Flobots - No Handlebars.

memoir.

this is a memoir that i wrote for my advanced comp class. i left the last "when i was twelve" part out of the memoir i turned in because it doesn't flow well and i know that, but that section probably conveys my feelings toward england the best. so i'm leaving it for my own sake.

When I was twelve, I started Mrs. Liss’s seventh-grade English class. When I was twelve, I started a lot of new things that I don’t remember, but I will never be able to forget Mrs. Liss.

We called her the Grammar Nazi, a nickname we later stopped when we found out she was Jewish. She was the typical old English teacher – she wore big rings on her fingers that seemed to weigh her hands down as the rings always tapped the desk in front of her. She wore pink lipstick that she sometimes got on her teeth, and her hair was so thick that when she scratched her head, three imprints were left from her fingers.

That first day of English was awful. I didn’t know anyone in the school, let alone her classroom, and I was twelve, and I wanted to fit in with everyone but I didn’t because I had big glasses and an English accent.

That first day of seventh-grade English class, Mrs. Liss had her class do two things. In case we missed a day of school, she told us, we would have to call a friend to find out what we missed in English class. So she made us find a friend to exchange phone numbers with. I didn’t have any friends, so I asked the only girl who seemed nerdier than I was to be my homework buddy. She was my first friend.

Then Mrs. Liss had us take a test about subjects and verbs. I knew what a verb was, but I had never heard of a subject, and so when she gave us the phrase “We won!” I figured that it was missing a subject since we didn’t know what they won.

Mrs. Liss talked about a lot of new things I had never heard of before, and that first marking period, I failed seventh-grade English class. My mom went in to talk to her about how I always got good grades and was really good at English, but I had never been taught any of this grammar stuff in England.

I had always thought that I was good at English, and then I failed seventh-grade English class. What a surprise for me to learn that I had grown up in England and hadn’t been taught English!

And everyone knew me as the English girl, and I didn’t want to be known as the English girl, I wanted to be known as Andrea.

And as for my friends, I had my homework buddy and a girl who let me sit with her at lunch. And the girl who let me sit with her at lunch thought that English people drove around in horses and carriages on cobblestone streets, which I assured her we did not.

But all of my anxieties were taken care of. I made friends, and Mrs. Liss eventually gave me an A in English class (because I was from England, and I also won a writing award). Time always takes care of us in one way or another.

When I was twelve, I sat on my mom’s lap on a plane and cried a couple tears as we flew over the country I was born in. But that was it – a couple tears. For the rest of the flight, the daydreamer inside of me took over, answering all of my family’s unanswered questions – where would we live? My daydreams were so vivid, and I knew that if it was up to me, we would move to where it snowed heavily during the winter, and I would have a big bay window in my bedroom overlooking our horse stables.

In hindsight, there are too many things wrong with this picture. My family had no experience farming horses, and I didn’t even really like horses. And the fact that we were a poor missionary family who had been living off of what others gave us for seven years didn’t delude the ideal of the bay window.

This was what I wanted, though I knew I wouldn’t get it – and what I did get was another bunk bed shared with my sister. But there were other dreams of mine that I knew would be attainable. I mean, how many kids got the chance to completely start over?

I would be a free spirit – my own person. I would wear big flowing shirts, and everyone would wonder about me. And I would also be a better Christian, and maybe I could even have Christian friends because in England I didn’t know any Christians my age.

Oh yes, I would have lots of friends who were Christians, and they would help me to actually be a Christian, because something that England had not given me was understanding and love for others, and the one thing I understood about Jesus was that He loved people, and I didn’t know how to love people. I knew that my mom loved it when I helped in the kitchen, but I only did it because I liked cooking. And me and my best friend, Jenny, didn’t like anyone. We even tried to make a potion to get rid of people we didn’t like. I always felt bad for making fun of other people with Jenny, just like I felt bad deep down inside when I was embarrassed that my dad would come into my school and talk about Jesus. I knew that I wasn’t a good Christian, but I also knew things wouldn’t change. And that’s why I was so excited to start over in the land of what many call opportunity.

But things don’t always turn out the way you want them to, like how I didn’t get a bay window, and I also didn’t make many Christian friends, and I didn’t really enjoy youth group so I tried not to go as often as I could.

So you just kind of exist and in the back of your head you kind of just hope that things go the way they were supposed to. And maybe my daydreams aren’t how it’s supposed to be, and you learn to be OK with that, and you also learn that that doesn’t mean you stop daydreaming.

When I was twelve, I very willingly packed up my small amount of belongings and left the place where I had grown up, and the place that I honestly loved. And I moved to a place that I honestly loved, and I forgot about my English home.

When I was twelve, we lived with my grandparents, and I cut corn, canned peaches, and made applesauce with my grandma. I always ate Honeycomb or Applejacks for breakfast, and my Grandma also stuffed an egg and piece of toast down my throat. That first day of seventh-grade we still lived with Grandma, and I could hardly eat a bowl of cereal I was so nervous. And a teacher yelled at me that first morning because I walked in the wrong door and didn’t know where I was going.

But when I came home from school, Grandma was working outside in the garden with her bonnet on, and so it was all OK. And that first evening, my cousins came up and we caught fireflies, and fireflies are what I think of when I think of our visits to America. There are no fireflies in England.

We looked at houses to buy and I chose the one with the coolest refrigerator, but my parents chose the one with the biggest yard. And lots of people gave us free furniture that didn’t match, and we even got two free cars, and it was then that I realized for the first time how poor we were.

One time in England during a flute lesson, my atheist teacher asked me how much my dad made, and I didn’t know, but one time I had seen a check from our church for £100, and I knew that they paid for our water and electricity, and so I told him that and he laughed, and I was mad at him because I didn’t realize what a small amount that was, but I knew that Mr. Ayers was somehow mocking him for it. I didn’t like Mr. Ayers and I wasn’t good at flute so I didn’t care, because I was happy as long as I could go home and eat crackers and cheese and watch TV.

And when we came to America I realized we didn’t have much money for clothes and I didn’t know that in England because I wore a uniform to school everyday, and unlike most girls, I enjoyed getting hand-me-downs because that meant my cool older sister had worn it.

So maybe ignorance really is bliss, or maybe it just didn’t matter how poor we were because we all loved each other, and maybe it’s true, maybe all a person really does need is love.

When I was twelve, after I got to know some girls, I went to a friend’s sleepover, and they started playing with a Ouija board. I knew that Ouija boards were bad, so I pretended to be asleep in the other room where they were watching a Stephen King movie. And I knew that I didn’t want to be there because I didn’t like horror movies or Ouija boards, but they were my friends. And one of my greatest faults is that I want everyone to like me, and I wanted them to like me, so I let it go and didn’t tell my mom.

When I was twelve, I found out that a lot less kids smoke in America than England – none of my friends had even tried a cigarette! I also realized that there weren’t many “scrubs” – our nickname we got from the song “No Scrub” by TLC which perfectly described the losers who would drive around looking at girls as we walked home from school.

And not that I didn’t observe smoking and scrubs in America, I just observed them a lot less. The worst thing that I witnessed was an older boy flicking a booger at me on the bus.

And now that I look back on it, I wonder what I would have been like had my parents not sat us down and told us we were moving to America. Maybe I wouldn’t have played Ouija, but maybe I would be sitting in the passenger seat of a scrub while smoking a cigarette.

I am not twelve now, and England is not a part of my life anymore. My time in England does not define me; it is just a cool fact about me. No, my past is behind me and there it belongs, and it slowly becomes less and less visible to me until it almost doesn’t exist.

a month later

i'm in my last year of school. crazy, right? i still feel like i'm in high school sometimes.
about a week after i got back from czech i went to one of my roommate's weddings. it was so encouraging to see real God-centered love.
here are two of my favorite people...rebekah and ariel. ariel was such an encouragement to me last year. she challenged me and loved me. and rebekah and i will just always be pathetically similar.
a little weird thing i learned about myself this summer was just how touchy-feely i am. that sounds weird, i know, but even now i find myself craving hugs from people. if i'm sitting beside someone and they're leaning forward, i really want to scratch their back. physical touch is definitely my love language, but i guess i should back off a little bit! :-)
this semester i'm taking an advanced comp class. it's just about the first time i've had in college to write creatively, and our first assignment, a memoir, is due next week. maybe i'll post whatever it is that i write about, but for right now i've just been typing out streams of consciousness, and i've actually been writing a lot about england. i am so disconnected from england, it hardly feels like that was such a major part of my life anymore. i guess it's not a major part of my life anymore. it's just a part of me that happened.
it's sad thinking of how life goes on. there are some really cool people you meet and then never see again.

life has gone on.

after Bohumin camp and follow up, we spent five days in Prague, hanging out and debriefing. Vojta, Silva, and Paja from Pardubice came to visit us for a day, and Michal from Val Mez surprised us and came to visit. here are some pictures:

we had a couple days of debriefing where all 30 Czech interns hung out and talked. we got to see the new Batman movie together, and then we had a dinner cruise on the river. the last night, my team had a nice dinner at a great steakhouse in Prague, and then hung out until 3:30 when we left for the airport.
so i don't know how i feel about being back. Nate had a lot of great thoughts for us as we come back, and that is that America is where i am called right now, so i can't be stuck on Czech. the biggest culture shock i've had is the high water level in the toilets :-)
Nate said that life has gone on for everyone and i haven't been a part of it. it's true, but at the same time, it seems like nothing has changed and i have so much. i hope that i can keep living in this change and not go back to the way things were before. i hope my love for Christ is renewed through the year.
keep me in your prayers, because it's so easy to go back to life and forget about my summer.
pray that i keep in touch with the students, and that the youth groups keep building relationships and caring for the students.
pray that i recognize my mission field in america and am satisfied to be here.

so here i am, and thus concludes my blog. sorry my entries have been so long, but in a way they've been more for me than anyone else. thank you for all your prayers!

Bohumin camp

what a wonderful camp. there were about 38 of us - we worked with another intern team because this year there was a lack of churches, and the one that had worked with Bohumin before backed out - a normal story this year for English camps. almost all the intern teams had at least one camp without an American church. i was nervous about working with another intern team for a couple of reasons - first, we were TIRED! an American church brings energy and enthusiasm, and as two intern teams we had given ourselves away to two other camps already. we didn't have energy for another camp. second, we had been to a cabin with the Bohumin group before as you may remember from an earlier blog entry, and i knew that they were a really energetic group, always having to do something...not a good mix for two tired intern teams. and finally, almost everyone on my team knew the people on the other intern team except for me, and when i thought about it too much i thought that i would feel left out of the groups. so because of all of these reasons, this last camp was the one that i was least looking forward to.
and even going into camp i had a bad attitude. meeting new people, teaching another week of English...ugh. but i started camp with the prayer of not only energy, but refreshment, and that i would need to depend on God more during the week. so i got into camp, played frisbee with them, sat at random tables with them, played dutch blitz with them (they are SO GOOD at dutch blitz!).
but before i go on, here's ania (and johnny, i loved these two!). you may remember a picture of her from earlier at the hillsong concert. she came to training for a few days with us before camp, and we were in the same room and hung out a lot. we really hit it off, and i think she was a big reason for my change of heart with bohumin. we loved each other right off, and she pulled me in and got me connected.
and as the week progressed, my heart did too. i really felt connected with almost all of the girls. here's another story and someone to introduce you to: Sarinka. Sara is a really funny and outgoing girl, and she can speak almost no English. when she came to camp, she seemed to like everyone but me. here's a clue about me: i want everyone to like me. so i tried with her so hard, and she still didn't seem to like me. i don't know when it happened, but at some point she totally changed with me, and started giving me hugs, and almost wouldn't leave me alone. we had the funniest relationship since we could barely communicate, but we called each other "moje kokino" - my sweet. at follow up she would carry me around on her back and we would pretend that i was superman.
we had such a fun group of campers. they were energetic, but God granted me these crazy spurts of energy every day - it couldn't have come from anywhere but Him. i did go to bed earlier than all my roommates though, and always felt guilty doing it because i knew they all wanted to talk to me. another way i connected: i had a group of kids who i called my children, and they called me their mom. it really meant nothing but i think it made us all feel special and loved.
(my class - in the back: me, emily, Andrea, George, Aneta, Dania. front: Martin (Bob), Mart'a, Martin)
especially with martin, who called himself bob - he is such a goof. he's a redhead, which you don't see that often in czech, so i called him my son and he called me mom throughout the whole week. he was in my class, and the other intern team had met him randomly in bohumin while they were playing basketball, and so he came to camp. he told us that he's now closer to being a christian than not. i hope that my other son, Johnny (he's a Christian, and the two hit it off right away) keeps connected with him.
and the other Martin in my class. here's a great story. he's from Prague, and so it was surprising that he would come to English Camp with a smaller town like Bohumin. one of the leaders spoke to his mom, and one of his teachers in Prague used to go to the Bohumin youth group, and suggested to his mom that he go to English camp. apparently Martin is pretty bad (thought i didn't get that vibe), and so as punishment his mom sent him to English camp realizing that only good could come of it. i had a hard time with him, not that i didn't like him, but i felt like we made no connection with him. he fell asleep a couple times during discussion groups, and i felt like we weren't getting through to him. but then one night in discussion, he said that he had some good talks with David. David - our translator wasn't even supposed to come to Bohumin camp with us - he was supposed to be in Bolivia! but it didn't work out and he felt like he should come, even though we really didn't need him. but it turns out we did. David prayed with him by the end of the week, and since David goes to school in Prague he's gonna get Martin connected there. i'm so excited for the two of them!
and finally, Andrea. she was in my class, and by the second day of camp she asked me to stay at her house for follow up, and i excitedly agreed to! she had come to english camp before, and didn't really seem too open during discussion. keep praying for her to be open - by the end of the week, she said she wasn't really interested in God but didn't know where her life would take her. she had a great family and i loved staying with her - she was so hospitable and loving.
and so i can't even fully describe this camp, but i really love them so much. all my fears about this camp were displaced - everyone loved each other. all of my fears just taught me that all I really need is to depend on God more.

uselessness.

i have found that uselessness can actually be a good thing. as i mentioned ealier in my prayer requests, the youth group in val mez did an amazing job at reaching out to students. during the night of the gospel presentation, we had a cajovna (tea house). i was able to talk to one of my roommates for a while before david butted into the conversation and took over in czech. so after that conversation was over, i realized that i had no one to talk to because all of the czech christians were talking to all the students! i had no idea what to do, and i felt so useless. but it was the best feeling i could have had at that point, because for the first time i realized my position as an american: to be american. the Val Mez youth group is solid, and it's a sweet feeling to know that the campers are still gonna be pursued and looked after by the youth group. and my job is to facebook the campers and still love them.

the group was so easy to fall in love with. the camp was younger than pardubice and had a lower level of English, but they were amazing kids who wanted to speak english and spend time with us. it's so fun to see the difference from the beginning of the week until the end, when students don't know each other and then when we're all so comfortable with each other. one girl kept to herself at first, but after days of everyone reaching out to her, she was laying on top of us and hugging us all.

we worked with a team from san diego and they were just what we needed - they were energetic and funny, and they loved the students. they were such an encouragement to us interns and really took care of us. they brought us american food and bought the girls some bath and body works shower gel so we could smell like girls again. i was so impressed with how everyone honestly connected as one group. i now have good friends in san diego who i can hang out with too :-)

here's a picture of the two american teams:

this is us being tough :-)

i did something different at this camp: i taught an almost beginner class. i've only ever taught higher level classes, but i really enjoyed teaching a lower level class. we really only covered three topics because there was so much repitition, but it was fun. it was more challenging for discussion groups for me - after having such great discussion groups in pardubice, i now had a younger group who hadn't thought through as many life issues (this year's topic is about being human - about experiencing different needs - love, success, failure, belonging, the difference between body and soul). it took awhile for them to really open up, but my co-teachers, amanda and john, really helped by being open with the students. kamila, my translator, and vaneta, the youth group leader also took awhile to fully begin leading discussion groups, so for awhile it was a little awkward having everything translated and having the americans try to explain everything. but by the end of the week, they had taken over discussion which was exactly what we had been praying for.

here are two pictures of my class.

this is our serious family picture. in the front are the teachers: me, john, and amanda. in the back from the left are klara, peter, kamila, radim, and vaneta. they were a really fun group, and they were active which was nice since we could do some awesome role plays!

we also had them each take turns translating everything that the americans said into czech. klara was probably at a higher level than the boys, and so i think translating made her feel a lot more confident in her ability. they were a very cool class - very different from what i'm used to, but it was what i needed.

amanda and i also got along really well and i'm excited to have a new american friend when i go home!

i wrote earlier about a girl who became a Christian, and that was klara who was in my class. she was cool, and definitely felt like she belonged at english camp and that that was where she was really accepted. she, kami, and vaneta really got to know each other well and i know that she will be well looked after and discipled. she's nervous to let her mom know of her decision. czech culture is so different - i know a lot of stories of kids becoming christians and their parents in turn kicking them out of the house. this happened to vaneta when she was 16 - her parents only gave her a backpack and then she was left by herself. but she knew that what she believed was true. pray for klara as she tells her parents about her decision and sticks to it! this kind of thing is so encouraging to me. here's a picture of klara with me and melissa. klara was really on my heart the whole week.

let me introduce two other girls who were as well: my roommates. eliska is blonde, and her sister is a part of the youth group. she brought along her friend, kacusa. they both have amazing english, and i really loved both of them. i enjoyed talking to them and joking with them and just taking naps in our room together. kacusa is such a thinker, and as i said earlier, i was able to talk with her during the cajovna. she studies history and religions by herself and is really interested in studying more religion, especially christian thelogy. i encouraged her to study the major world religions, and david gave her a mere christianity book by c.s. lewis. she was amazed that such famous philosophers and writers like c.s. lewis and tolkien were christians. i really loved these girls and found myself basically following them around all week. i hope that these are relationships i can keep.

i loved it.

i've been thinking a lot about my future, and i've always been going back and forth about whether or not czech is in my long-term future. i will always return to czech, but i really feel like this is where i belong in the long-term. i hate leaving english camp not knowing when or if i'll see some people again. the outreach here needs to be relational, and it's the hardest thing leaving people who i really began to love.

well, time will tell.

just a couple thoughts...

just some randomness. i'm seeing the end of the trip in sight, and though it's been AMAZING and indescribable in some ways, i am excited to go home and see my family, especially knowing they're all on vacation together this week. but i'm realizing more and more how necessary this trip was for me...i needed change. i needed to be here to be broken by God again, but i'm also realizing how much passion i don't feel for God and it hurts me. i wish that i could feel Him and just long to praise Him. camps have made me so dependent on God which is amazing, but i still wish i could just love God with all of me.


after camp with Val Mez, Keith and i decided to take a trip back to pardubice to visit some friends. here are some pictures:






just as a disclaimer, i have shorts on under my skirt. from the left is Vera, Vojta, Keith, Vitek, me, and Helena. these are my good friends from pardubice, i'm so glad i could go there and just spend time with them.




they took us to the top of a hill where there's a castle and we hung out and watched the beautiful sunset. really...it was so gorgeous.












the next picture is at the same place of me and keith. i think it's such a cute picture and keith likes it because he "looks manly." and he doesn't look manly that often ;-)

and now, finally: the big change. last time i pierced my nose, here's a picture of it (if you can see it). i love the piercing! this time...i tried putting blonde streaks in my hair. Vera and Helena tried doing it, but it didn't work. apparently red hair is really hard to dye - Larissa told me when she gets highlights her hairdresser uses a special dye and leaves it in for longer. so here's a picture of me trying to get highlights:

and here's the nose!