FREE JR.

I'm not sure who or what Tibet is, but I always see that "Free Tibet" bumper sticker, especially when me and my friends go riding in Big Sur.

I wonder if people are doing it? Freeing Tibet? I wonder if the bumper sticker makes a difference to Tibet. Does Tibet know that people in America are putting it on their cars? Can the people who read the bumper stickers free Tibet? Can the people who put on the stickers? Maybe people just feel so helpless to free Tibet, all they can do is put up a sticker to show what they wish would happen.

My mom says you can wish in one hand and shit in the other and see which one fills up first. Which I think is another way of saying that a bumper sticker slogan isn't worth shit to Tibet. Or it is worth it. Seems like the things worth less than and the things worth exactly shit are still worth about the same.

I don't know why my mom says that about wishing, either. Maybe it's so we don't get our hopes up on things that can't happen. She wishes things too; she just doesn't say them out loud. She stays up half the night wishing, because my brother can't come home. Except she calls it praying. She has about a dozen different statues; I don't know who they are, but they take up enough space in the living room to start asking rent. There's incense and candles. She does it quietly at night and doesn't say anything about it. She pretends she doesn't do it too, because in the morning she acts like she just got up. Even the cooking smells in the morning don't cover up the incense. This morning I was fed up with no one saying anything.

"Mom," I said, "it smells like the sausage has something in it."

"What do you mean?" she said. She didn't turn from the stove to show her heavy eyelids.

"I dunno, something holy and sweet."

Now she did turn. She just stared at me.

"Mom, are you awake? You look like you've been up all night."

"Eat your breakfast and mind your business," she said, turning back.

"Fine, mom, but every night you pray is followed by a day without him. Nothing is happening. They're not even letting him write. And he's not an American citizen, so how is America supposed to care about him?"

She was quiet for awhile.

Then she said, all softly, "They did a story about him on the radio. People know about it. If people know, they can do something. That is enough of an answer for now. It's something."

"But people don't care, Mom!"

She didn't answer.

I tried again: "The radio doesn't have anything to do with all the saints in the living room!"

Still quiet.

I had one more: "You can wish in one hand--"

"Shut up! Shut up!" And then she started swearing in her mother's language and banging the spoon on the pan, so my grandmother got up and started yelling too. I just took my breakfast and left everybody in the kitchen. I said goodbye to the dozen saints and walked to school.

After school, when I got to work, people were quiet and kind of giggling. I put my stuff in the locker and asked the blond girl what was up.

"Eric put something on the dune," she whispered. "Dwayne is mad."

Dwayne is the manager. He's okay, but he gets too excited about little things. When he's mad at someone, he gets all perfectionistic with everyone.

"What did Eric put?"

"Go look."

I looked around for Dwayne. He was talking to Josh at the register about putting the bills in straight. I grabbed a broom to look official.

There's a huge sand dune between the beach and the highway, and people write stuff on it with all the pine needles and other junk. It's like a big billboard, because all the people on the highway can see it when they drive by, and all the people driving up Fremont. You could probably see it from an airplane if you were low enough. You can see it right from the drive-through window, too. Today the dune said "McDwaynolds".

I stepped away from the window before he saw me. I wasn't supposed to be working the window tonight, so I would definitely get yelled at if he saw me there. I wondered if Eric would still have a job, or if Dwayne knew who did it. I just kept quiet and busy until my shift was over.

That night when I got home my mom was gone. She's usually home, because she gets home from work at six, and I went with my friends after I finished work because it was a Friday. So there was no leftovers because she wasn't even there to make dinner; only cold sausage. My grandmother started following me and scolding me. I just walked by her and sat at the table. Maybe what I said at breakfast was too mean. I miss my brother too. But it was stupid of him to go there, just for fun. Maybe it was his money, but you can still make stupid choices with your own money.

Grandmother was still behind me, talking. Now she was saying something about the sun, and how it goes over the whole earth. She was getting on my nerves and I wanted her to be quiet for once. I told her in Spanish, "The sun stays still and the earth moves around it, Grandma. Everybody knows that. Go to bed."

Usually when I talk back to her she just yells at me louder, the same thing, but now she sat down and said, "The earth goes around the sun, but the earth spins, too. And so the sun sees every part of the earth every day."

"Whatever, Grandma," I said in English.

"The sun sees Junior every day," she said.

"Oh, now you too. And I bet you see him every day too." I didn't feel like speaking Spanish. I was just tired of this stuff. I ate until I was tired of her sitting there watching me, and then I went to do my homework. She didn't follow me.

Mom was there the next morning, and she looked the same as ever. I didn't say anything, I just ate quick because I had to work a morning shift. But before I walked out she said, "God cares. As long as he will listen, I will tell him. And people can care too. But if you never say anything, how can they care?"

I walked to work thinking. How did she know God cared? Or people? People just do what they want, just like my brother did. He thought he would be heroic or funny or something. He and his friends went to Iraq. They're not soldiers or anything; they just went to make a point. The radio says they were just hiking when the Iraqi soldiers captured them, but I think they meant to get caught.

Either way it was stupid, because there was no way to get back home, where they all have moms who probably all stay up at night, praying, wishing, asking God to listen. Mom always reminds me that he sees everything, but she usually only says that about bad stuff we do. So maybe he got what he deserved. He did something he shouldn't have, and now not even Mom's prayers can change things. So even if he does see my brother, it's just like the sun sees him. Neither is going to make a difference by seeing him.

I got to work and clocked in. I was a minute late. I hurried to get to the window and Dwayne walked by. He didn't say anything to me; just gave me a little nod. I got situated but there weren't any cars, so I glanced up at the dune. Someone had rearranged the pine needles. It said, "Free Jr.".

The Cabin in the Woods

The ants at the cabin were enormous. They were, in memory, at least an inch long. They assembled their hills out of little granite pieces the size of grape-nuts, and the good hills stretched a few yards. There was a hill on the side of the road, just below where our drive met it, and it stretched all the way to the bend in the road. If you were about on foot, you knew you were almost home when you reached the bend with the ant hill.

Some of the ants had red sections, but most were black. The occasional ant found his way into the cabin and was swept out after lunch. Apart from that they left us alone. We did not leave them alone. We drove pine branches into their colonies and waited for the frenzy. We poured the remainders of our soft drinks down the hole and watched them splutter out. I always wondered how they could crawl around under all the tiny rocks, and where and how they quarried the uniform bricks of their houses.

Sometimes we found a dug-up hill, which, I was told, was the work of a bear looking for a treat. It didn't bother me, bears devastating ant-hills less than 100 feet from our cabin. What troubled me was a creature of such great size and little dexterity hunting ants. His appetite must be huge, yet how could he collect these insects with any accuracy? Isn't that why God made the anteater?

The fire seemed to cement the hills into a true structure. They had stood there, low and quiet, while the rest of the forest roasted, and afterward you couldn't collapse them by standing or jumping on them, much less driving a branch in. The ants must have slavered over each granule with fire-activated glue. I wonder whether the ants could live deep enough in the ground to survive a fire, or if new ants come to live in deserted colonies and clean out old ants' cremains.

On the Merits of Books, or, A Book is Not a Novelty

When you read a good ways into a book, a real book printed on paper and bound, you can squeeze together the pages you've read to measure how far you've come. You can see how close to the middle or the end you are by the thickness of the pages. Then, once you finish the book, you can put it on your shelf next to your other finished books. Look at all the pages you've read!

When you give a book as a gift, you can write an inscription on the inside cover in your own handwriting, commemorating the occasion of the gift. Sometimes, books have blank pages in the back you can tear out and use at need.

Another great thing about a book is how you can take it camping or any other outdoor destination, and if someone kicks sand on you at the lake or it falls out of your backpack, you can pick it up, dust it off, and miss none of the utility of the book.

You can leave a book in the car in plain sight, and when you return to your car, the book will still be there, and your car window will not be broken. Even if it's a scorching hot day, you needn't worry about that book in the car.

A cookbook will often sustain wear and tear from working in a kitchen. But even if you splatter it with sauce or catch a corner on fire, the recipes will still be usable; the pages will still turn. If you take a book into a crowded public place like a bus or a sleepy private place like a hammock, a book can take the abuse of a shoving mob or the squish of a rolling body. Even if you drop your book in water, though the pages will never lay as flat as when you bought it, you can still read it.

If you read something especially resonant in a book, you can use a pencil or pen to underline it and add your own notes. And if you read a book you know a friend or acquaintance will appreciate, pass it on.

When you need a little extra cash, cull the ho-hum reads from your shelf and take them to the used book store. Maybe you can get enough money for gasoline, or groceries. Maybe you just need more money to buy books. Many used book stores offer more in trade than they do in cash. Trade in last semester's required titles and buy next semester's for a bargain.

Books can be collected by municipal libraries and arranged on shelves for easy browsing. In addition to housing books, the physical plant of a library hosts other community functions, such as a story time for children, homework help for students, volunteer opportunities, and meetings of various kinds.

Very few operator errors occur when using a book. Books never need a fresh battery and can continue to be read indefinitely after a power outage with no loss of capacity or impact.

Books limit their utility only to the literate.

Books can be piled in a heap and burned.

Poem/Dream/Conflict part 2

The pastor sat in his chair and swiveled around to a bookshelf. "Would you like a cup of tea?" He picked up a mug. "I have mint, Earl Grey and green."

"Oh! ...yes, please." She realized that she was still standing. She sat down and sighed. "Pastor," she said. "I think I can teach Sunday School."

She received the cup of water and three tea envelopes from the pastor. He sat back down and faced her.

She said, "I've been thinking about it a long time. Praying...But I feel like someone has to do it. The children need someone to do it."

The pastor stirred honey in his tea and put it where she could reach it.

"I know I said before that I didn't want to do it, but after the turnout at the children's clothing drive, and so many mothers asked me if our church had Sunday school, I didn't know what to answer. I felt like maybe God was calling me. To teach Sunday School."

"Do you want to teach Sunday school?" asked the pastor.

"I want our children to have a teacher." She was pleased to give this answer, because she had thought of it beforehand.

Poem/Dream/Conflict

For him we batter our hands/ who won for once over the world’s weight.

She’d read the whole poem, stuck it out for once. It wasn’t a good time to read a whole poem. She was standing, bag on shoulder, waiting for the pastor in his study. Wasn’t sure why her anxiety moved her to a book of poems; that’s not where she’d normally find solace. And if the pastor should appear, she’d have felt like an intruder, rifling through books on his shelf. Why a rushed reading of a poem?

And why, after such haste, should the last line linger?

She elected to make herself comfortable. Book in hand, she settled in a chair and put down her bag, immediately noting the feeling of assurance, even buoyancy, that arose as she crossed her legs and opened the book. She would act like she belonged here. She smiled, and it defied the gravity she had brought in with her. Then she remembered that she was going back to read through the poem again.

Almost like deja vu, a tempting morsel of the vexing dream from last night fickered when she opened the book. Unable to recapture the lush dream upon waking, she now grasped at the memory. She had been at the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party, and a gentleman fox had been guest as well, extolling the virtues of experience over innocence. His wooing had been quite persuasive, she thought. He poured a cup of tea and passed it across the table to her. There the memory disintegrated.

Her son Henry had not eaten his food again last night. Usually he ate healthy portions but lately he’d only picked and then pushed his plate away. This intermittent habit seemed to coincide with an increase in comments from others:

“He’s two?”

“A little small, isn’t he?”

“Looks like he might need a belt.”

“Aw, what a peanut!”

In a year of life when other children would change clothing sizes several times, he would be able to wear the same clothes all the way through, including shoes. It had saved money, but she gladly would have spent it to accommodate longer legs, a thicker waist, fatter feet. He was the happiest, most pleasant toddler anyone had ever met, smart and compliant, which, combined with her worry, broke her heart utterly. It broke her heart that something might be the matter with him and he played as though no care could ever touch him.

These thoughts left her heavier in her chair. She closed the book with gravity just as the pastor walked into his study. She rose timidly.

“Oh, Dick Wilbur!” said the pastor gregariously.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Excuse me; Richard Wilbur’s poems,” he said, indicating the book. “Any favorites?”

“Um…no.”

A pause.

The Current Project.

The back screen door growls open and creaks shut.

Nick, a vision in denim and navy and gold rugby stripe, stands on the stoop. His eyes are generously spaced and sweet and his shoes are still untied.

“Our trenches have puddles in them,” I tell him.

He looks. “Yeah.”

“Yesterday the whole back yard was perfect for playing. The dirt was just wet enough for digging and the sun was shining. All the leaves on the ground were crisp when we put them in a pile.”

“Yeah we jumped in them.” Nick suspends Monday morning in the scattered pile of soggy leaves. He smiles. Fog particles mix with his open-mouthed breath. “Let’s go,” he concludes.

We follow the mud out to the field. It’s deepest at first base, right where the runner takes his lead off toward second. Nick stands there at first base, shoving his foot in the mud and pulling it out again, listening to the sucking sound. The mud squeezes out around his foot, decorating the soles of his new shoes in celebration of the first time Nick wears them. Nick is waiting for Jimmy, whose backyard gate nestles between the hedges at the far end of the field. Even though it’s foggy today Nick can squint and see Jimmy burst out of his backyard gate and flail across the field. Here he comes. He opened the gate from his back yard but he didn’t close it. He’s very far away but we can see the straps of his backpack crossed over like they shouldn’t be around his neck, the way Teacher Toni always asks him not to do. Jimmy runs fast because he’s so skinny.

Nick keeps dipping his shoes in the diamond mud.

Jimmy’s here. “What are you doing?” Jimmy has a speech impediment, so whenever he says a word with ‘r’ in it, it sounds like he’s saying ‘aw’. Example: ‘What aw you doing?’

Nick considers the mud, lifting his shoe in and out. Jimmy bends down and puts his fingers in it. He picks some of it up. He’s going to wipe it on us. Nick says, “Come on, we’re going to be late,” and turns to walk.

“There’s the bus!” Jimmy yells, standing up. He runs to it as the doors swing open. The bus driver greets their entrance with usual warmth to combat the grey morning.

“High fives, fellas, we’re thirty-six seconds ahead of schedule! Three fives, that makes fifteen fingers for those of you counting.”

“High! Five!” chirps Jimmy.

“Whoa, and it’s a good thing too, we’re gonna need those thirty seconds to keep you from skinning your knees, Nicky.”

Nick stares at the bus driver blankly. The bus driver’s name is Mitch. Mitch points to Nick’s shoe, laces dangling and covered in mud. Nick looks to where Mitch is pointing.

“Can’t have those trippers loose! Remember how?”

“Yeah, I was practicing.” Nick bends down and methodically manoeuvres the laces around his fingers. Nick has cultivated this skill to admirable mastery and seems to perform it with certain ceremony.

Jimmy, Nick and I make our way back to the usual seat. No one can see out the windows of the bus today. They’re all fogged over. The window next to where we usually sit has already been written in; somebody has labelled Jimmy and Nick’s seat just for them. Nick focuses on the finger drawings, his face crumpled in usual consternation. It’s his turn for the window seat today but Jimmy reaches across him and traces the letters on the window.

“Boog…b-r…buh, buh…”

Nick turns. “Jimmy, you left the gate open by your house.”

“Booger brains!” announces Jimmy in Nick’s ear. Some of the kids near us stifle a laugh. Jimmy hears it and yells it to the rest of them: “BOOGER BRAINS!”

One of them asks through giggles, “Jimmy, are you a booger brain?”
Jimmy sticks his finger up his nose. “Look! I’m pointing at my brain!” Half the bus erupts in laughter.

The bus driver yells from up in the front. He wants everyone to put a cork in it unless they are laughing at one of his jokes. Then he tells one (“What did the square say to the triangle?…”) and everyone laughs again.

“Jimmy,” says Nick, “You left the gate by your house open again.”

Jimmy still has his finger up his nose but he takes it out. “I was pointing at my brain,” he smiles. “What gate? Oh, yeah.”

Nick turns back to the window and stares out like he wants to be alone so I wander up to the front of the bus. Mitch, the bus driver, frequently talks to himself and it turns out that I’m a conversationalist of sorts too.

“…Heh…eats, shoots and leaves…heh heh heh…how many more stops have I got here, is this Pekoe Street? Man, got to get myself a decent cuppa coffee. Decent cuppa joe has a significant impact on a man’s life, could make or break a day…something like daily bread. Yeah, people lining up outside Starbucks with foodstamps! Heh.”

Mitch eases the bus to a halt at a grassy curb and swings wide the doors. “How you like this fog, kids? All aboard!” The bus scoops them up and rumbles off again. Mitch continues with a bit of a tune.

“Poor old granddad, I laughed at all his words…”

I don’t always remember Mitch issuing the incessant broadcast during time I’d known him. I’ve known Mitch for three years. One morning, three years ago, when Nick was in kindergarten for the second year (and shortly after we first met), we marched aboard the bus and into one of the bravest moments I’ve ever seen Nick embrace, in spite of his usual mumbling “Morning, Mitch.”

“Morning, old Nickelby!”

“I brought someone with me today,” Nick offered.

“Oh Nick, I don’t see Jimmy anywhere.”

“Not Jimmy. This friend has a superpower. You can’t see him!”

“Aha, invisibility! What’s your superfriend’s name?”

Nick hesitated. We had only just become friends, Nick and I, but naturally I could intuit Nick’s vacillation at Mitch’s potential patronizing reference to me as a “superfriend”. Plus we hadn’t talked about names yet.

Nick focused on his velcro-strap shoes. “His name is Buh…Bert.”

“Nice to meet you, Bert. My name’s Mitch.”

Here he paused long enough for a person to say, “A pleasure to meet you, too, Mitch,” and since this is the type of thing Nick would imagine a friend to say when meeting someone new, this is what I said.

“As long as you won’t use your superpower for evil,” he continued, “feel free to ride on my bus!”

Mitch’s discourse with me pleased little Nick. It reinforced Nick’s unarticulated belief that Mitch understood the nature of secrets. This was true. Mitch kept the secrets of virtually every child on his route. Mitch knew things even children’s best friends couldn’t awn. He knew Laurie Spatchle wasn’t out sick with the flu all last week, per se, but that Mrs. Spatchle had confused dandruff shampoo with head lice treatment shampoo. Better said, she had misinterpreted Laurie’s little white symptoms and laundered every launderable in the house all for the sake of little Laurie’s itchy, flaky scalp.

Mitch Kranzenhupf was a veritable filter for hurt. Mitch even seemed to keep the “secret” of Nick’s self-evident delayed development hidden from himself in order to treat him the same as the rest of the children. Each of the “routies”, as he liked to call them, he greeted with congruent gusto and sealed their secrets with a magical wink.

At this point in the story of me meeting Mitch for the first time, he presented us with precisely such a wink and we took our seats on the bus. Ever since that day, Mitch is the only person besides Nick who knows about me, knows that we’re a team, knows that I’m a superfriend wrought into existence by the power of Nick’s faith in make-believe.

Flattery Will Get You Somewhere

If by "somewhere" you mean "something I can read on Anne's blog".

Some wise man once said a blog is a little seed. It may lie dormant for many years, but its sleep, nestled in the nutrients of the earth, may in time send up a probing white neck, noodling back to the sunshine.

Okay, no wise man ever said that. What kind of a wise man uses "noodle" as a verb? But this blog has noodled its way back. After Taiwan, a "life and times in St. Louis" blog would have been anticlimactic (in my estimation), plus there was no time.

Now Open Epistle is different. I won't be posting diverting pictures or unfolding anecdotes as in a journal. I'll be writing earnest fiction, though, of course, you may hear echoes of stories or characters from my life if you know me. Since (I assume) you're here to read, I can leave off the self-criticism and get down to business and the whole arrangement works out just as it was intended. Simply having a reader, real or imagined, ramps up my ambition that much more.

Just a Blip

Hey, whaddya know, I have a blog.

I finally got that plane ticket home from Taiwan, too. Only I had so much luggage, and the bus that was supposed to take 90 minutes to get to the airport, it turned out, now takes 180 minutes, that Yule decided I would cry trying to take the train. So he and YiWen drove me themselves. After that, debacle, there's not much of a travel story to tell, because it's just the same old ten-hour-layover-in-LAX sob story anyway.

I thought to myself on the airplane over the sea, "one day, tomorrow even, all this waiting to get home won't even matter anymore, even though during these 13 hours over the ocean, it's all I can think about." 24 hours after leaving Taiwan, I stepped into the cleanest air I thought I'd ever breathed. Ahh, Sacramento. I could even see stars in the sky. Mom and Dad said, "gee, it's so hot," and I said, "What?"

Three days later I bought a new car. Two weeks after that I drove it to St. Louis, where I am now. Right now is a quiet evening cooling off after hundred-degree days. I'm setting up the classroom and school will start soon.

This has been the summertime update; an attempt to stay on the radar. Drink some lemonade and swing in a hammock for awhile. The next you check, there might be something more exciting going on.

Garlic and it's Usefulness

They say garlic helps lower blood pressure and cholesterol, helps insomniacs to sleep and repels mosquitos and unwanted creeps at bars. Or everybody, really. But you might not have known garlic as a bringer of the heavenly kingdom.

Wednesday nights bring an opportunity to pick up a little Chinese in a semi-organized fashion. For the past semester, my usual teacher is a friend of our hosts Yule and YiWen. He is a principal at a school about an hour's drive away from ChiaYi. Despite the distance, he and his wife come every Wednesday night to teach Chinese for a few hours. I know him as Principal Hong.

Willing conversationalists, Principal Hong and I usually engage in discussion that wanders all over, even revealing a mutual interest in birds. This topic led us on an adventure to a wildlife reserve specifically for the black-faced spoonbills, who make their winter home here in Taiwan. Even though the flock could only be seen through a telescope, it was a breathtaking experience.

Even so, all attempts to talk about the Gospel had been heretofore rebuffed. When I seemed to have an in and ask if he'd like to hear about my faith, for example, he would chuckle and say, "No thanks."

Last Wednesday night, the foreign teachers invited all our Chinese teachers to a dinner we would prepare. I told the principal that we would be having a spaghetti dinner, an adopted American dish. He asked if there would be garlic in it. "Oh yes," I replied, "We love garlic."

"Really?" he said. "Is this a Taiwanese influence? Taiwanese cook with garlic a lot. I heard Americans used garlic to keep evil away."

"Most Americans probably haven't done that since the 1800's."

"Then what do you use to keep evil away?"

And just like that, we entered the discussion of the Message from the angle of good and evil spirits' influence in our lives. By grace, the Holy Spirit had stirred up many questions in this devout Buddhist, keeping us talking for at least an hour. At some point, YiWen (the Gospel Enabler) deposited a Bible in front of us, which was even more useful than garlic.

Give glory to God that he leads wandering hearts back to his own. Pray that the Holy Spirit would grow this seed into full faith, breaking down the influence of deceptive evil spirits and showing a need for dependent repentance.

Frequently Asked Questions; Infrequently Explained Answers

Much like a recent college grad, I've found myself faced with a simliar set of questions these days. I have a hunch many readers want to know the same things. Casual conversations elicit shorter responses, or as much as I can get in edgewise, but I here you can read unabridged explanations. Conversational questions tend to be a little more blunt, as you will see. That's just part of the culture.

Q: When are you going home?

A: Well, I'm not quite sure yet; there seems to be a hang-up at the travel agent's office. That's just as frustrating to you as it is to me; I'm not trying to be difficult with this apparent ambivolence. Last I heard was July 1 or 2. But you know honestly, considering the wild fluctuations in schedule that I've come to accept as part of life in Taiwan, I wouldn't be too surprised if I didn't fly home until Christmas.

Q: When are you coming back?

A: To Taiwan? Um, well, I won't be coming back for another semes--

Q: You're not coming back?!

A: Unfortunately not.

Q: Ever?

A: It's not outside the realm of possibility for me to visit again sometime in the future but I'm not in the position of making any promises here.

Q: Don't you like Taiwan?

A: Of course I like Taiwan.

Q: What (on earth) will you do in America?

A: Well, I'll teach 3rd grade at an elementary school.

Q: What will you teach there?

A: What will I--third graders! Oh, you mean--every subject. Except, probably, music, health and computer.

Q: Are you trained to do that?

A: You'd think that because I'm a foreigner trying to make a bit of cash with my native tongue in Taiwan, I'm just a bum but yes, actually, I have a bachelor's degree in education. (Sometimes "when will you earn a graduate degree?" is the next question after this one. For my purposes here I consider it irrelevant.)

Plus I'm not just a foreigner trying to make a bit of cash by the way, I actually care for these kids because they are sought by Jesus like precious lost sheep, just like any person in creation. It is the desire of my heart to bring the Gospel message to the children I teach.

Q: Where will you live in America?

A: I'll live in St. Louis, Missouri, a city right along the Mississippi River. I've never been there before.

Q: Why do you want to move there?

A: Well I got a job with a Christian school there that appears to have a mission focus. I'm excited to do what I was trained to do and also to explore the dimensions of the great commission right in the good old USA.

Serendipitously, my Handsome Accomplice will be in the same town, going to the Lutheran Seminary and studying to become a pastor.

Q: When are you going to get married?

A: I'm not that kind of Lutheran. Your guess is as good as mine.

Q: So which do you like better, Taiwan or America?

A: (diplomatic answer may vary)

still raining

Concordia Middle School, where the Practice Hotel is (and where I live) sits on a bit of a hill. After all this rain, I began to wonder where it was all going, so today I put on river shoes and a raincoat and walked to the bottom of the hill. Sure enough, the canal there was running high and muddy, and the bent weeds along the banks showed that it had run up to 1.5 meters higher than I beheld it.

That's because we got 30 centimeters of rain yesterday.

To see a picture of this system and it's movement up to 48 hours ago, visit Taiwan's central weather bureau page. (You have to click on the link to the left that says "satellite".)

Today we got 12 centimeters. Anna H says the sum of today and yesterday is a third of Nebraska's rainfall in a year, for all you rainfall statisticians out there. I guess that's why they call these parts "rainforests".

Tainan

A couple of weeks ago I went to Tainan.

An acquaintance from Friday Night Bible Study and I were talking. She asked how long I'd be in Taiwan yet. When she learned that I'd be gone for the foreseeable (sp?) future after a month and a half, she insisted that I visit Tainan before I leave. We marked our calendars.

Sometimes I have introverted tendencies, like doubling back on plans for dumb reasons so I don't have to get into potentially awkward social situations. The morning of the trip to Tainan, I didn't know which train to take. This was easy enough to find out, but I considered flaking out until I accidentally stumbled into exactly the information I needed. I realized what an idiot I was being and determined, then and there, to have a good time that day.

I got to the train station and even bought a ticket by myself--two firsts. Things were going great, but there was no sign of Daphenie. She appeared on the platform just in time to make the train.

A short hour later, we had arrived in Tainan, and she was negotiating the scooter rental. Soon enough we were motoring through a colorful city. Bustling with everyday activity, it had a feeling unlike the run-down rush of most every other city I've been in Taiwan. I saw that it had wide sidewalks that were not too crowded with vendors that people could walk on them: unheard of! Leisurers peppered the city's many parks, walking dogs, riding bikes, and following their noses. It was as though they conducted life at a Westerner's pace. Taking it in, I knew my hope in Taiwan would be restored that day.

I think one reason this city has maintained it's life is that it has preserved many important old things, such as temples and castles from Taiwan's post-colonial years. The first set of pictures shows views of Chikan Tower, which sits on site of the Dutch's castle before it. The Taiwanese eventually defeated the colonizing Dutch. The statues in the picture commemorate Holland's surrender. Before Holland protested, the figure of the Dutchman could be seen kneeling. His posture was changed after the Westerners complained that this was demeaning.







It was here that I saw the altar to the god of scholarship and some of the many prayers to him I would see that day. Daphenie explained that many students were preparing for important exams that would determine their entry into middle school, high school, or university, and they came to worship and supplicate for their education.




Daphenie was a font of information, including the historical context of exams. Tests have been important in Chinese culture for generations upon generations, and just as hundreds of years before, still determined one's ability to hold a public office. Aspiring civil servants were to take a series of three tests. The number of tests passed dictated the level of service, with the highest achievers rising to the emperor's cabinet. Only the richest men had time to devote to studying for these exams, and who even knows what kinds of things were on these exams. In learning the this context, my students' schooling seems to make a little more sense.

Tainan is also home to oldest and hence the most important Confucius Temple in Taiwan. Chinese culture holds Confucius as the greatest teacher of all time. You can see a picture of the altar in this temple here. I don't know what the characters on the plaque say. Must be something pretty smart.

The grounds of the temple were grand. An enormous tree shaded the outer courtyard. Red, the decoration of the most sumptuously accomplished, washed the inner coutyard.








After the Confucius temple we stopped for a bite to eat. Daphenie produced a map and showed me the course she had mapped by the rest of the day. It would take us to a waterfront on the bay, some more historic buildings there. When we arrived the tourist destinations had been closed for the day, but the ramshackle alleys that took us there captivated me. Residents whiled the afternoon cool with neighbors in front of their houses. One woman, at least seventy, wore an old pink dress. I imagined how enchanting she must have looked before both their beauty was worn out.

If I could choose where I lived in Taiwan, I'd live on that little alley off An Ping street, right next to the woman in that enchanting old dress.

We walked by the bay and fireworks exploded over our heads--an unexpected treat. I thought, what a pity that I'm not on a date. Not that I regret the company, understand. It was just that, well, you know.



After dark we scooted back downtown, to a rehabilitated street where several artists had set up civic art projects. Some could be climbed upon. Some were good for pictures.






We reached an intersection with another small alley. Here a kitten squeezed out from under an antique door. Upstairs a woodcarver tok tok tokked away in the window of his workshop. It gave light to our pursuit of the playfully shy kitten, who we eventually abandoned to follow the alley. The alley gave up secret art projects at intervals; we found what looked like tiny glowing pebbles all over the cobblestone pavement and decided they would have been ideal for Hansel and Gretel's predicament. The little lights changed colors, but not because we stepped on them, as originally believed.

When this stroll led us back to the scooter, I believed our tour had come to an end, but Daphenie drove us to a little church. I found some sisters while Daphenie was parking the scooter properly, and to my delight, guessed correctly at the greeting of fellow Christians. "Ping an," we all said simultaneously, wishing one another peace.

Daphenie came to Friday Night Bible Study as an invitee of another attendee. There are no members, but a solid core of regulars. So far I only knew Daphenie's spiritual progress to be "curious". Curious enough to return week after week, but I never could have guessed that she sought out a church in her area on her own! In the sanctuary we found musicians practicing for the Sunday service. I thanked the Lord when a woman there recognized Daphenie from a previous visit and extended a warm welcome to both of us. I reasoned that she must be in charge of what American churches call "outreach and assimilation".

With the final trip to her home, about a half an hour outside Tainan, we met her parents and her 10 year old brother, all delightful and generous. Allen (English name for her brother) hopped in delight and showed me all his stuff. I guess kids are like that everywhere (a wink for Carol).

Even if Tainan hadn't been so delightful, there was still hope for Taiwan simply because of the people. One feels like an immediate member of the family in their households. And family life is so incredibly strong, how could anyone not become immediately immersed in such an environment? I hope that I can also practice such gentle hospitality, even with strangers. There in Daphenie's family's home, underneath a mesh net to keep out the mosquitos, I slept the night. In the morning they gave me breakfast, company, and time to sit and read. And to think, the previous morning I planned to flake out completely, wary of an awkward situation.

To see more pictures from this trip--and piles of others from my travels abroad (plus a couple of weird looking Americans' portraits inexplicably upoaded by Charlotte)-- feel free to visit my flickr page.

Now where did I put that ark?

Last night booming thunder woke up most folks at the Practice Hotel, sounding as if the clap materialized from inside the building.

"It was the loudest thunder I have ever heard," stated resident and foreign teacher Anna Horkey.

Since that time a massive low pressure system with arms all over Asia has dumped almost a foot of rain on ChiaYi, Taiwan.

"My alarm went off at 7:30 this morning, when I usually go walking with Anna Horkey," said Anne Woodward, another foreign teacher. "But I didn't even have to look out the window to know that we wouldn't be walking today." By the time it came to walk two hundred meters to work, Anne had a hard time finding high ground between puddles. "I was wishing for a boat."

Driving to work was more of a gamble. Foreign teacher Michelle Cavalli braved roads that had become rivers, reaching as high as the seat of her scooter in some places. She had to drive in the middle of the road to get anywhere at all.

National teacher Pearl found it necessary to drive over a sandbag barrier in order to navigate a route to Concordia English Language Academy. The 15 minute trip took her 50 minutes.

Nevertheless the schoolday began normally with Friday morning Bible study and continued with the usual Friday preparation and general milling around.

Finally, at 11:28, the memo arrived from the boss: all elementary classes cancelled. Kindergarten classes were quick to follow suit. Everyone in the office joined their voices in a jubilant whoop and found themselves embraced in adrenalized group hugs with Michael Vogel, office nutcase.

Woodward remembers where she was when the call came. "I was writing an email to my friend Charlotte, and I was just saying how I thought school should be called off...and then it was!"

Still there remained the obstacle of getting home. Though the rain had let up by intervals since the morning downpour, many teachers had to negotiate closed roads and traffic jams.

Friday Night Bible Study has also been cancelled. Plans for the evening? Asserts Woodward, "Bloggercise."

The Past

Well, I think I've waited long enough since the last post to throw off any would-be readers. So it's time to have a little fun. A scad of mini-posts! What could be cuter?

Now The Past is a pretty broad topic, so, like we learned in school, we have to pare it down a little bit. I'm going to reflect specifically on how my understanding of Taiwanese life has shifted.

When I first came to Taiwan, I thought I'd never learn to identify with the people here at all. That hasn't been the case. To begin with, I have learned some, not a lot, of Mandarin Chinese. I would have liked to pick up some more, not only because I happen to be kind of proud about the "linguistic ability" I assume I have. Language holds indefinite keys to unlocking culture. I consider this depth relatively unplumbed.

However, I have become acquainted with idiom of a student in Taiwan. It's very different here. I've written a little about it before, but I myself was never fully aware that being a student absorbs every part of a young person's life.

Just imagine meeting someone who doesn't have interests or hobbies outside of school. This is a difficult person to teach for the sake of finding common ground. The Taiwanese middle or high school student is a person who most likely does not have a lot of chores around the house because Mom and Dad think it's more important that homework gets completed. They are entirely content to complete almost any exercise in silence, save for one that requires classroom interaction or mental engagement in the higher levels (such as analysis, synthesis and evaluation. This, however, is merely a reflection of the type of rote education they've been absorbing). In all this, one can all but forget about existential rumination.

To me, this was abominable. I never knew how someone could lead a life so devoid of curiosity, yet so focused and determined. Slowly, however, I learned what it was like for a classroom to absorb me. Over the past few weeks, I've spent most of my waking hours in the office or the classroom (this of my own volition). Last night I had an hour to kill and I didn't want to do anything except go to bed so I could get up the next day and go to work. It was easier not to think about the tough stuff. I think I understand Taiwanese students a little better now.

One last morsel for now. I started watching old Mickey, Donald and Goofy cartoons on some evenings and would you believe that the Chinese voice for Donald Duck sounds exactly as incomprehensible as his English voice? So I figure I'm not missing out on much there.

Pictures next time.

The Pending

It's my last month of service here in Taiwan. My record of the year here has been limited, at least as far as the blog is concerned. At the outset I had designs for video and audioposts and whatnot. Well you know what they say: ask for the moon and get New Jersey.

Let's tackle some tough topics.

The future
After squaring away some paperwork, grading, and other insipid tasks, all that remains is sorting and packing. After that comes the matter of hauling and waiting (this means travel). Then comes the greeting, smiling, sleeping, and grumping of reentry.

About a month after that, it's time for more sorting, packing, hauling and waiting, but of a more permanent variety. I'll take up some new residence in the Midwestern Area of the United States, which may as well be a foreign country. Okay, yes, I was born in Kansas, but that was 24 years ago. Over there, I'll start talking, listening, giving the evil eye, and cutting things out (this means teaching, but different from the gig in Taiwan. I debate whether or not to keep the blog. Will possibly engage that topic in a later blog entry).

This location will also give me the opportunity to be with My Handsome Accomplice on a much more healthy schedule. By the time I see him it will have been 6 months since our last visit. That's more than half of our entire relationship.

I have high hopes for this future. It looks colorful in my mind's eye, and the future Anne of my mind's eye has interminable energy and strength. I could start writing about my vision for education, but I expect that's not a draw for readers.

Lemme Tell You About My Day...

Any kindergarten teacher in the world know's one has to be ready for curveballs. They also know said curveballs make for some pretty good stories. Curveball of the week: we suddenly learn Monday morning that each class had been given over to wholly inept college students who've invaded the kindergarten en masse in order to participate in some type of field experience.

It's enough to effectively de-rail a class when the homeroom teacher doesn't accompany her flock, and this happens often enough. Bedlam reaches new heights when four greenhorns amble in, hugged and tugged by the little ones. At this point, I become the only one even remotely in control of these children, and I don't even speak their native language.

Monday through Wednesday I slogged through business as usual. After each class I was ready, to use one of Anna Horkey's favorite lines, to set my hair on fire. Thursday I made ready for the visitors to earn their keep. With no preparation save the little English understood from me, they would teach my class.

As I made preparations Thursday morning, a two consequential events occured. First, I used the last kleenex in the room to help convey a used and crumpled kleenex from the floor to the trashcan. Simultaneously, bending to pick up the wad, I split the posterior seam in my pants. Three seconds later, twenty five students gushed into my classroom, bombing around the knee-high furninture and screeching like banshees. With a little quick thinking, I introduced my students to the ever-popular scoot-around-on-your-bottom game and successfully tricked them into getting into their places! I began class, split them into groups and set them loose on the field experiencers, who dared not refuse. It was working! Now just to keep from showing anyone my backside.

But wait, what's this? Presently I noticed some of the students holding their noses and a brown smudge on the floor. Crap. I took a quick poll of the five or six tykes standing round; none of them had to go to the bathroom (anymore), so I relocated their group and walked toward the kleenex box. The empty kleenex box. There was no chance I'd make a run to another classroom, only to leave moonstruck everyone in my wake. Distracted with the logistics of this substance's arrival on my floor, I resorted to paper, which I crumpled several times to make it more cloth-like, and alcohol-based hand sanitizer.

The show went on. That class eventually ended, and in the moments before the next class came in, I took the stapler to the ripped seam. Naturally, it was out of staples.

Perfect Little Muffins

I have a preferred class of kindergartners. Inexplicably, they are called "Hyacinth". I hesitate to say "favorite", even though it might be true, because it reflects poorly on me as a professional. Plus, my other classes are filled with equally enchanting little muffins, but one teacher makes the difference. The Hyacinth class has the best homeroom teacher, and as a result, they are more easily taught than all the other classes.

For a moment, I want to point out some sobering truths of this situation which may not be readily apparent. The kindergarten where I teach, and indeed the Taiwanese kindergarten model has three levels labeled, predictably, K1, K2, and K3. Many little ones find themselves in the uncharted environs of K1 no later than their third birthday. Fine, we Americans send our toddlers off to preschool, but mostly this does not include learning to sit still, listen, and learn for extended periods of time. My own classes last 40 minutes, and no one turns a hair if the students spend that whole time sitting in the same little spot.


One bright Saturday, I realized the magnitude of these students' training. The kindergarten gathered all 150-some of the K3 students, who range between 5 and 6 years old, to take a group picture (see photos of the arrangement to the right). I was to be in the picture as well. As the teachers assembled their students into portait formation, I noted the children standing, just standing, and waiting for their teacher to put them somewhere. Get 150 American 5 and 6 year olds together and see if organizing a portrait isn't something like trying to keep a bunch of squirrels in a shopping cart. The mere possiblity of such a feat without tranquilizers left me thunderstruck.

For the time being, however, these children love school. Successful kindergarten teachers, like the one keeping Hyacinth in line, implement faithful discipline, show the children genuine love and and develop nourishing relationships them. I think. Some days, I wonder what really accounts for Hyacinth's mostly-rapt behavior.

Today, for instance, Jay, normally a chipper and bashfully winsome little muffin, could hardly keep his eyes open. I tried to figure out what was wrong, but could not get him to tell me anything. He simply sat there with sleepy eyes. Finally, as the class colored in their workbooks(!), it all came out. Not words, no, but whatever he had for lunch. Poor Jay oozed as quietly as Mauna Loa until a student fetched my attention from another child. Jay hadn't said a thing! I thought, was he really taught so well not to interrupt?

This is the only time these children will love school. From here, the long road of education is potholed with superfluous tests and examinations, endless schooldays (beginning, for example, at 7 AM and lasting until 6:30 or later, depending on the amount of cram schools they attend), and homework that will deprive them of the proper amount of sleep. Yet somehow all this busywork determines precisely the future for each of these students.

Hyacinth's teacher has taught them to obey. Perhaps it's more pleasant to see a child grow without as strict a code of uniformity, but the habit will serve them well as they grow in their culture.

An unrelated footnote:
Those of you following the saga of My Handsome Accomplice and I will be keen to learn that the relationship is now not only international but also intercontinental. That's right, somewhere around 12 hours from now, his kin will be scooping up his remains from the nearest airport after a 25 hour trip. He should recover just in time to begin studying Greek, the wretched soul.

Calls Pending

Believe the headlines! The rumors are true; there's a divine call from Mecca, er, St. Louis MO with my name on it. Grace Chapel Lutheran School offers me their third grade position. The papers are on their way. It's my understanding that they're spending some time at the district office.

Last night at Friday Night Bible Study, I was talking to another expat. Previously unchurched, she has ended up a Bible study regular and has been given depths of curiosity about her creator. We were talking about future plans and I told her about my call and the call process. She asked why they were called "calls". It was an interesting chance to look at my little world of Lutheran experience.

I explained how Lutheran schools choose from a pool of candidates trained to work at said Lutheran schools, and how my dad had received calls to different schools while I was growing up. While childhood's simplicity filtered out the qualifying details, I cobbled together an understanding that schools employing him did so on behalf of God. Each time he received an opportunity to move again, he would consider and we would all pray, and God would lead to a new school or to stick with the script.

Even though the papers are still basking in their authentification process in the district office, I circulate the prayer request to anyone who will take it up, both for me and for this Lutheran school, that the Lord would lead and give clarity to the glory of his name.

Friday Night Scratchpad

It's that time again! Thanks for tuning in for the monthly-if-you're-lucky blog post.

Betimes, I've complained about my gaggle of sixth graders before, citing them anti-social or inconsiderate. I'm not planning on taking any of that back, as children of their age are, as an empirical fact, pains in the butt. In fact, their inelegance speaks the grace of God all the more emphatically.

All of last week's curriculum focused on the story of Easter. Each day our learning took up a different theme: triumphal entry, last supper, and so on. By the time Thursday rolled around, I was convinced these kids had had it up to here with all this Bible learning. "Just what is this American teacher trying to shove down our throats, anyway?" In my mind, they may as well have been saying this.

Incidentally Thursday was also the day we took an intense look at the crucifixion, and the day I encountered five of my boys chucking chunks of asphalt across the school parking lot full of cars during our breaktime. Things were not going well. With a heavy heart I planned for Friday, (Good Friday in actuality, but the day we would celebrate and study Easter in my class).

The students' attitudes on Friday could not have been more joyful. They were more considerate and talkative than I've ever seen them, and many of their free-write responses about the Easter story were phenomenal:

My favorite part of the Easter story is that Jesus had nails in his hands when he died, after he alive again, holes from nails still in his hands. When he died he forgave our sins, when he alive he beat death, it's powerful!

I have more reasons to believe that the Holy Spirit has planted some seeds of faith. One student wrote me email, and in two simple sentences, triggered more moxie and joy from the Gospel than I can remember: "Teacher, I love to listen to the story about Jesus. Can you tell more Jesus story to me?"

"It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy." (Romans 9v16) Hasn't he told us? Reminded us again and again that we aren't capable of adding a drop to his ocean of grace? And he tells us, but we only seem to listen when we can see the fruits: God is faithful. He will grow faith.

Go therefore and be joyful.

Cured by Ham

Recently, when reading the parables of Jesus, I've felt overwhelmingly convicted. Especially potent has been the parable where the master gives three servants ten, five, and one talent, and then goes away. Like the stubborn servant with the one talent, I'm predisposed to pout about the amount given me and sit on it, comparing myself to others.

Last week at Fiday Night Bible study, I led songs for the first time. Then I got to teach.

Anyone who knows me knows that when I get in front of groups, I'm a natural ham. For one reason or another, I'd been hiding this character trait from greater Taiwan. Well, from anybody who knows me here. Maybe because being a missionary, you're "supposed" to take things seriously? Probably. (You're not really "supposed" to do it, but that was apparently my careful approach.) Additionally, I'd never gotten the chance to ham it up, aside from with my 6th graders, which no one ever sees,and obviously the kindergartners, because any kindergarten teacher who doesn't ham it up is straight doomed.

Friday night, all that changed. Back to textbook Anne. It lifted a weight so big that I even felt lightheaded. I wasn't afraid to talk to anyone; I'm Anne. Finally!

It could hardly have gotten better when a man walked up to me. This was his first time to come to Bible study. I asked him what brought him here tonight, and he told me he wanted to learn more about the Bible. As part of being with us the first time, he had received a pocket-sized Chinese and English New Testament, but he thought the print was rather small. He was right. It was pocket sized. However, he told me that he had a Bible at home: he checked it out from the library. Well, that will do.

He said he wanted to learn more about the Bible because of the influence it has on the world. I figured, better not waste any time. Let's get this man what he wants. He agreed to start reading the Gospel of Mark with me, and we'd talk about it next week.

Maybe it's elementary to suggest this blessing was positive reinforcement from the Lord. Either way: pass the ham.