Merry Christmas!

 In an effort to have a good balance of work and rest, we are not doing a proper blog post this week, but are going to enjoy some relaxation and family time. We hope you had a very Merry Christmas and that God will bless you all in the coming year! 

Merry Christmas!

Christmas English Club

PRAYERS ANSWERED
Our Christmas gathering for our English Club was very well attended! Pray that the good news heard would continue to stir in people’s minds and hearts. There were two babies born among our friends (one on Christmas Eve and another on Christmas Day)— praise God for healthy babies and mothers. Our old teammate has had some relief from her pain, allowing her to enjoy the holiday. Unfortunately she wasn’t able to come to Clove Island, but we are very thankful that she was well enough to leave her house and have fun with others on the big island. We had a scary incident this week where our son went to take the trash out and didn’t come back because he was taken into custody for depositing trash at the wrong time of day (a law we didn’t know about and that they have just decided to start enforcing). We are thankful that he doesn’t seem traumatized by it and that we had friends and people speak up for us.  On Christmas afternoon Tom got the gift of sharing the good news quite completely with his friend Muki.  It all started when Muki said, “There is no love in this place,” which led to a great conversation.

Not enough chairs, so put out the mat!

PRAYERS REQUESTED
Our three teammates are all getting away for a prayer retreat this week and we are also hoping to have some restful days off. This is always harder without leaving the island. Pray that we can have restful and rejuvenating time. On Dec 31st, Megan and our daughter will be leaving to get her back to school. Pray for the logistics of their travel as they will be attempting a same-day connection on the big island. Also pray for our family as we are saying goodbye again! Our colleague had surgery for her detaching retina! As far as we know it went well, but they are still waiting for the pressure in her eye to subside so she can be cleared to travel home to her husband and children. One of our island brothers just had his boys circumcised— there was conflict with the extended family about how that should be done and what kind of ritual/prayers should accompany such an event. Pray for him and our other island brothers and sisters as they navigate raising their children with their extended families and the competing influences in their kids’ lives.

Hot or Cold Christmas

Moving to the other side of the world, we often have to weigh the balance between keeping a connection with our home culture and traditions and giving those up to make new ones. Sometimes we have clung to traditions that we probably should have just let go of, other times we have found ways to recreate them with an island-twist or replace them in completely island-style.

Decorating for Christmas

But we are struck by how much of our home Christmas traditions are wrapped together with it being in winter. What would you do if you moved to a tropical island, where Christmas was at the hottest time of year?

Throughout this month, our kids have been making paper snowflakes and putting them up around the house. Snowflakes?! When it is so hot and humid that we are constantly sweating? In a place that never drops below freezing and where most people have never seen a snowflake? Maybe it is a little silly, but making paper snowflakes at least is an easy thing to do here (even if it doesn’t have much to do with the islands or the meaning of Christmas).

The islands don’t have any Christmas traditions because it isn’t usually celebrated here. But that’s not to say that the only people who celebrate Christmas are north of the equator! Our good Brazilian friends talk about associating Christmas with going to the beach and barbecuing outside! Perhaps we need to steal some new traditions from those hot Christmas places. Or we could do as some of our Australian friends have talked about and celebrate ‘Christmas in July’ too as a way to retain some cold-weather Christmas traditions. (Not that the islands get that much colder in July.)

We associate lychee season with Christmas!

There are definitely pros and cons to retaining our cold Christmas traditions. Most of the value comes from helping to connect us to home and stave off homesickness at a time of year when it easy for overseas workers to miss home. There is also the desire to see our children experience things that we loved growing up and therefore have a way of making the time special and meaningful and help them feel more connected to extended family.

What is the cost of retaining old traditions? The personal cost is that it usually takes a lot more time and effort to recreate home traditions here. Things easily bought in a store at home have to be made from scratch. Substitutes have to be found or created for things or ingredients unavailable. Even then, it may end up a disappointment as we can’t always recreate what it is like back home. But a bigger cost that we also have to weigh is the impact on islanders. Will those that want to celebrate Christmas feel that in order to do the holiday justice they have to find a Christmas tree and import various products?

When we talk to islanders about celebrating Christmas, we try to downplay the decorations up in our house. Instead, we try to focus on the Advent themes of hope, peace, joy and love— how we try to reflect on and remember these beautiful realities in the context of the story of our Savior’s birth and how they are lived out in our lives and communities.

Tom & friend on hike

If an islander comes to our house right now, they may notice a small decorated tree, or see our stockings made with island fabric, or watch the colored lights blinking, and they may hear Christmas music playing. But hopefully they will also read the signs with the words hope, peace, joy and love in the island language—it is our prayer that they would see those things in us and through our words and deeds.

I bring you glad tidings of great joy! We hope you all have a very Merry Christmas.

PRAYERS ANSWERED
Our big holiday gathering had over 50 people. It was very encouraging to be together to sing, read and eat together. We were especially encouraged by the traditional island style that was included in the event (from dress, food to music). We are very thankful for our teammate who hosted the event at her house and helped coordinate lots of the arrangements. Megan was able to schedule an MRI in Kenya for when she drops our daughter off at school at the New Year. The boy that stole from us is back at our house again today.  

PRAYERS REQUESTED
One of our colleagues was diagnosed with a detaching retina and had to rush off island for surgery, leaving her husband and kids behind. Pray for a smooth surgery with no complications and a quick recovery and quick reunion with her family. Pray for this coming week— we have several smaller Christmas gatherings, including our annual English Club Christmas party. Pray that these gatherings would be full of truth and the hope, peace, joy and love of the season. May they lead to good questions and deeper conversations.  We hope to celebrate as a team/family on Sunday morning and would love for a break in the heat—so we pray for big rains that day and for power all day for fans (usually power is out half the day on Sundays). Our old teammate is supposed to be joining us from I1 for the holiday weekend but has been in pain— pray for her healing and that she can still make it!

The Culture of Shoes, Feet & Mats

Another funeral this week… that means hours of women gathered together sitting on mats and chanting and saying prayers. Before coming to Africa, I never spent so much time sitting on the ground on mats.

An event on mats

Islanders use mats a lot. You don’t have enough chairs?  A mat instantly provides culturally-appropriate seating for multiple people. If you have a group gathering at your house, most people will expect that the seating will be primarily mats. There are certain events that happen completely on mats (like funerals). Islanders will lay out multiple mats together to create one huge matted surface, either inside or even outside on the street. Mats are a great hosting asset, but there is one rule that newcomers to island culture need to remember: Mats are shoe-free zones.

I heard or read someone theorize that the culture around shoes hinges on the cultural understanding of the cleanliness of the floor and the cleanliness of feet. Apparently everyone recognizes that shoes are dirty, but if you see the floor as dirty, then you might see wearing shoes as protecting your feet. If you see the floor as clean, then you take off your shoes to protect the cleanliness of the floor.

Pile of shoes at event

When we enter an island house, the assumption is that we take off our shoes at the threshold. Occasionally a host will complain that they haven’t swept or mopped recently and insist you keep your shoes on, but a good guest usually starts to take off their shoes at the door (especially if the floor is tiled). But even if you kept your shoes on when you entered, if you reach a mat the shoes will always come off.

For big events there are a lot of people, which means a lot of shoes.The edges of the mats soon have piles of accumulated shoes. Some afraid of theft or just not wanting the hassle of finding their shoes afterwards, will bring a baggy to take the shoes with them or they will hide their shoes somewhere near the entrance to make them easier to find. Once we were stranded on a mat at the end of an event, because the host had honored us by putting our shoes safely in her house.  Culturally we were unable to step off the mat until our shoes were brought to us, lest we dirty our clean feet!

The assumption is that bare feet are clean. And overall I have found that islanders feet usually are. Technically, a ‘good’ islander should be washing their feet five times per day before prayers. And while I know most islanders don’t do this, they do seem to value clean feet. I have been embarrassed a few times to sit on a mat, only to realize that the bottoms of my feet were a bit dirty, meanwhile everyone else was showing clean soles.

We took shoes off at river, too!

There is a lot of this shoes/feet culture that we have absorbed from our years here. We train our kids in the rules.  We immediately start to take off our shoes when we come to a house. We cringe when we see a foreigner walk on an island mat with their shoes on. But it doesn’t mean we get it right all the time. This week I chided myself for not washing my feet before going to the funeral, so as I sat down on the mat, I causally hid my feet under my wrap. :)

PRAYERS ANSWERED
There was an encouraging women’s gathering this past week— with a study and singing, prayer and laughter. We are thankful for some good progress in preparing for the new family coming in Feb and for our teammate who has been heading up those preparations. We are thankful for an outing to the river on the weekend and its cool water on these hot days.

PRAYERS REQUESTED
There is a big gathering being planned for this coming weekend to celebrate the holiday. Pray for the logistics and that it would be an encouraging gathering that would strengthen the island body and that it would inspire all those who attend to share the good news of the season with others. Pray for us in the heat and busyness that we would balance our time well. The boy who stole from us came for one reading lesson, but we haven’t seen him since. Pray that we would be able to have a restored relationship with him and that he would have good influences in his life. May the joy of the season be felt in us and through us!

Petty Theft & Relationships

What would you do if someone stole from you?  What would you do if it was a guest in your house?  Or someone who worked for you?  I’m not talking about breaking and entering—strangers, robbers in the dead of night.  I’m talking about friends, neighbors and acquaintances.  People you have invited into your home.  People you thought you could trust.

View of our town from a hike to the fields

Everywhere we’ve lived on the islands we’ve experienced this problem.  Every home we’ve ever stayed in, people we’ve trusted have stolen from us.  And from the stories of teammates, it seems like we are not unique in this experience.  What do people steal?  Mostly money—a wallet or a purse left out is later found empty.  Those coins we left on the table are no longer there.  Toys have often gone missing. Our kids have gotten very protective of their favorite toys because they’ve seen too many of them disappear.  I remember going to visit a neighbor once and seeing five or six things that used to belong to us.  Sometimes other things have gone missing—pens, books, food.  We’ve had a camera stolen.  Others have had phones and tablets lifted.

It isn’t age-specific. We’ve experienced stealing by children, teenagers and adults, respectively.  Talking to islanders, it doesn’t seem to be especially targeted at foreigners—they have plenty of stories of people stealing from their homes, their businesses.  It doesn’t even seem to be especially targeted at those with wealth.  I have poor friends who have had things taken too.

The hard part about it is not the ‘what’ so much as the ‘who’.  In most cases the ones who have taken from us have been friends, neighbors, or house helpers.   Each time a suspected theft happens we have to ask ourselves what to do.  Do we confront?  Sometimes we aren’t sure if the theft has really happened.  Maybe I spent that money on something and forgot.  Is it possible someone else has been in the house and took it?  Other times we’ve known for sure—no one else was in the house.  Something is definitely missing.  Do we confront?  How do we confront?  Are we ready to take our friend to the police?

Old neighbors visit to welcome our daughter back

When we have been sure of the theft and the thief, the confrontation has usually gone badly. They have usually just vehemently denied it, which leaves us in the uncomfortable place of knowing they are lying to us, but having to choose between shaming them and ending the relationship or letting it be.

We’ve never taken anyone to the police.  The amounts have never been so grave as to really harm us.  The harm has not been so much to our pocketbook as to our heart.  It hurts to know that sweet little kid who comes to visit, that young man who seems so friendly, that house helper who has worked for us for so long, could do such a thing.

We don’t live with the same needs as many of our neighbors. The fact that we leave a wallet or a purse lying around our house is a sign of our comfort.  The fact that we don’t know where every penny goes and maybe won’t even notice a small theft, point to a level of ease that many islanders simply don’t know.  Perhaps they are truly desperate and that theft will feed them for a few days.  In that case, perhaps the cost is worth it for them? Sometimes the immediate need may drown out the longterm cost.   We can see how petty theft can become just a way of life. Maybe not even seeking it out, but taking advantage of the opportunity when it presents itself. The temptation silencing any objections.

Just last week, we confirmed that a boy whom we have known since he was born, whom we have welcomed to our home and fed meals countless times, stole money from our wallets/bags.  He comes from a poor family.  He has very few positive influences in his life.  Oftentimes he comes to our house, eats a meal and then falls asleep for hours in our hammock.  When we ask him about school, he evades our answers.  We think he goes, sometimes…

Playing in the hammock

When we realized that he had stolen we prayed about it and then we sat him down to talk about it.  It was a little different than other times— we have a parental role with him, so though he initially denied it, once we told him that we knew it was him and once we started to talk about repentance and forgiveness, he latched onto the idea and asked for forgiveness, saying he would never do it again.  We are happy for this, but the question remains, What now? How do we rebuild trust?  How do we continue to love and care for someone who desperately needs to be shown love and care?

It will not be simple.  We are trying to find ways to balance love and care with taking responsibility and consequences.  There is always hope.  It could end up that what was meant for evil could be used for good.  Can we transform this dark moment as an opportunity to show this boy love, forgiveness, mercy and grace?  We aren’t sure if we can manage it, but we’re trying.  We love this little guy and are praying for a better future for him, that he would choose a better path.

PRAYERS ANSWERED
Our daughter is home with us! She arrived on Monday and we were able to have some good times of hanging out, playing games, and decorating the house for the holidays. Tom and Uhaju got to study and also to have some bonding time on an outing. Continue to pray for his growth and connection with other islanders.

PRAYERS REQUESTED
Pray for our relationship with the boy that stole from us— we are attempting to make him ‘pay us back’ by having him learn to read. Pray that we could do our part to guide him well. The former president was convicted of high treason and sentenced to life in prison. We would have expected unrest in reaction to this very short trial, but so far it has been calm. Continue to pray for good governance and justice on the islands. It is very hot! Pray for cooling rains and good electricity for fans. Hopefully there will be a women’s gathering this week— pray that it would happen and be an encouragement to all. Pray also for there to be plans for island brothers and sisters to gather in a meaningful way this month for the holiday.