Itsara

We’re back now from our trip home. For me it was really encouraging. The loving support we get from you guys is more than we ever expected. You’re not just a bunch of fellow churchgoers who give us money cuz it’s the Christian thing to do. You’re our brothers and sisters and mothers who love us and pray for us and want to know how we’re doing and want to come out and visit us. You’re our family. I’ve always felt that way at Coast – that’s why I love that church and am always so sad to have left it. But we didn’t really leave it. Everywhere we go we take you guys with us, and I love that about you guys.

We tried to do less scheduling on this trip than our last one. Instead of making appointments at every possible time slot, we took most days as they came, one at a time. In some ways it worked. We got to hang out with some people that we might not have hung out with otherwise, and we saw some people more often than we would have had we made appointments. If we missed you though… well, that’s why I said it worked in some ways.

Reverse culture shock wasn’t that bad. It happened some at first. For example, we forgot that in the States it’s normal for folks to pay $10 for a plate of food that could feed 3 hungry people (and then throw away the part they don’t eat!). And I was surprised when we bought OJ with pulp to see that they had to artificially add the pulp. On the other hand it was nice to have drinkable tap water (with optional hot water), trash cans every 10 feet, and grocery stores open at midnight.

I did suffer from a surprising bout of culture shock (the non-reverse kind) with Cindy’s family. I guess the cultural difference has been there off and on, but this is the first time I identified it as a cultural issue. (That’s a good thing. Knowing the reason for the differences makes it easier to handle.) There are a number of facets to the issue, and I don’t really want to go into details here because I like Cindy’s family and I would hate for you to get a bad impression of them. In general, it’s just that sometimes I like to be asked before certain forms of help are offered.

We already really miss all of you and are grateful for the time we got to spend with each of you. We’re not sure when we’ll be able to travel back next (what with having 3 kids starting in December), but I believe that Sean and Prang plan to come out sometime in the next couple of months. I know a bunch of you want to come out and visit us too. If you’re not sure how to make that happen, let us know. We can help you work out details, and we’d love to see you out here!