i must be looking older

jordan: were there computers when you were our age?
luke: she's not THAT old, guys. the computers just stunk real bad.
me: well, you'll say that about your computers too 5 years from now.
*some silence*
jordan: were you alive during the holocaust?
luke: oh, my gosh. they ARE actually retarded... (*forehead palm slap*)
me: uhhmmm... do you know the actual dates of the holocaust?
david and jordan: yes.
me: my GRANDMOTHER was a child during the holocaust!
david: really? so when was your first dinosaur sighting?

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/12/07/connecticut.chimp.attack/index.html?eref=igoogle_cnn

1. monkeys are never cute.
2. monkeys are never to be trusted.
3. even trained and domesticated ones.
4. but especially not wild ones.
5. under no circumstances.

places to go

glory: it's so hard to arrange a meeting with you.
me: why?
glory: because you have not much time.
me: and you have not much time.
glory: yeah.
me: and my not much time is not at the same time as your not much time.
glory: exactly. that's why it's hard.
me: so when do you have not much time?
glory: oh, i have a lot of not much time.

a present from Jesus

friday i was walking to my house when i spotted something shiny in the grass.
naturally, i went to see what it was, hoping for money.
i was not disappointed.
it was a quarter!
an american quarter!
how odd...
so i picked it up and looked more closely.
minted in 1986. same as me.

so there i was.
walking.
on java.
when i happened to find a quarter.
from the same year as i was born.

me: *looking credulously at the sky while holding said quarter in the palm of my hand* God? is that You?

and the best news!

in the craziness of the day, i have forgotten to say this:

KIM CAME HOME YESTERDAY!!!

and she is feeling so good after 2 weeks in ICU in singapore that after flying into semarang, she, clayton, yo, and gt spent TWO HOURS shopping and walking around the mall there.

i got to go see her last night, and she herself says that based on how she feels now, she can't believe that she almost died just 2 weeks ago.

God IS bigger!

paper

remember all those rules i put in place several weeks back for the rowdy 9th graders? one of them stated that if they slander, put down, or badmouth in any way anybody else in class, they have to write a paper on it explaining why they should not have said what they said, complete with Bible verses. i got a beauty from one student today entitled "Why I Shouldn't Insult People". It reads as follows.

"When I called Jose stupid it wasn't nice, even if it is true it isn't nice, therefore I shouldn't have said it. The Bible says to "love your neighbor as yourself", and I wouldn't have liked it if he said that to me. Also, I shouldn't have told Aditya to shutup. What Aditya has to say is important to [sic] therefore I shouldn't have said that. The Bible says to "love your enemies." Therefore I should love aditya and not tell him to shutup. Also, I shouldn't have called Kyuho a ho because obviously he isnt a ho because a ho is usually a woman, and obviously Kyuho has never done that."

well, i can see this student learned his lesson. ahem....

i found where my cat had her kittens at! and they are still alive! unfortunately, i cannot see them... i was out to dinner with some friends last night. one of them, andre, teaches indonesian at the language school next door to my house. apparently she had her kittens in the ceiling of one of their classroom buildings! so now during class, they can hear cats mewing and thumping around up there. oh no! dre assured me that they are no bother and that when they get bigger, if they are still trying to live up there, they'll have the guards get them down and bring them to me. whew! he replayed the following conversation for me from class earlier this week:

andre: oke, silahkan mengulang. (ok, please repeat after me)
cats: MEW, MEW, MEW!!!

he apparently thought that was hilarious, because throughout the evening, he repeated it 3 or 4 times.

visits from history

my skype has been real weird this week. it keeps sending me messages from the past. for example, yesterday, i thought katy was talking to me, but then i looked at the time stamp and realized the message was from the day before and that katy was currently offline. this morning, i got this one from over a week ago when the family + gramma drove to oklahoma to be with zach. this one made me laugh. and miss my family. love you guys!

18:36 - Love you Abbie
Have a wunnerful day - Mom

20:11 - You there?
20:11 - Hello Hello Hello
20:13 - Anyone there?

20:31 - dear abbie, Ijam going with your folks to see zach. am at your house right now waiting for the car to get here and your dad too. Deb took me to hicksville and your mom picked me up there wich was about half way .worked out very well. think the car is going to be loaded for bear with all the stuffweare taking.wished i could have gone to see you too but kn ew that was not possible. excuse the errors i am making.love you and take care .grandma

rice babies

5 kg bags of rice were distributed to all the seniors today for them to clothe and decorate. these will serve as their "babies" for the next 7 days. it's part of their contemporary issues class project. we don't get those fancy high tech talking, pooping babies over here. just rice. oh, so asian.

so at lunch, i got into a fantastic conversation with yejun regarding his naked rice baby.
nat: so who's the father?
yejun: it was a virgin birth.
nat: then who's the mother?
yejun: me. i virgin birthed the baby in ways you cannot imagine.
nat: ooohhhhh.
yejun: and its name is going to be PMS.... or Satan.
alexa: PMS?
yejun: yes, it's short for peter mose sullivan.
me: well, that's a very korean name.
yejun: i can't give it a korean name. it's white rice.

geometry today

me: uh-oh... we have a square root of 2 in the denominator. what do we need to do with that?
david: multiply both sides by the square root of 2!
me: both sides? but there's no equals sign.... so there is no "both sides".
david: uhmmm.....
jenna: oh! multiply by something equivalent to one, which would be the square root of 2 over the square root of 2! so top and bottom are getting multiplied by the same thing.
me: RIGHT! good explanation too.
david: that's what i said!
me: almost.... both sides implies there's an equation. top and bottom would imply a fraction.
david: *mumbles* you're gay.
me: WHAT?!
david: OH MY GOSH! i'm SO SORRY! it just came out!!! OH MY GOSH!
luke: david! are you ACTUALLY retarded?!
david: I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'M SAYING!
me: woowwwwww....
david: I DIDN'T MEAN IT! YOU ARE SO HOT!
me: DAVID! you are NOT helping your situation at ALL!
david: why?! i'm trying to be nice!
me: oh, dear.....
luke and jordan: *chanting while banging fists on their desks* slap him! slap him! slap him!

things i’m thankful for

Number one.  My family and God's protection over them. Sometimes, I  think about how easy it is for bad things to happen.  There've been times when it's even been hard not think about those things.  And when I'm so far away from home, that's a really scary thing.  But God has always been so good to my family.  Nothing bad has ever happened to us.  We're healthy.  We’re warm and dry and safe.  We have the things we need, and plenty more.  No matter how far from home we go, He is there with us.  Sometimes I forget about that, but if I look, it's easy to see.

Number two.  My friends.  Around the world.  You are my surrogate family.  To those I’ve left: I miss you.  You are irreplaceable, and I can't wait to see you again.  To those here: thank you for who you are and what you mean to me.  It breaks my heart think about the day when you will become those I’ve left. And if I write any more in this category, I will cry on my computer, which is not ideal. I love you all.

Number three.  My job.  Seriously, I have like the coolest job in the world.  I get to hang out all day with awesome kids who love Jesus.  Yeah, some days are better than others, but no matter what, I love my kids and what I do here. God opened some serious doors to make this happen, and I am so thankful He did.

Number four.  The experiences God has allowed me to have.  I have had quite the life - and gosh, I’m only 23!  Earlier this week, I was reading my journal from college.  It included a lot of memories from high school and before.  I was just reminded of a lot of the experiences that I've had.  Some good, few bad. Some bizarre, few normal. But all leading up to who I am today and preparing me for where I am in this moment.

Number five.  The knowledge that my God is the biggest.  He is bigger than allah.  He is bigger than me.  He is bigger than the demons.  He is bigger than my circumstances.  And He always wins.

Number six. The rain. I hear it right now. It makes everything green. It sustains life. It keeps the heat away. It sings me to sleep.

Number seven. The body of Christ. It is living and active in every part of this world. Everywhere I go, I find it. I’m learning to see the beauty of it.  I’m thankful that it is here, and I am thankful that I get to be a part of it.

Number eight. The little things. Like the fact that technology has progressed to the point where I can call my family when I’m homesick. Or that feeling of accomplishment I get after having a conversation in Indonesian. Or that I’ve only ever found snakes outside my house and not inside. Or that my pembantu is an awesome cook. Or that Christmas vacation starts in 3 weeks.  ALL these – and SO many more – are things to be thankful for!

all 88

last night i went to a piano concert.
i have never heard such incredible playing in my life.
i didn't want him to stop.
during one song, i could hardly breathe.
it sounded just like water.
sounds like that don't come from this instrument.
at least, not for most people.

but anthony hartono is not most people.
and he is only fourteen years old.

skypes with dad

[11:10:34 AM] dad: I'll take lots of pictures this weekend
[11:11:16 AM] abbie elizabeth: i don't want to see them
[11:11:43 AM] dad: even if I don't photograph the food?
[11:11:55 AM] abbie elizabeth: oh, that's fine then.
[11:12:00 AM] abbie elizabeth: i also don't want to see people having fun without me.
[11:12:01 AM] dad: k
[11:12:11 AM] dad: shellfish
[11:12:15 AM] abbie elizabeth: so maybe some pictures of crying or sleeping people would be fine.
[11:12:31 AM] abbie elizabeth: or maybe just send me some pictures of strangers or wildlife in the area.
[11:12:57 AM] dad: strangers crying in their sleep?
[11:13:49 AM] abbie elizabeth: THAT'S IT!
[11:13:55 AM] abbie elizabeth: yes, that is perfect.
[11:14:00 AM] dad: I'll try

mom and dad and gramma and kyley are renting an impala and hauling a turkey 11 hours to have thanksgiving in oklahoma with zach. meanwhile, i'm in rainy season in indonesia. and not very happy about it.

madura (mis)adventures

our trip to madura this weekend was like a train wreck from start to finish. (note: no trains were harmed in the making of this blog post) it all started with kim, which i mentioned in my last post… she had surgery thursday morning for kidney stones. routine procedure. it went well. kidney stones gone. we got on our bus and left shortly after lunch. by late that afternoon, it became obvious that kim was not doing so well. we are still not sure if a mistake was made on the part of the doctors or if kim just reacted very negatively to the anesthesia. at about 4 o’clock, we got word that her blood pressure had dropped dangerously low, she had been placed on oxygen, and though she was conscious, she couldn’t hear anything. by 8, they had called in the family. ron, her husband, made plans to come early the next morning from sumatra to be with her. we were hundreds of kilometers away, and there was nothing we could do except pray.

we arrived in madura at about 11 with no further word on kim. however, within 30 minutes, GT got word that his fiance’s father had died. pak tukiman had been a driver for our school for many, many years, so all the teachers and many of the students knew him. he had been in and out of hospitals for the last 2 years, so his death wasn’t entirely unexpected, but he had been doing somewhat better lately. GT made plans to head right back home by bus early the next morning. poor guy spent the last two weeks driving to aceh and back, only to arrive in madura, then have to go straight back home!

friday morning, GT left, and we got word that kim had not improved overnight, so she was being med-evacuated to singapore to be put on a ventilator. but nobody could contact ron. so with even more prayers being said, we headed to the local middle school to teach english. our experience at that school was great! the kids did a fantastic job teaching things like action verbs, emotions, conversation questions, and several other things.

their students responded well, and they even took time to sing and play music for us!

after we got back from the middle school, a small group of us went directly to a local nursing school where we practiced conversational english with the university students there. they were excited to have foreigners come visit them!

on our way back from the nursing school, we got a phone call from someone at the middle school we had been at earlier. she called to tell us that the police were there questioning them about our visit, and they wanted to know our REAL reasons for being in madura. she said that they were sending some officers to our hotel to talk to us. once we got back, jesse immediately went in search of yohanes to translate for him. i went back to my room to change out of my long sleeves, pants, and head covering (madura is roughly a billion degrees), but something told me not to. so i left my room, planning to wander to the beach. instead, i found nasreen and two police officers walking toward me. then we began to play 20 questions, which was not so much a fun guessing game as it was two surly cops asking me 20 very pointed questions and me trying my best to give 20 very polite, complete, and unincriminating answers. luckily, nasreen stuck around to translate. an eternity later, jesse and yohanes found us and took over. it seemed there were two options at this point: either they would make us pay them a lot of money (which we would not do) or they would make us leave.

in the meantime, some students had gone to the beach with no shoes and had actually WALKED ON CORAL! like, open your eyes? so on top of everything else, we now had blood and deep cuts to contend with. nasreen and dan, two of the seniors on our trip, opened up a little patching up shop with the bus first aid kit, and i came to help after my encounter with the police. everyone was fixed up in no time.

then some students and i walked across the street to a little food stall to eat lunch. unfortunately, nearly all the other students NOT involved in the interrogation – spectating or otherwise – had the same idea. can’t blame them, given that it was the only place to eat for 100 meters. and that is a far distance in the blazing heat. there were only four tables in there, and they were totally packed out, so the owner invited us to go next door and wait for our order there. wearily, we marched out of the warung, glad for a place to sit. and then we realized that next door was a mosque. and we’re not exactly halal. so we went back inside to ask the proprietor if that was REALLY what he meant, and he said ya, ga pa pa (no problem). we could eat there. so we all kind of looked at each other with that “what do we do now?” look in our eyes, and we wandered back outside. in a sudden burst of good vision, one of the students noticed some rickety looking benches in the shade along the side of the mosque, so we all sat back there instead. while waiting 45 minutes for our food, we spent quite a bit of time in prayer for all the things that were heavy on our heart that day, and it was an awesome and encouraging time… i love our students!

whew… this is getting long… stick with me…

shortly after we finished praying, jesse and yo came over to eat, and we were able to ask them about the police visit. like He always does, God worked things out and softened the heart of the police. they took copies of everyone’s IDs and told us that before we come next time, we needed to report to them. whew… that situation could have been a WHOLE lot worse, and in fact, everyone who has heard about it has been amazed that it wasn’t any worse! apparently, madurese police are known for their corruption – and indonesia is the second most corrupt country in the world! go, us…

while walking back across the street after lunch, we encountered an unusual scene – two parents beating their teenage daughter in the street. she was screaming and sobbing and laying in the road. they were trying to drag her out of the road while landing a few punches here and there while they were at it. right as we arrived, a teenage boy sped off on a motor bike, and we heard it rumored later that they had been caught together at the hotel. this is a bigger deal in muslim culture than i can even begin to describe to you. worthy of beating your daughter in the street in front of everybody. of course, nobody touched the boy… it was a very awkward situation though as we stood there trying to figure out how we could help, but quickly realizing that as foreigners, there was absolutely nothing we could do.

the students spent some time at the beach that day, and about 30 students from yet another school came to hang out with them and practice conversation. i crashed for 2 hours at this point from sheer emotional exhaustion, but i heard that many, many good conversations were had, and some students told me that this time was the most meaningful – and their favorite – part of the entire trip.

that evening, we drove to a nearby town to have dinner. there were WAY more food options there! and nobody had to be asked to sit in a mosque! as long as the students stayed in non-coed groups of three or more, they were safe to go wherever they wanted. we also left plenty of time for them to be able to hang out and meet people. there is a large muslim school nearby, so there were LOTS of opportunities to meet other middle/high school students. and they did! it seemed that everywhere i went around town, i would find a group of our students surrounded by a group of indonesian students! i myself was thronged by a group of second graders… not sure how that happened? maybe because my vocabulary is right about at their level. all their parents were food vendors nearby, so they were basically left to their own devices all night long. we had fun singing songs, counting in english and madurese, and talking about our families. they were super fantastic! when we had to leave, about 40 little kids paraded with us through the streets to our bus, cheering and singing and waving goodbye.

the following morning, we packed up all our things, checked out of our hotel, and drove to a local pesantren (muslim school) where we again taught english.

this school was night and day different from the school the day before… of course, this one was still noisy and chaotic, but it was also MUCH less respectful, especially toward women. the male students (and even some teachers!) were very disrespectful and even perverted, coming onto our female students and even me in very inappropriate ways – especially for muslim culture! it was unfortunate and very disappointing. even as a teacher, i was scared to go anywhere by myself in this school. it was VERY male dominated – the girls didn’t talk or participate in class at all. but AFTER the teaching, when we got time to just hang out with them girl-to-girl, they really opened up. we spent about 2 hours there after classes talking to them, getting to know them, sharing with them, and exchanging email addresses.

we left to come home after our time at the pesantren. by this point, we knew that GT had made it home safely and that kim was in more stable condition, but that she had an infection in her lungs (which turned out to be double pneumonia – she’ll be in ICU in singapore for several more days, but her entire family is with her now. please keep them in your prayers!). so spirits were much higher coming home. God has a way of working everything out.

after we crossed the suramadu (the bridge from madura to java) – which is one of the longest bridges in the world! – we stopped to change clothes. nobody really wanted to wear their muslim garb the entire way home – especially not the girls! so we stopped at a gas station. since there was one bathroom, 11 girls, and 25 guys, we decided that the guys would all change on the bus, and the girls would all change in the bathroom. to get to the bathroom, you had to walk through a sliding metal door into a 9’ x 12’ tiled room. in the back of this room were 2 doors. one led to a toilet stall and one led to a musholla. the toilet was occupied. by our bus driver. who had the runs. roughly 5 minutes later, he finally came out. we all decided quickly that none of us wanted to go in after him, so we closed that door behind him, made sure nobody was in the musholla, and decided to slide the big door shut and all change at once in the tile room. so we did. and when we finished, we found that we were locked in. in the 100 degree bathroom. that didn’t have windows. that smelled foul. luckily, a jaga came with a key (on his 5th or 6th try!) and freed us. gas station air never smelled so sweet.

i am happy to report that the bathroom incident was the last of our misadventures. we got home safely at 2 sunday morning. we’re all a little tired and cranky today. some more than others. me more than others. but in the words of my dad, which became my motto for this entire trip, God is bigger.

in control

wow. so this madura trip... it will be interesting.

kim had surgery for kidney stones in semarang this morning. praise God that's all it was! it could have been any number of more serious things. needless to say though, she won't be going to madura with us, which is a bummer. this is her trip. she always goes. she has great relationships with the schools and the people there. and she's the one who knows what she's doing!

as of 8 o'clock last night, yohanes and gt were stranded in jakarta. they were on their way home from their road trip to sumatra and had flown from medan to jkt, but once there (at about 1 pm), they found that there were no more flights and the bus to anywhere local had already left. yo mentioned that he had lots of stories to share, so i smsed back, "will tomorrow's 10 hour bus ride be long enough for all your stories?" to which he replied, "tomorrow?!" uh-oh.... they both thought we were leaving friday! so after explaining to them that we were leaving at noon today and stressing them out to their wit's end, we had to contemplate whether or not we could get along in madura with no translators. thank heavens they were able to find a night train to solo.

that left one problem though - how would they get from solo back home? they called kim's husband (who is currently working on another island) to ask if they could use her car so that yo's brother (a driver) could pick them up, and he said yes. but i informed them that her car is here at school, she is in a hospital 1.5 hours away, and nobody has the keys. not kim (who i had to wake up by calling to ask if she knew where they were.....), not me, not the jagas. ugh. they finally got tracked down. and yo and gt made it home safe at 6:30 this morning.

one student who was supposed to go woke up with a fever this morning so can't join us. however, yo and i both seem to be mostly over our sicknesses of earlier this week.

please continue to pray that God will protect us and keep us all healthy. madura would be an awful place for anyone to get sick...

pray without ceasing

an excerpt from a mass email i sent out earlier. . .

" Dear family and friends,

Until I sat down to write this, I hadn't realized how long it had been since I last wrote! I apologize for my lengthy silence.

I would like to break my loooonnnnnnng period of silence by asking for prayer. Every semester, our school has a three day weekend that is designated for ministry trips. This semester, that weekend is this coming weekend. Some of the trips this semester are here in town and last only one day. Some are to towns nearby where those involved will be spending the night. But every semester, there is always a trip to another island of Indonesia called Madura. Those going will stay from Thursday - Sunday. While I am asking prayer for ALL of these ministry trips, I would especially ask for you to partner together with our school in prayer for the team going to Madura (I will be going as well). Madura is a very strictly Muslim region and parts of it are under Muslim law. Because of this, when we go, all the girls must wear pants, long sleeves, and head coverings, and we cannot be very free in what we say. Because of the nature of our trip, I would rather not share many details via email, but I can tell you that we will be working with several schools there to teach English. We are planning to visit 2 schools but are expecting to get invited to more once we arrive (this is what typically happens).

Specific things that I would ask prayer for:

1. First and foremost, health and safety for all the teams. Every team except one (which will be working on campus) will be doing some traveling; the team to Madura will be driving most of the night Thursday and again Saturday to make the 10 hour drive there and back. Flu has been going around the past couple weeks, and some of the teams will be staying in village homes, so those are both major health conerns.

2. Unity on each of the teams. We have a handful of kids at our school who aren't saved, and in fact, there are 5 Hindu students going on the Madura trip. Also, as with any group of teenagers, there are some who struggle with having people in authority over them. Please pray for those students as well.

3. Pray that through all things on each trip, God would be glorified, and that love would be able to reach places where our actions and our limited language cannot - both to the people we are working with and the people we are working for.

4. Pray for the leaders of each team, that God would just give us an enormous amount of wisdom in directing the students, in organizing the trips, in trying to keep 120 highschoolers safe and healthy, and in reaching others. Please pray also that we would be willing to be led by the Spirit in whatever He would have us do.

I appreciate very much your support through prayer for not only me, but for our entire school body as we set out this weekend to be a blessing to the community around us!"


Something I would now like to add....
Please pray that Satan would be bound. He is certainly attacking us even now as we make preparations. There are 5 adults that are to go on this trip. Two fellow teachers, Yohanes, GT, and me. Yesterday, Yohanes woke up with a fever and I with a nasty head cold. And this afternoon, one of the other teachers was put in the hospital, possibly with kidney stones. She is the leader and organizer of this trip, but right now, it's looking like she won't be going with us. This puts me in the position of being the only female adult going, which is a little daunting. Please pray also that no matter what happens, God would work through it. And pray for the other teacher, Kim. If it's not kidney stones, there is a possibility that it could be something more serious. They'll be doing more tests tomorrow (Wednesday).