Chinese, Southern Style

My cousin Vonnie asked, "What does Lao Lao mean?" Now I am no expert, but I was told by a Chinese friend that it literally means "old, old." And since my grandmother was 71 when I was born, it seemed a fairly fitting description of her, although she managed to stay young enough that I enjoyed telling her my secrets as a teen. And she was everyone's favorite person, right up until she died at the ripe age of 96, sharp as ever. But what I could never figure out, is how Lao Lao could mean "old, old" when it is also supposed to mean "grandmother on your mother's side" (confirmed by another Chinese friend). My brother's son called my mother "Nai nai" (at least that's how I spell it) which means "grandmother on your father's side." So I guess I'll go with "very old grandmother on your mother's side." I'm quite sure my "old old" sister is loving this, since she is the matriarch of our family, and was the first to be a grandmother, although my brother has come in at a quick and close second.

In East Berlin, however, I would like to have a name that means "young, young." I was tooling through the grocery store one day with my godchild, thinking of how not so long ago it was Rebecca in the stroller, when my ex-favorite cashier said, "Oh, is that your grandchild?" "No!" I exclaimed, too shocked for a snappy comeback. "Well, it could be," she commented. So much for blond highlights. They fool no one.

Yes, Berliners are quite truthful. Sometimes I wish they weren't quite so truthful. Like the time I and a girlfriend were talking about bathing suits (East Germans are famous for their "free body culture" beaches--read: "suits? who needs one?"). We were at a pool, however, so my friend was wearing a bikini, in contrast to my rather modest attire, which was definitely in the minority. Me: "I just don't have a bikini figure." "No," she agreed, "You don't." I am still getting over that one. Pass the popcorn, please.

Back to Chinese. Our family has this very weird thing with Chinese. Since my mother grew up there, we grew up on fascinating stories of Bandits, Crossing the Yellow River, Rickshaws, Revivals, Japanese Smugglers, Uncle Archer's antics in boarding school, Mother's roommates in boarding school (it sounded fun!), Moon Gate, Joutze dinners and Szeezicks, the dog who went to church. I always felt cheated growing up in boring America, where the most exciting thing that happened was . . . um . . . um . . . well, give me a minute . . .

China was such a big part of Mother's life, understandably, that when we got a white German Shepherd named King, she dubbed him Wong, Chinese for King. We were probably the only family on the planet with a white German Shepherd named Wong. "Please let Wong out to do his business . . . Here Wong! Wong, bad dog!" I now have Chinese friends who are named Wong. I hope they will forgive me if they are reading this blog.

My fascination with the Chinese Language at about age 10 led to my learning to say John 3:16 in Chinese from my nearly deaf very southern "old old grandmother on my mother's side." My grandfather, called "granddad," although his Chinese was nearly flawless, painstakingly wrote it out for Lao Lao and me on a paper, which I still have somewhere. I never knew she had been unable to learn more than the most rudimentary language skills because of her accent and her deafness. We simply practiced it right along with the Psalms and "Precious Jewels" (a children's hymn) each summer morning until I could say it perfectly. Somehow my mother never got wind of this scheme. Years after Lao Lao's death, she and Uncle Archer and I got talking about my learning Chinese from Lao Lao. "Lao Lao?" "Chinese?" "Oh, yes," I insisted, and proceeded to recite John 3:16 in perfect Macon Georgia Chinese. "She lives!! She lives!" howled mother. I don't know when I had seen Uncle Archer laugh so hard. I was apparently a perfect mimic. Unfortunately history is repeating itself--our Timothy can beautifully imitate German with a strong American accent. . . Now where would he hear that?? I am deeply perplexed.

My Chinese friend Bing (last name not Wong) did try to reteach me John 3:16 with a correct Mandarin accent. She said I came a bit closer when I imitated her, but sadly, old habits die hard, and I am forever stuck with "Shang di ah shu ren" from Macon, Georgia.

So, Vonnie, aren't you glad you asked?

Travelin' down the road, goin' East, goin' West

Well, thanks for the comments. Yes, Peg, we all stand on the porch and wave like crazy when someone leaves. The odd thing is that lots of people are back-door folks, where we often forget to leave the light on. So when they leave by the back door, we stand there. But the folks that know us well, know to look up when they go out the driveway, and we'll be standing there!

I'll never forget the picture of my tiny grandmother, Lao Lao we called her, standing on the porch of Torrey Lodge, waving a little white handkerchief to send us off. Nowadays it seems people are pretty quick to shut the door, sometimes before we even have gotten in our car! It always makes me wonder what important task my visit was keeping them from doing . . .

Our travels . . . we got to Tallahassee, stopping at Panera Bread along the way for Becca to do her on-line French class. It was always nip and tuck seeing if we estimated the trip right for Becca or David to go on-line at the appropriate time. We have stopped at libraries, community colleges, and Panera Bread. Becca's class is MWF and David's is TTh, so sometimes we were sitting around waiting, and other times we were rushing to get plugged into internet. So Panera Bread has free wireless. Borders was 6 bucks an hour, so we figured we were better off spending our 9 bucks for an hour and a half on refillable coffee, 2-4-2 sandwich deals and lemonade. After this trip, I am thinking of buying stock in Panera Bread, that is IF I win the Reader's Digest Sweepstakes, which isn't likely, since I don't get that stuff any more, but hey . . .

What I DO get are a million solicitations. When the firemen called, I was really nice--since the firemen saved our stuff, I sent them a donation. After all, our firemen are volunteers. Then the police called, and a policeman once saved me from a bad situation, so I gave another donation. Now I have somehow gotten on every bleeding heart list imaginable.

Is that how people feel when they get OUR bleeding heart letters? Dear me.

"Hello,isthismrs.smitharoo?"
"Umm . . ."
"yes,thankyou.thisispattycallingforpoorlynandtimwhoare
(gasp for breath)inberlanery,germany
(they never get my town right)andcanIputyoudownforadonationfor30buckswhat'syour
creditcardnumber."
"No thanks, things are pretty tight right now." IunderstandperfectlycanIputyoudownfor20dollarsthenplease?
"No thanks, I am thinking of not even praying for them anymore because I don't have time."
"Yesofcourseyour10dollarpledgewillbeagreathelpandwe'llbesendingyoua
decalcalled'Ihelpedsavetheberliners'foryourcontribution . . .
"NO, I am maxed out."
"Yesofcourse,butonly10dollarswillreallyhelp."

Now of course if I do agree to ten measly bucks (can't even feed the fam at Mickey D's for that, much less Panera Bread), I will get a letter which will remind me how expensive it was to send me that letter, and won't I consider increasing my GENEROUS pledge by 5 dollars?

Click.

So today as I was taking Becca and David to plant trees on someone's property (the government is paying a person from the church for this tree planting project, which is why they don't have much leftover money to give us to educate our son Timothy--he should be planting trees instead of going to college), I was listening to our Christian radio station.

After listening to and from the tree farm, I now have a new way of raising the approximately thousand bucks a month we need to get out of furlough purgatory and go back to he.., oops, Berlin. It's called WEST vs. EAST. So far people in the listening audience who live in the WESTern part of their broadcasting area are leading the giving by 1556 dollars in pledges, and we just know that listeners in the EASTern area (that's folks who live near me, ahem!!) definitely are going to want to COME BACK UP FROM BEHIND and tie it up with their pledges!! This is really exciting!! Oh, there goes the phone, and it's someone from the EAST!! Oh, it's getting thrilling!! (Whoever is doing the share-a-thon must not get out much.)

So I think I'll call each of the folks who get my prayer letter. "Hey Mary!! We have a new game in raising support! It's called West vs. East. Now YOU live in the East, and so far the East supporters are trailing our West supporters by 300 dollars. Now I just KNOW you want the East to catch up with the West! Can I count on your support? Thank you so much!!" Then the music will start in with Michael W. Smith, "Go West, Young Man." (Yes, they really did put that song on.) Mary's heart will bleed, along with her pocketbook, and she will pick up her cell phone and call in to our mission, just in time because anyone who calls in from a car cell phone, without causing an accident, there is a wealthy (and bored) supporter who will MATCH that support for 25 dollars or more, THIS HOUR ONLY. Of course it might work better if we do south vs. north--we just got back from the south, and believe me, they know how to do missions conferences and dig deep. I could call all the northerners and get THEM riled up about catching up . . .

That's it. We just need to get the phones up and running and we'll be on our way in August!!

I switch to the OTHER radio station in my listening area. They are advertising the gift of the month!! For your pledge of 50 dollars or more (they do 5, but I like 50 better), you can have this incredible magnet that says, "Lyn and Tim need YOUR prayers." Let your family and friends know, you have class on your refrigerator. Display this fine magnet with pride, and help support our ministry. It looks really great next to the prayer card of Tim and Lyn. Impress your friends and help keep us on the air, I mean, IN BERLIN.

Na, I think I'll go back to praying about it. Pretty low-key. Besides, can you picture Tim on a phone-a-thon? He'd end up forgetting all about the money and just ministering to the folks who called. Poor guy. He's a much better missionary than fund-raiser. Na, it would never work. Guess we're back to the Holy Spirit . . .

I'm back in Tallahassee, where a church that never met us, decided to support us because God is at work in Berlin. And we're getting three new teammates from that church, because when they came to pray with us for a week in Berlin, God changed the direction of their lives. Now THAT's a cool deal. Much better than a gift of the month or a pledge to catch up.

Well, until next time (if you're still reading, that is!!)

We went from 80 degrees back to THIS!!--more snow!!

Back in Montrose

We have just returned from a long, but satisfying 4 weeks on the road. We travelled about 5,500 miles (David and Becca will tell you it felt like even more), and only had a major repair when we were at Rosie's and had enough time to get it fixed. About 4 hours from home, in blinding rain, the windshield wiper went flying off on the expressway--that was an adventure!! David and I had to steer Tim off the exit ramp which was right there (thank you, Lord!) and to the gas station (right there also!). Fortunately there was a garage nearby, open late because they were repairing the car of the lady running the gas station.

Last night we slept in our own bed. What a nice treat!! Timothy was thrilled to have us home. He has been alone except for the wedding, and said how nice it was to have us sleeping upstairs instead of rattling around the house alone. It is great to be a family again, and I am looking forward to later in the week when I have unpacked and sorted. :)

We are so blessed!! We started our tour with staying with Uncle Waldo and Aunt Leta. Uncle Waldo (my Dad's kid brother, who looks a lot like Santa Claus and just as generous) and Aunt Leta are glue people--you know the kind--they keep people glued together. So Aunt Leta invited Rik and Kellie and Steve and Marie and their kids to see us. Rik and Steve are my brilliant cousins who were teaching at the John's Hopkin's computer lab when they were in high school, and are now making their living doing stuff no one understands but everyone needs. They and their dad helped Tim figure out how to repair his computer while all of us enjoyed Aunt Leta's incredible cooking.

The next day we were off to cousin Dave's (now we're on my mom's side). After discovering that Dave and Katie's son Andy is a great cook, Dave stayed up most of the night saving Tim's computer from near distruction, and Tim from losing his life on that computer. What a gift!! We continue to be amazed at how God brought everything together--first knowing what needed to be done from Rik and Steven, and then Dave having what we needed to fix the problem. Wow.

We were on our way and made it to North Carolina to Tony and Dee Dee's. The computer is now fixed, now we got our eyes fixed by Tony. Result--Tim looks very spiffy in his new glasses, and I have bifocal contacts. Only I and my doctor need know. My assignment is to get used to them without going crazy. Meantime I have new, very intellectual looking glasses and am pretending I am as smart as I look.

Tony and Dee Dee go back to Philadelphia days. We had a preemie and couldn't take him anywhere. They were optometry students, just married. So we taught them what we knew about making marriage work, and like good students, they have gone on to surpass their teachers and have taught many more much better. They are also the best eye doctors on the planet, and try to get us to choose glasses we actually aren't embarrassed to wear.

Off to Georgia. We met my Uncle John (big brother to Daddy) and his daughter Judy at a Cracker Barrel for breakfast. I was struck again with how Daddy's generation is growing old. They are loving Jesus more and more, and the closer they get to the kingdom, the more they marvel at what God is teaching them. Uncle John choked up about all that God had revealed to him in Revelation, and I sat praying for the same wonder he has for Jesus and the same dedication to the things that really matter. Having two doses of Daddy's brothers right after each other, I suffered waves of homesickness for my own parents after that. It seemed as though I had just lost mother and daddy, even though it has been 27 years since Daddy joined Jesus, and 6 for mother.

Well, that is enough rambling for tonight. I'll write more about the rest of the trip later. I can't believe anyone really wants to read this stuff!!