this is my life.

One of the fun things about fasting month, is my Muslim friends are always really excited about eating dinner, breaking their day-long fast. So, last week Erin and I decided to meet up with some friends at the mall to break the fast (at the time, we had hopes to share with them, but they diverted a bunch of our lead-in questions so it didn't happen). They said to meet at six, but being on rubber-time, they didn't arrive until much later. Let's say that after about twenty minutes of waiting, Erin and I were really hungry, so we decided to get a bread snack at one of the stores on the other side of the mall. We got it, and ashamed, stood behind a poll to eat it, at a place where they couldn't see us. It was delicious.

After that, we went to meet with them, ate dinner, then walked around the mall for a while. Suddenly, we were in front of that same bread store, and the conversation went like this:
I: Hey, who wants bread?
E, C, and K: No, thanks.
I: Ok!
But, in true local style, she bought bread for all of us. So, Erin and I, already very full, sat down inside the store to eat the bread that we had already eaten only an hour and fifteen minutes before that. I was on my second nibble when I noticed the staff were gawking at us--"us" being the white girls--and one of them, laughing.

Yes, I was laughed at by a tiny Asian man. Unfortunately, that's nothing new. But, to make things worse, that was just the beginning of our embarassing night.

After that, we escorted our friends to the side parking lot, to their motorcycle. On our way back, we had to cross two exit-ways from the car parking lot, which consist of a little lane, post, and gate for each (you know, the same gates you see at toll ways). So, Erin and I wait for the first car to go, he goes, we start to walk to the middle/safe zone when suddenly the gate comes heavy down Erin's shoulder. The parking guy, at this point, had seen the whole disasterous thing before it happened, and had tried to stop it, but who's to stop the stupid white girls from getting themselves chopped in two by the gate?

At that point, Erin turned to me and announced, "Oh Cass, we gotta go, I'm so embarassed. Hurry."

But, we had to wait for the second car at the second post. Thankfully, it goes, and just as we start walking, the gate comes down heavy on my shoulder.

As you can tell, we're not the brightest bulbs in the box, and I don't yet know all the lessons I'm supposed to have learned from our encounter, but...this is what happens on an all-too-regular basis.

my Charlie Brown moment

Today I caught myself dripping wet, standing under a tree, with no place to go.

The story is long, so I won't go into the details of my life being living proof of Murphy's law, but I just want you to picture this: white girl in a brown-skinned world, standing under a big tree, wet shirt, wet, dirty pants and feet. No where to go, and no clue about where I was actually headed. It was raining hard, and I didn't have an umbrella since this is the dry season. I was very sad, and emotionally feeble from a rough day.

It took about fifteen minutes for me to turn to God, and even then my heart was weak and all I could do was a muffled prayer in my head of, "God, please let this all stop."

In that second I realized that it didn't take cancer to make me feel sad. It didn't take a tsunami, losing my job, having my family die in a car wreck. It didn't take a crippling disease, holding a dying child in my arms, being engulfed by war, or even being imprisoned. I wasn't beaten or teased, never harassed. Yet, at that moment, all that was within me was ready to give up, as if I had suffered some atrocity.

Paul should have addressed his letters not to people who were really suffering, but just to some twenty-something girl who was stuck under a tree during an hour-long rainstorm, because if he had, maybe I would have realized that I could persevere through such an ordeal.

^ That last part was sarcastic, for those who are less inclined to read it that way.

At the same time, I checked Tim Challies' blog tonight to find his post about trials and suffering, which only did more to convict me about the "trials" I have to endure. This is from the Valley of Vision:
Father of Mercies, Hear me for Jesus’ sake.
I am sinful even in my closest walk with thee;
it is of thy mercy I died not long ago;
Thy grace has given me in the cross
by which thou hast reconciled thyself to me and me to thee,
drawing me by thy great love,
reckoning me as innocent in Christ though guilty in myself.

Giver of all graces, I look to thee for strength to maintain them in me,
for it is hard to practise what I believe.
Strengthen me against temptations.
My heart is an unexhausted fountain of sin,
a river of corruption since childhood days,
flowing on in every pattern of behaviour;
Thou hast disarmed me of the means in which I trusted,
and I have no strength but in thee.

Thou alone canst hold back my evil ways,
but without thy grace to sustain me I fall.
Satan’s darts quickly inflame me,
and the shield that should quench them easily drops from my hand:
Empower me against his wiles and assaults.
Keep me sensible of my weakness, and of my dependence upon thy strength.
Let every trial teach me more of thy peace, more of thy love.

Thy Holy Spirit is given to increase thy graces,
and I cannot preserve or improve them unless he works continually in me.
May he confirm my trust in thy promised help,
and let me walk humbly in dependence upon thee, for Jesus’ sake.

what is written above your door?

I could go into a long story about how one of my favorite aspects of soteriology is found in Exodus 12 and the blood of the sacrifice on the doorposts of the houses of the Israelites, but I won't. Instead, I'll go directly into the story of what we recently found above our door. You see, for a while Erin had noticed an enveloped taped to the wall high above our front door. Since the ceilings here are pretty high, and we're both pretty lazy, we let it go, only imagining the big piece of wall that had been chipped-at underneath the envelope.

At the same time, there had been some...different things happening in our house.

It started with our money. Little by little, sometimes big by big, would disappear from the places where our money is kept safely. One morning Erin went to shower. At that time, she had been keeping close tabs on her money, as we'd seen so much disappear. She counted it before she showered. Our house helper and I were the only ones in the house, and when Erin came back, some of the money from her wallet in her purse was gone.

Now, logically, the house helper was the only one who could have taken it. And yes, even though our house helper treats us like her own children and we think of her as family, we did suspect maybe she was doing it. We were hurt and a little angry. I confronted her about the issue, not directly casting blame, but just letting her know what was going on. Erin and I prayed that whatever had happened would stop, that we would be able to forgive Ibu Mila, with whom we are trying to be lights, and that it would all go away.

The very next day, I came home and had a significant sum of money in my wallet from my most recent trip to the ATM. I put my bag in my room and went to help Ibu Mila in the kitchen. Two hours later, I had a portion missing. Ibu Mila hadn't left my side.

At this point, for a while that at the time did not seem connected, both Erin and I had experienced a darkness in our house. When Erin was here, I would pray as I was walking around the house, not liking the weird feeling. I would pray in the bathroom. Pray as I used the shower. It wasn't a good feeling. I didn't know it at the time, but Erin was feeling the same thing, and was praying every night before she went to bed that nothing evil would enter the house. Then more recently, Erin woke up several nights in a row, petrified for no reason but feeling something bad.

By far the strangest thing happened one night in Erin's room. She woke up to a light noise in the middle of the night. Assuming it was a magnet falling off her dry erase board, she rolled over and went to sleep. The next morning, Erin saw something underneath her bed, at the foot. It was a Chinese coin. To understand the weight of this, you have to know Erin. Her room is impeccably neat. She had just remade her bed the day before. There was nothing in her blankets but blankets. Moreover, even though her friend had recently traveled here from China, she had never owned a Chinese coin, and did not know where it could have come from.

Being Americans, we tried to think of as many scientific reasons as we could before we even thought of the spiritual realm. (Which, by the way, is very real here. Very. And not fun, although thankfully aside from these incidents I've been blessed to not witness its power.) We still can't explain what all happened, and of course people in the West will think it is ridiculous, but there is a striking darkness that is over the darker places in the world, and this sure is one of them. You don't have to be "sensitive" to the spiritual world or even be seeking it out to feel it, it's just there.

One night a friend of ours saw the envelope above our door. He decided to take the envelope down, only to find out that when he did it, inside were some incantations and stones.

We believe the weird animistic spell that was meant to keep spirits out of the house for the previous owners was actually acting as an invitation. We know the ultimate solution isn't to get rid of the envelope, but we did. We know the real solution is to worship the Conqueror of sin and death, which we do and will continue to do if more weird things keep happening.

Yesterday, I read one of the best...collection of thoughts...on spiritual warfare. It's a long article, but it's very biblical and insightful without fanning fanatacism and promoting Exorcist t-shirts. Highly recommended.

to the country (yet again, last Friday)

This is Ibu Mila, her daughter Olivia, her daughter's friend, and her son Agung. Ibu Mila works part-time for us as a cook/maid, and we are so thankful for her. Last Friday I went home with her to her village and was able to see her family's farm and meet some of her family members. Her husband often works in the capital, so he is away, but she also lives with her mother, two brothers, their wives, and a little nephew (who is 2, but is about the size of a 1 year old).




This is one of Ibu Mila's friends, along with some kids from the village. I only stayed there for one night, but had a great time (despite the roosters that began crowing at 3:00 in the morning and did not stop until after 6. I had some grilled corn fresh from the small brick oven, and was able to meet quite a few people, at which time I realized that I really don't know this language at all.

an asian zoofari

Close to my city is a zoo-like place that is part zoo and part zoofari (where you drive through the animal habitats. I've been there twice (the first time because I had never been, and the second time because Erin and I wanted to take our helper and one of her children).
This is the group that went on the first trip. In the backseat with me is our friend Ardi who we go to for all things regarding movies. He's our local American gentleman, always allowing ladies to go first, opening doors, etc. Very kind and good friend.

And this is who joined us on our second trip: Ibu Mila and her son, Agung. This was right before she freaked out and dropped the carrot. The nationals here tend to be scared. A lot.
This is one of my favorite pictures. Too bad I had to shrink all these pictures, because if you could see it, the orangutan would be gazing off lackadaisically.
This is another one of my favorite pictures, mainly because we were only ten feet away from this tiger.
Another of my favorite experiences at the zoofari are the camels that aren't afraid to stick their entire heads in our windows (as long as food is involved, anyway).
This one was hanging in a tree in the zoo part of the park, more free than the other animals.
I know by now you're probably getting bored of looking at animals you could see in any zoo, but look at this itty bitty baby and his really long tail.
This hippo was pretty close to us, too. He was about ten feet away. During this part, we were driving through the water. He almost looks fake, don't you think?

There is a funny story behind this one. So here are the people involved: 1 very large and in charge rhino, and one very small Asian man. The rhino had *somehow* gotten out of his little fence (they really have a false sense of security with fences here, but that's another story), and this man was just escorting it along the way, occasionally slapping its behind.
Here are the Nasty McNastiest--the komodos. Gross. Look at that tongue. Nasty.
This guy reminded me of the Jungle Book, one of my favorite Disney movies. You know the part where Mowgli and Bagheera are preparing to sleep, and the panther falls asleep. Shortly thereafter, Kaa (voiced by the same man who voiced Winnie the Pooh in the old cartoons) comes along to eat Mowgli.
There is another funny story here. Remember when I told you nationals are afriad of a lot of things? Well, Ardi here was afraid of this 4 ft tall deer. Too afraid to feed it. You see him laughing because he is nervous (note: his hand is on the window, rolling it up). By the end of the day, he was reaching out the window. As Chucky Finster in Rugrats would say, he was, "A big brave dog."
One of the lions. Both times we drove through they were being super lazy, all asleep within close proximity of one another.
A bear eating a melon. When we went the second time they were bathing. That was really cute, but I wasn't able to get a picture.

to the country (only for a little while)

Two weeks ago we had a long holiday, so Erin, Mei, and I went to nearby countryside to hang out. It was foggy, but beautiful. We found our way near some farms, and then we got out and started to walk around, toward one of the local mountains.

Here is just one glance at the immaculately-combed farmlands. The farms were the only things we could see for miles. Gorgeous.

Here is a renown Hindu temple in the middle of the farms.
Here we are in the middle of nowhere. We used one of the farmer's motorbikes to prop our camera. The strange thing is the grade going uphill is pretty steep, yet they somehow drive their motorbikes up there. Even Mei, the national, was amazed, and he's pretty daring. So then, after walking around for a while we went back to the car only to found that it was parked in some wet grass so it didn't want to budge. Mei and I tried to push it while Erin worked the gas, and it worked only in unsticking the back passenger wheel and moving the car closer to the ravine. We were covered in mud splatter, but unfortunately it didn't show up in this picture. Sad times. Eventually, one farmer joined us to help but the car got too close to the ravine, so we had to get more farmers to push it out manually without having someone operate the gas.

to the country

Yuli, Olvi (who helps Witner), Ika, Erin, me, Witner (Mei's brother), and Jules (who helps Witner).

Last weekend my friends and I went four hours to J-town to visit a village. This is the same village that Erin and I slipped in the mud a month and a half ago, so of course. Our friend Mei's brother lives there, and he had invited us to come stay for a couple of days. So, we packed up Erin's car (oh yeah--my roommate has a car, which comes in handy here) with five people and headed for J-town. Because I had already had to travel to J-town four days before due to immigration, I laid in the far back seat and took a four hour rest. When we got there, we immediately realized the village was not as scary to walk around when it is dry.

The trip was good, and the visit was even better. The land was beautiful and the people were so kind. Some of them would ask, "Hey, do you remember when you fell that one time?" The only problem was the mosquitoes there were very strong (and plentiful), so I came home with thirty or so new bites. J-town is much hotter than here, but for the record, you know you are in this country when taking a cold bath/shower at 5:30 in the morning feels really good.



Here we are in a river taking a rest. The water was perfect, especially since it was pretty hot that day.
Here we are walking through the rice fields.

Erin and Mei acting like farmers.

Here's Erin pretending she cooked all the food Olvi prepared for us. This included: rice, friend banana, fried noodles, fried chicken, fried fish, and vegetables.

Here we are eating the way some people do around here.

Fresh coconut milk, then fresh coconut meat. (Note: it tastes nothing like the coconut we get in the States.)
Here's one of the coconut trees. Don't stand under one too long, as it could be hazardous to your health.

Dental Projects

One day a co-worker of mine was driving around when he realized that the people around the villages don't have teeth, partially because they have never brushed their teeth. So, he decided that it would be good to show young children how to brush their teeth, then equip them with toothpaste and toothbrushes so they could have clean, healthy teeth. The project is through the English center here, and the nationals who take courses at the center are the ones who lead the projects, the foreigners are only there to assist them. The projects are good because not only does it provide something good to the children, but it helps establish a relationship between the village schools and my co-workers. Anyway, here are some of my favorite pictures from the two dental projects I have attended.


This is how we teach the children how to brush their teeth. Unfortunately, our puppet's teeth has seen better days. Maybe we use this as a scare tactic? Nova (the girl) leads most of our community development projects. This day, Mei (the guy) helped Nova with our puppet.


This is Wicak, one of the teachers at Access.


This little boy was adorable. He had no front teeth, but he kept brushing away.

These kids were waiting while the older kids were brushing their teeth outside. They were listening and learning words to the song "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes."


My friend Ibra was teaching these students how to brush their teeth and apparently he made a funny because they cracked up.


This school was called "Jungle School." We were wondering if our vehicles could make it out there, but we did! On the way we validated the name "Jungle School."

critter update

Here is a list of all the critters we have found in and around our house in prior weeks.

Cockroaches come out at night. Sometimes I take the effort to kill them. A lot of other times I don't. These are called friends.

Ants of many different forms can be found on and in our food. We don't worry about killing them because it would be futile. Did I mention they were everywhere? But anyway, not a big deal. These are called vitamins.

There are centipedes that we find every now and then. Those creep me out, but usually I just put them on a piece of paper and throw them outside.

There are sacks that hang from the ceiling, and we're not sure what critters are in them, but we've labeled them little nasties.

Then the things we thought were slugs--turns out they are leeches. They are still around, but they are only bad on some days. We kill them like no other.

One time we saw a miniature snake with legs. It was only about six inches long and we were able to kill it with a flip flop, but it was disgusting. One of my national friends saw it, and I asked him what it is called in the national language. He said he only knows it as "snake with legs." Helpful, huh? Anyway, we call it Satan, because surely that's what Satan looked like in the Garden.

There are many lizards who live here, but we like them because they eat the mosquitos. The lizards here are almost translucent--a wild looking animal, and they are pretty skittish.

The worst part is the cats. We have several that think this is their house despite our efforts to prove them wrong. When we aren't here or are inside, they are in our front yard. One time when we were watching a movie, one snuck in Erin's room (through the window which doesn't have a screen, only the bars) and puked on her bed. Another time I was asleep when I woke up to what sounded like two very frustrated cats. Then I realized the frustrated sound was actually them making babies. It was pretty loud, and I knew they were inside the house, so I got up to find them outside our kitchen going at it. They can get in because the back of the house is open to the sky. The next time I see them I will kill them without a second thought. I tried to hit them with a broom, but they ran away too quickly. The bad thing is that these ugly cats get together and the only thing they propagate is more ugly cats, so really if I kill the ugly ones, then I would be doing this country a favor. We just call these things, "Die, you stupid cats!" (Only we say it in the national language so they'll understand. ;) )