...Because if you're not in Asia, you're in yesterday


Sunday, October 30, 2011

New Post #7

Another email from my friends in Vietnam("Yogi" and "Boo-Boo"), who are sharing the good news there still:

"Hello! I hope you had a good weekend!


Today after helping Hannah teach the children, we went out to eat snails and hot pot. They have an idiom in Vietnam that says something to the effect that “______ is as easy as eating snails.” They use it to say that something is really easy to do. The funny part? "Boo-Boo" and I have a really difficult time eating snails. They get stuck in the shells. It’s kind of embarrassing, but also funny that we have to use toothpicks to get the snails out of their shells. I guess that’s why we don’t use that idiom in America.


While we were with Hannah, she was telling me that her neighbor, who also happens to have his daughter in our kids class, is the Vice President of Foreign Affairs in our province. Hannah told me that he knows “many things” about us. I replied that I knew that because we had to fill out so many papers and turn in a lot of information in order to live in OUR CITY. Hannah replied that she didn’t mean that kind of information. She said that the gover*ment here is a lot different than in the United States and that they know many things about the people they allow to live here long term. I must have looked surprised because she quickly told me not to worry, that her neighbor, the official, likes us very much. In fact, he told her that many foreigners have applied to live in OUR CITY, but he will only allow the two of us to live here long term. He only allows other people to stay for around a month or so, but no one can else can live here long term.


I know that the only way we found favor with the gover*ment in OUR CITY is because of G*d’s working. It is His favor alone that has kept us here. We are so thankful.


Earlier this week, I invited David and a girl from fellowship to go to the new and only fast food restaurant in town. It just opened last week, and it is the only place in town that serves hamburgers and spaghetti. David ordered a hamburger, I ordered French fries, and we sat down to eat. The excitement in his eyes quickly turned to near horror as he took his first bite of hamburger. He had never eaten one before, and I don’t think that he will ever try one again. I felt so bad for him. I could tell he wanted to eat it to make me happy, but he just couldn’t. I told him not to worry, that I felt the same way when I ate a bird embryo here for the first time.


As we were driving home, he told me that his stomach was hungry for Vietnamese food. Maybe this experience will help him understand why we miss American food so much. I guess it’s all what you get used to! I included a photo of us standing in front of the Jollibee bee. Thanks for pr*ying for my health! I am feeling a lot better this week. I am glad that this four week illness is nearing its end. "Boo-Boo" seems to have picked up a slight cold, but other than that, we are healthy. Please pr*y for the other teachers in our organization. This is a time that people generally suffer the most with culture shock. Also, please remember our Vietnamese friends in your pr*yers. We are thankful for many opportunities that arise to share Him with them. Thanks for your pr*yers and support!"






Love,Yogi

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

MORE thank yous

We could not have had a wedding like this without our very generous friends offering their house and land to us for the wedding. A HUGE thank you to Mr. Bob and Mrs. Roi!!

And I am so thankful to and very touched by George Mixon coming to officiate the wedding. He is a good friend of the family and came from Nairobi, Kenya a few days before.

This picture is from 2009 when I got to visit him and his family in Nairobi. They took me out to Massai land where they lived when he was a vet with Christi*n Veterinary Missi*n. Here is George working on his land rover. He taught a few lessons while we were there. Told the basic stories from the Bib/e.



His family is so cool. Seriously. I've wondered for a long time now how he and Martha got their kids to be so cool. I want to learn. I wanted to be a vet because of George and homeschool my kids because of Martha.



When I was in college, they came back to the US and George went to seminary. Now he trains pastors in Kenya. Here he is working on the land rover again.




They are an amazing family and are in Kenya with http://www.whm.org/.
And if you want to support them, you can donate to the Mixons on that website, or you can specify 'Mixon Vehicle Fund.' They need a new land rover...





We wish the whole family could have been over here for the wedding! Francois just has his default face on here; I completely understand because I have one too




I just wish I knew what he was saying to me here.






Kris Carlson and Erin Rodriguez bought tons and tons of sparklers on their way down from Michigan and North Carolina. They got them out and played with the kids, then they gave them out to everyone when it was time for us to leave.It was AMAZING!




And my older brother Trey bought vuvuzelas for the bridal party-MONTHS before, just to be prepared. That was seriously cool, and was really special that he thought to do that. Francois (was so cute) heard them and said, "Vuvuzelas!" Then he turned to me and smiled and said, "...They planned that."Here, Francois is telling my dad to blow harder in the vuvuzela to make a noise and my dad is handing it to him saying, "You do it."
And of all these, we can't decide which one we like the best:











Tuesday, October 18, 2011

A Few Thanks





There are way too many people who helped to mention them all, but here's just a few of the details that made our wedding extra special to me:




Tara and I wrapped about 97 vases and beer bottles with yarn and twine. I really liked it- being able to be creative and new with every one. Cara came out and helped one day too, and folded invitations with us.




My aunt Sally worked her rear off tying (gosh, is that how you spell that?) the raffia on those baby food jars. And trimming the tealights. And ironing and folding napkins. AND much more. Also, a big thanks to Tori for eating all that baby food so we could use those jars.






Did you notice the flowers in the last picture too? Beautiful! Thanks to Katie Newman, Wendy Hall, Jennifer Galloway, Lynne Colbert, Tara Jones, and Cindy Baynham (and probably more, I was busy and probably missed some stuff). And a friend of Aunt Sally's gave us about 30 stems of huge sunflowers.



Again, my bouquet was perfect. It was so colorful that it made me decide to wear a necklace that I bought in Hội An, Vietnam. (The blue bracelet--my something blue-- was given to me by my student Selena) Thankyou Cindy Baynham for putting together a stunning bouquet!!
And Cindy's daughter, and childhood best friend, Kate designed the programs and the font for them! Although I printed them out with the song lyrics on the front (not her idea)(tryin to be green folks), her design was fantastic. And I was very touched that she made the font especially for us, with a little African touch for Francois. No one else has ever used this font. Pretty cool.




Laura and Steph glued the sticks in there and we all got a little giggly from the rubber cement.



Francois used the router to carve the words in all of the little signs you see. I love them.

I know this table was touched with many hands. I love it so much!


If anyone ever needs to borrow a water dispenser...




Granddaddy's lady friend, Mrs. Patsy, helped us get a bunch of September peaches from her family's farm.I had some ideas and just barely mentioned them and Tara and others just made everything happen. Everything looked great.




My lovely cousin MC made this chocolate cake with chocolate butter icing. Yum yum! Beautiful too. MC and I learned to knit together when I visited her in Montreat when she was going to school there (and 4 years later I copied her). She's very crafty and you can see on her website: http://www.nu-trio.com/







My cousin Suzanne decorated our little fisher price farmhouse people to be the bride and groom (see the little vest?). And I found out later that Brian (MC's husband) so expertly re-hotglued those sticks together. Well done all around.







That's still not all, but I'll post again soon. THANKS TO EVERYONE WHO HELPED!!









(again, pictures by Cindy Stansberry Photography)

Some pictures from the wedding!

For those of you who haven't seen pictures from our wedding, here are some more, taken by my friend Cindy (http://www.facebook.com/#!/cindystansberryphotography). The wedding was September 10th, 2001 and the weather was a perfect miracle.



Some of the flowers I ordered didn't come in; apparently it was a bad time for cornflowers. The proteas did come though and I had a little bit of South Africa in my bouquet, which made me really happy. As for the rest of the flowers, friends and family pulled together and cut hedges, scoured flower shops, and cut out of their gardens, and came up with the PERFECT FLOWERS. Everything was better than I could have imagined. So many little details that came together right at the last minute.



These are only a few of them, some of my favorites actually. I'll put up more from the ceremony later. These take forever to load, so it's a process...


If you see 'the kiss' (it's on youtube too)... I'm so glad Cindy caught that on camera. Francois said that he hadn't planned it, but he just decided a few seconds before George said, "You may kiss your bride." Probably took a lot of people off guard who don't know Francois very well. I was shocked too because that could have gone very wrong, especially with how nervous we both were!


Ahhh, what a great day...










































































A big THANK-YOU to Cindy for our wonderful pictures!!
http://www.facebook.com/#!/cindystansberryphotography