Now I know my ABCs

Today was a typical day for me.  I woke up and did some reading and journaling, then enjoyed a curry breakfast at 9 o clock.  By 10 o clock I was ready to leave the house for the day, as per my host's instructions; we ended up leaving at 11:30 - typical of how time flows here in Sri Lanka.  I have learned to always have a book or magazine handy.  We were off to make the rounds visiting some people from the congregation, praying for them, seeing how we can help meet some of their needs.  These visits are usually conducted exclusively in Sinhala, so I usually just pray, or if there are children in the house I try to make funny faces at them, hoping to solicit a smile or two.  Kids don't seem to care that I can't speak their language.  I am learning a lot of these universal languages as I am here. smiling is one language in which I have been able to have beautiful conversations.
 Anyways, one of these smile conversations led this one pretty little girl to show me her "Learning ABC" book.  She opened it up and showed me the "R" for Rabbit, and "D" for Dog and other classic examples that you would expect to find in a book teaching the alphabet to toddlers.  However, there were a couple examples that were sure sign indicators that this book was not published in a country that speaks English as there first language.  This lovely publishing company from Sri Lanka had some interesting words it wanted to teach children for "A" and "Q":

For those of you, who like me, do not even know what "quinine" is:
quinine |ˈkwīˌnīn|
noun
a bitter crystalline compound present in cinchona bark, used as a tonic and formerly as an antimalarial drug. • An alkaloid; chem. formula: C 20 H 24 N 2 O 2.

Definitely a useful word in anyone's vocabulary.
If only I had a book to teach me these these valuable words when I was a toddler.

"The unexamined life is not worth living." ~ Socrates

My last post left you with tales of toiletry and cultural conundrums, evidence of my stumblings and bumblings in a strange new land. I am happy to report that this strange land is becoming less foreign and more....dare I say..."home." I think that for me, I would call home a place that I can be myself and people accept me. The comfort level is steadily rising to a degree where I feel I can be myself. Obviously there are limitations: "myself" communicates in English and not Sinhala; "myself" would still have dreadlocks (but that is a more complicated issue than me wanting to be myself); "myself" would probably itch and scratch places that I would not dare of itching and scratching here, but that probably has more to do with becoming TOO comfortable at home than it has to do with being myself. These things aside, I can be myself. This "home-coming" became evident to me one night as I drove in a van with three other Sri Lankans, only one of whom has a convervastional grasp of the English language. I can't recall the context, but somehow I had got the entire van into uproarious laughter, and it wasn't because they were snickering at my attempts at Sinhala pronunciation!  I guess laughter is a universal language - it makes me feel at home.
Being more comfortable has afforded me the opportunity to engage in one of my other favorite activities: thinking. A peculiar pastime for sure, but one that is difficult to ignore when every moment, every fiber of my life is being grated against the fabric of a culture whose construct chafes against my North-American nurtured skin in every way possible. Living in a developing country does not make me resent my North American whiteness and wealth; I am not sorry that I am a white man - but it does make me ask a lot of questions about life and justice and morality and spirituality. Some things I am thinking: (these are rhetorical and have by no means come to any concrete conclusions in my mind, but I would love to hear your comments on these things)
-Is a desire to be challenged and have my mind expanded a worthwhile reason to spend a whole bunch of money to fly to a third world country with money that I am sure could have fed hundreds of starving children?
-Are tithes and donations to "feed the poor, heal the sick" of any worth if the giver remains unchallenged by the very reason that poverty and sickness exist?
-Is traveling, in an effort to be challenged, a worthy investment of God-given resources?
-How do we ensure that our lives remain/or become "others-focused" while living in cultures that are so comfortable and play towards our selfish nature?
-Do we need to fly half-way across the world in order to keep our minds and worldviews from becoming stagnant and unchallenged?
-What is the balance between enjoying/exploring all that Creation has to offer (a seemingly selfish endeavor) and helping others (selflessness)?  Do they exist at opposite ends of the spectrum or can they find common ground in some sort of union?

?

These are the things I end up thinking about every time I pull out my fat wallet to purchase something for mere pennies from street vendors.  I don't necessarily feel guilty, I just think.  Maybe that is a problem too. 
I don't know the answers and I doubt you do either, but that does not mean it is fruitless to engage these questions.  Please comment, or write me an email, or just let this stew in your minds for a few days and let me know what delicious brew forms.  My own mind has been marinating since I got off the plane.

Happy digesting.

Caught Left Handed

This week has afforded me a haven of sorts, called Lanka Bible College.  Upon graduating from Briercrest, I doubted that I would be back in a Bible College classroom so soon, but here I am, in Kandy Sri Lanka carrying out the same routine that I have become so comfortable to me for the past five years.  No, I have not re-enrolled in Bible school, this is only a one week stint at LBC, but a welcome one.  My host, Chaminda, is working on a Bachelor of Theology degree and was due for a week of Contemporary Theology this week, so I opted to join him.  For the whopping price of 1, 250 rupees ($12.50 Canadian - compared to around $700 per class that I paid per class back in Canada), and the promise of instruction in English, I figured it was too good to pass up.

This has proven to be a fantastic opportunity for me.  I have been able to engage my mind in English again, and have also made some friends with a large handful of English speaking people in Sri Lanka.  But more than that, sitting in discussions with a class full of Sri Lankans has allowed me to gain a MUCH greater understand of this nation, its people, and its values.  I feel that I am starting to gain my feet once again. 

A welcome sign of my acclimatization has been the return of humor.  Rather than seeing culture differences as frustrating, a lot of them have become quite hilarious to me.  For instance, today after class I went on a couple visits to some homes with my host, both of them non-English speaking.  Sri Lankans LOVE to be hospitable, and in their world hospitality involves pushing as much food as possible at you anytime you visit.  I have learned how to say no, but in this situation, with the language barrier, they must have misconstrued my polite "no thankyou" hand motions as a plea for more.  So within an hour I had polished off half of a cake and had downed my 6th cup of tea for the day, and I am sure I would have been forced to consume more had it not been for Chaminda rescuing me from the food pushers by interpreting my feeble sign language. 

My cultural learnings have also allowed me to uncover the hilarity behind some of the things that I previously disregarded.  Case in point - This is a picture of one of my very first sights in Sri Lanka: a welcome oasis in the Colombo airport after the 9 hour flight from Frankfurt to Sri Lanka.

  I was immediately intrigued by the "shower head" on the wall in the toilet stall, so I took a picture and wondered why people would find it necessary to shower in the bathroom stall.  For the past week, as I have lived amongst hosts that are well accustomed to North American guests, in a house complete with all the North American comforts, my initial analysis of the airport bathroom required no further scrutiny.  However, today during lunch break, as I discovered "the facilities," I found the same peculiar set up that I had seen in the airport, minus one very important item...toilet paper.  As I frantically searched the neighboring stalls for a scrap of white gold, I came to the horrifying realization that toilet paper was not only missing, but entirely foreign to these bathrooms (and most bathrooms in Sri Lanka).  Those "shower heads" were not for showering at all...  and now I understand FULLY why everyone here eats with their right hand! 

....sorry for the bathroom humour, hopefully you can laugh at my clumsy cultural education and not necessarily at the potty prose

Challenge

This post could be an interesting one.  I have had about a million thoughts floating around in my head since I arrived in Sri Lanka; the sheer volume of which hasn't really allowed me to process all that I am thinking.  I have done a little bit of journalling to try and make sense of what I am experiencing here, and this is kind of a continuation of that: a sort of verbal purge of all that is in my mind in an attempt to lay it out before me (and you), step back, take a look, and see if I can understand what's in my head.

A day or two before I left, my aunt asked me, "David, what do you hope to gain/experience from your time in Sri Lanka?"  Without hesitation I replied, "I want to be challenged."  Yikes.  If I only knew the full extent of what those words would imply as I threw myself wholly into a different world, to live and love and experience for three (or more) months.  Yes, I am being challenged.

No matter what anyone did tell me, or could have told me, despite what I read and studied, I don't think I could have prepared myself for my first experience living in a different culture.  Everything here forces me out of my comfort and requires me to alter the way I think about things.  I was trying to put my thoughts into picture form: I feel like I have suddenly been forced into a wheel chair after a lifetime of knowing how to walk.  I look around and see people walking, even running, and I know that I know how to walk and run as well, but here I cannot.  Rather, I am stuck in this wheel chair, being pushed around by those who can walk and run freely.  My mobility is limited, I am restricted to studying these walkers from my wheel chair, hoping that I can pick up cues and habits that might enable me to walk with the same strength that I formally knew.  But for now, I simply go where I am pushed.

Obviously, the biggest challenge is the language.  There are plenty of people here who speak English with enough fluency that I can have uninhibited conversation, however, the feeling of being "on the outside" is never far away.  If I am in a group of people, the likelihood of all of them speaking conversational English is slight, so the conversation naturally falls into Sinhala.  I have a little Sinhala-English phrasebook that has allowed me some hilarious conversations, in which most of the time is spent flipping furiously between pages, trying to piece together some semblance of communication.  They are usually quite pleased with my efforts.  I have found a "Learn Sinhala" website that I hope will be allow me more conversation and a less time blankly staring at people.

I think I am pretty much over my jet lag now.  But fatigue is never far away.  It is incredibly exhausting to live in a completely different culture.  All my natural, Canadian-born inclinations, must be checked, adapted, and then evaluated to make sure that my actions were culturally acceptable.  Some of the adaptations I think I am doing quite well at.  For instance, I don't use utensils anymore.  Everyone in Sri Lanka eats with their right hand.  My first attempt to eat Sri Lanka style involved diving in, North-American-hamburger-and-fries style, with both hands.  Quiet laughter and a gentle rebuke informed me that I should leave my left hand in my lap.  The left hand apparently has a historical function that is not conducive to eating!  Lesson learned.  Despite wanting to eat with my hands my entire life, it is a lot more difficult than expected!  Believe it or not, there is a proper way to put food in your mouth with your hand...maybe I can give you a demo when I get back.

Other things that are culturally "other to me:
-A girl asked how old I was and I replied, "22," to which she replied, "I thought you were older, about 27 or 28, because you are so tall and so fat!"  hmmm....I don't think I have ever been called fat in my entire life.  My host figures she meant "in shape."
-It is not uncommon for men to hold hands
-Average meal times: Breakfast - 9 am; Lunch 2 pm; Supper 9 pm
-They don't really eat meat here
-I have eaten rice for every meal since being here, except yesterday I ate KFC for lunch
-Schedule?  What's a schedule?
-I have seen a grand total of 3 white people since I have been here.  I visited a village where some little boys ran around yelling "SUDHA, SUDHA!" My host informed me that I might be the first "sudha" (white man) that they have seen.

One difference that has really quite affected me is there views over how one should dress and look.  Imagine with me a country where the the temperature is usually over 25 degrees Celsius, and the majority of work is done outdoors, or in open air shops.  You would think that shorts and t-shirts would be a common sight....WRONG!  For whatever reason, most of the men where dress pants and dress shirts.  The older, working class men wear sarongs (skirt like garments), and a lot of the women dress in saris (just google it), but the majority of men wear hot cotton dress pants and collared, stifling, button up shirts.  I think most of you know me well enough to know that this is NOT MY STYLE!  I have been able to get away with shorts and t-shirt most of the time (I think because I am a young white man, given some allowances because I am obviously not part of the culture) but I feel as though I might eventually have to give in to this uncomfortable looking fashion.  It did not take me long to realize that the "clean-cut" business-man style is the norm here.  Once again, not my style.  However, I made up my mind long before I set foot on this island, that I wanted to try to be a part of their culture as much as I could.  This meant gut check time for me (some of you might see where this is going).  I made a thousand arguments in my head to try and get my own way, but basically, as such a stranger to this culture, I don't want to offend anyone, without understanding anything that people were saying I want to know that when they were staring, it is because I am white and not because I have/had dreads.....

see post below

"...all things to all men..."

free to comment

Aayu-bowan!
I have officially arrived in Kandy Sri Lanka!  Flight came in at 4:15 a.m, went through customs no problem (which I am sure is a great relief to all of you who thought I would be strip searched for drugs on account of my hair) and then began the three hour windy drive to Kandy with Chaminda, my host/pastor/uncle (apparently in Sri Lankan culture I am his nephew we are related and I am younger than him, which makes him my uncle).  I am just writing a quick post to let you know that I changed my settings so that anyone can leave comments now.  I wasn't aware that I had it set otherwise.  So, comment away!  Just make sure you fill in your name when you comment so I know who it is from.  Ok, I am going to try to sleep off some jet lag.  I will do a full update as soon as my mind joins my body in this time zone.

shift

Greetings family, friends, and curious strangers!

Let me preface this entry by informing you that the "SHIFT" key on the keyboard from which I am typing is malfunctioning. As a result, capitalizing anything requires significant effort and a fair amount of luck to get the button to hit just right and capitalize my letters. Indeed a rather frustrating predicament for my debut in the blogging community. So, if it is alright with you, I will cease to capitalize from this point forward (unless it is really important and worth the effort). i promise that my commitment to grammar will return as soon as i am able to write from a fully functioning keyboard.

this unfortunate circumstance does however allow me a convenient (though slightly cheesy) segue into this post. "shift" is appropriate to describe the next day, week, months of my life as i enter into something completely "other." today, in approximately 8.5 hours, i will be boarding a plane in toronto that will inaugurate my journey of shifts as i leave canada to travel halfway around the world to live in sri lanka for 3(minimum) to 6(maximum) months. there are certain things that i am expecting to experience, but i am aware that there is little that will prepare me for much of what i will live/learn/be exposed to while i am there.

some "shifts" i am expecting:

-from -4o degree celsius canadian winters to +25 sri lankan winters (with an average relative humidity of 70%!)
-from english to sinhala. sinhala is the language spoken by the majority singhalese population. tamil is spoken by the minority tamil population. both are official languages of the country.
-from living as a member of the majority population, to occupying the minority foreigner role
-from driving on the right side of the road to the left
-from the vast open, unpopulated countryside of southern alberta (canada has a population density of 3.2 people/square km) to densely populated little sri lanka (298 people/square km)
-from momma's good 'ole "meat 'n potatoes" dutch style cooking to spicy, spicy curry. i have heard that sri lankan curry is one of the spiciest curries around. apparently it isn't uncommon to eat curry for breakfast either! i am hoping that this radical shift in input doesn't result in too radical a shift in output... ...
-from coffee breaks to tea time (sri lanka is one of the world's largest exporters of tea)
-from a "christian" nation to a buddhist nation. in sri lanka: buddhists - 70%; hindus - 15%; muslims - 9%; christians - 6%
-from a place where i can freely worship God and attend a church, to a country where christians are seen as suspect. though outright persecution of christians is minimal, the buddhist government is worried that other religions are encouraging young buddhists to abandon buddhism. christianity is seen as the main threat.
-from a peaceful country to a country who is just starting to recover from a three decades war that ended (by media and government reports) in may of this year.

i am excited about shifts. i am excited about the opportunity to be confronted each day with a way of life that is radically different from my own. i hope that my own worldview is refined and challenged when held up against the fabric of a completely different way of life and thinking. hopefully this blog will be able to relay some of the changes in my thinking and being. more than just regurgitating my weekly events, i hope to give anyone who ventures upon this blog something to think about. i undoubtedly will be doing a fair share of thinking myself as i undergo a shift in my life which is sure to leave its mark long after my adventure in sri lanka comes to a close.

p.s.
i hope to post at least once a week at least so be sure to check back! and, since this is the primary communication i will have with most people back home, PLEASE LEAVE COMMENTS!

p.p.s. i promise i will use proper capitalization next time