More holy?

Sometimes it makes me feel uncomfortable when I think about our 'status' as missionaries, especially when people look at us and think 'Wow! You guys really love God!" "You scarificed a lot!"

We know in our hearts that we are just the same in our hearts as any Christians. We struggle to stay close to God, we struggle to be pure and holy, we struggle to obey God's will.

I started to have a taste of "you are holy than us" syndrome when I first got accepted into seminary. I remember even before I saw the inside of my seminary, friends at church already treated me like I suddenly know a lot about God and the Bible. Little did they know the reason why I went to seminary was because I felt like I was lacking knowledge in both!

Then came the time when I became a full-time worker "for God". I felt ashamed when believers thought I prayed 50 times a day and always got illuminated by the Holy Spirit when I read the Bible. Or they might say I had so much faith in God that they were ashamed of their distrust in God. Oh, boy! How I wish I could dig a hole and hide.

I sometimes asked myself if I am displaying myself as a holy person and that's why people would make those comments? Because if I was, I need to repent. The last thing I want to do is to make other people think that I obey better than they do, I have more faith than they do, and I always understand what the Bible says.

They are coming after me!

Indeed the world is becoming smaller and there are a lot more exchanges among peoples and cultures, but being a "foreigner" in Asia is still somewhat different.

It is OK for Dan, he is used to it since he married me and he has travelled to Asia many times. However, little Kioni is not understanding some of the unwanted attention that are given to her. Wherever we go in Asia, she draws attention because she how she looks. To westerners' eyes, she looks Chinese, to Chinese, she looks absolutely western. When we went to Pizza Hut in Xiamen, one of the waitress stared at us three for a long time while we were waiting for the elevator, finally she asked me if Kioni is mixed, and if I was her mother. She has an expression of total disbelief when I answered 'yes' to both of her questions. She finally said, "But she doesn't look Chinese AT ALL!'

It was fine in Hong Kong, people there see lots of foreigners, so people might turn and take a second look at her, but not much after that. In Cebu, where a lot of people worship mixed kids, thinking they are the most beautiful type of people on the planet, Kioni is physically touched a lot, on her face, on her arm, on her head, on her legs, etc. More than once, kids in Cebu just come up to Kioni and stood within 2 inches in front of her and started touching her. I don't care how old you are, you just won't put up with things like this. As a result, Kioni screams whenever she sees strangers, children or adult approaching her. "They are coming after me, Mommy!" Then she would run to me for protection. She always has this fear and said such things when someone comes a bit closer. Eventually, I have to tell her people do that to her because she is cute. She still screams, but not as loud as before.

Here is Xiamen, people are more reserved, a lot of long stares will follow us as a family, a few bold ones will touch Kioni with lightening speed. Even with just stares, they are sometimes hard to deal with. Yesterday she couldn't take it anymore and asked me over and over why people look at her and smile at her, that was when we were taking a ferry to Gulangyu. There were so many people on the ferry that she couldn't hide from them even I was holding her and she buried her face on my shoulder. Eventually, I just have to tell Kioni to ignore them. I know this is not the nicest thing to say, but she just cannot possibily deal with all these attention. I have a taste of how being a celebrity must be like. (Pay attention to the staring eyes in the background of the photo.)

Every day from going out of our hotel room, to getting into the elevator to walking in the street and sitting down in a restaurant, it never fails that she, or we, drew a lot of attention. Dan already sticks out like a sore thumb, then with me talking to Dan in English, and with a mixed kid in tow, people are bound to stare and point, this makes our outing quite uncomfortable sometimes. Both Dan and I have learned to ignore the stares, but Kioni is still figuring out why people would touch her, stare at her, smile at her, and a few even attempt to hold her.

As a mother, I feel like I have failed her when someone successfully touched her and made her scream. I feel like I failed to protect her, I was her only defense, yet some people are so quick, some sneak in from behind, some would touch her dangling leg even when I was clutching her tight in my arms.

On the up side, though, she has priviledges that a "regular" kid does not have, she gets colorful bowls and plates to eat with, she gets special little attention that other kids won't get. She has gotten so many extra gifts when we go into stores to buy things. She got a bowl and chopstick gift set because we bought a $20 USD worth of things, while that gift set is for customers who have purchased $400 USD or more. The guy behind the counter just said, "I will give you a set, just because you are so cute." She has gotten little free gifts from shops where we bought stuff. People just found her irrestibly cute and had to give her something to please her.

All in all, it is not healthy for Kioni to be admired for something that neither is her virtue nor her merit. I am worried that she would grow up being used to having people around her adoring her just because she is different looking. I am at lost in what to do right now. Maybe living in a western society will give her a better share in life. It must be hard for long-term missionaries who try to raise their children in Asia, however, I trust that God will give us a way to deal with all these if He indeed would call us to serve him long-term in Asia.

The cleanest city in China

We have finally had some time to do a few hours of visiting. Here are some photos to show what Xiamen and the "Piano Island" Gulangyu is like. The photos with tall buildings are taken in Xiamen, and the photos with more greenery were taken in Gulangyu, a small island where 150 years ago where various countries had their consulate located. For more history and other information on Xiamen, visit Amoy Magic online, a wonderful website by an American couple, they have lived in Xiamen since the 80s.

Xiamen

We have been in Xiamen for two days, Dan is teaching for two weeks. We are staying in a wonderful hotel, well, it is not 5 starts or anything, but the room we have is an apartment style room. Not only it has two separate rooms inside the room with queen size beds, it also has a sitting area and an desk where Dan works on his lectures. There is also a majong table, where we use it as putting all sorts of papers on.

We have not seen much of Xiamen yet, all the mornings are occupied with teaching, and after eating lunch with the students, it is time for us to go back to the hotel for a nap. It will be almost dark when Kioni wakes up from her nap. Dinner follows and not much after that.

As much as we can see during our taxi rides to the training center and back, we see a clean city. Of course, it is still a developing country, so there are still tell tale signs of it in the city, e.g., broken sidewalks, people stepping out into traffic, dusty floors, etc. But in comparison to what I remember from years ago, this is a major improvement. The level of living is also far beyond what I have known.

I am especialy impressed with the students Dan is teaching, wonderful young people who loves the Lord. Still young in faith, but are already committing themselves into the full-time service of the Lord. I am very impressed by them.

God spoke...

This evening we are flying to Hong Kong. Kioni got up at her normal wake up time, ate breakfast, did Kumon, and was jumping around in our air-conditioned bedroom. She then asked daddy, "We are taking the Revo (our car) to the airport instead of taking a taxi, right?" "Who is driving it back home then?" I asked. "Daddy." Of course, daddy always drives in Cebu. "Then how is daddy going to get to the airport?" "He can take a taxi." "We'll all go in a taxi, Kioni." I said to her firmly, trying to extinquish any thought of riding in the Revo to the airport, because she could go on and on.

At the same time, I was thinking to myself, "Oh, yes, how I wish we could drive our own car to the airport and not have to call a taxi. I am so tired of dealing with the taxi drivers who always want more when they hear you are going to the airport, and we can take all the time we want to load and unload. But that is not going to happen unless we have enough money to hire a driver, nope, it is not going to happen."

A few minutes later, the phone rang, it is one of Dan's students, he is the owner of a used car dealership which also fixes cars. We have talked to him about fixing our car, and he is glad to do that for us FOR FREE. Now that we are leaving for a month, it is a great time to let him have the car. The reason for his call was that he wanted to see if his plant supervisor would be able to meet us at the departure level of the airport in a few hours, and drove the car back to the dealership. They will fix it and will drive it back to the airport on the day we arrive back in Cebu so we can drive the car home!

"Kioni, we are driving the Revo to the airport afterall."

I was speechless. I was reminded of the Bible: "From the mouth of infants and nursing babes You have established strength." "從 嬰 孩 和 吃 奶 的 口 中 ， 建 立 了 能 力 。" Psalm 8:2

God takes care of every detail of our lives, to a point where I wonder why I would ever worry over anything at all. He is there, He always watches over us.

Moving again!

We are going to move again in July or August to another house in Cebu. This is the life of missionaries, I guess, be flexible and constantly on the go.

We knew before we came to Cebu that we will have to find another house to rent by the second part of year 2007. The missionaries who were staying in this house are going to come back from their furlough.

We started looking a few months ago, but it is hard to find a house that is fully furnished, in a safe area and within our price range. (We have raised $600 US for rent.)

Then God starts to work on our behalf, a chain of events happened.

Our mission organization owns a house in Cebu, it has been occupied by a missionary family until they went back to the U.S. about a year and a half ago on furlough. They were planning on coming back this June. While they were gone, the house was rented out to another missionary family from England, and we were friends with both families, in fact, the U.S. missionary family were our main contact in the U.S. before we came here.

Last week, we found out the U.S. missionary family is going to delay their time for coming back, however, the missionary family from England has already made plans to rent another house. Therefore, the missions' house will be vacant, which they don't really want to see happen, they would want to have someone live there, even just for keeping watch on the house.

We jumped on the opportunity and asked if we can move in. Sure enough, they are glad to have us live there. Not only that, since the U.S. missionary family still have most of their household items stored in their house, the house comes furnished, the U.S. missionary family is willing to let us use some of their household items also.

Because the house was owned by our mission organization, we will only need to pay a much lower amount of rent on the house. This house is HUGE. It is a three bedrooms and a kitchen that is bigger than the whole living area in our townhouse in Mundelein, Illionis. It also has a seperate maid's quarter, which most missionaries who stayed there used as their office. It also have a very open living room and a huge playroom. The outside has a fenced in yard also. It will surely be more space than we need, but we love the space, though we will work on updating the house a bit, which the missions also welcomes.

Interestingly, when we were in that house last time visiting the missionary family from England, Kioni asked if we can live in that house. (That was three weeks before all these events happened.) When I asked Kioni why she liked that house, she said because it was big and there were a lot of space to run around. At that time, I told her we couldn't move into that house, because our friends were living in there. One month later, I told her we are going to move there, you should see the look in her eyes! She then started to ask me what furniture items and which toy animals are going. We then spent the next half hour making sure that every toy animal she likes is on the list.

We are again surprised by God's greatness and provision. It was just beyond what we anticipated.