The Weedas in Indonesia: 2012

Sunday, May 20, 2012

Archipelagos

These past 4 years have been almost exclusively spent on an island—Java. In addition almost all of our travel has extended to other islands. While these island experiences have been incredibly diverse in their characteristics it’s fun to start linking them together in different ways. We have visited:

· Some of the largest islands including an island continent (Australia), the worlds 3^rd (Borneo), 6^th (Sumatra), 11^th (Celebes or Sulawesi), 12^th (South Island of New Zealand) and 13^th(Java) largest geographic islands in the world.

· 2 of the world’s most densely populated islands (Singapore and Hong Kong)

· The world’s largest island by population (Java)

· Islands off of other islands (Nias off of Sumatra, Gili Trawangan off Lombok, Bunaken off of Sulawesi, Philip Island off of Australia).

· An island in a river delta (some tiny little island in the Mekong delta where we stayed for a night) and an island on an Island (Samosir at Lake Toba on Sumatra)

· Both tropical island resort paradises (Bali and Lombok) and islands with glaciers and penguins (New Zealand’s south island and Philip island)

· A island housing a famous volcano (Krakatoa)

Not only are these islands linked statistically, they may also be grouped by our experiences in each of them with different friends that we may have travelled with, stayed with or even the stories that we have shared with others about those places. Perhaps most of all, these places can be joined by the Christian communities that exist there, even though often we just travelled there to see a new place and have a good time.

When speaking to friends back in North America, Janet and I often feel that our experiences in Indonesia (Java) have been a very isolating. Realities (friends, experiences, day to day life, travel) in Jakarta are just so different that any attempt to connect our life here to a North American context has been almost impossible. Some of this is our fault as we lack the ability to tell a good story or to seize opportunities to relate relevant perspectives to our friends back home. In spite of this fact, as we end this journey here and move back to the U.S. I pray that our time in Indonesia will build archipelagos of knowledge, understanding, and faith to all the places where we live.

Thanks for listening for these 4 years.

Ibu

The north side of Gallup is a working class neighborhood with homes built in the twenties and thirties near the coal mines of Gamerco and Coal Basin. In addition, it has a lot of small businesses targeting the Native American clientele drifting south off the reservation. Some of these businesses are great (tire and feed stores, barber shops) and some not so great (bars, pawn shops). If you know anything about Gallup, New Mexico, you would know that alcoholics abound in this area. Nestled amongst all this hubbub is Casa San Martine, a soup kitchen started by Catholic Nuns of the same order as Mother Theresa (In fact Mother Theresa visited this outpost and Gallup twice in the 1980’s). During my days as National Honor Society mentor at Rehoboth High School, every year I led students on service projects to Casa San Martine to help the nuns serve meals and do wash. It was great to roll up our sleeves and help cut vegetables, hang and fold laundry and then at 4:30 PM serve hundreds of drunks as they piled in to the mission.

The nuns were always short, extremely hard working and almost always from places like India, Africa or the Philippines. They worked tirelessly except Thursdays (their day of prayer) and Sundays. On days we were there, we observed the nuns constantly taking crap from rude drunks who harassed them 90 percent of the time and begged for prayers from them the other 10 percent. I always wondered where these amazing servants came from and where they got their patience and disposition.

Now I know.

2 weeks after arriving here, Ibu Warshi began working for us. Almost every day since then, she has cooked and cleaned tirelessly around our house—without complaint and often amongst ours.

Similar to the nuns at Casa San Martine, my 4 foot 7 inch Muslim maid has modeled Christ to me more than anyone else in my life.

By the way, Ibu in Indonesian is the title given to all adult women. It means mother—Our entire family will greatly miss mother Warshi next year.

Calvin Assignment

This semester I took an online graduate course in education from Calvin College. As part of the application process to the program I had to complete the following essay. Because my assignment pulls in some experiences from Indonesia... I thought I would share it with you.

Please write about an educational experience that you had from which you learned from it.

Relatively new teachers in small Christian schools most often get to teach the classes no one else wants and I was no exception. As a social studies teacher with 3 years of experience, the school needed someone to cover the new World Religions class that had started the previous year, and I was slated for the course. Already swamped with other classes, a second child on the way and the commitment to coach varsity Basketball for the first time, I did not look forward to the assignment. Seeking to minimize the push that would happen during the school year, I spent a few pivotal days of the summer seeking the advice of the first teacher of the class. In addition to teaching the course, Theo was the librarian and yearbook sponsor (obviously low on the seniority ladder as well) and while he did lots for the school, was not trained to be a teacher. Theo, lived in the duplex next door, and I went over to his apartment, sat on the floor with stacks of his manila folders full of brochures, photocopies and printed and handwritten notes for the class. With my legs folded, hippy style, I listened as he explained the course and how he taught it. I found myself asking lots of questions. The framework that he selected to teach the course resonated with me and suddenly many of the isolated, dry details of different religions and worldviews I accumulated over the years suddenly found their way into the framework he laid out. During our 3-4 hours of conversing, the course became insightful, needed and fresh.

In my 20 years of teaching, whenever I embark on a new course, the first year is almost always brutal as I hack my way through the material and stumble through the words and lessons I choose to convey the important ideas and material—and this is usually in content areas I am trained for! The exception to this is a World Religions class that, even though I only taught it for one year, flowed out of those question and answer sessions with Theo on the floor of his duplex, and led to some of my most interesting classroom situations including a visit to a mosque for Friday prayers and a visit from a Wiccan practitioner who explained earth based religions to my students.

Since that year, so many situations in my life have relied on the material I learned and taught in that class. This is especially true these past four years as I teach students from Christian, Buddhist, and Muslim homes in an International Baccalaureate school in Indonesia. These students find themselves challenged by the secularization of their very traditional world and as many of them prepare to go off to large Western universities in the U.S., Canada and Australia, I hope they can find the framework needed to understand and interpret their world, just I did on the floor of that duplex.

Saturday, May 19, 2012

New Zealand

Just over two years ago, we spent 2 weeks in Australia and I walked away raving about it as it seemed to have about everything: beaches, open spaces, friendly people etc.... This Spring break we went to New Zealand's south island with the Comrie family (friends and colleagues from SPH)... and as much as I loved Australia, I now love New Zealand more. lthough they are limited and don't do the places justice, here's a few pictures to confirm why: