(Not to be confused with offensive photos.) People have started complaining that we don’t have enough photos up. A giant pile of photos is coming soon; I’ve launched a picture-taking offensive, carrying the camera everywhere and taking pictures of everything. The plan is to take a gazjillion photos of everyday life around here and the people we see everyday, and create some representative galleries of what public life in our neighbourhood looks like.

But I have issues. Somewhere in past international travels I developed this hang-up with taking pictures of people. It just seemed wrong to invade their personal space; I’m afraid of being the obnoxious tourist. Plus, being the relatively super-tall white guy with a camera in an over-populated public place tends to increase one’s self-consciousness. I accidentally took a picture of our boss the other day – he was walking through a crowd that I was shooting, and I didn’t notice until that night when I downloaded them off the camera. Some days you feel whiter than others.

But I’ve reached a compromise. It’s much easier to take someone’s picture if you’ve talked with them for a while, and you ask. People are more interesting than anything else about a place; photo albums with no people are boring. So, I’m going to take tons of pictures… and just be nice about it.

“Kiki, do you know what coffee does?”
“Coffee make Teacher happy!”
Shaping Taiwan’s future… one 6-year-old at a time.

You know how in North America people wear clothing with Chinese characters on it, and they have no idea what it says? Well, that goes both ways. Two shirts worn by our students this week:

stra worry is made of love
nezzopiano

London oveand Peace
Poupine girl
ove and Peace
New style Love and peace
stvs and girls New style
Sexy Girl
upine
vs and girls

Yes, the Sexy Girl shirt was worn by a 7-year-old boy. Makes me wonder what all those Chinese shirts we see in North America really say.

Time Asia describes the world we witness everyday in, “Asia’s Overscheduled Kids.”

Yet many [parents] also quietly fear the impact of the ferocious pressure imposed on their children in service of these aspirations — how could they not, when tales of emotionally broken prepubescents and student suicides are a media cliché? But however ambivalent they may feel, most parents conclude that the goals are worth the risks. Indeed, the sight of a child being driven to study harder — by a frowning teacher, bullying father or beseeching mother — is a tableau as archetypal to the region as planting rice.

Of the handful of English teachers we know personally from our time in Texas, two have witnessed student suicides in China. Mingdaw (our boss, and the founder of our school) doesn’t hesitate when he says, “I hated cram school my whole life.” The expectations put on these kids are insane – that’s one ethnocentric judgement call I don’t mind claiming. The Time cover story, our local friends, and our readings suggest various reasons for this, from the one-child policy to too-frequently-recurring social instability to Confucius to honour cultures and saving face… Whatever the reasons, much of what this Time article reports is reflected in our students.

What is a 5-year-old (our youngest student) doing at a ‘cram school’ four days a week – after his regular school – learning a foreign language? He can’t even use a pair of scissors yet! I gave the older class a big speech on Friday about how their grades, tests, and homework assignments are private (a new vocab word) and how I will only show them and their parents. Their grades are not each other’s business. It was a novel idea to them – I’m hoping the implications sink into and affect their classroom behaviour and enjoyment. Most of the other cram schools publish the students’ grades and names on big posters in their front windows, ranked from top to bottom. My students have this insatiable need to know how they compare with each other on every test, every worksheet, and even in classroom games. The cutthroat competitve attitude, which included passive-aggressive behaviour, was ruining the classroom vibes.

But we are having a good time in the classroom, for the most part. One of our students called tonight – with her mom coaching her English in the background – to invite us to attend a traditional stage performance tomorrow. That’s a welcome excuse to ignore some homework! I imagine that means more pictures coming soon, too.

We fed our children something for snack time out of packages that read:

Open the pack, its rich fragrance shall make the last but a lasting impression on you. The delicious taste and crisp quality can’t help you but having it bite by bite, truly, it’s worth tasting!

Such of these serial nice cakes of CTC different delicious tastes shall meet your appetite, the kind or piece each is full of aroma and finess, welcome to taste it and compare it with others, all of the cake are under a strict quality control for serving your taste, kindly give us your advice by consumer teleline or by mail for our betterment, thanks.

Now, I realize that when we start our language learning we’ll say stuff way worse than this, and we promise to post it (if they ever clue us in as to what we’re actually saying). But either way, I guess if English teaching doesn’t pan out there are always other places to peddle our English abilities.

For a month and a half, our apartment has been pretty sparsely furnished (a table, two chairs, and a bed). This week, all of that changed as I finally had success locating some used couches (and a coffee table, fans, and a rice cooker) within our price range (cheap!).

So we are now sitting in comfort, though not exactly style, as several of the couches are covered with cowboys and horses. *sigh* Will we ever escape Texas? (=

Look for a “photo tour” of the apartment sometime on Tuesday!!!

(This is the third update from Julia, my sister, in South Africa.)

We have had an eventful few days. We would be writing a novel if we went into details into all of our incredible experiences. But we will try to highlight some of the events we have been involved in since our last e-mail.

We started Monday morning at 5 am. We prepare and clean up breakfast in our outdoor kitchen and eat overlooking a beautiful rain forest in our mountainous setting. After about a 45-minute drive we arrived at our host school to do a one hour chapel starting at 7:15 am. The primary students were very receptive and participated well in our songs that we taught them. We then drove for about another 45 minutes to do a presentation at a high school called Kgola Ka Leleme in a very needy village called Seagopo. The students were a little rowdy and rampageous as we lined up to start the presentation of making wise choices in life. Andy broke the ice as the students thought he looked like real Madrid soccer star David Beckham. It was an incredible opportunity for us to clearly and boldly share in this public high school which had over 200 students. The afternoon was filled with many changes in our schedule and driving and waiting and driving again.

Tuesday was a very busy day again as we woke up at 5 am and welcomed with pouring rain. We did a one-hour high school presentation at a school, then went into individual classrooms for another hour sharing about Canada and our personal stories. After that we went to a village primary school where we did two more hour presentations. We wish you could see the faces of the 5 and 6 year olds as they saw puppets for the first time in their lives. From there we visited a hospital, which was extremely emotional as we saw extremely serious cases of people suffering. We had awesome opportunities to pray and sing to many patients. We then had another incredible opportunity to share with about 250 children at a school for disabled children. The amazing thing was that they ministered to us as they sang several songs for us, which brought tears to our eyes.

Wednesday was a workday in a village as we are helping to build a kitchen and play area and Wednesday evening we presented a youth program at a local congregation.

Have you ever thought about the role that the sense of smell plays in our every day experience? Or about how the definition of “good smell” and “bad smell” might vary from culture to culture? Until I traveled to Africa and spent 13 weeks in rural Uganda, I just never thought about it. The following experience, in particular, helped me to realize this important lesson.

One day, as I was waiting in a matatu (taxi van) to be taken out for a bonding experience in a rural village, one of the local vendors suddenly thrust a bottle of lotion at me through the window. He said, (please note that my interpretation of his accent and use of English is not intended to be condescending…it’s just the way English is used there, and the way the memory is burned into my mind) “Hey muzungu! Madame, Are you wanting to buy some nice lotion?” I politely answered, “No, thank you.” However, he was a persistent salesman and continued his pitch. “Oh, but madame, this is very fine smelling lotion. It is smelling very good! You try it, you like!” Again, I said “No, thank you.” He tried another tactic. “You buy it, madame. You will be smelling very nice!” Since I had showered quite thoroughly that morning and even put on a small amount of my own Bath and Body works lotion, I replied. “No, thank you. I am already smelling very nice.” His eyes widened in amazement (or shock, I’m still not sure which) and replied, “No, Madame! You are NOT smelling nice!” I didn’t even know how to reply to that sales tactic, but fortunately I didn’t have to as he stalked off to find a more willing customer. After my visit to the village, I told the story to the missionaries I was staying with, trying to illustrate that this guy obviously needed some tips on how to sell things to westerners. They said, “Well, to him, you probably didn’t smell very nice. That’s probably why he was trying to sell you the lotion in the first place.” Their comment completely reversed my understanding of the incident! In my mind’s nose (I figure that is a more fitting expression than “mind’s eye” for this post), I smelled great…whereas the salesguy, and his product smelled pretty bad. But in his mind’s nose, I smelled terrible and desperately needed some help!

According to “The Smell Report,” The experience of smell is not merely biological or mental, it is also social and cultural. Here’s an excerpt of some of the “Smell Preferences” that they have collected from a number of different cultures.
“Western notions of aesthetically pleasing fragrances are by no means universal. For the cattle-raising Dassanetch of Ethiopia, no scent is more beautiful than the odour of cows. The association of this scent with social status and fertility is such that the men wash their hands in cattle urine and smear their bodies with manure, while the women rub butter into their heads, shoulders and breasts to make themselves smell more attractive.

The Dogon of Mali would find these customs incomprehensible. For the Dogon, the scent of onion is by far the most attractive fragrance a young man or woman can wear. They rub fried onions all over their bodies as a highly desirable perfume.

The most complex aesthetics of scent are to be found in Arab countries, where women use a wide range of scents to perfume different parts of their bodies. In the United Arab Emirates, musk, rose and saffron are first rubbed over the entire body (which must be scrupulously clean). Hair is perfumed with a blend of walnut or sesame oil and ambergris or jasmine. The ears are scented with mkhammariyah,a blend of aloewood, saffron, rose, musk and civet. Ambergris and narcissus are among the scents used on the neck, sandalwood in the armpits and aloewood on the nostrils. Perfumes are only used, however, in private situations, when a woman is in the company of other women, or of her husband and close family. To wear perfume in public or in the company of men is to be “like an adulteress.”

Arab men may also wear perfumes: they use rose and aloewood behind their ears, on their nostrils, in their beards and in the palms of their hands.

The African Bushmen would probably regard the olfactory preferences of almost all other cultures, including our supposedly sophisticated Western tastes, as distinctly lacking in subtlety. For the Bushmen, the loveliest fragrance is that of rain.”

By now you’re probably why I’m posting about all of this and what kind of Taiwan experience would prompt such a long discussion on the merit of smells from culture to culture. First, I ran into this comment on a message board for foreigners living in Taiwan. (Note:If you click on the link, be forewarned that the foreign community here reportedly has a high percentage of odd or socially maladjusted people and some of the contents of the message board reflects that. I usually just stick to the “Buy and Sell” thread, as I try to find some more furniture for our apartment. But when I do wander into some of the other threads, I really have to wonder about some of these people. “Did they come to Taiwan expecting that everything would be exactly the same as Canada, US, South Africa,…etc.?!?!”)

But the comment, in a thread titled “Where can I find deodorant?” said the following:

“I’ve gone native and started using some local stuff. It lasts a long while and covers up the stink pretty well. Trouble is, I’m getting tired of smelling sweet like some sort of marinated pork product. Think Speed Stick, but this is more like (sesame) Seed Stick.”

We also recently ran out of the few bars of soap that we packed with us from Canada, and picked up some more soap at a little bitty shop while we were out getting dinner one night. The next morning, I unwrapped the soap only to discover that it smells (in my mind’s nose) terrible!!! Joel thinks I’m over reacting, but this soap (“Imperial Leather”) really smells like the flea soap that we used to use on our pets! Or, like really bad men’s cologne. Or a combination of flea soap and really bad men’s cologne. Ohhhhhh, it makes my eyes water the whole time I’m in the shower. For a few minutes, I wondered if I really had picked up some flea soap by accident, but then I remembered that the saleslady said, “for to wash body.”

I’m certain that there are some local soaps which I will find quite pleasing to use and to smell. I’ve even seen a few western brands (though they are more expensive). But none of those were available at this particular little shop, leading to our selection of a six-bar pack of “Imperial Leather.”

But here’s the good news: 1 bar down, 5 more to go. Then we get to try again!(=
Until then, I just use a little extra of my Bath and Bodyworks lotion and hope that the locals don’t find my smell too offensive! (After all, why would I cover up that nice smelling “Imperial Leather” with that putrescent smelling American lotion!!!)

(This is a cleaned-up version of the latest news from Julia’s South Africa team. E-mail my parents for the unedited report.)

Greetings again from beautiful South Africa. Well we have had our first three full days here and it has been a fantastic trip thus far. Saturday was an incredible day as our group had a very rare and unique opportunity to have a sitting with the “Rain King” of the Mudjadj region. We had a private history lesson from one of his advisors then had an extremely rare visit through the royal compound. We all had to remove our shoes as we walked through the palace area. This was a privilege that only a few outsiders in history have enjoyed. Our host had a chance to share with him and set up further meetings with him. We then had a wonderful picnic in a nature reserve and went on a gruelling hike through a rain forest in 38 degree heat.

We were then able to go back to our “camp” where we relaxed, jumped in our stream, wrote in our journals, had personal devotions before everybody joined in to help prepare then clean-up dinner.

On Sunday we were honoured to present a program at a local village meeting. It was held in a large tent in a rural village with about 30 adults and 40 children. It was an incredible time It started off with some typical lively African style including the congregation dancing in a line around the tent. We bonded quickly as Julia and Ruth joined in on the dance and the singing. Soon the entire congregation filled the African village with songs. Joseph, Oliver and Jenn then shared a puppet show about including others which the children absolutely loved. We wish we could describe the faces of the children as they watched with eyes and mouths wide open as they soaked in every word of the translation into the Sotho language. Susan then shared her story of how she was helped as she adjusted to life in Canada after she moved from Korea. After leading the children in more songs, Andy shared a powerful story of how he was helped through some difficult times in his life. Ashley, Jenn, Julia and Angie then led out in “Thula Siswe,” a Zulu song. It was an amazing experience for all of us as the entire congregation joined us in the Zulu language as we sang together. The people did not seem to want to end the meeting as they thanked us over and over again for coming to share with them.

Continue to think of us as we move into our busiest time of service sharing several presentations a day in schools, hospitals and villages. In the middle of the week we will be doing our work project at a local school. Everything has been beyond our expectations and we are so thankful for how we are being used to serve people here in rural South Africa.

- South Africa Team 2006

PS – Ruth, Ashley, and Susan just found a Black Mamba snake on the side of the house… it’s dead now, but we will leave that story for another day….

Another assignment bites the dust. 13.5 pages in one day and a morning – about 17 hours of writing time. Approximately 2.5 cups of green tea per page. That’s roughly 33.75 cups of green tea in over a 36-hour time period. One of the books we read for the assignment, Overcoming the Dark Side of Leadership, suggests that I have tendencies toward compulsive leadership behaviour, that that’s a bad thing, and that I should do something about it. Fine with me. But if I do the exercises and address the personality issues, do I still get to drink the tea?

(My sister’s team’s updates are only accessable through their high school’s passworded portal, so I’ve posted their lastest here, with slight editing. I’m not sure but I think Modjadjiskloof is called Dulwelskloof on the map.)

The team had a very long journey from Vancouver. We had a 9 hour flight to London, a four hour stop over at Heathrow Airport then an 11 hour flight to Johannesburg. We were all very tired, but otherwise healthy. Then we had a long, hot drive north to Modjadjiskloof.

Fred, our contact, has done a marvellous job preparing for us and we are staying in a very beautiful forested area in a very rural area. Monkeys welcomed us and watched us curiously as we unloaded the bus and settled in.

Some of us dove into a cool, fast flowing stream just below our cabins. Fred then gave us a detailed orientation about our next two weeks. We had an awesome meal then fell exhausted into our beds.

Please continue to pray for us as we have a busy first few days planned. Talk to you soon!