How many people can say they are friends with a Tibetan Monk?

Beautiful faces, big smiles, chopsticks, sqatty potty experiences, hacking loogies, and amazing scenery…TIC (This is China.)

When we first arrived in this country, I was not sure how I felt about the place. Of all the places we have been, this is the most different. Instead of you being a tourist taking pictures, the Chinese people stop you and ask to take your picture. Instead of them trying to speak English so that you can understand them, they carry on in Chinese like you completely understand even though all you know how to say is “hello” and “goodbye” in their mother tongue. It is versatile in the type of cities, sceneries and in culture. From the beginning we were thrown into the beauty of this culture.

     I don’t think that anyone is a stranger here. On our very first 13 hour train ride we could only get standing room tickets so we made so many friends. I don’t think I have laughed so much in a situation that (in retrospect) could have put quite a damper on my whole experience of China. There we were sitting in the floor of the train and trying to get any seats that would come available throughout the journey. The only problem was that there were other people trying to do the same thing…So, we made friends. Since there was quite the crowd of us and we looked quite different from all the other 120 people in our one train car, we gathered quite the audience. Once we saw that people thought we were funny and were watching us, we thought, “why not entertain them!” So, we pulled out the guitar and rocked out that train car with familiar tunes. Everyone was so excited that you could no longer see their eyes because they were smiling so much! This one adventure was a precedent for how the remainder of our time here was.

     Once the greater southbound team had broken up into smaller groups, we settled into where we would be for the next 2 weeks. My team of 4 (Gerhard, Gehta, Tian, and I) were privileged to go to a small little town that was slammed packed full of culture. Around every corner there was something new to learn about the people and the history of the land and the people group that surrounded us. On the first day there, we were introduced to a monk in the town. That man became one of the biggest blessings to us while we were there. He did not believe what we believe, but he wanted to know more. The more we told him, the more he wanted to hear. He would say to us, “Tell me that story of Jesus again,” and then we would have the opportunity to share the amazing truth of the Word.

    Often, we spent time in a café in the small town. There my cravings for American style pancakes with maple syrup and clumps of butter were filled and  were even was topped off with a cup of coffee or two. Within the walls of that café we were able to meet fellow travellers. Stories were told of their travels and our travels. I learned so much about culture, ideals, and view of life. Most importantly, I got the share my story. As adventures were told of their trek around the world, we told them of a different kind of adventure that we had been having in the very same countries that they had been visiting. We testified about the miracles that we had seen, we discussed the common needs of man and how all of man searching comes down to one thing…the need to know and be known by God. There was one girl in particular that I was able to talk to for a couple of hours about this very topic. We met lonely travellers that walked through the doors of that cafe searching for someone to relate to...there, they found us. As we shared with them, some sat for hours, some came back meal after meal just to continue talking to us.

      Our time in China was quite eventful. We saw a lot of the major things to see and we met so many interesting people. But the thing to me that hit home the most is the very thing I talked to that one girl in the cafe about one day, “people are just people.” No matter where you go, what people you meet, you will find that people still have the same basic needs and are still searching. They are searching for something and someone greater than themselves. The past month has been helping people realize what and who they have been searching for. Seeds were planted, friends were left behind to water, and I believe more revelation will come to the people we were able to invest in.