Happy Home in Vietnam?

I started this a few days ago with this part:

I'm starting this blog post at the English center I'm volunteering at while my students are working in three teams trying to come up with the longest list of words associated with emotions. I can hear them whispering "scared, afraid, wonderful..."

The range of emotions I have been through on this trip likely includes everything they will come up with and more. It's amazing how I went from desperately homesick and dreading another two weeks away, to horrified that I only have ten days left and wanting it to be longer.

The biggest hardship I have with my travels is wishing I could be with everyone and everywhere at the same time. I am usually pretty good at enjoying the moment, but there are times I miss my kids (the kids I have bonded with so closely on my travels home and abroad) so much my chest constricts. I know that once I adopt children I will have no issue in viewing them as my own and loving them as such. I already have bonded with hundreds of kids. I always cry when I leave them behind and have their photos hanging all over my room. It's much easier when I know I leave them in good and loving hands, like in Myanmar. 

And this is from tonight:

There are other people people I so want to share parts of my travel with! Normally seeing something I know a friend or family member would love goes something like *Whoa! That is impressive art on the side of that building. Katrina would love it! I will have to bring her here this week.* However, that becomes less possible when she is in New York City and I am in Da Nang City. Sure I can and will photograph it when it is not pelting rain, but a photo is not the same. A photo is even less the same when the thing you want to share is riding in the 14th tallest ferris wheel in the world and the view it has of the city lights. (which is a real thing I did last weekend.) So many experiences, so many friends I want to introduce to each other that live on opposite sides of the globe.

I had lunch today with an Australian girl descended of Vietnamese parents who is in the country working with an NGO. She is going home tomorrow and as we talked of what she and I were looking forward to, we also talked of the sometimes awkwardness of going home. You find that you do not fit quite as well as you did before. Your friends ask if you want to go to the movies, and theoretically you do, but then you see the price tag of $12-$19. I can get a hotel and food for the day on that here! I will think of my afternoon students in Myanmar praying for a truck so they no longer have to walk forty five minutes to and from school. They do it five days a week regardless of if it is pouring rain or not. Regardless of the lack of streetlights on muddy backroads. How can I justify $14 to entertain myself for an hour or two when that same $14 could buy a school uniform and help a child get their family out of poverty. So usually I opt not to go. I like the movies! However, I can count on my fingers how many times I have gone to the movies in the last year, and I do not thing I paid once. Do not get me wrong though, I am not some kind of saint who never self indulges. I bought myself a new ring today when I went to buy presents for my family. It's on my finger as I type this. I am much more mindful about money though. I try to only buy things that are needed, reusable, or will bring considerable joy.

My increasing sensitivity to money is just one thing that sets me apart from my peers in my "home" country. I put home in quotes because the U.S. is not my real home anymore, it never was. I am only visiting here until I die. The One who's face I will finally behold after death, the One who sends me trotting around the globe, He is making me love new countries and feel at home everywhere and nowhere at the same time. I have eaten breakfast in a home with a dirt floor and holes in the walls big enough for the chickens to fly through (thankfully they chose not to). Minus the language barrier, I was totally at ease there. I have eaten diner at Top of the Hub (a restaurant in one of Boston's tallest sky scraper where the cheapest dinner is $27 and you can pay $56 for another) more than once and felt comfortable and happy there too.

As I grow too tired to continue I have looked back and realized how deep this became. This was not meant to be such a heavy post guys! I was planning to tell you how much fun I am having. Look at this view from the hike I did this week!

Who could be unhappy when they have a tour guide as happy as this girl?

Best work buddy ever!

Especially when she tells you that you look like a princess so many times you've lost count.

Do princesses wear pink dresses?

I meant to tell you that I love my work. My students are fantastic! They challenge me, make me laugh, welcome me, tease me, share their country and their hearts.

Giving practice talking to a foreigner to a class taught by a Vietnamese lady

Every night we have a topic led by a foreigner, sometimes me!, and we sit in groups at tables to answer questions and discuss.

We talk about deep stuff in class some nights, and I think they like it as much as I do. (Or they are really good at sympathy clapping their thanks at the end)

This was my favorite topic! Passion.

I was meaning to tell you all that I helped with the little ones (1-4) at church this morning and how happy it makes me to spend time with little'uns.

They pick the craziest colors!

I have been meaning to tell you that I went on the 14th tallest ferris wheel in the whole world. There are only two taller than it in the U.S!

Da Nang's Sunwheel

The view from the top

It is so colorful and the refections it makes are beautiful

And I was planning to tell you about my little moth friend who decided he liked my hotel room so much that when I carefully caught him and put him out the window he flew right back in twice!! So I had to catch him again and bring him down the stairs, through the reception, and out the front door before releasing for the third time.

In short I am having a good time, but that is the simple, short, and incomplete answer. It is true though.

A Fond Farewell, and an Excited Hello (With lots of photos!)

I'm sitting at gate 1 of Yangon International Airport as I write this. I am about to leave Myanmar, and go to Vietnam. It seems appropriate that it should be downpouring. As I'm sure you can imagine my feelings at the moment are quite complicated. Happy, sad, excited, thankful, nervous (flying always makes me a little nervous, especially when flying to foreign countries) Rather than risking boring you all to death talking more about my feelings, I shall now recap the last week for you.

Last weekend Peter's friend from Singapore came up to Lashio for a long weekend. He observed my Friday evening English class, and wound up being somewhat of an assistant teacher as he fed the boy he was sitting next to the answers if the group couldn't think of it fast enough. Which seemed to please and amuse the boy very much indeed.

Saturday was spent with my afternoon class hiking up a small mountain near their home. Hiking could be more accurately discribed as bushwhacking/clambering up, and mud sliding/trying really hard not to fall down. Before we set off, Jenevy split the kids up and assigned them all to an adult and said we were to all forage for edible wild plants. My team harvested hardly any food, and perhaps part of the reason is that the older girl in my group focused almost all her energy on trying to make sure I was okay, and helping me. At times she would offer me her hand at a particularly slippery or difficult part. I would look at her small frame and think "Honey, if I slip and we're holding hands, you're going down with me. I appreciate the gesture, but you're really too petite to hold me up." However, I could not really refuse her when she looked at me with her sweet quiet smile, said "Teacher." and held out her hand. She is one of the quieter ones in class, and just in general. She has a very soothing motherly spirit. She surprised me with knowing more English than I realized at one point saying "Teacher Iana, come over this way." Which might not sound like much, but the students didn't know all their colors and didn't know any shapes, and most struggled to even answer the questions "What is your name, and how old are you?" So for her to pull out a six word senance with proper word order that I had not taught her was surprising and comforting as I continued falling down the mountain with her doing her best to find me a good way to follow the trail. Once we got down, some of the kids laughed at how dirty my pants had gotten from my slipping in the mud so much, which was pretty funny. My little tour-guide/mother for the day just calmly, without many words got some water from the other kids and helped me to clean my hands and my wounds from sliding through a thornbush at one point. Then she ground up some leaves in her palm and dabbed my wounds with it, which stung so I assume it had some cleansing property. Just in case you are wondering if it was worth it since I got hurt, it absolutely was. The view at the top was amazing, and it was nice to see the kids outside of school and doing something that they love! Just spending time with this beautiful young lady made it totally worth it.

Before heading up. I think the hill behind us might be the one we climbed, but do not let it deceive you into thinking it was easy. It might have been fine with stairs....there were no stairs, handrails, or even a path

My team! Can you tell how sweet and motherly the girl in the back is?

This is the trail after being hacked at with the machete

Such a cool kid

Thankfully someone mentioned this makes
you itchy right before I touched it! 

Two of the most giving (and fun!) people I have met

This is my arm after being cleaned and having the leaves rubbed on.

This is how dirty Peter's hands were at the end.

Sunday brought a service at Peter's mother's compound. Weiguo, the friend from Singapore, shared some of his testimony and encouraged the children to run the good race. The service was in Mandarin translated to Lisu, so the only part I understood was my own opening prayer! After service we ate a delicious lunch (as always. The Lisu are fantastic cooks!) and then took a bus to Hsipaw.

Our bus to Hsipaw was not a VIP bus.

The purpose of going to Hsipaw was strictly tourism, and I did not really want to go, especially because it was my last week in the country. It was only for a day and a half though, and everyone was encouraging me to go, so I agreed. In the mysterious way of life and God, I went for rest and to get away from being surrounded by languages I don't understand, and then the very first thing that happened was we were invited to a Lisu home where no one spoke English. We went back again the next morning and one of the most touching moments on the trip happened. We had just finished praying for some of the people in the house who were a little sick when a new young woman I had not seen before came in. I was told she wanted prayer because she was sick too. I could tell this already. She was so frail and way overdressed for the heat in her fuzzy sweatshirt. After I'd prayed for her, which was a more moving experience than usual, I felt an overflowing love for the woman and the strong directive and need to hug her. I asked through Peter's translation if that would be okay with her, and was apprehensive of getting a no as hugging is not common in her culture. I got a shy yes and squatted down in the dirt to be level with where she perched on a stool. As I started to hug her I said "May the Lord bless and keep you." and asked Peter to translate that. Once he did I was suprised to feel her body start to shake with sobs. I held her while she cried, and until her own arms wrapped around me loosened minutes later. She thanked me, and then disappeared behind the house after some handshakes and headnods. I do not normally have people crying in my arms, and am very thankful I went to Hsipaw and had the chance to show this woman that she is loved by God. 

The rest of the day was spent biking around the city. We saw some beautiful rice farms, a corn factory, and a number of muddy, but very picturesque rivers. It was a very lovely day that ended with very lobster skin, which had both of my Asian (and barely sunburnt) friends laughing.

Little Began

Corn Factory

Tuesday morning we took the 5:15am bus back to Lashio, only to discover that both the Bible students, and my afternoon class were busy with other things and I therefore did not have teaching. I wound up sleeping all the way to lunch, and then went out with Peter to buy snacks for the kids as a goodbye present. One of the women in the market commented on the fact that I was wearing a floor length skirt like the Burmese women traditionally do, while many of the young Burmese women are wearing short skirts today. She found it ironic that I would be more modest, and was very approving of my outfit.

Wednesday was a day of goodbyes for all my students as I took an overnight bus down to the capital Thursday afternoon. My afternoon classes sang some songs for me in their wonderful enthusiastic fashion. They also gave some thank you speeches through Jenayvy's translation after we had our final English lesson. They came so far, and I'm so proud of them. They were the hardest to leave because I spent the most time with them. I'll admit to you I started to cry a little bit as we drove our motor scooters out of there. The only reason I was not crying a lot is because I am confident I will return, and if I do I should see most of them again. I am thankful I was able to get a group shot, and a photo of me with each child one by one. I wanted to give them all huge hugs goodbye, but instead resigned myself to the standard left hand on right elbow handshake, lots of waving, and lots of smiles. A few of the boys went running along side us as we drove out. It reminded me of my little brother who regularly does the same.

I love these kids!!

My sweet little mama. Some of us get the mother spirit young and strong.
So happy to have been able to bond with this quiet one who reminds me of
myself. She's the only one rested her head on my shoulder for the photo, with
the rest mostly posing like the young man below.

For dinner that night we went more than half an hour outside of the downtown to a river with lakes and a dam. The view was beautiful, and I really enjoyed the extra long motorscooter ride.

The kids used the dam as a free water slide

After dinner it was time for another goodbye party with both my evening class, and the Bible students. They had a small church service of sorts with hymns, a thank you, a present of the most colorful bag I've ever owned, and prayer. Then it was my turn to say something, and to give the kids the snacks I got for them. One of the women joked that I was the best kind of teacher, one that feeds their students!

A meeting before my farewell party

They really wanted me to take pictures of them eating their snacks and I kept hearing "Teacher!" yelled from different tables, only to turn and see them ready and posed.

These kids have personality and enthusiasm!!

So many lasts one after the other. Thursday was my last day in Lashio. I slept very little that night because I stayed up painting thank you cards for Peter's family because I literally could not find any cards at all in Lashio or Hsipaw, except at one shop where I found some unloved rather dusty looking birthday cards.Then it was off to the bus station for a fifteen hour bus ride to the capital.

How did I do?

My favorite was the one I painted for Peter's mother

Heading off to school after lunch break.

Thankfully we had a very good driver for these crazy turns

Now, the day after that long bus ride, I'm finishing this in the Ho Chi Minh airport. My flight has been delayed, and I've walked some laps around the airport, gotten food, and finished writing up this monstrously long post. So if you are bored and forcing your way through reading this, blame me being stuck in an airport without internet or people to talk to. Also, if you are bored and forcing your way through this, I can only assume it's because you love me. Thanks, I love you too!

The view at the restaurant where I ate my last diner in Myanmar

Ho Chi Minh City!

That's well over enough for now, I'll go back to reading!

Please be asking that:

• I do what I was brought here to
• The children back in Myanmar are well
• That I stay well, I do not really have time to get sick.
• That I would get enough sleep
• That my planning meeting for volunteering at Vision Cafe will go well tomorrow night.

Thanks y'all!!!!9