Amber is cool.

This is my friend Amber.

She and I photographed a wedding together last Saturday.

Amber and I both love photography.  We talk equipment and share ideas of photos we’d love to take someday.  Photography has been sort of my creative outlet for years, but I really don’t have any official training.  Amber has both her undergrad and master’s degrees in photography.  This girl knows what she’s talking about.  She even had an art show at a studio in Beijing earlier this year.

Amber is just incredibly cool and so much fun.  Talking photography with her inspires me to continue to pick up my camera.  It’s sad how often I leave it hanging on the hook by my front door.

I was just thinking today about how many cool people live here in China with me.  When I was getting ready to come here, I was petrified about coming alone.  I was convinced I’d be all alone and would eventually turn into a weird hermit person who talked to herself all the time.  

I am continaully amazed at how many incredible people have come into my life in the last 2 years.  I never expected that I’d experience community like this, and I’ve been looking around lately and find myself very grateful.

Transparent Tuesday.

Living in China, I get a lot of pats on the back.  

I hear a whole lot of, “Wow, you’re doing such a selfless, courageous thing.  Orphans, man.  Serving the poor?  Living in a little village?  Man, that’s just sold out, off-the-charts awesome.”  

And being a verbal affirmation kind of girl, I eat this up.  I know, I know.  I’m supposed to be this crazy humble person who never gets her self worth from the way other people see me, right? 

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about living in China.  In a couple weeks, I will have lived here two years, and I’m wondering how much longer I should stay.  And as I’ve been considering all this, God has brought me back to my motives for being here in the first place.  Some of it’s good, and some of it is gross.

At the core, God is teaching me one very fundamental thing:  If I’m not living a life of love, nothing that I give will matter.

“If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body…but if I didn’t love others, I would be of no value whatsoever.”  (I Cor. 13:3 NLT)

I gave up a secure job to come to China.  I gave up a financial safety net.  I gave up going to friends’ weddings.  I gave up being there for my nephew and niece’s birthdays.  I gave up Panera Bread and Target and Trader Joe’s.  I gave up a really great mountain bike.  I gave up potential relationships.  I gave up consistently cute haircuts.  I gave up living close to friends and family.   There’s no denying it – I did give up some things to come to China.

But absolutely none of that stacks up to a hill of beans if I’m not loving the people around me.

Deep down, I realize that having given everything to come to China, I’ve felt like God owed me something in return.  It’s like I’m saying, “I left it all to come here, God.  And are you telling me that I still need to deal with petty human resources issues at work? I still need to deal with feeling insecure?  I still have to wrestle through feeling restless or uncertain about my future?  I don’t know God, but I was kind of expecting total life fulfillment here, and You’re not exactly coming through.”

And then I stop to wonder:  How much of living in China has been about me?  Is there any part of me that is here serving because I have a need to feel significant?  Did I come here with any thought that through all this service, maybe I could manipulate God into doing what I want? 

The truth is that being broken and sinful, I don’t know if any of us can work entirely out of pure motives.  We are compelled to do things for any number of reasons, both good and bad.  I don’t want to belittle what God did in my heart to get me here to China.  He touched my heart for orphans and the poor, and there’s no discounting that.  I know that my life will always be different, and that God has significantly changed the way I see the world.

But I also know that God is working a whole lot of junk out of my heart too.  Whether I stay in China or move elsewhere, I just know that I no longer want to be motivated by pride, insecurity or selfish ambition. 

I want to be motivated by love.

another puppy post.

Garbage in the village goes into large blue dumpsters.  I won’t go into detail, but these dumpsters are gross and smelly and kind of oozy.  They are emptied by a little old man who shovels the stuff into his tricycle.  Where it goes after that, I have no idea. 

On our way to work the other day, my friend Rebecca and I walked past the garbage man.  But instead of goopy garbage in his shovel this time, he was gingerly carrying a tiny little puppy over to the side of the road.  The pup was covered in you-know-what and was shivering and scared.

“Oh that poor puppy!”

He quickly replied, “Do you want him?  He needs a home.  He’s a mess.”

“He’s so dirty,” I replied.

Quickly he responded, “I have a bag!” and immediately began rooting around in his garbage-filled tricycle. 

I couldn’t imagine carrying a filthy little puppy all the way to work in a plastic bag, but I could hardly leave it there either.  But man, I really really didn’t want to pick it up.

Just then, the pup’s mama walked over, looking totally bewildered. 

I explained to the garbage man that everything was ok now, the puppy had his mom.

Whew, another close call.  I have the feeling that if I stay in China much longer, I’m going to have to give in and adopt a mut.

Hi, my name is Caroline, and I love giving presents.

Back home in the States, I’d often come upon the perfect gift for somebody six months before their birthday.  I’d take it home and hide it with glee, counting down the days until I could wrap it up and hand it over to the recipient.  Gift wrapping is another thing that brings me great, persnickety joy.  To wrap a gift perfectly with just 3 pieces of tape?  Amazing.  But I digress.

The art of gifting is much harder to do in China.

First, my memory of birthdays, anniversaries and holidays have all just evaporated.  This is terrible, and I have no excuse for it.  It just simply is.

Second, it’s kind of tricky getting care packages out of China.   I’ve tried.  Few have made it through.

And so, I’ve come to further explore this thing called the internet.  Online window shopping is terrific!  No crowds.  No aggressive sales people.  No fight for a parking spot.  No need to even put on shoes. 

PLUS – there are so many places where you can buy cool stuff AND make a little bit of a difference.  This is doubly terrific.

So if you’re having a baby, I will probaby get you some cute threads from HERE.

Getting married?  You can probably expect a gift from HERE.

If you’re a guy, I’d probably get you a tee shirt from an organization like THIS. 

And if you’re a girl, I wish I could afford to get you a closet full of dresses from HERE.  I could write and write and write about how much I love these dresses.  They are classic.  They are beautiful.  They are feminine.  They are just…lovely.  Plus a portion of each purchase helps fight poverty.

So hopefully in the coming months, my gift giving ability won’t be quite so terrible.  But remembering to shop ahead of time?  That still needs some work.

Mei Ke Nung

Roughly translated, this means “Wild goose chase.”

Last Saturday Joe and I set off to Beijing in high hopes of finding Beijing’s Underground City.  Also known as the Underground Great Wall, this is a massive network of tunnels beneath Beijing, covering over 85 square kilometers.  It was basically a massive bomb shelter built in the early 1970’s in case of nuclear war.

I love exploring stuff like this.

It was said these tunnels could hold the entire population of Beijing and were equipped with stores, restaurants, clinics, theaters, reading rooms, factories, mushroom farms and even a roller skating rink.  They were mostly hand-dug by over 300,000 local citizens.

A lot of these tunnels have since been converted into subway lines, underground shopping malls, and a couple youth hostels.  There were actually over 70 different entrances to the Underground City sprinkled throughout Beijing.  But as far as getting to actually poke around some of the tunnels as they were, there was only one original entrance left.

This was our destination. 

I love heading off the beaten path in search of  places that are a little tough to find.  Maybe it goes back to all the summer days I spent as a kid, rattling over gravel roads in the family minivan in search of a ghost town, remote hike, or ultimate fishing spot.  Sometimes we struck gold, sometimes not so much.  A favorite “not so much” day was a doomed hike to Rat Lake.  That day will go down in Koopman history.  But that’s a story for another time. 

I remember the first time I discovered the international classrooms in the Cathedral of Learning in Pittsburgh.  I was with Anna and Steve, and we had no idea what we were looking for.  But when we opened the door to the Ukranian Room, it was like we’d discovered Narnia!  We practially flew from room to room, exclaiming over the sheer awesomeness of what we’d discovered.  THAT was a gold strike day.

Another gold strike day involved the greatest hot dog of my life, smothered in cream cheese and “everything bagel” seasoning.  It was consumed not in a typical hot dog shop or at a baseball game, but in a hip little speakeasy type joint that Dave discovered…maybe it was the East Village?  Can’t remember.  But man, I remember the dog. 

Oh and ANOTHER gold strike day was taking a speed boat down the Li River when Lauren and I went to Guilin in southern China last spring.  We sped past all the dopey river cruise boats and had the time of our lives, singing at the top of our lungs and pulling ashore at whim for photo ops.

But anyway, back to our quest…

We got off the bus at Tiananmen Square, and Joe asked around until he found a police officer who knew of the Underground City.  So off we went, following the officer’s rather vague instructions.  After wandering around for quite awhile, we finally found ourselves in a tiny little neighborhood of hutongs (narrow alleyways) and ancient courtyard houses.   After asking a few more people, we eventually found the entrance.  But that’s all we saw - a locked door with a tattered notice stating that it was closed for safety reasons.

Bummer.

Didn’t exactly strike gold, but we were still pretty pumped to have at least found the door.

Just call me Tom.

Looking back on my past several blog posts, it seems like I primarily talk about two things: my commute to work and dogs.  But I just can’t resist – I have to tell you about this guy.

Meet Tom. 

The foster home adopted Tom several months ago to help the kids get used to being around animals.  There are several reasons I am a huge fan of Tom:

• Tom lives at the foster home, not at my house.
• Tom loves the kids and is really patient with them.
• Tom hardly ever barks.
• Tom catches frisbees.
• Tom loves to have his ears scratched.
• Tom obeys pretty well in both English and Chinese.
• Tom rolls on his back and wags his tail when he sees me coming.
• Tom has no weird diseases, worms, or lice like the scruffs in the village.

Basically, Tom is great.  And he’s my friend.

Jack Attack

Jack is an awesome kid. 

He’s got the greatest laugh and gets such a thrill out of life.  He had surgery for congenital heart disease plus he has two radial clubbed hands, but he’s never let any of this slow him down.  I’m amazed at how much he can do with his hands just the way they are. 

Last week the foster home went on a trip to a water park in Beijing, and I was pumped that he was the kid I was assigned to play with all day.  He was so excited to ride the bus into Beijing – we pointed at buildings and buses and people all the way into the city.  

He giggled in the locker room as we changed into our suits and got all fortified with 30 spf waterproof sunscreen.  He let me take his hand as we chattered about the water and the sun and all the fun we’d have.  (It’s so cool being as fluent in Mandarin as a three year old.)

Once we actually got to the water, he was a bit timid at first, but pretty soon he let me carry him into the deeper waters.  

We had a ball.  He carried a little rubber duckie that we named “Ping” with him all day.  Sometimes we’d let it float away and then I’d help Jack kick his legs so he could “swim” after him.  Jack wanted to play this game over and over again, saving his little friend.

But hands down my favorite part of the day came about mid the afternoon when a tired little Jack contentedly cuddled onto my lap, wrapped in a towel. 

The past few weeks, I’ve been exhausted, burned out and just…discouraged.

When I let myself get over-worked, then I start thinking that my life is a big fat waste of time.  I think about how I came to China with this heart to do all kinds of big, exciting things, and I compare myself to other people who are off leading incredible, fulfilling lives.  Then I take a hard look at my own life and see that most of my days are filled with a whole lot of “normal.”  I start to despise the smallness of it all. 

I answer emails and create spreadsheets.  I give tours.  I shop for vegetables.  I make pancakes for interns.  Nothing special.  And then pride starts creeping up - telling me that I deserve a life that’s filled with meaningful work and grand adventure.  But then I simultaneously start thinking that if I truly had it together, I would never even struggle with things like this.

None of this is pretty.

And so, I walked to work yesterday, kicking little clods of dirt along the way and feeling very, very sorry for myself.  I kept wondering, “I came to China for this?”  

Then a man stopped me – a little old man with about one and a half teeth, wearing a crooked navy blue hat and ratty black slippers.  

I immediately recognized him because I walked past him every day – I remember first seeing him about a month ago.  He sat on a folding chair just outside his home.  I smiled and waved as I walked past.  He just stared back at me, expressionless.  I didn’t think anything of it – a lot of people stare and don’t respond when I smile.  But  I saw him in the same spot the next day, and then the next.  One morning as I walked towards him, I saw him sitting on the edge of his seat, holding a cup of tea and craning his neck – waiting to see when I’d walk down his lane.  After that day, he began waving and smiling at me, but still we never spoke…until yesterday. 

As I walked past all miserable-like, he called out to me.  He told me that his wife died in mid June, leaving him alone with no other family.  It was about this same time that I began walking past his house. 

He kept pointing at the morning glories growing nearby and said to me very carefully, “You are my flower that comes every morning.”  He also explained that he didn’t need me to talk to him or anything, he just wanted me to keep walking by every day, smiling and waving.  This morning as I walked past, he grinned and yelled, “Good morning, my flower!”

Life really is a whole lot of normal, isn’t it. 

We go to work, sit in meetings, and answer emails.  We shop for groceries.  We raise kids.  We have dinner parties.  We play sports, hang out with friends, go on dates.  We pay bills, wash dishes, get our teeth cleaned.  But in the midst of all that normal, God has an extraordinary plan.

“The kingdom of God is as if one man should scatter seed on the ground…”

It’s easy for any of us to look over the course of our lives and feel like our days have been filled with a whole lot of not-so-much.  But looking through Scripture, it’s obvious that God actually calls us to the small things. 

I need to remember that there is significance in walking past an old man’s door and smiling.  Or kissing a baby on the top of their head.  Or having people over for dinner. 

It’s just like walking out into a field and scattering seed – and letting God be the one to make it all grow.

Little Debbie

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Cause You Had A Bad Day…”