Technology in the Third-World: It's implications for the American English teacher abroad...

What that title basically means is that my laptop has been broken for a long time, and getting it fixed was far less easy than if one lived in oh......I dunno, lets be generous and say North America.

First the power connection port was broken. No power = no typey typey...

They fixed the power after two weeks of meddling with my motherboard, but my internet port didn't work when they were finished. Of course I didn't find that out till I got back to campus.

Keep in mind I don't live in the city - I live on campus. It takes an hour on Smash (my moto) to get into town. So when I discover that my computer has all these problems I can't just turn around and head back in. Well... I could, but who would want to???

Anyway, then I figured while they were fixing all these various odds and ends, why not upgrade my hard drive??? My first computer, the family computer back in 8th grade, had a hard drive of like 538 MEGAbytes - most wristwatches now have more storage than that. My laptop had 37 GIGAbytes, a drastic improvement no doubt, but it had run out of space due to all the killer photos I've been taking and uploading. So....back to the computer store to get a new hard drive - 120 gb - heck yeah! Then, after installation, the internet port was not working AGAIN.

If you're still reading, rest assured I'm done talking about my laptop woes. It's fixed. Now I can blog.

Well, I finally started teaching, and just in the nick of time - I had almost forogotten why I moved to Southeast Asia. Most of the new team members, myself included, were PRETTY upset that we didn't start teaching until mid-November. That would have been great information for the organization to include in it's pre-field training.

The general letdown is like this, "WHYYYYYYY did I come here so early when I could have stayed home with family and friends????" It's a normal response. The answer isn't an easy one. ELI/C does all of it's training for Southeast Asia at one time. Other places like Vietnam and some schools in Laos start their school years at a more reasonable date. Cambodia has a late academic calendar, so there's always been this tension for ELI/C teachers here in The Kingdom of Wonder (yes...that's actually the offical country slogan for tourism purposes). "Blunder" rhymes very conveniently with "Wonder," so I don't hesitate in substituting whenever I get the chance.

So what do you do when you are and English teacher in Cambodia with no students??? Well...you find some, or find SOMETHING you can do to be productive. After all, I'm here on other peoples' dimes, people who sent me to help out those in need. With that weighty mission in mind, I set out to find an organization with whom I could partner and work in order to be productive and stay sane.

There was a neat little solution to my problem, in the form of an organization called Kone Kmeng. This group partners with local churches to identify and resuce children at risk from poverty, malnutrition, sexual & physical abuse, sex trafficking, lack of educaiton, etc. This is a Cambodian-run organization, but their support comes mostly from Britain and the US, so they really needed a native English-speaker to do their writing and publicity work. I've been blessed to work with them lately as just the guy for the task. I get to travel one weekend a month to one of their project sites where I take pictures, collect stories, and then write reports for a monthly e-newsletter. Their hope is that this letter will generate more funds for the organization. Another project as of late is the org's website. It's in bad need of updating and reorganization, so I'm going to be working on that.

These kids above and to the right are in a very poor area of Cambodia on the Thailand border. If you're interested, google Banteay Meanchey. It's the province where the communists held out the longest. Really, many of the people 40 and older were part of the old regime, and while I was there I saw many wearing the old black pajamas and red neck scarves, the hallmark outfit of the Khmer Rouge. It was chilling to say the least. In case you're wondering, this little baby is being pulled by his older brother in a little cart made out of wooden wheels and frame with an old tire as a......hmmm.......container? basket? carriage? I dunno... It was cute, and that's all that matters. I loved how the baby was like, "What is this guy doing???" His eyes didn't leave me the entire time I was within the vicinity. Oh the joys of being a white man in Asia...

Well, I'm teaching now. Just finished my fifth straight week of unadulterated, univeristy-level English teaching. It was like, "Oh, yeah... this is what I came here for. Now I remember." It was well worth the wait, and I'll talk more about that next time.

Bryant

Quick Updates...

I've been super busy and super tired! For some reason I have no energy lately. Lift me up in your thoughts that I would have strength to continue the work here.

I'm not sure if I mentioned this or not, but I started volunteering my spare time with an organization called Kone Kmeng. That's Cambodian for "Little Children." They assist local communities in rescuing abused children or those addicted to drugs or infected with HIV/AIDS. Kone Kmeng also digs wells and tests water quality in many poor villages around the country. I've been asked to head up their monthly newsletter. I'll be traveling one weekend a month to a project - usually quite far away from the capital - and collecting stories, taking photos...that sort of thing. I'm excited. Anyway, I just finished the first edition. Check out www.kone-kmeng.org. I'll also be revising/updating the website.

I'm continuing to teach Spanish in the afternoons at the student center, and I just started tutoring a guy for his TOEFL test. This is like an English aptitude exam that many students must take before being accepting into foreign, English-speaking universities. Think of it as the ACT or SAT only just for English. This guy I'm tutoring, Nary, is a former student from Kampong Thom (I still need to blog about my week there!). He's wanting to attend a seminary in Singapore, but he'll need a much higher proficiency in English if this is gonna happen. I'll be traveling out to his school twice a week to tutor him. It's about 45 minutes away on a good day, and I have to drive through mud and muck to get there, but I enjoy it 'cause many of my former students are studying at the same school. Sina is out there, so I can catch up with him some.

That's all from the Asian front. Drop me an email somtime. My pics are up-to-date finally. Check those out.

Grace and peace,

Bryant

Scorpion Women

I'm compelled to briefly share a funny moment from today. In the ongoing saga of crazy t-shirts in Cambodia (see "No Money No Honey" below), I ran across one today while driving to the....uh....somewhere. I forgot where. Anyway, I was driving on my moto, looked up, and the back of this girl's black t-shirt said, in big pink letters, SCORPION. Intrigued, I glanced at the front - it was blank. I thought to myself, At least they label themselves here! Seriously, folks, you can't make this stuff up.

What a great week...

I just spent the most relaxing, refreshing week in Kampong Thom (see previous post). In contrast, I'm now back in Phnom Penh in an American bar that is run by Cambodians and currently filled with British people. You can't make this stuff up. Consequently, I'm in a bar because they have free wireless... the sacrifices we have to make. Anyway, so much happened last week that I'd like to share, but I'll have to break it up into different posts for my sake and for yours. Right now, let me tell you about why I went and how I got there...

It all started two weeks ago when I met up with an old student, Thydeth (tee-det), from Kampong Thom. Thydeth is studying architecture here in Phnom Penh, and knows some mutual friends. It was great running into him. I said, "Thydeth, I wanna go visit K.T. again soon." When he invited me to go with him during the P'chum Ben holiday (puh-choom-bun), I couldn't resist. At any rate, what was I gonna do besides stay here in the city and spend money on food and gas??? Like I said before, if you have a burning passion to understand the intricacies of P'chum Ben, google it. Here's a synopsis for the lazy folks:

Khmer (Cambodian) Buddhists believe in a heaven and hell - despite Buddha's teachings to the contrary - where spirits of the dead go when....well....it gets really complicated. For the sake of brevity I'll say this: Dead relatives can end up in hell where they are subsequently starved. Once a year (during the time of P'chum Ben) they are let out of hell by the Keeper. These spirits will seek out their living relatives in search of food, and if they don't find any food they will curse their families. To solve this quandery, the Khmer make decorative sticky rice balls and take them to Wats (Buddhist temples) where the monks bless the rice, naming it for the family. The family will throw the rice into big pits dug in the yard of the Wat. Spirits, called by the monks, will then "eat" the rice and return to hell will full bellies. Families must do this in the morning before daylight, because spirits, as everyone knows, can't come out in the daytime. For 15 days this takes place, culminating in the 30th-ish of September. I say, "30th-ish" because the Buddhist calendar follows the moon and not our Gregorian system. This culmination is a huge, two-day holiday here. An easy way to think of it is our Halloween meets Mexico's Day of the Dead. I've really discovered that, much like Mardi Gras back home, it's just an excuse to get off work and school. I'm not complaining! (Even though i think it's a dumb concept. Ironically, Buddha would too.)

So, during P'chum Ben thousands of students migrate to their home towns and villages to either feed grandma and grandpa's spirit, or just to chill and enjoy a week off. Speaking of dead spirits, the roads become highways of death themselves as traffic nearly doubles with motos, taxis, and overloaded busses tearing up provinical roads and national highways. Thydeth wanted us to take my moto for the 200 km journey, and I nearly agreed (the Indiana Jones in me coming out), but thankfully at the last minute I said, "You know, let's not." I'll have to admit that the idea of a cross-country moto trip is just the sort of thing I'd normally jump at, but I think Providence stayed my hand. Ok, I know Providence stayed my hand. Turns out Mrs. Sue, the lady I used to work under in Kampong Thom, was in Phnom Penh and was going home on the same day as Thydeth and I. She offered us her taxi, and we glady accepted (especially since she was paying). On the way there, it rained like I've never seen it rain before. Thank the Lord for deciding against the cross-country moto thing. I'm talking tropical storm proportions of rain and wind. What should have been a 2 hour taxi ride turned into a 4 and-a-half hour ride.

On the way there I noticed for the first time how much of this country is under water most of the time. I've never been here after the full brunt of the rainy season. I've only experienced its initial onslaught. To give you a picture of what I saw let me describe the road to K.T. National Road 5 leaves Phnom Penh and virtually bisects the country vertically, eventually ending up in the Northern city of Siem Riep where the famous Angkor temples are located. National Road 6 is a two lane highway built up from the terrain a good 6-8 feet, with about 5 feet of shoulder on either side. Traveling this road in years past I've always wondered why it's built up so high.

This time around I saw why. The Tonle Sap River and Tonle Sap Lake lie to the west of National Road 6. During the height of the rainy season the Lake breaks it's borders and floods downriver for thousands of square kilometers into rice country. The road is built up because it acts as a sort of dam, holding the Tonle Sap at bay. Periodical flood gates along the road allow controlled irrigation on its eastern side. It was amazing to see that much water after only a couple months of rain. Interestingly enough, the Mekong River will reach a capacity at which it causes the Tonle Sap to reverse flow, increasing the floodplain even more. Families in this region who, during the dry season, live on solid ground and farm become boat-living fisher families during the wet season. Traveling Road 6 I was so amazed by this because the Tonle Sap is not some river just around the corner; it's a hundred kilometers away, and here we were traveling on a raised road that holds it at bay from flooding the rest of the country.

At any rate, we pushed through the rain and winds, passing hundreds of motos stopped on the side of the road, their poor drivers waiting out the pelting rains under flimsy ponchos. I must admit, Indiana Jones tendencies or not, I was thrilled we had taken a taxi, and I told Thydeth he was lucky we didn't or I would have never spoken to him again. (Ok, not really.)

Arriving at Sue's house was the best feeling ever. Students, many I remembered from years past, were there playing cards in the downstairs student center. Some things, I thought, really don't change. It was probably one of the only times in my life I've felt like I stepped back in time. Things in the room where exactly as they were three years ago. Even books and games and knick-knacks on shelves were just as they were the last time I was there. It felt like Christmas. Seeing such consistency made me realize how much and how often things back home change, and I realized how precious stability is, at least to me.

In America, I fear we've grown to a point where we can't live without constant change and what we would consider "progress." In a certain light it's almost a disease. We trample underfoot the things that are precious and worthwhile in order to advance, to make an extra buck, to have an bigger house, or a larger pension. I tried to think of one place back home that was special to me from my childhood that remains as unaltered and unchanged as I found Kampong Thom six nights ago. There aren't any. Yet here, the same students gather and laugh as usual. The night I arrived they played and talked of the same sorts of things they always have without boredom, and they played card games and watched the rain like no time had passed since I saw them last. Refreshing doesn't even approach an accurate description. It was reassuring and comforting. I said to myself, Ok...this is still here. And then I took a deep breath.

Sorry for going all introspective on you. It was a great night, playing games and talking and catching up and letting the students praise my improved Khmer while laughing at the mistakes I still make. That was just the beginning of an incredible week. More next time...

Bryant

Quick update

To reassure people that I'm still alive (several have been asking), I'm house sitting for a fellow "worker" out in the countryside. If you want to know where, specifically, google a map of Cambodia, look dead-center in the country, and you'll see the provincial town of Kampong Thom. This is truly like the Mayberry of Cambodia - I love it. It's where I taught and worked during summers of 2003-2005.

I'll post again soon with pictures and details of my time here. It's been a blast, including activities like boat races, swimming in the rice fields, long moto rides through the countryside, visiting the local "mountain." Yesterday I went to the market and bought an onion, garlic, tomatoes, and basil (the asian variety) and made myself an awesome pasta sauce. Noodles are easy enough to come by here. When all was said and done I had spent $1.25 and had myself an incredible dinner.

Ok, that's all for now. Peace out everyone!

Bryant

No money no honey...

This is a post that is long overdue. I started it a week or so ago and didn't finish. I'll just pick up where I left off, and I'll add some more funtimes blogging at the end.

My morning, nay, my entire quasi-month of living in Cambodia was made entirely better this morning when I saw a young dude walk by with a shirt on that said, in giant letters I might add, "NO MONEY NO HONEY." After spraying coffee all across the crowded breakfast stall, I grabbed for my camera only to realize in a gasp of horror that I had left it at home. This was not the first time I wanted to take a picture of something hysterical (usually involving Asian use of the English langauge) and didn't have my camera handy, but I assure you it will be the last.

Oh, wait, nope... I lied. It happened again. I was in the same breakfast stall three days later. ONLY THREE DAYS! And I was once again treated to Asian-English gold when another young guy (could it be the same one???) strolled by my breakfast stall - stall is really the only justifiable word for it, hence the continued use - with a shirt that said, in the same ginormous letters, "I COULD BE YOUR DAUGHTER."

............................................

Seriously? That's too good to be true... But I yet again disappointed myself - no camera. And, unfortunately, the google image search did NOT reveal any appropriate examples like it did for the other shirt.

The question I want to know is, "Where are they getting these shirts?" I want one! Funny thing though, this guy probably doesn't even know what it means. It's just cool 'cause it's in English. Well I'm certainly glad he wore it.

Another wonderful use of English waylayed me today at a Chinese restaurant. On the menu, they offered many delectable items such as roast duck, sauteed noodles, and real sesame chicken, oh and steamed dumplings, can't forget those. There was one item, however, that caught my attention. I think it deserves a return visit with a camera - "Stirfry with rape mixture."

Hmmmm I'm not sure if I want the rape mixuture stirfry or the steamed domestic abuse sampler....

Well, these things happen to the best of us. Ok, so they don't; they only happen to Asians, but you just gotta roll with it man! It's awesome, and I thoroughly enjoy laughing and smiling. I've been laughed at enough with my use of the language here. Yes, indeed I've done my time. It's my turn.

It's hard to have legs here...

This will be a straight-forward update on what I'm currently doing, but first I want to tell you about how hard it is to have legs here in Cambodia. I'm not making light of people who have no limbs - there are tons here who have lots a leg or both legs to land mines... Their plight is not a joke to me. Fortunately there are NGO's (Non-Government Organizations) established to help them get established and cope with life.

Ok, so back to my point about how hard it is to have legs here. I feel like mine have taken an absolute beating and then some. I haven't stepped on a mine, granted, but I've definitely taken a beating. In my first moto "incident" I scraped the skin off my left calve (not badly). That's pretty much healed up. But, in trying to jump-start the moto for the first time I had to really kick it, and my foot slipped and the kick stand totally ate up my right shin. That is still red and scabbed over. I mean the kick stand dug in good....

Then, in a soccer match, I was trying to slide tackle a guy and ended up scraping my left knee up really bad. The funny thing is, I did it again on the exact same spot in the next match. Moving on, I pronated my right foot in a soccer match - you should have seen the "field" we played on...try cow pasture instead - and now I think I may have planar fasciaitis or something like that. It hurts really bad. I need to stop playing soccer for a month but just can't let go. Then....let's see.....oh yeah the constant heat here makes my ankles swell for some reason. I think it's combined with lack of water or too much salt in the diet or something like that, but by the end of the day I got some major cankles going on.

Also, I've burned my leg twice on hot moto exhaust pipes. Once on that of my own... Oh yeah, and at all-country training I rented a moto to check out the surroundings. Turns out the front brake didn't work - thanks for telling me, Kep Lodge! - and the moto went flying down a gravel-covered embankment, ejecting me at just the right angle to run a half-inch gravel burn down my left leg. Oh yeah! And then on the way home from all-country training our taxi broke down (read two blogs previous), and we had to stand on the side of the road for an hour-and-a-half and my legs got tore up by the Cambodian version of fire ants. There are red whelps all over them, some on top of previous injuries.

I supposed the moral of the story is don't play soccer and don't ride motos if you want nice-looking legs. Otherwise.... I dunno... I forgot what I was going to say.

On to more important things.... I've been playing the waiting game with my school. The school year was pushed back a month because of the elections, I found out. I can understand why; two elections ago they had tanks in the streets. We really can't relate to that kind of uncertainty. Lots could be said about that, but in realtion to me it means I don't start teaching until November 15th. We've been living in a team member's house - by we I mean my two team mates for the NPIC campus - and it turns out we will continue staying in his house on the weekends. I've made a sweet pad out of the roof-top room. I'll blog just about that soon, with photos for sure. I love it and wish I could stay there permanently. But alas, to stay there would violate my #1 rule for Southeast Asia: If it's convenient and/or would make you happy, it's probably not gonna happen. Many would chide me for my pessimism, but you'd be surprised how true that rules holds. Besides, if it's occasionally broken then you're pleasantly surprised.

So back to what I'm doing. Tomorrow, the Peters and I will - fingers crossed - move all our belongings onto campus. We bought some cheap, wicker furniture a couple days ago, and will take that along with clothes, groceries, and household supplies to our little campus apartments. My first night there will be interesting, to say the least.

In other news, this week begins the Khmer festival of P'chum Ben. It's basically their version of Halloween. To learn more, google it. I'll try to take some pictures this coming Monday when the big event takes place and maybe blog about the goings on. My point in mentioning P'chum Ben is that I'll be taking the holiday weekend to visit the town I used to work in here - Kampong Thom. This is one of my favorite places on earth, and it will be interesting to see how it is after three years. To see Sue and the orphanage again will do me worlds of good. Or, actually now that I think about it seeing Sue and the orphanage might make things worse. I could end up wanting to stay.

Well...that's all from this end. Lift up my soon-to-be students and our move to campus. Keep me in mind and don't hesitate to email! pmeredith@elic.org

Grace and peace,

Bryant

To kill a dog...

Today on the way back from the coast we piled into two taxis. I was in taxi number two, and we were a little late leaving because I left my iPod at the guest house. That misfortune delayed our departure by about fifteen minutes. The ride, for the first hour, was really enjoyable albeit bumpy. I mean, the thing had AC so there's nothing to complain about.

Half way into the trip, I hear the driver honking and fussing about something and feel a sudden swerve. Looking up, I had just enough time to see a large dog disappear behind the front bumper - thud clunk rattle rattle clunk clunk - the dog goes under the car... Driver pulls over to check the damage... I was thinking, "Eh...It's just a dog. We'll be fine. Let's get going." You may think me heartless. Believe me I didn't like seeing the dog get hit, but there are dogs EVERYWHERE here, and as you can see from the picture above, they all look like dingos. In fact our dog looked exactly like this one only tan like a dingo. In fact, I call them the dingo dogs. Does that make their untimely death any easier? .....I have to say yes. Trust me, they're nasty.

So picture a road much like the one above and a dog like the one in the pic (only tan) getting bowled over by a late 90's model Toyota Camry. I got out with the driver to check the damage, mostly to stretch my legs thinking there couldn't be anything wrong. Well....turns out this dingo packed a punch. He totally smashed the front end up and busted a hole in our radiator, water spewing everywhere all over the road.

Now, keep in mind, we are an hour away from the coast, which is remote jungle despite being a tourist destination, so we're really, really remote being this far down the road. It's like rice fields and...well...that's it. I knew we were in for a wait. Fortunately, like everyone else in Cambodia, taxi driver dude has a cell phone and, like every spot in the country no matter how out-of-the-way, he has a clear signal to call. (How many spots in Mobile can I NOT get a signal????) Anyway, having dealt with lame taxi rides before in this country, I knew we'd have to sit it out and wait for a replacement. (Laura, it didn't even approach our taxi experience in '05!)


Indeed we did wait. Driver said an hour, but I knew better. We waited for nearly two. In the mean time, I mulled over the destroyed radiator with the driver. He had no idea what he was doing. Another taxi stopped to offer help - unprecedented here, I assure you - while we wasted away in the tropical heat, our lower extremeties being devoured by the Southeast Asian version of fire ants. He and I actually managed to get the radiator detached, only to find what I told him already, "The bottom corner's missing." I mean, it's not like the guy was gonna weld a new bottom on the thing out there. And he certainly didn't have enough chewing gum to plug that crater. What threw my mind for a loop was when this guy continually went into the rice paddy to collect water to fill the radiator to watch it all leak out - he must have done that ten times. Um...dude...it's got a hole in it. I'll admit, however, that I did have fun playing around under the hood. It reminded me of the good ole days with my grandpa, workin on cars. Here's an insight for you ladies. We men really like doing things like looking under hoods of cars, even when we have NO idea what we're looking at. It makes us feel manly and somewhat in control. Ridiculous, perhaps, but true.


Anyway, the Peters and I waited. They are troopers. How many pregnant ladies do you know willing to sit in the hot sun for two hours without complaining? To pass the time, Ben and I played a game called, "See who can throw a rock between those two palm trees." Neither of us ever did, but it was fun. I think it really confused the rice farmers in the adjacent field; we already gave them something to gawk at merely by our presence, much less by chunking rocks at trees for no good reason.


All in all, I'd have to say it was a typical Cambodian day. "Does that happen to you often???" someone might ask. I'd say, "Well...yes and no." Things LIKE that happen all the time. Now have I ever been in a taxi that hit a dog and busted a radiator? No. Yet it was still very, very unsurprising...


I wonder if they ate the dog??? (seriously...)

RETREAT!

This weekend has been an in-country retreat for orientation and getting to know the team. We're in the coastal town of Kep. I've never been here, so it's refreshing to be in a place in Cambodia that's new and different.

It's also beautiful. Kep is the least disturbed town I've been to in Cambodia since 2002. The absence of development and things western makes it feel like you're genuinely in the middle of nowhere. It also provides a nice perspective for Phnom Penh - as overwhelming as it may seem at times it's way more convenient than living in the jungle.

Speaking of Jungle. I've been getting to know the natives. For a full photo record of my encounters check out the MY PHOTO GALLERIES link to the right. Here is one of them. This guy to the left lived in my room for a day. We hung out for a bit, took some photos... I named him Buster.

Other roomies included a tarantula behind the toilet, a giant gecko in the thatch roof, and 8 inch long milipedes - or millipedes - however you spell it.


So our in-country orientation has been fairly productive as far as getting to know eachother and realizing where we'll be going as a team this year. Ben, Andrea and I constitute the team at the National Polytechnique Institue of Cambodia. We discussed some avenues for connecting at the school and for reaching out to our students.

Mostly, this weekend has been good as a time to relax and take a breath from city life (and smog) and just chill. I like Kep better than other parts of the coast I've visited here for the simple reason that it's remote; you don't find much of that anymore, and it's a much-appreciated quality for this Southern guy.

Are we there yet?

I so wish I could start teaching. It would give me something specific on which to focus. I'm the kinda guy who likes a routine. Seriously, I wouldn't mind, for the most part, doing the same things at the same places at the same times day in and day out as long as A) It's productive & B) It's enjoyable. Here I take a certain amount of pleasure in frequenting the same breakfast place, and using the same money exchanger, and getting my moto tuned up at the same mechanic, and using the same internet shop, and knowing that on Saturday's I'll be playing soccer. I just wish that I could go ahead and incorporate full-time English teaching into the schedule. But who am I to argue with the Buddhist calendar?

If you need an update, I haven't started teaching yet because the school year (this year) doesn't begin until Nov. 15th. We discovered that school schedules here are very flexible things. They may start earlier or later depending on the Buddhist calendar and on the politics/enrollment numbers going on within universities. For example, the administration may say, "Hmmm... Buddhist holiday such-and-such is rather late this year, let's start school late." Or they may say, "Well...we haven't got a full enrollment yet. Let's start school a month later to see if we can get some more students." I know this is bizarre to our Western way of thinking, but it's totally normal here, and I assure you no Cambodian gives it a second thought.

In my haste to have something "more productive" to do, I think I'm forgetting that people/situations/opportunities are being placed right in front of me right now for a reason. My soccer team is such a highlight during the week, and I want to make an effort to get to know those guys better - yes...even though they're French. Today we played in the monsoon rains. It was killer. I'm so into soccer right now. Ben and I will have tons of fun on our campus, as they have a really nice field (in our backyard!).

There are other things going on that make my time productive. I'm teaching Spanish and piano at a student center. That's really fun and makes me feel useful. There are some other things too, but they're too sensitive to discuss over a blog.

Here's some random info. Today I got into a moto accident. I was driving Ben and me to our match when this guy pulled out in front of me. I swerved as much as I could without totally laying the moto down, but I still clipped him. What killed me is he not only pulled out in front of me, but was looking at me the whole time like, "GET OUT OF THE WAY!" It bent my foot brake back onto the foot rest, so now that's totally unusable. I'll have to get it fixed tomorrow. Another funny thing: When I hit the guy, he toppled over slowly, but I kept going albeit a little wobbly. The rule in Cambodia is the foreigner always loses. If I had stayed he would have insisted that I pay for the "damages." Other people nearby started yelling at me to stop as soon as it happened, but I kept going. I knew he would accumulate a crowd of "witnesses" who would attest to the foreigner's guilt. Running away from an accident seems atrocious to a Westerner, but there are no police to speak of here, and if you can get away it's in your best interests. Ben kept looking to see if we were being followed, but we weren't. I kept thinking, "If I can just get to my team they'll be able to back me up!" Fortunately we didn't reach that point. I can get the brake fixed for about $3 - no biggie!

So...Ben and I are sitting in Freebird's American Bar & Grill. It's less glamorous than it sounds, and far less American. It is, however, a nice reprieve from Asian life outside, and there's free wireless and Johnny Cash and something that approaches a cheeseburger.

Tomorrow I think I'll go to my breakfast spot, get some noodle soup, buy some postcards in the market, and see if I can't find a post office. Be checkin your mailboxes folks!

Grace and peace,

Bryant

My day-to-day scene

Today was a rather exciting day. Instead of meandering around the city in endless cycles of sweat, food, more sweat, language faux pas, and more sweat, you get the picture... Instead of all of that, my two team mates and I moved the first bunch of our stuff out to where we will live and teach. I'm now considering how best to communicate the significance of this event. Oh, wait, first let me say the picture above is the main highway out of the city, towards the airport, that takes us to our school. This is the last vestige of anything urban before we hit the real Cambodia.

Ok, now on to why this first move was so significant. Let me start by saying I've been living out of suitcases for about a month-and-a-half now. No large sacrifice, I know. It's not like I was climbing a mountain barefoot in zero degree temps. But...such things get old. It would be different if there was a really good reason, but as of now a really good reason eludes me.

Why can't I move in yet? Many factors come into play. First you have to consider that I'm going to a new school with a team that is the first foreign-teacher team at the place. The school administration has been doing the best they can with the information they were given by my organization. Something got lost in translation... At any rate, our apartments on campus weren't ready today, so we had to come back to the city.

Two good things came from the quasi-move today: 1) We learned what we'll need to really settle in and make it home, which is great because it will be home for a long time to come. 2) A small attraction for the place was kindled inside my, as-of-late, indifferent heart.


The scene to the left here is what I see from my balcony, only imagine a small mountain off to the left. Seriously, how many people get to see something like this every day? Ok...so...100 million Southeast Asians get to... I guess I should say, "How many guys from Alabama get to see something like this every day?"


Most of you are probably thinking, "Hmmm... I'll take suburbia any day." Granted, rural Cambodia isn't for everyone, but I can't help admire the beauty and simplicity of it all. It rains, people plant rice, they till, uproot, replant, harvest... It's hard work, but the cycle continues and something about it makes me envious.


Until I have more stories and pictures, I will say adios. Or, as they say here in Cambodia, "Lia sin hauy!"


~ Bryant

Motorcyles & Museums

I've spent the past week wandering around the city, getting my bearings, honing my language skills, and trying not to kill small children with my moto (or myself for that matter). Ok I need to clarify something from the start: What you see me on in the picture is called a "moto." It's not a moped; much to my mother's consternation it's not a scooter (she still calls it that) and...........ok..........it's not a motorcycle. I'll admit it. It's not a motorcycle. It has a basket on the front for crying out loud. But it's definitely NOT a moped. I call it "Fun On Two Wheels" cause I have a blast on it (with helmet, of course).


The problem is we won't start teaching until MUCH later than we thought. Such is the nature of Southeast Asian culture. Things like school schedules are seen as flexible. The students will always study the same length of time, but when that length begins is up to interpretation. Things like weather patterns, the lunar calendar, and plain-and-simple bureacracy come into play. We won't start until the end of October.


What will I do until then? I'll learn language, make friends in the city, meet some summer students, teach a couple seminars.... I'll be as productive as possible, you can believe that. A friend - Will Rope - and I are memorizing the New Testament together. That's been crazy encouraging to me. I enjoy doing that during my mornings and evenings.


I've also been spending time with the new teammates who are going through in-country training under the capable tutilage of Trisha, a 3-years-accomplished English teacher here in Phnom Penh. She has been getting the new guys acclimated to Khmer culture and oriented around the city. She's made my readjustment so much easier, so props to Trish.






One thing the team did lately that I got in on was the Toul Sleng Genocide Museum. I've been four times already, but I really wanted to go and see what's been updated and maybe this time take some serious photos (as serious as photos from yours truly can be).


I was onced again moved by the humanity on display at this place. Thousands of photos of the victims plead with you as you walk the halls of this school-turned-prison-turned-memorial. You somehow have to come to grips with the fact that they were all murdered; they're all dead. I don't think I've ever really given it the amount of thought I did during this recent visit. I decided to focus on the faces individually. There are too many to count - you have to look at a section and focus on the few that jump out at you.

There I was in this solemn place staring into the faces of the dead, wondering what they were thinking and feeling. What were their last moments like? Do they have family still alive? Which were the ones that made it out alive?






Out of the some 17,000 prisoners, only 14 made it alive. This is only the prison where political targets were taken. Out of the country's 8 million + population roughly 2 million were either exterminated or died of starvation, disease, and malnutrition.




My big problem is how to process all of this as an American. I've undergone NOTHING in my life approaching the total upheaval, violence, desperation, and destruction that these people have experienced. I've not experienced any hardships at all....period. The only medium I have for relating to this is a movie. How pathetic is that???



All I can do is be here and try to contribute to the rebuilding and regrowth of this nation. I feel like, in many ways, the United States is responsible, even indirectly, for what has happened here. (I'm still patriot, don't worry.) But....that's for another time and another blog.



If you'll look at my links page up top and to the right, you'll see one that says "My Photos." There you can view all my pictures from the museum as well as other photos from Cambodia. To see the museum look under "Phnom Penh - Genocide Museum."



Grace and peace,



Bryant

Bienvenidos a Cambodia!

So we finally made it! I'm in Phnom Penh once again, and ready to get going. The only problem is I can't get going just yet. The past couple weeks have consited of some orientation and acclimation and, for the most part, just waiting.
Classes don't start until the middle of October (possibly later). You may ask, "So why are you there so early?" That's a very good question, and I would answer it by saying my organization does their training based on the earliest semester date. In other words, some teachers in other areas will begin teaching in the next week or so. ELI/C can't do three or four separate trainings. Therefore, those of us who start teaching later in the year come to our respective countries/cities and do things like learn language, get used to the food, set up our living spaces/apartments/houses/what-have-you... We begin to make connections with locals and learn our environment. It's good to have a large space of time in which to do this, but at times it gets really lonely and monotonous. I'm being fruitful with my time, though.



I don't have much time left for this blog, so here is a list of things that have happened since I've been here. I'll try to comment on them individually later. I'm a big fan of lists...

1) Met the Korean staff from my school
2) Had impromptu acupuncture in a public place
3) Joined a French soccer team
4) Played in my first ever soccer match
5) Bought a moto
6) Had a moto accident (not my fault and nothing drastic)
7) Relearned the streets of Phnom Penh
8) Attended a Khmer "service"
9) Memorized the first two-and-a-half chapters of Philippians
10) Created an international incident just by showing up to to local Cambodian gym
11) Went to two birthday parties
12) Eaten a baby duck (it was gross) to prove my manhood (don't know how much I actually proved...)



There's my update. I invite you to check out my photos on phanfare.com. I'm guessing the easiest way to do that, for now, is to either look at my phanfare application on facebook, or to sign in to phanfare directly. I'll try to put a link on here, but such skills are not my strongest. You can always email me at pmeredith@elic.org.

Grace and peace,

Bryant

Ha Long will this blog be???

Ok, so back to Ha Long Bay... Where to begin??? Let me start by saying something. (I feel like most of my blogs come with disclaimers...) The one lesson I've learned from traveling aroung the world is this: The world is amazing and full of cool stuff, but it's never as cool or as breathtaking as you think it will be. Now indulge me as I wax philosophical:

My thoughts are as follows: Americans are spoiled by Hollywood. Take any adventure movie - Indiana Jones, Tomb Raider, Bon Voyage Charlie Brown! - and you will see beautiful, exotic scenery that appears remote and larger-than-life, what-have-you. Ok, so I'm kidding about Charlie Brown, but he did go to France in that one... My point is we see these movies and get an idea in our head that is a little mas grande than real life. A beautiful example is a comment made by my new friend and team mate, Erin Gripper. In our taxi on the way home from Highland's Coffee (so good!) Erin was telling Megan and me about going to Egypt. She said the pyramids were, "very cool but not as big as I'd thought they'd be." That's a fair sentiment, I think. Honestly I expected her to say something like, "It was the coolest thing ever!", but the more I thought about her response the more it made sense to me. It's really easy to make something on film or in pictures seem larger than life or more exotic or more remote, and then when you show up you find out that it's really not any bigger than a warehouse and there are tourists running around everywhere and, "Oh look! A Starbucks!"

So, back to Ha Long Bay. I went into this expecting less than what was offered, and I honestly still came up short. I'll have to explain what I mean, and in all honesty I want to be fair. It's a part of the coast east of Hanoi (in the North) where there are literally over a thousand of limestone islands of various shapes and sizes. Some are as small as half a football field, while others are miles in diameter. Most are jutting sharply and steeply out of the water. The pics below was taken by my friend Berkeley, a teacher going to Laos. In fact many of these are his 'cause he has a killer camera and mine camera went dead after the first night.

As you can from these and the one in my previous post (that pic was actually mine) there is some really cool geology/geophraphy to check out aroung the place. Here are a couple more to give you an idea of what it looks like:

So the one on the left is Berk's pic. Mine on the right here is a view from our boat. More on that later..... I have to go to bed. I'm a little under the weather and just took a couple nyquil. They're kicking in big time. Next time I'll put up some more cool pics and talk about how my disclaimer ties in to Ha Long Bay. There will also be some funny commentary via me as our bizaro tour guide.

Grace and peace!

Ha Long Bay

Last weekend my team took a little trip to one of Vietnam's natural wonders. I'll have to tell you more about it soon because something just came up, but I'm gonna go ahead and post this and get back on here later for full disclosure.

In the small things...

****DISCLAIMER***
The main purpose of my blog is to communicate with whatever poor sap accidentally stumbles upon it (my apologies in advance). One function of this blog is to let people back home know what's going on with me, specifically about exciting news and positive themes and encouragment concerning the work here in Cambodia. Other posts will not be so cheery. I fully intend to write down some of the bad stuff too, for it is both the bad and the good that constitute our short lives in this fallen world. Out of the bad comes Hope. In desperation Redemption comes. That is the message I've brought with me from home; why should it be any different here? If you are one of my supporters I want you to know you are supporting a real human being who has bad days sometimes, but I'm here and I'm more convinced than ever this is where I'm supposed to be right now. I'm not going anywhere, and in the mean time you get to read ALLLLL about it! :0)

I've spent the past few days pining away in my own bubble of cultural depresssion. I miss home. I miss good food. I miss my gym. My body has been attacked by Southeast Asia and it's fighting back, albeit a losing battle. The memories of my family are being relegated to further and further back in the ole brain, and this time around there won't be any going home in a month or two for a refresher. A group of 18 that three weeks ago were relative strangers have now become my only friends, coworkers, and classmates. I've come to love many of them and value their friendship; they are a refuge of community and like-mindedness in an onslaught of crazy. There exists little doubt I'll continue to stay in touch with many of them in the years ahead and will see them on the other side of Glory, yet two weeks from now has a sad goodbye in store as some go on to Laos and other parts of Vietnam while my three team mates and I go on to Cambodia.

I've been shocked how small things are what make me miss home most, and how the small things are fueling culture shock. Today a random smell (and there are plenty here) reminded me of my parents' living room, the mental image of which brought a hundred sights, sounds, and memories to mind. It could be a play of light on the sidewalk, or the sound of traffic that reminds me of Mobile. A young child playing with a toy car might remind me of my godson Bailey, or the laughter of someone on the street might pass for my brother's laugh.


It's almost impossible to handle crazy without wanting to share it with your friends. ("Crazy" is my new noun for the week, and yes I know it's not really a noun.) If you're having trouble with this vicariously, imagine you're driving by a corn field, see aliens land, stop, meet them, they look cross-eyed at you and leave. What's your first inclination??? You want to tell people, of course! I'm not yet sure if I believe in aliens, but Vietnamese people are coming close enough lately. And when they throw crazy at me all I want to do is tell someone back home. It's usually Craig, sometimes Kristen, although I tend to want to spare her somewhat as she'll be experiencing all of this for the first time soon enough. (Love you babe!)Unfortunately I can't tell anyone except through this blog.... GET ON SKYPE, CRAIG!

Where was I going with this? Oh yeah, it's the little things that make the difference in life. My dad always told me that if you paid attention to the little things that you'd get the big things right. Great inductive advice from a guy who is great at the small things, that's for sure. Or is it deductive? I can't remember which one, anyway... It was a little thing that brought me out of my stupor of culture shock this evening and put me back on track, returned to me the perspective and focus I so desperately needed. And you probably thought this was going to end negatively, didn't you? Maybe next time...



It all started when Ben and Andrea, whose blog is linked to the right here, suggested we go out tonight for Chinese dumplings. I'm a fool for Chinese dumplings and didn't have to think about my answer. As is typical with the group of teachers here, our small trio turned into a sextuplet which snowballed into the 8 or 9ish range... We piled on a crowded bus and headed for a tried-and-true Chinese dumpling street restaurant. Once there we realized the menu was all in Vietnamese and Chinese - strike one and two. My phrase book didn't provide much assistance. Frustrations built. To stall for time we ordered drinks (coke translates well in most cultures). I frantically tried to translate the menu to make sure we got pork dumplings instead of squid and rice....



That's when it happened... Andrea asked for a coke and an ice water, so I quickly spat out the order at the lady with too much forcefulness and very incorrect intonation. The waitress looked at me with just the right amount of annoyance to say, "You don't have to be a jerk." Suddenly, despite the absence of words, I saw the light through that well-deserved disdain. Here we were - a group of five dumb, illiterate Americans demanding drinks and hopelessly and quite erroneously making blind jabs at this young lady's national language. It's not her fault we can't speak her language in her city (even if it full of crazy). She can't help it if we don't know the difference between dumpling and toilet paper in Vietnamese. And she certainly hasn't done anything to warrant impolite customers.




Oh, if I could only tell you what good that proverbial slap-in-the-face did for me in that moment. As I wallowed in my abject shame, our friend and classmate Steven came up just in the nick of time. He and his wife Joelle have been here for 6 months studying language, and he was able to help us order our food. Plate after plate of, in my opinion, the best food in Asia came pouring out from this little street kitchen. There's something perfectly inviting and comforting about Chinese dumplings. It's the same quality shared by macaroni or spaghetti or french fries... I suppose it must be the simplicity of these meals that makes them so appealing, their very nature reassuring us that everything will be ok, just take one more bite. Even the utensils - essentially, two dowel rods - are the epitome of simple function - no bells and whistles. It's the little things...


I'm sure I sound ridiculous, but who cares? Who knew that something as basic as steamed dough and meat could do so much for this ethnocentric American guy, wallowing in his self pity? Dumplings taught me a lesson today about the small things. They often matter most. I'm thinking the tongue here, mustard seed maybe, or heck even ordering a coke in Vietnamese. The small things constitute life, and now, thanks to a little dumpling, I'm ready to get on with mine again.

Life today is like a Michael Buble song...

When I think of songs I think of days past when I felt like a particular song or was listening to it. I have really vivid memories from odd times simply because of particular songs linked to the memory. But I'm not writing about the hypothoses of sensory input assocation. I just want to say - today I feel like that Michael Buble song "Home." Only, I'd have to say I probably feel more like the country version since I'm thinking of home - Alabama. The funny thing is I hate that version with all my being, but right now I'd cut off a finger to be in my truck driving down Wilmer Rd. listening to it. Go figure...

Especially relevant is the line, "Maybe surrounded by a million people I still feel alone, and let me go home. Oh, I've got to go home." There are way too many people in Hanoi. The commies should redistribute some population or something. I mean if you're gonna be communist then why not take advantage of it, you know what I'm saying? (Ok. I'm not totally serious, and no disrespect intended to the government of Vietnam. You reading, guys???)

The problem is really not food or the heat. I miss my family; I miss my girlfriend. I want to hold her and be with her, yet I can't. It's like the adult version of a kid who wants to have the new toy more than anything, but daddy keeps saying, "No."

I miss my brother, and I hate not being able to hear about his first experiences in college. He'll be fine; I'm not sure I will sometimes.

Now I'm thinking of a Derek Webb song, and it's so good I'm gonna put the whole thing on here. Please read it:

As I survey the ground for ants

Looking for a place to sit and read

I'm reminded of the streets of my hometown How they're much like this concrete that's warm beneath my feet

And how I'm all wrapped up in my mother's face

With a touch of my father just up around the eyes

And the sound of my brother's laugh

But more wrapped up in what binds our ever distant lives

But if I must go

Things, I trust, will be better off without me

But I don't want to know

Life is better off a mystery

So keep'em coming these lines on the road

And keep me responsible be it a light or heavy load

And keep me guessing with these blessings in disguise

And I'll walk with grace my feet and faith my eyes

Hometown weather is on TV

I imagine the lives of the people living there

And I'm curious if they imagine me

Cause they just wanna leave; I wish that I could stay

But I get turned around

And I mistake some happiness for blessing

But I'm blessed as the poor

Still I judge success by how I'm dressing

So I'll sing a song of my hometown

I'll breathe the air and walk the streets

Maybe find a place to sit and read

And the ants are welcome company

And you know what? I couldn't say it better...

I'll be ok. Grace my feet and faith my eyes... Bring it on, Hanoi. Bring - it - on.

A closing thought for the day...

How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,

Is laid for your faith in His excellent Word!

What more can He say than to you He hath said,

To you who for refuge, to Jesus have fled?

In every condition, in sickness, in health;

In poverty’s vale, or abounding in wealth;

At home and abroad, on the land, on the sea,

As thy days may demand, shall thy strength ever be.

Fear not, I am with thee, O be not dismayed,

For I am thy God and will still give thee aid;

I’ll strengthen and help thee, and cause thee to stand

Upheld by My righteous, omnipotent hand.

When through the deep waters I call thee to go,

The rivers of woe shall not thee overflow;

For I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless,

And sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.

When through fiery trials thy pathways shall lie,

My grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply;

The flame shall not hurt thee; I only design

Thy dross to consume, and thy gold to refine.

The soul that on Jesus has leaned for repose,

I will not, I will not desert to its foes;

That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,

I’ll never, no never, no never forsake.

Off the chart: How to fit road rage and Mexican food into your Southeast Asian Worldview

There are moments in life when the unexpected happens. We could all agree on that, right? We take the unexpected as it comes and, usually without conscious thought, assimilate it into our worldview. Por ejemplo, you find yourself caught up in a bank robbery. The thief gets caught, like they all do, and you come out of the situation unscathed. You go home a little shaken up but none the worse for wear. Now, you have to fit that situation into your worldview in order for it to make sense.

"Well, I guess I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time!"

The above statement implies you have a worldview based on fate and not one of providence. The latter would say,

"I guess there was a reason for what happened today, even if I can't see it now!"

Why am I talking about worldviews and the unexpected? Well, today was a fun day in Hanoi. The Farnums (picture on the way) had Team Lao and Team Cambodia over for Mexican food tonight. The Farnums are ELI team leaders here in Hanoi and have been serving as hosts - more appropriately, babysitters - for us trainees. They let us do laundry, show us around town, hold our hands across the street, etc. Aparently their house help can cook Mexican, so Erin Gripper (more about her and others later) dropped a less than subtle hint and, BINGO, dinner date for Thursday night (tonight) for Team Lao and Team Cambodia. Team Vietnam had already been over for Mexican, so they weren't invited.

So......

Ben Peters and his lovely and pregnant wife Andrea, Berkeley Shorthill Ph.D., Erin Gripper, Sarah Price, Melissa Tucker, and I piled into a seven-passenger van and headed for the Farnums. (Yes, there were eight of us).

On the way, our taxi driver... Wait... Lemme back up... There is a typhoon hitting Vietnam right now. It's name is Kummuri or something like that, and it's probably not a typhoon anymore. It just looks like a typical stormy day on the Gulf Coast, actually. So anyway our taxi driver was driving in the bad weather and accidentally bumped (barely nudged more like it) a moto at an intersection. The driver looks at his bike, looks up at us, looks at his bike again, gets off, comes over to the drivers side, we all hold our breath, the guy yanks the door open, cusses the driver, slaps him, and slams the door....

Excuse me! Waiter? A round of heart palpitations for me and my friends please!

Moving on from that adventure... wait... I need to say that I wanted to slap the jerk, because our tiny little taxi driver (couldn't have been more than 20 years old) was so embarrassed. I could tell. He just sat there and took it and didn't look left or right. I wanted to cream the guy on the moto, and I wished I could say, "Don't worry about it!" in Viet.

Ok, moving on from that adventure we arrived at the Farnums, and this part will be really short: WE ATE THE BEST MEXICAN FOOD I'VE EVER HAD. PERIOD.

So, upon reflection, I want to say that life throws you curve balls sometimes. I mean, homemade tortillas and guacamole and road rage were not on the agenda for today. How does one begin to process Mexican food, nay, outstanding Mexican food in Hanoi, Vietnam??? Much less during a typhoon.... I might point out that all this is taking place while my friends and family are asleep in bed on the other side of planet Earth, the implications of which I'm still unable to process. I think I need some tylenol.

I suppose the answer to my questions is found in knowing that, in our lifetime, little is left that is truly remote. I would also add that the more I'm around people of other cultures the more I'm struck by similarities rather than differences. Road rage? Could be Mobile, Alabama; could be L.A. or D.C. or, heaven forbid, Hanoi, Vietnam.

So what do you do with Mexican food in Hanoi??? You eat it, of course, and lots of it, and you don't ask questions.

Bryant

Hi from Hanoi

The following was an assignment here in Hanoi for one of my grad classes:

Bryant Meredith
Reflective Journal: Entry 3, “Free Write About 1st Week In Hanoi.”
August 4, 2008

It’s very difficult to qualify in writing what one experiences in a culture plunge such as this. I use that phrase for lack of better description. Cliché references such as cross-cultural experience and international experience are both annoying and inadequate. Here’s a word picture:

Imagine standing at the edge of a creek. You’re at the bottom of a wide valley between two large peaks that converge somewhere in the distance. It’s a summer day, and the valley is filled with warmth and life. Staring at the creek, you visually follow its course up the valley and see it emerge from underneath a glacier that has descended from the mountain and is kissing the edge of the valley. You’ve been hiking all day and are hot and tired and the creek looks so inviting. You can see smooth pebbles lying at the bottom of pristine water, and it’s so easy to imagine how wonderful they’d feel on your feet while refreshing water cascades over your tired shoulders.

Unable to take it any longer, you drop your heavy pack and strip. Feeling a little vulnerable you quickly jump in… Breathless, in pain, unable to speak or scream you quickly scramble for the edge. Water cold as fresh snow slaps you in the face. Suddenly you realize your mistake - the glacier sourced this water, and as inviting as it looked it would always be numbingly freezing. Once at the shore you realize that some of the shock has worn off. It slowly becomes easier and easier to enjoy the water, yet you eventually will have to return to the shore for warmth and a recharge if you want to continue to enjoy the creek.

That is a real experience that somewhat compares to my initial impressions of S.E. Asia. I’m thinking back to my first trip to Phnom Penh in 2002. Being here in Hanoi reminds me of that initial impression and shock I experienced. There are things here that are simply no longer unfamiliar and shocking, and then there are things that will always continue to surprise and “slap me in the face” like a cold shower or like jumping into the glacier creek. Many naïve presumptions and wistful expectations were soon dashed to pieces during my first week in Phnom Penh that year, much like the hiker jumping into the inviting creek in the valley.

I expected Asia to be far more rural and less modern. Part of me expected a quainter Asia like I had seen in movies. I expected to be bathing at a well or in a river and sleeping in a bamboo hut (actually I did sleep in a bamboo house for awhile) and communing with workers in the rice fields. Imagine my surprise when, on the night-time drive from the airport in Phnom Penh, I saw billboards advertising Ovaltine, and asphalted streets with painted lines, and ice cream shops, and neon signs on cell phone shops. When I reached the house of the Khmer family with whom I stayed, I was floored to see semi-normal beds and a western toilet and tiled floors and chairs and a sofa.

Despite these similar conveniences I also encountered the cold-water slap through things like constant, unabated heat, “dirty” surfaces and environments, filthy smells, bad meals with no recourse to familiar food (there was not a selection of Western food in P.P. back then), and annoying Asian habits 24/7 for which I was not prepared. I lived with a Khmer family, and they were not terribly concerned with the fact that I was American and might do things a little different, leading to some very awkward moments.

My first week in Hanoi has certainly been a catalyst for a flood of memory. The sights and smells of S.E. Asia are intoxicating. I often say this when asked what the place is like. “It’s intoxicating!” I tell them. Usually this elicits weird responses and facial expressions, but that’s the truth about my impression. S.E. Asia invokes emotions that, in me, feel guttural and deep and lusty and alive and powerful, as though I’m here for a purpose and here doing what I was meant to do. Life here feels like life ought to feel, not like the packaged and commercialized theme park ride that we call Life in America. Rather it feels like you might actually have to exert some effort and take some risks and live on the edge a little…. Alive for the first time… Living life at last…

Theology in music....

a favorite hym...

Praise to the Lord, the Almighty, the King of creation!
O my soul, praise Him, for He is thy health and salvation!
All ye who hear, now to His temple draw near;
Praise Him in glad adoration!

Praise to the Lord, who o'er all things so wondrously reigneth,
Shelters thee under His wings, yea, so gently sustaineth!
Hast thou not seen how thy desires all have been
Granted in what He ordaineth?

Praise to the Lord, who doth prosper thy work and defend thee;
Surely His goodness and mercy here daily attend thee.
Ponder anew what the Almighty can do
If with His love He befriend thee.

Praise to the Lord! O let all that is in me adore Him!
All that hath life and breath, come now with praises before Him!
Let the "amen" sound from His people again;
Gladly for, aye, we adore Him.
Text: Joachim Neander; translated by Catherine Winkworth
Music: Stralsund Gesangbuch, 1665

The Weight Of Glory

Sometimes when I have too much to think about I like to put some of it out there on paper, or in this case screen. Tonight is a night for that. It's kinda like organizing a t-shirt drawer or something - if you've got too much stuff in it, you have to pull some of it out and see what's really in there. Then you can start to put it back in a more organized way. That's how I process... What I'm about to write is raw me. I'm not trying to be offensive or blunt, although it will sound that way. In fact this really isn't intended for anyone else to read but me. I don't mind, but that's not the purpose here. If you do read, just take everything as is and know that there's a happy ending.

I just returned from a singles fellowship. It's a group of "young adults" from my church that gets together regularly. I had a good time, but I'll have to admit my brain was light years away. The problem, and yet the blessing, is that I'm going onto the mission field in about a month. I've been pursuing this calling for more than four years, and now the time is right around the corner. I call it a problem, not because it's getting in the way of anything or causing a burden, but because I'm having some trouble dealing with this leaving thing. Have you ever had an instance where you thought one way about yourself and God slowly and gently said, "No way dude." ? The past four months or so have been like that for me.

You see, I've always been the guy that's like, "I wanna go live in a hut in the jungle and share the gospel and give my life up for Jesus!" Half of my university education consisted of Christian Studies, so I was always around the amateur theologian crowd. That's basically where this calling developed. In the epic search for a major I finally sailed ashore onto the land of "The Ministry." This is kind of a cliche term these days. If I had a nickel for every time I've heard, "I feel called into the ministry" I would be listed in the Fortune 500. I'm not downplaying that calling, but I think lots of people say they feel called to the ministry when what's really happening is they're feeling called to be real Christians. (I'm getting a little off-track here, but I'll get back to the mission-field-and-me thing in a second.)

In most of our churches here in America there is no real sense of the need for true service or of the urgency of the gospel or of mercy demonstrated among the least of these. Many young folks see this and they know it should be different, but they believe that the ones to serve and preach and teach are the "ministers" while all the other pew-warming, affluent, self-made followers of Christ are the "normal Christians." So when one of these young people feels that he or she wants to get up off the pew and do something about it, he or she will profess a "calling to ministry." Immediately this creates a dichotomy between what every Christian SHOULD be doing, and what people perceive as the role of quote-unquote ministers. Don't mistake my meaning; some of these callings into full-time ministry are very genuine. I just think, from experience and observation, that many are not.

My case, in the begining, was very much like what I just described. In searching for a career I had to ask myself, "What's most important to you?" That's a tough question, if you think about it, because we value conflicting goals and ideals. Someone may value a really high salary but doesn't want to admit to pursuing money or material goods. Another person may value humanitarian goals but knows that this will mean a life a hard work and exclusion from the American dream. Other people may want to make an impact for the good, whatever that may be. That was me my freshman year in university. Because my context here is as a follower of Christ, I wanted to be used of God in the most effective and eternally significant way possible. That excluded a lot of things, but it also opened the door to a whole array of choices. Preaching, counseling, youth ministry, music, medicine, and even politics seemed like avenues for having an impact. Eventually I realized with the help of friends and mentors that I needed to discover my gifts and then go after them. I liked languages, I liked foreign cultures, and I liked the idea of getting to travel, so I began to pursue the idea of foreign mission work. After my first trip overseas I was hooked.

My horizons expanded a thousand percent, and I came home fit to be tied. Some really good things came out of this, and some really bad things came too. I read and read and read about missionaries and about the call to go share the gospel and about how to minister in different cultures. I also discovered that many of my friends were feeling the same way. There was actually a missionary click at school, if you can believe it. As for me, I wanted to be the next Jim Elliot - I wanted to go to the hard places and live the hard life and, live or die, serve Christ. I can actually remember times when I said things like, "I'm the kinda guy who can live anywhere and eat anything." Unbelievable. These kind of attitudes were pretty common, and from time to time we unconsciously played this little game I titled, "Who's the Best Missionary?" Here're the rules: 1) You have to be planning to go into missions. If not then you don't really count. 2) You have to make at least one misisons trip, preferably more. The more you make the higher your score. 3) The missionary who goes to the hardest place and does the hardest work gets 100 bonus points. Possibility of death or imprisonment indicates a true heart of service. This is your trump card. For example, working with Muslim youth in Pakistan would trump doing college outreach in France. Doing undercover Bible storying in communist China would trump building a church in Mexico. 4) You have to have read at least four missionary biographies and listened to "Doing Missions When Dieing Is Gain" by John Piper. Otherwise you don't really have a heart for missions.

Believe it or not, we played this game. We danced this prideful dance for all to see. I'm not really sure if it ever really crossed our minds what we were doing, but....there we were. Like Paul I elevate myself to the position of chief in this sad game. I played it hard and well. The funny thing is, less than half of those "sold out for missions" are now going.

What does this have to do with anything? Well, I'm trying to admit some pride here. And this is why: the time for me to finally become the missionary is here. I'll be leaving soon. I've finally found an awesome church. I never thought after leaving my old one that I had time to connect with a new community of believers, but the Lord dropped one in my lap. He is really too good to me. I'm sad to be leaving them. My family has become more and more important to me the older I get, and now I'm leaving them just when things are getting interesting. The little brother has finally grown up, and the older he gets the closer and I grow. Now I'll miss most of his college years and his baseball games. I never really had a real best friend, but God's given me one of those recently too. It's just one more relationship that is about to be "infringed upon" by this missions thing. What else? Oh yeah, how could I forget the big one? All I've ever really wanted for myself was to have a family. Material things have never held much interest for me. I just want a wife to love and some kids to call me "daddy." Yet here I am, 25, and still single. I know deep down that God has this all under perfect control. You know that right? He really does. It's not an if-then situation; it's a 2+2=4 situation. No need to argue. So why are you whining, Bryant? Well, I don't know that I am really. I mean, I think I'm just laying my heart out there. The kid back in college who was ready to go and lay it all down is still ready, but now I think I realize that it's not me producing that desire. God has to have planted it there and watered it and nurtured it. Because the "me" side of me is gonna pout about saying goodbye and missing out on American life for three years, be it church or dating or football or the gym or AC or Subway sandwiches or you name it. The missionary game is over. Now the real thing begins. I think I've finally realized that if God wanted me to go live in the jungle and be the next Jim Elliot I would have left three years ago; I wouldn't still be sitting here.

God is patient. He is infinitely kind toward us, His children. Why He bothers with me so much is still a huge mystery.Part of me thinks that God is showing me here, at the end, that He is still my Father. He isn't witholding any good thing! I can only assume that the good things now will be strengthened in the next few years. The perspective I'm trying to have is one of excited anticipation. The gospel will be preached to thirsty souls. May many hear and believe! I'll learn so much while I'm gone and come home ready for life's next step. God will continue to work through my church, and I can't wait to read the reports. All other doubts and fears and grumblings are laid at His feet where they belong, and I can walk away confident of His sovereign plan. The mission field is all around us. That's a trite Christian slogan, but it's biblical. My mission field, for the time being, happens to be on the other side of the world. If the Father wills, I'll come back having lived these words of Martin Luther:

Let goods and kindred go
This mortal life also
The body they may kill
God's truth abideth still
His kingdom is forever

Bryant