On a completely different note...

... HOW 'BOUT THEM TIGERS!!!!!!!

An Argentine Winter

Wow, my time in Argentina has been brilliant, but busy. I have had the opportunity to spend time with many dear friends, to revisit my favorite places, and to be at my friends' wedding.  I've had the chance to see many of my former students as well.  I really can't express in words the love that has been poured out on me over the past few weeks.  It has been incredibly overwhelming.  I have about three more days to enjoy myself to the fullest before I head back to Bangkok and start work next Monday.  What a summer it has been! 

Bowling with students- they're so grown up now!

Spent a fantastic day with my Spanish teacher and her sweet kids.

Awesome day at the zoo with my friend and her girls. 

Got to stop by the botanical gardens, one of my favorite places in the city.

Lunch with students at one of the best restaurants in the world.

Tea with a friend- a frequent occurrence- and a good few hours of Spanish practice for me!

A cost to everything

Flight to Buenos Aires: $1,100
10 year Argentine Visa: $160
Inflation in the last 2 years: 200%
3 weeks worth of abrazos: Priceless

Whew, I still speak Spanish!

I have to admit, I was a little concerned about the linguistics before I came to Buenos Aires this week.  In the past two years, I've been able to read and write Spanish a little bit, but my opportunities for speaking and listening have been few and far between- and most have been with people speaking with different accents than I am used to, making things more difficult.  So I was worried that I had lost most of my Spanish. To my great surprise, I've lost a little bit of my speaking fluency, but otherwise seem to be right where I left off two years ago- meaning there are times I feel very comfortable with the Spanish and other times where I can't seem to get it to come out properly. 

I have really been enjoying the Spanish though, and singing in church last Sunday was definitely one of the highlights.  There's also been a little bit of Thai floating around my head, but mostly just a few small phrases that keep wanting to come out. I'm sure these weeks of Spanish will set my Thai back a little bit, but I'm guessing not too much as I'm at least exercising the foreign language muscle pretty heavily!

Dwelling Place

Dwell: to live or stay as a permanent resident; reside. 

Moving around so much the past 5 years has taught me a lot about the meaning of the word home.  You hear all kinds of definitions, from 'where the heart is' to 'where you lay your head' and recently I heard one I like better than most others: home is where there are people waiting for you to arrive.  I've stopped trying to define it, and stopped trying to avoid the inevitable contradictions of phrases like "I'm going home for the summer" and then when I get there, saying, "Yeah, I go back home (to Bangkok in x weeks..."  Home is Michigan. Home is Bangkok. And I have realized these past few days, home is still Buenos Aires also.  

I've learned that it doesn't really matter where my home is, along as I am dwelling in the shelter of the Most High and resting in the shadow of the Almighty.  My home here on earth is temporary. My dwelling in the courts of the Lord is eternal.  

But too often I forget that.  Too often I get it al revés or turned the other way around.  I start thinking that I need to make a home wherever I am in order to be secure. I forget that I am a permanent resident of a place so much greater than anything I can imagine here. I forget that what I see does not last- that it is the unseen that is eternal.  Much of my stress in life, too much of it, comes from things that are rooted in the here and now.  But if my permanent residence isn't here, if I am truly a stranger and alien in this land, than why am I spending so much time and energy worrying about it?  


He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.  

God, give us eyes to see not just the seen, but the unseen, to fix our eyes on you and make your house our dwelling place, and not to get caught in all that surrounds and entraps us here.  May we truly rest in your shadow. 

Creating spaces

Lots of laughter: perfect way to spend an afternoon.

I slept in until 10 am today and rose eventually to have a leisurely breakfast here at "home" and then drink a pot of tea while I spent some time with God.  I had a quiet afternoon visiting with a former student who long ago captured a very special place in my heart.  As we talked and caught up he would periodically throw his head back in fully body laughter, at a story or a memory or one of the Thai words I was telling him.  As I mentioned in a previous post, summer break is a time for me every year to step out of my day to day life, a time to reflect and reexamine, looking at both my teaching and my living.

And today, as I sipped my tea, smiled at the joy before me, and then had an evening snooze on the sofa, I realized that I haven't been giving myself enough space in my life.  Space for pots of tea.  Space for solitude.  Space for head throwing laughter.  And as a result, I haven't given myself enough space for exercise or naps or prayer or healthy food or spontaneous conversation with friends.  In the transition and stress, the scramble to feel settled and be settled, I filled many spaces with many good things, and wore myself out in the process.

So this year I want to be more intentional to leave those spaces.  To not fear my own company.  To turn off the music when I jog and let my mind wander.  To cook.  To invest in pots of tea with friends.  To worry less about how much Thai I'm learning.  To say no more often.  To spend time at the foot of the cross and listen to the voice of love that gently whispers my name.

It's easy to do that, of course, when one is on vacation.  And it's easy to set those goals.  What will be difficult is to both be intentional about doing those things, and also be intentional about forgiving myself when I'm not able to do all those things. I'm just the sort of person that says, "I'm going to cut back and balance my life by doing a, b, and c, and then striving for such perfection in accomplishing a, b, and c on my timetable that I wear myself out.  Instead of taking a half hour to pray or rest, I'll spend a half hour journaling about how I didn't give myself enough time to pray or rest.

So perhaps my biggest goal, in creating these spaces in my life this year, is to be kind to myself when I fail to create the spaces.  To say yes, there are all these improvements I want to make in my life and my teaching, but I am, in all likelyhood going to fail to make them all. And that's okay.

A return to Buenos Aires

12 hours ago I landed at the international airport in Buenos Aires.  The first time I landed there, 7 years ago now, I had no idea what I was in for. When I returned two years after that, I thought it was to teach- little did I know it was to fall in love with this city. I walked through my old neighborhood today, stepping over the same cracked sidewalks, crossing the same cobbled streets, dodging the same crazy drivers and I felt such a mixture of surreal-ness and at-home-ness. For two years it has existed only in my memory, and now suddenly, it is real again.

Returning here is so different than returning to Michigan.  Every time I leave Michigan, I know that I will return, and I generally know when as well.  Michigan is such a fundamental part of who I am that I am never really far from her, even when on the other side of the world, and my continual return is never in question.  But here, every step back is a small miracle, a gift to treasure and savor.

It's going to take my brain some time to adjust to being here, but that's okay.  For now I am content with the unreal-ness of it: the laughs with friends over coffee, the struggles of my tongue to respond in Spanish, the sounds of the cars as they rumble down the streets, the chill of a Buenos Aires winter day.  And I am reminded of the cliché that each day is a gift, that no matter where I am I carry the people and places of my life in my heart.  Today begins my 20 days of the gift of Buenos Aires.  The gift of these people, these friends, this language, this city.

O Beautiful for Spacious Skies

I don't always give the US the credit it's due, so in honor of her birthday, these are some of the things I appreciate most about my home country:

• Diversity. It's often one of the first things I notice when I touch down in the US.  I love that we are a country that is full of diversity in our ethnicity, language, culture, landscape, climate, and opinions. 
• Generosity. For all the bad press about greedy banks and selfish attitudes, I think Americans are on the whole a very generous population. When crises arise- be it next door or across the world- we are quick to send aid or lend a helping hand. 
• Cleanliness. From tap water to city streets to daily showers, few nations have such a strong sense of cleanliness and I very much appreciate it. 
• Freedom. Having lived and traveled in countries where your words and actions are more closely monitored and regulated, where freedom of speech and freedom of the press are still not a reality, it's nice to know that here, while you may be fired or hated for saying certain things, you're not going to be arrested for it and while your political or religious views may be unpopular, they won't put you or your family in danger.  
• Organization.  If the USA had a Myers-Briggs personality type, she would be a J. Argentina and Thailand would be P's.  And my love for the US's J-ness is not just because I am a J. Try to accomplish anything, especially something official, in a P country and you too will love the smoothness with which many things can be accomplished here.  (Actually, now that I think about it, the US would probably be an ENTJ)

Happy Birthday, USA!

New York City: A Foreign Land

Ever since 9/11, I've felt like New York was at the very heart of American patriotism.  Big Apple, apple pie kind of thing.  Yet my weekend there sent many of my foreign country instincts into high gear.  I saw and heard Spanish at every turn.  There's a whole New York sub-culture with rules for traffic and pedestrians as well as how to dress, when and where to sit on the subway, and I'm sure many other things I can't pick up on in three days.  It felt a lot like the first few days in a new country when you're hanging back half a second trying to observe how the locals do things so that you can figure out the system without making so many mistakes.  The many cash only establishments just added to foreign feel all the more.  

I've been to NY before (pre-9/11) and had a chance to see many of the sites then, so this trip was more about enjoying and exploring the city with my brother.  I met a friend for brunch on the Lower East Side (I feel so sophisticated just saying that, ha!) and enjoyed catching up with her after 5 years.  After that fun and deliciousness, we walked the High Line, a beautiful elevated pathway that didn't even exist last time I was in town.  We made our way to Central Park, which I got to really wander and explore for the first time, before heading back to Brooklyn to grill in the backyard (yes, he actually has a back yard!).  Saturday morning found me in Prospect Park watching city league baseball for the first time in years before seeing some other areas of Brooklyn.  That evening we wandered a neighborhood of Manhattan and found a great Italian restaurant to enjoy dinner before going Uptown for a play.  The independent show Growing Up Gonzalez did not disappoint.  Sunday we got a chance to stroll around Brooklyn before an amazing brunch and a visit to the 9/11 memorial.  Afterward we wandered to Battery Park and then one of my favorite areas- the financial district, where we found a small Italian pizzeria to watch the second half of the Euro 12 final game.  The little old Italian owner was the best part.  Somehow, we also managed the energy to walk on the Brooklyn Bridge and see the park beneath it before stopping for gelato and then heading home to crash. 

At the 9/11 memorial

Central Park

Appetizer Saturday evening

Brooklyn street

On the Brooklyn Bridge

View of the Manhattan Bridge from the Park

Evening light on the Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan skyline

The entire weekend reconfirmed to me how much I love New York, as well as how fun and easy it is to travel with my brother.  He and I always travel really well together.  So even though it didn't necessarily always feel like the US, it was a great way to spend some of my last days in the US.  Can't wait to go back!