soaking in the rain

Overcast skies dumped waves of rain down over our city on Saturday morning.
I was thrilled.
I was almost cold!
It was raining!
Ah, maybe Kuya was right, people from the NW do in fact have webbed hands and feet!
My day began at nine in the morning. That might not sound significant, but it was. I slept in until nine, no inexplicable waking at five to roll over and pretend the new morning sunlight didn't exist. The long sleep was amazing, no doubt induced by sleep debt I had been compounding over the last few days! Well, with this happy wake-up, I rolled out of bed to do my 150 sit-ups, check for texts from home, and make for the shower. The water was much colder than usual that morning, as it was today. Ah, well, small price to pay for not feeling repeatedly sticky through the course of the day.

Little did I know that the weather was not going to leave me untouched. Sticky I might not be, but wet I was certainly going to get.

In the early afternoon, four of us (three interns and the girl who is living with us) ventured into the city to meet friends.
During my afternoon and evening, I stumbled upon a few interesting anthropological observations I would like to share with you:

1) Older trikes do not keep water out very well, that is why inhabitants of this part of the world stick their umbrellas out and open them to cover the entire doorway, like a little shield.

2) People from my home city back in the NW are prejudiced against umbrellas and refuse to buy them even here where it is cultural to do so. Also, someone happened to go against her "always prepared" instincts (in the extremely rare case of traveling light), and didn't bring her raincoat that day, which would have made a useful tarp. This resulted in four very wet girls. (To paint an accurate picture for you, think of torrential rain flooding muddied streets on which children blissfully are splashing and playing to their heart's content. It should have taken us a half-hour to get to our destination. It took us an hour and a stopover in hopes of waiting it out.)

3) Pizza is good comfort food at the end of a journey like that, right? A big slice of warm pizza. Well, I'm not sure how big it could be considering Pizza Hut's biggest size here ("family size") is a 12"!

4) I feel like I'm always eating and eating here, because everyone is always eating and eating here! Dinner rolled around more quickly than I was expecting. We went to a sort of buffet, where, right in front of the cash register at the end of the food line were cups of rice formed into balls and wrapped individually in wax paper. I have seen this dozens of times in the last month. Only now did it strike me as something to write home...er, blog...about.

5) Doggie bags are literal bags here. Little cellophane bags you pour or scoop your extra food into. Tie a knot at the top, plop it in your purse, and you are ready to go! (Note to self: tantalizing scents of beef will waft out of your bag when you least expect it and when you least feel like smelling it.)

Continued insights from today:

6) Kareoke isn't that bad...especially when you know the songs. I am convinced though, that some kareoke machines take the in-tune voice that is sung into the microphone and disort it into a off-pitch, warbly, echoing ghost of what it once was. Half of the two kareoke machines I have encountered this week seem to have this kind of affect.

7) Birthday parties and kareoke seem to be inseparable around these parts.

8) Austrian party games can make people from three nations laugh in unison, especially when candle holders are being embraced. ;)

* * *

On a more serious note, I had a thought today hit me quite suddenly out of the blue during the morning service today. I was thinking to myself that I always feel ten times more at ease when I am with someone who is a friend who speaks the local language here, no matter how favorable or unfavorable the circumstances are. I may not fully understand culturally what is going on around me or the comments that are perpetually being made about me as I walk along (so they tell me). I trust in my language expert and friend implicitly, no questions asked. Though I may be curious to know the nuances of what is going on around me or frusterated because of my lack of language skills, I do not (for the specific situation) need these things because of my guide who is watching out for me.
Now for where this is all going.
My relationship with God is the same way. I may not understand how He is orchestrating my life, nor how He is working in the lives of others, nor what is happening in the spiritual realm around me. I may be blind, I may be naiive, I may merely constrained by the finiteness of being human. However, "I know in whom I have believed." I am at peace because I know the one who is brilliantly crafting reality, and He is my Father, my Protector, my Caretaker, the One who loves me most. My place is to follow Him with complete trust and obedience. Not unthinkingly, not irresponsibly, not without asking questions, but asking questions for the sake of marvelling at His plan and His world and Himself with Him.
In trust is quite a joyful place to be.
A lifestyle.