while trying to give people the freedom to meet them or not. It is a hard journey, one I have resented many times, but now am learning to embrace. It is part of our journey after all, and as with many things, necessary, but not evil. I am actually even getting excited about the whole need for support thing. That somehow, if it is a partnership of people that feel their hearts stirred by what we think He laid on ours, we can all be mutually blessed. Anyway, good things happening in my heart and attitude, which I am thankful for.

I know that many people are wondering what is happening with the olive farm, our projects here, the goats, etc. I will hopefully get to writing some about that soon. And yes, I know that you can post pictures on these fancy bloggy thingies, but just updating it is a huge step for me. So, once this technically challenged mama doesn't have to ask my hyper busy husband to post these things for me, I will work on the photos.