Normalizing

The monsoon season has arrived in China; the rain comes down in sheets, washing clean both the ground and the air.  The morning after a rain, Beijing is reborn. Hundreds of thousands of Chinese take to the streets to walk, laugh, and live for a moment in the clarity of pure sunlight.  I love those mornings too.  I know there are places in China where clean, crisp air is the norm, but Beijing, Shanghai, and the eastern populations centers are not among them.  We take clean air for granted in the US.  Next time you go outside, take a deep clean breath of American air--then thank God for America.  I do, more and more each passing day.

I am now entering the last month of this amazing summer; I can't believe it has passed so quickly.  There have been ups and downs--summits with fantastic views, long frustrating plateaus, and deep dark gorges of despair.  I have experienced all of these here in China and I think I am not alone.  With a foreign culture like China, you have this moment where you think everything is fantastic!  Even the scorpions taste good!  Eventually, however, the novelty of chopsticks and two dollar lunches wears off and all you see are the over crowded subways, dirty streets, and strange sounding Chinese people.  I call this period the "Everything American" period because all you want to do is find the American international stores, buy peanut butter, and make a freak'n sandwich.  For me, it was only a couple of days, some of my classmates never escaped and still can't say a nice thing about China or the Chinese.

Not me.  I've finally normalized and find China to be intensely interesting.  There is so much raw potential here.  It doesn't feel like the states where I feel like we are maximizing a least a portion of our national potential.  In China there are literally hundreds of millions of people moving up the ranks of society--working to make something of themselves--but just can't for some reason of another.  What would happen if that potential was released?

We went to Shanghai, its been a while since I've recorded my experiences.  Shanghai was like New York--a lot like New York--just a little bigger.  It is heavily influenced by western culture and was really built by the West--hence the New York feel.  Its beautiful at night.  You look across a branch of the Yangtze River into down-town and its pretty fantastic.

From Shanghai we went to Suzhou, China's Venice...just older...and more people.  It was pretty cool to walk along the grand canal and watch the private barges move along the current-less water.  I had a moment of clarity watching one barge meander past me.  There was a clothes line stretched across the back of the boat and the captain had no shirt on.  Then I noticed it was a little family on the boat: A Dad, Mom, and a little boy.  They obviously lived on the boat--moving up and down the ancient canal day after day.  The grand canal was built in 700 AD from Guangzhou all the way to Xinjiang...then later to Beijing.  Thats like a canal connecting Florida and DC, built 1300 years ago.  Anyway, my moment of clarity is hard to explain, but it has something to do with living authentically and learning to love the life we've been blessed with.  As some of my classmates murmured incessantly about the heat and discomfort of our trip, I wiped the sweat from my forehead and wished I was on that barge headed for Tianjin.  Who was that man and his little family headed north?  What did he think about communism and democracy, capitalism and liberty?  Surely he has an opinion, but on that hot summer day--he just drove his boat and his family north.  I don't think you will understand my meaning here: it is something of a feeling rather than a concrete concept.    

the family barge

the family barge 2

We're back in Beijing now.  We moved up north to Beijing Normal University.  Yes, that is the name of the school.  There are no errors in the name.  In fact there are lots of "Normal" universities in China.  There is something lost in translation there that I can't quite get a grip on.  No one would go to Phoenix Normal University.  It would be too....normal.

Soon we will be headed to Tibet.  I'm so excited I can hardly stand it.  We're going to the base of Mt. Everest, riding a night train across the entire country, and even seeing the capital of Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism.  One of the teachers, Dr. Jones, grew up in India and Pakistan--near the border of Tibet.  He is Evangelical Christian and one of the smartest men I have ever met.  I talked to him a lot about Christianity, my own faith, and the history of the East.  I am evermore convinced that God loves all of his children, and is working now to bring truth to the billions who wait.

Whatever I see in Tibet, it will probably be the most un-normal experience I have ever had.

Keep the Faith