Leaving Home for Home

Today (the day when I am writing this particular paragraph anyway), I spoke a mixture of Bahasa and Mandarin with a little old man selling me coffee (for oleh-olehs, I still don’t drink it myself) while side-nodding my head like an Indian. I probably would have clicked my tongue or raised my eyebrows for ‘no’ like an Arab if the opportunity had come up. I’m a very confused Asian, as I have lived in almost every region of Asia—East Asia (China), South Asia (India), the Middle East or Near East, whichever you prefer (Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen), and of course South East Asia (Indonesia). I still need to get to Central Asia. Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and/or Uzbekistan—I will get there someday, probably….I hope…

I gave him the "namaste hands" when I left.
Also, notice that his shop specializes in coffee and toilet paper.

But now I live in Africa.

I think I mentioned this before, but as a kid, someone once told me if I learned Arabic, Mandarin, and Hindi, in addition to the Indonesian that I already spoke, then I could talk to most people in Asia. And at the time, I was convinced that Asians of every region were the coolest people in the world, and the only ones worth talking to…or something like that…anyway, I decided I would learn those languages. While my Mandarin and Hindi aren’t as deep as my Arabic and Indonesian, I can carry on decent conversations on a variety of subjects, and someday I hope that I will be able to improve on that too. But, like I said, now I live in Africa. I figured it would happen some day, and I even hoped it would, but I’m finding that it still doesn’t make it easier to leave here. I won’t just miss my parents and my friends and the wonderful food—I’ll also miss speaking Asian languages, holding up two fingers for photographs, and finding Hello Kitty-brand white sugar for sale in the grocery store.  I just really love it here.

 

Extra-sweet Hello Kitty Sugar

Peace sign photos with cool kids Ica and Jeri from nearby Panti Asuhan.
I love me some orphans.

One time a friend told me, when I was bemoaning the fact that I didn’t want to leave behind ‘my’ people (I was moving on from one of my international jobs), and she said, “Amanda, you have lots of people. You’re not someone who connects with just one.” And she is a very wise woman, and I think she is right. Because I realized recently that I’m already developing some African loyalties.  When a friend commented about how much she loved Asian elephants on a photo I posted from my elephant-riding fun in Thailand, I found myself wanting to get defensive of African elephants, even though my friend hadn’t said anything derogative at all towards the Africa pachyderm with their extra-large ears. When I noticed that defensiveness, I felt pleased that I have clearly started to put down some emotional roots in Africa, and I know I don’t just love their variety of wild life.

I’m looking forward to some more runs and bike rides through the jungle, dancing and singing with my charismatic brothers and sisters in church, hanging with my friends under the mango tree, and feasting my eyes on the most beautiful clear starry night sky I’ve ever seen anywhere. Mundri, South Sudan is my home now, one of many I’ve loved, and I’m sure I’ll be glad to be back once I'm there. But I’m still sad to leave the first home that I knew was home once I knew what home was supposed to be. 

So you can see some of the greatness of Indonesia, here are some photos of some favorite moments/places/people:

Martabak Asin--and tons of other great food.
I love you, Martabak. Bade sono pisan ka temenku, Si Martabak.

Holding cute tiny babies named Amanda.
It is a name that will bring you greatness, Small Child!

Buying veggies at the pasar--we really need better pasar2 in SSudan,
 and we know I can't count on my garden since I have no weeding skills.

Bumbus at the pasar!

Yeah, I like pasars, OK? You should too.

This wasn't a favorite moment, but I wanted to show you how
many network signals were available from one spot in the mall.
 Yes, 21st Century, you have made it to SEAsia.

Worshipping in Bahasa with my Indo family.

Seeing this special friend again! I love you dan keluargamu juga, Iren!

Playing with Iren's kids who are not afraid of me,
though Kasyfi refused to take photos with me.
But Kafya didn't mind the paparazzi.

This was a truly great moment: one of my most favorite people
and one of my most favorite foods.

Best for last: the Ortu. Love them. Blessed to be their daughter.
Will miss them the most.

From the Library of Amanda Stillman

Northern Sudanese me

Anytime you look at someone’s library, you learn something about who they are. Whenever I’m at someone’s house or office, I look at their bookshelves. It’s always interesting to me.  My family is pretty bookish, and we all have some sort of book collection.  Joanna and Benji’s library is full of books about parenting and being godly people and getting the Gospel out into the world. Marian and Josh’s library is full of military books, young adult fantasy, anything by L.M. Montgomery, Laura Ingalls Wilder, or a plethora of other sophisticated female writers, and of course, parenting books, and books about being godly people. Marian and Josh have a ridiculously large library filled with a variety of books (some stolen from good people who happen to live out of the country and some borrowed from that same good person, but many purchased legitimately). You can tell things about their lives and personalities from their books. Joanna and Benji have a small library since they

Sudanese sisters in Yemen!

don’t have a lot of room to keep lots of books, and they care about being parents and being godly people. Marian and Josh have posh military housing, so they have lots of books, and they care about being good parents and being godly people and knowing about the military. Also, Marian just loves books. As for me, surprisingly, I own no parenting books. My books about being godly are all on my kindle because you can often get those books for free online, and I am always looking for discounted godliness. The few that I do have actual copies of were given to me by my concerned parents. My mom once gave me the same book two years in a row at Christmas because she’s getting old and so is her memory. It worked out well, though, because I hadn’t read it the first time, and I did read it the second time. And it was actually a good book.

Some of my early Sudanese friends

I was thinking about this because I just bought a new language book. When I committed to buying it—clicking the ‘confirm’ button on Amazon, I realized something: I committed to buying this book because I’ve accepted that I’m moving to this new country. It is not unusual for me to be looking at language books. The Foreign Language Section is my favorite of any bookstore. I can spend hours checking out obscure dictionaries, phrase books, and grammar texts for various languages that I’ll probably never take the time to learn—from Xhosa to Khmer to Quechua or Kurdish. I am just fascinated by the sounds and letters and meanings.  But I rarely buy them, for the same reason that I rarely buy anything: I never have enough room in my life for more stuff beyond the essentials. I really hate having stuff—I love getting rid of excess crap I’ve accumulated, but books are an exception. So if I buy a book, I have to really like it. Or I would have to be enrolled in a class that required it.  But I’m done with school now, hopefully forever, so the books I buy have to be useful to me. The books that I keep now are all re-readers for me. So there are a few books by a Canadian author dear to my heart—Gordon Korman. I was taught by Canadians until grade 6 (see how I did that, eh?), and they shaped my young reading interests. Gordon Korman makes me laugh, and I love laughing. His book about kids who hate camp and try to escape is written for junior high boys, and I love it so much I have it memorized. And I still read it again every time I’m back with it.  And then there are books about relief and development, which is my chosen field, and occasionally I want to go back and get ideas and refresh my memory on certain concepts.  But the largest category of books in my small library are the language books. If you look through those books, you can see a bit of my story—where I’ve been, the people I’ve met and loved, the languages and cultures that have shaped my own thoughts and ideas, the millions of words crowded in my mind that I’m constantly translating from the word that BEST fits to the word that the person I’m speaking with will actually understand. I don’t speak all of those languages fluently, but I can at least carry on a basic conversation in all of them. And I’ve known and cared about someone who speaks each of those languages. If I haven’t been to a homeland of that language, at least I plan to go someday (Yes, I’m talking about you, Afghanistan and/or Iran).

Indian babies=I like them

So the book I just bought is a Juba-Arabic phrase book. It is scheduled to arrive at Joanna and Benji’s house about a month or so before I make my next move to the next country that will be my home for however long the Lord allows. I’ve loved Sudanese people from my college days when I worked with precious refugee kids from there. Then I lived with a lovely Northern Sudanese lady for a year in Yemen, even celebrating a big holiday with her family. I’ve never lived in Africa before, though I’ve traveled there. I’m looking forward to spending time in a place I already feel connected to.  I’m glad I’m not saying goodbye to India forever, though. I’ll be back and forth for the rest of this year at least. It’s a new transition for me, but I’m pretty good at transitions. I’m good at change and moving on and trying new things, but I’m bad at goodbyes. I always have the urge to sneak away without telling anyone. I never do that, but I always wish I could. I don’t like to make people sad. I know how much it hurts to be left behind. It is really hard to balance the goodbyes between all the friends from different places.  I know I’ll be eating 5 or 6 dinners every day for that last week….it’s fun at first, but it gets challenging towards the end. I hate those prolonged goodbyes—come back to my house one more time, eat dinner with us for the last time, one more time, one last time…That mantra will be going through my head too. Last time to watch for mongooses while I run…last time to sleep in this bed, cook in this kitchen, shop at this store, pay my electricity bill at the ATM…

Sudanese babies=I like them (I was so young and innocent!)

I’m excited about what’s next—new people, new challenges, new adventures, but I know that it will inevitably be followed by another goodbye and ‘last time for____’.  They say home is where the heart is, and I’ve left pieces of my heart all over the world. Ripping off chunks of your heart and throwing them around is pretty painful, but I’ve certainly made myself a lot of wonderful homes all over the place. I’m not complaining. Most people don’t get much say in their occupation. I did get to choose mine, and I’m acutely aware of what a blessing that is. I know not as many people are as jealous of my life as I think they should be, but I’m thankful for my calling and how much I love doing what I do, even though so often it just hurts. Mostly I’m thankful for the hope that I have that everything is going to be renewed. There will be a new Earth, without pain and sorrow and poverty and evil. And I’m pretty sure that all the people and places and cultures and languages I know and love will be right there with me, perfected in the way He always intended that they would be. I will be out of a job then, of course, so I’ll get to devote myself to lots of new hobbies, like developing my superpowers of flying and teleportation, or maybe joining some new and exciting profession like marine archaeology or sky-diving ballet (it’s not a thing yet, but it will be).

Drawing diagrams of toilets in the dirt--every little girl's dream job! Don't worry, India: this project isn't finished yet. I'll be back! (Probably 3-4 more times this year...)

A collection of thoughts on my life before I head back to the States...not in any particular order...

 Traumatic events build unbreakable bonds between people. So do extra-long church services, I think. When I first met Sam, I was smitten but he was indifferent—not afraid, but uninterested. An hour into the service when he was being unwillingly pinned down in his mother’s arms, he became intrigued by me and my bracelet. Later when he was about to scream during the sermon, his mother, also initially hesitant about my presence in the chair next to hers, ripped the bracelet off my arm (where I had returned it once because Sam had been more interested in the cookie his mother pulled out from her purse) and handed it to him like a pacifier. It surprised me at first because it shocked me out of my deep thoughts about the sermon (of course) and trying to figure out if I had calculated my arrival date to the US wrong (I had), but it made me feel like part of a family in which no one has any embarrassment about taking what they need from someone else. And now Sam and I are pals.

Sam, his mother, and my bracelet

Strikes in India involve women in colorful saris wandering down the streets yelling into megaphones and carrying signs. It reminded me of the sister suffragettes and “votes for women” was running through my head even though this strike wasn’t about votes it was something about farming…if you have never seen Mary Poppins, you will have no idea what I am talking about. If you have seen it you may remember more of the “votes for women” song than I do—since that is the only bit that I remember.

Can you see the line of striking women? I took the photo from inside a store.

India (at least this part of India) doesn’t have our Western Christmas songs translated and installed in their appropriate church-song repertoire—at least not that I have heard and not that the two men I asked about it today knew.  Maybe that’s because I haven’t attended a Baptist church yet, but I am strangely disappointed by that even though I know that it is way more culturally appropriate for them not to have to sing awkwardly translated songs. But translated songs are great ways to have guitar sing-a-longs where everyone can sing whatever words that they want. Also translated songs are great for learning new vocabulary. Also I think it’s fun to sing songs in a multitude of languages. But Indian praise songs are enjoyable too, so I’m ok. If I don’t learn “Joy to the World” in Hindi, it’s fine.

India moving companies are only allowed into Patna after 11:00pm. My movers arrived a 12:30am and unloaded a large truck full of stuff from the Kolkata office.  It took 2.5 hours and left me with a house full of boxes and furniture. I walked around sideways like a crab for days.  We opted for a less sophisticated but equally effective option for moving the stuff into the new office: a parade of bicycle rickshaw drivers. I was told that they would arrive at 5am to get an early start. When I woke up with my alarm at 5am, I realized how dumb of me it was to actually believe that they would show up on time, so instead I called my mom and asked her for a recipe for something to make to serve them while they were in and out of my house carrying stuff.  As I get older, I’m realizing more and more what Asian/Jennie Stillman etiquette that has become deeply engrained in me. Most of that etiquette has to do with food, which is why I’m constantly baking these days to make sure that I never send someone’s plate back to them empty. And people keep giving me food, which is great but not actually a time-saver for me. On a related note, I kept thinking how awesome it was that I could call my mom at 5am and know that I will only be interrupting her dinner, not her sleep.  My phone etiquette, which I probably didn’t receive from Asia (which has no phone etiquette) or my mother (who would never call someone during dinner), was totally ok with this.  And while maybe 1 or 2 bicycle rickshawers were brave enough to try the beautiful cinnamon rolls, I ate them for the rest of the weekend that I spent running to and from the office without a second to spare for cooking food.

                                  

I have become wonderfully adept at small home improvements—these are improvements of things that no one else would naturally think of as things that need to be improved. That is why I can’t think of anyone in particular to call to help me with these things. You know, you can call a plumber if your sink is leaking or a mechanic is your fridge is buzzing. Who is the person you call if you need to unscrew a light bulb that is in the way of a giant lighted glass display case for fancy dishes with extra drawers underneath that you want to move? I couldn’t think of the name either, so I climbed up on a chair, and unscrewed it myself with my pocketknife because of course I don’t have any tools. And that is generally where I end up when doing home improvements: on a chair with a pocketknife unscrewing something.  And my pocketknife is one my dad got for me two Christmases ago as a free gift at a Christian bookstore in Indonesia. It says “Halleluya” on it. It isn’t one of those awesome chunky ones with tweezers, scissors, a retractable hammer, and a cappuccino maker. So clearly, it is the awesome person who is wielding it (yes, I mean me.) who has all the skills. I recently unscrewed two showerheads and then re-screwed in the one that was better in its original state, as I personally believe that one big stream of water pounding on one’s head is better than a tiny trickle spitting out in several scrawny drips.  Moving the large glass display case may have been trickier than unscrewing the light bulb and light blub socket and prying it out of the paint, but it had to be done.  Otherwise my washing machine would have to sit in the middle of the dining room. Now it can be barely wedged between the sink (yes, there is a sink in the dining room for post-dinner-eaten-by-hand-hand-washing) and the glass display case.  Of course, I still have to move it out to the balcony before using it to stuff the drainage pipe down the balcony drain so that the water doesn’t explode all over my house.  I learned this the hard way—by experience. My first load of laundry extended that day’s house chores to cleaning the floors and drying the furniture. I also made a dam out of an old table cloth that I found.to keep the water from getting into other rooms. I kept thinking to myself, “There must be SOME ingenious way that I could force the water to go out on to the balcony and then drain outside.” And I considered building a channel to redirect the water outside with cookie sheets (I am always in favor of using kitchen tools for multiple purposes.), but then I remembered that I only have one cookie sheet and a channel has two sides. I was wracking my brain for various water-proof objects that I could line up and use to trap water when I realized that I could pick up my washing machine and carry it a little closer to the balcony and the plastic tubey thing would reach the drain of the balcony.  Another brilliant solution to my house-keeping needs.

While I was in Sri Lanka I was informed that I have taken to doing the Indian head-nod. I am like a chameleon. I can adapt and change and morph no matter where I am. In the Middle East, I clicked my tongue and raised my eyebrows for ‘no’. And now I shake my head side-ways like a bobble-head doll outside in a hurricane.  I can’t say that it just happened. Initially, I worked on the skill and at least once I was told I was bobbing excessively. Now, however, I am pretty sure I’ve mastered the exact amount of tilt and shake. At least there have been no more comments about my head-nodding now.  I imagine I’ll get a few if I happen to use this new skill in the States though…

And now, here’s a photo of a goat in a rickshaw:

Internet...and other happy things

Two months to the day of the first time Airtel told me that my phone and internet connection would be activated it finally is! Yes, I am as amazed as you are. It got to where Airtel would tell me “tomorrow” or “in one hour it will be activated” and I laughed in their faces—which really isn’t the best way to go about getting what you want, but I was that confident that it would not make any difference one way or the other that I risked it.  Then I had a few days of my phone working but my internet not working and most recently, for a change, my phone was not working, but my internet was. And, so you know how awesomely technically advanced I am—the internet was working on one computer but not on the other. So I rigged the working computer to share internet to my computer so that I could get emails in on my laptop. How awesome am I? I know…but then, I realized that all I needed to do was uninstall and re-install the internet USB thingy (yes, I know it’s called a dongle, but that is the dumbest word and I refuse to use it unless I have to), and so maybe I am not as technologically advanced as I originally thought.  But I know I am more technologically advanced than Airtel Customer service—or maybe I am just more logically advanced, but I do know that the following conversation with customer service is rather circular:

Trying to call from my phone:  “Your out-going calls have been temporarily suspended. Please call 121 for more information.”

And after calling 121: “Your out-going calls have been temporarily suspended. Please call 121 for more information.”

Anyway, if Airtel craps out on me in a few days (very possible), I already have a back-up plan: Daniel’s wireless connection, which comes in very clearly to my flat. I haven’t met him yet, but I am sure that his name is Daniel. Why am I certain that he named his wireless internet after himself? Because he is not creative at all. How do I know that? Because his internet password is “123456.” Thank you, Daniel, for not reading any of those scary articles about hackers who steal your internet and then your identity and not changing your password to Fwe23g49Hjq*?p.

My happiness at finally finishing the internet/phone business, which means that I don’t have to go back to the Airtel office and sit there for hours again, made me start thinking of other happinesses in my life:

·      I have moved the bazillion boxes of stuff from the old office out of my house and into the new office.

·      And the new office has multi-colored walls.

·      And they moved the stuff out of my house by bicycle rickshaw. Yes, it was awesome.

·      And I have discovered a 20-minute running loop around my neighborhood. It’s not a great route like my down-to-the-Ganges River-route was, but there is less likelihood of me being attacked by a river dolphin or kidnapped by a gang of angry fishermen. The 20-minute loop is something I can work with—run it twice plus whatever smaller loops I can find or run it three times for extra fun.  Running here is tricky because I can’t go before the sun is up (currently about 6am) since I might trip over a sleeping water buffalo or fall in a craterImeanpot-hole. But if I’m out running too late (i.e. past 7:30), I get stuck in school traffic—kids in uniforms erratically riding their bikes down the street or bicycle rickshaw drivers with carts full of school children riding erratically down the street or cows wandering erratically down the street…keeps me on my toes, figuratively and literally.

I’m sure there’s more stuff to be excited about, but it’s wedding season here and blasting fireworks are shattering my peace of mind. I saw an elephant walking down the street last night from my car window—part of an elaborate wedding procession. I leaned out of the window to try and get a photo (for my nephew who recently made it clear that he likes elephants way better than cows and I want him to like me the best of all) and knocked off my sunglasses that were on my head that I had forgotten about because it was night-time and I wasn’t using them because I am not a hiphop star (yet).  The wonderful man who is helping me out this week, slammed on the brakes and went back to get them for me before they were squashed by the elephant.  That same man plus our newly hired field officer have contrived not to let me carry anything from our office-shopping list. I am telling myself to accept the chivalry and enjoy not having to carry anything. It’s not so bad since, true to my womanly nature, I always carry around overstuffed bags with things that I’m sure I can’t live with out and I might need at any random moment but most of which I never use. Not having to carry other stuff kind of helps.

And now I should start winding down so I can do the other stuff I was supposed to do before I started writing this.  I will leave you with this photo of an elephant butt that I got after the elephant passed us while we were looking for my glasses. It is the only one that came out.