Return from Amsterdam

Though I had intended to blog more while I was in Amsterdam, not blogging meant more time with my team. We had a great time together learning, hanging out, praying for each other and just getting to know one another. I am very excited for the group of people that will be serving in our location and believe that God has brought a great mix of gifts and abilities to the team. I wish I had a picture of all of us but it was such a busy week, we didn't even stop to photograph us all!



It was great to be back with those serving in my same organization. Throughout this week I was able to learn from others with a wealth of experience and wisdom. We ended the conference with some great interactive intercession/prayer that is often a part of Y's ethos. (and fyi...in future posts I will be using Y to represent my organization as I'm needed to keep things a bit more secure online. Thanks for understanding!) So, we prayed over maps, kneeled before the cross, jumped into the "river," or lit a candle to represent in the physical things that we were engaging in in the spiritual. It was an evening full of blessing and worship.



I really enjoyed being able to experience Amsterdam beyond the Schiphol airport! I have flown through so many times but didn't realize what a great city lay beyond. I would recommend a visit to anyone who hasn't been able to come through yet. I was able to enjoy some great cafes, wonderful food, the Van Gogh museum, Anne Frank's house and walking along the canals. The photo above is of the pancakes for which the dutch are famous for...as they should be. They were fantastic and I will never think of pancakes the same way again. Yum.

Well, I'm back in Wheaton and am on the countdown until I head back overseas. I will be in the country for about 3 weeks more.

Amsterdam, Day 1

Well friends, I am here in Amsterdam enjoying the warmer-than-the-midwest-deep-freeze-but-still-quite-cool temperatures. It rained this afternoon as I was wandering around the city but it was blowing wind and I haven’t been able to shake the chill.

I’m staying at a Christian hostel one night and then at the Y base for the time of the training that I’m going through. It was so much fun to wander around the streets of a city I haven’t been to before (this is country #21 for me). I have flown through the Schipol airport countless times but this time I actually got out of the Transit Lounge and into the city. Don’t let this disconcert you but the area where I’m staying is right on the edge of the red light district. I kind of stumbled into one of the main streets of the area today while I was out and about with the women wearing very little clothing, posing like an advertisement in the front window of the shops with the triple x on it and the loud music blaring inside. The more I travel, the more I see the best and the worst that this world has to offer. What made me sad was my innate instinct to look away, not make eye contact…the whole escapade leaves you forgetting for a moment that the “object” in the window, is a human being. This is a place that needs Jesus, a connection in the deepest parts of the soul of the people…and because of him, there is hope even in a place like Amsterdam.


As I continued my wanderings I sat down to have a good ol’ European lunch of some cappuccino and a tomato, mozerella and pesto sandwich on a bagette. Yum!

I also figured I’d get out and see at least one of the endless museums that Amsterdam has to offer. I settled on the Anne Frank house mostly because it cost less than the Van Gogh museum (which I still may break down and get to that one too before I leave). The Anne Frank House was well worth the entrance fee. The museum is structured so you physically walk through the house where eight Jews were hiding from the Nazis. You get just a taste of what it was like as you enter the hidden passageway behind the bookshelf, climb the steep stairs and hear your footsteps creak underneath; all the while quotes from Anne’s diary are prominently displayed on the walls reminding you how quiet and unseen they needed to be. At the end in a display case is her original journal with pictures she pasted in, scribbles and pages filled with her powerful testimony to her life in hiding. You can’t leave the museum untouched and passive. This is a photo of the house from the front, although the family was hidden in an annex to this building on the 3rd and 4th floors in the back.


Well, jet lag has settled in and I’m starting to mumble as I chat with others staying at the hostel. I may need to crawl into bunk #6, put in my earplugs and enjoy a goodnight’s sleep in a room with 15 other girls. You gotta love the romanticism of “backpacking in Europe!”

A homeless wanderer once again

I finished the book Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. And, as I usually shun pop culture out of a bit of a rebelliousness in my heart, I actually enjoyed this book along with the others who have raved about it. It is one woman's journey, physically, emotionally and spiritually after a brutal divorce. I don't see eye-to-eye with her on everything but it was enjoyable and encouraged me to continue to live my own life to the fullest and not according to how others perceive it should be lived.

Anyways...in the first section of the book she has a discussion with an Italian man about The Word that would sum her up. If she could be described in one word, what would it be. She comes to her own word at the end of the book (which you'll have to read yourself to discover) but I found this concept intriguing. If I could be summed up in one word, what would it be?

I may have to give it more depth of thought but what immediately came to my mind is the word SOJOURNER. I've always been drawn to this word because it's not someone who just travels but one who journeys with a purpose. I believe that my journey in life is one with purpose. Also, I believe that on this side of heaven, I will continue to sojourn. I have not found my true home yet. Therefore, I will be a sojourner even if I do have a permanent address.

But, I begin my physical journey once again. I drove up from West Chicago yesterday to my grandparents' house in northern Minnesota to again shove my small pile of earthly belongings in its place under the stairs in their basement and begin the transition process of heading back overseas. I admit, there is a part of me that increases as I get older that really longs to have a place of my own to call "home." It's been a small dream over the past few years to acquire a place (maybe a townhome or something so someone else can do my yardwork) that I could live in when I come back from overseas. I could rent it out to someone while I'm gone, but know I had a place to stay when I came back. But, that's part of the sojourning adventure. And so many have taken me in, given me a guest bedroom for a night, a week or more. I have friends all over the globe and a lot of physical places I could call "home." Even so, the uprooting and the transition does take its toll on me. Especially when I look around at my friends buying homes, having their second child, involved in their community and church. But, a friend of mine once said, "Know what you are called to so you know what to say no to." I know that I'm not called to unpack my suitcase just yet.

So, once again, my email address and my blog are about the only permanent address I actually have! Stay connected with me here because even though I'm in and out, I still love to hear from friends and be a part of your lives.

Happy 2009!

The New Year event is like a drug for sentimental people like me. It actually is a viable excuse to take a trip down memory lane, read through old journals and blogs, reflect, analyze, ponder the future. I love the new year just for that.

So, guess what I did...I read through my blog from this last year (haven't even touched my journal...it's a bit more of a tome) and was amazed at what this last year held. In juxtaposition to all the dim and dreary news (economic crisis, war in Iraq, violence in the Middle East, shady Illinois politics....)I found my life over the last year one to be happy about and not a year that I need to forget or drown myself in alcohol to make disappear.

I'm hoping that's a sign of a life well-lived.

So, here's what this last year held for me:

Travels:
as always, I'm amazed at the places I've been able to go and things I've been able to experience. This year found me on the beaches of Kona, Hawaii last January, hiking through the Red River Gorge in Kentucky over Spring Break, in Los Angeles for my friends' wedding in April, traveling through Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Dubai, U.A.E. over the summer, in Montana tromping around Glacier National Park in August, visiting New York for the first time in November, and meandering between Minnesota and Chicago, IL in between all that! Whew! What an amazing journey it's been physically. I should wear an odometer to keep track of all the miles!

Education:: of course the highlight was my graduation from Wheaton College grad school with my Masters Degree. I never fully considered further education after my graduation from undergrad and yet here I am. I'm now even considering the possibility of doing PhD studies in the future!

But...I also got my certificate in TESOL this summer which I hope will be a useful tool and beneficial training for the years ahead.

And I got a little "hands-on" education learning how to really wear a burka on the dusty streets when it's 110+ degrees out. I learned how to be a better cook this year. I learned what an art recruiting is. I learned how to ask better questions.

Friends and Family: life would be so boring with out the people in our lives to experience it with. I'm so thankful for the dear friends I've made from the Y friends that seem to come in and out of my life all over the world, the friends I've made a Wheaton, the local friends I make whose names are so difficult to pronounce correctly, and my family who watches me flit in and out of their lives like the wind, embracing me while I'm home and praying for me while I'm gone. There are those people who send emails and notes on facebook and yet we have not seen each other in a long time...friendships that stand despite distance. And of course my faithful team of supporters whose financial sacrifice and bended knees I couldn't live without. Thanks to all of you who have loved, embraced, prayed for, and laughed with me over this last year.

2009
And as always the New Year has us hoping for better no matter how great the previous year has been. Some things that I hoping for this year is that I want to be more open to deep relationships in my life...truly connecting with people, not holding back or shutting people out. Same for my relationship with God...I want a greater revelation of him this year, to go deeper with Him, to devour his word and ache to hear his voice.

I want to love the stranger, help the poor and speak hope into the lives of as many as I possibly can.

And I want to see God be God this year. I want to stand in awe at what He does and who He is.

Bring on 2009!