Christmas Reflections

I really loved Christmas this year. I flew to Portland and have been enjoying a whole week with my family and extended family. I will fly back to Santa Barbara on Sunday, just in time to make my usual Church service, which is cancelled this week. My flight arrives in the middle of the one service they are having. I obviously won't hit everything, but I'll hit some of the highlights.

This is the first time I've seen my brother Nathan since he turned 21, so I got to have a few drinks with him. I introduced him to Rum and Coke, Pina Coladas, and sent him back to college with Rum to spare. Happy New Year Nathan!

My father recently digitized some of our old reel-to-reel family videos and put them on DVD. The videos started with my parents' wedding. My grandmother asked them if they were thinking "will this work out?" My mother's answer was somewhat striking to me. She said back then people generally didn't think about that. They went into it knowing it was a lifelong commitment. As I'm hitting the point in life where my peers are starting to get married, I wonder which ones will last. I hope that they all will, but statistically speaking it is very unlikely that all of them will. It saddens me to know that marriages that fall apart are just as common as marriages that last in America. I also realized that my parents were my age when they got married.

Another thing I noticed about the videos is that there were a lot of videos of me. Just about every semi-major step in my life up to age three was caught on film. My two younger brothers got progressively less. I'm sure that's quite common for first children, but it seems too bad. If I'm ever a father of multiple kids, I hope I make the effort to take plenty of pictures and videos of all my kids, not just the first one.

As a closing thought, I am realizing that Portland really isn't my home anymore. I spent a week here for Christmas. There is a good chance that I will not be back before Christmas next year. Similarly, I may not see some of my extended family again until Christmas next year. Up until now, I've always been back in Portland at least twice each year. Throughout college I still spent about four months out of every year living in Portland. It's a little hard realizing that I'm now past that point in life.

Reiteration

As I mentioned yesterday, I've been having trouble with the alumni.hmc.edu email forwarding. I am currently aware of four emails that I did not receive because of forwarding problems. There were two more that bounced back to me because I tried to send them to someone at an alumni.hmc.edu address. In that same time period, some did get though, so it is very intermittent.

From now on, please just send directly to my gmail address. This is not a temporary request. I'm done trusting a forwarding server that only sometimes works.

Email Problems

I have reason to believe that they alumni.hmc.edu email forwarding system is not currently working. If you have emailed me recently and I haven't responded, I would recommend re-sending the email. For now, please just send email directly to my gmail account. If you don't know that email address, just leave a comment asking for it and I will email you.

Final (?) Car Update

I got the battery replaced this morning and it seems like everything works fine again. Given that the car is about four years old, the battery is probably also four years old. Apparently that's a pretty common age for batteries to die, so I guess all is well and hopefully this battery will last me for at least another four years.

Thank you to everyone that offered me advice on what was going on and how to fix it.

I Spoke Too Soon

My car still won't start, although now I hear a very weak clicking of the starter. I guess I have one of two problems. Either my battery is completely dead and needs to be replaced, or my car isn't able to sufficiently charge it during a 40 minute drive at unusually high RPMs.

Whew!

This morning I had the unfortunate surprise of my car not starting. Actually it did start, and I pulled out of my parking space. Then the engine died and wouldn't start again. It wouldn't give me so much as the slightest try. Ugh. Now I had to get my car out of the way of another car and get to work.

I tried everything I could think of, which wasn't much. Mostly it was just opening the hood and staring at everything in there. I did locate the fuse box and verify that the fuse wasn't blown. I also convinced myself that it wasn't a dead battery. The radio and the lights still worked. I hadn't left my lights on or anything. Also, the car started up easily the first time.

Eventually I called Steve Palladino and he came over. He helped me push my car back into a parking space, then I dropped him off and borrowed his car for the day. The whole thing only put me back about 75 minutes. During the day I called a few mechanics, and one of them suggested that it really did sound like a dead battery. I came home, tried to jump start it, and it worked. The whole thing only cost me $20, and now I own jumper cables. Oh, it also cost me something to drive around for 40 minutes to charge the battery.

A few things are still a mystery to me. First, why did the engine die when I pulled out of my parking spot? Second, what drained my battery? I'm almost certain that I didn't leave the lights on. Oh well, what's life without a few mysteries?

Christmas Dinner - One Week Early

On Saturday night Philip and I hosted a Christmas dinner over at our apartment. We managed to fit 11 people at one table and fit that table in our apartment. The whole event took a lot of time to organize, plan, and prepare, but it was certainly worth the effort. Once we were able to sit down to dinner I didn't need to stress out about the food and I could just enjoy the food and the company.

One of the men there took some pictures and posted them online. Here is the link. I think the pictures pretty well capture at least a little of everyone, except for Mark, the person who took the pictures.

My Apartment

A month or two ago Philip and I received a letter from our landlord informing us that ownership of the building was changing hands and that we would have a new landlord. Our original lease would still be valid under the new management. At the end of last month, everyone upstairs moved out. Last week a giant dumpster was moved into the parking lot. I didn't hear a lot of details, but my best guess is that all of this was a plan to do some remodeling and/or non-trivial maintenance on the upstairs units. Yesterday we received a letter letting us know that they want us out too. We have until the end of January to be out.

This is frustrating to me. A lot of it is just the work and hassle involved in finding a new place quickly, moving, and then informing a multitude of companies, organizations, and people that my address has changed. On top of that, I just like our place and I'm not sure if another place will really match a lot of the things I like about this place.

More on Jeremiah

We are nearly at the end of our Jeremiah study, and certainly there seem to be new things hitting me each week. Last week we studied Jeremiah 31:27-40. This is probably one of the most central pieces of Old Testament prophesy, and yet I had never been aware of it before. This is where God announces the new covenant. Among the amazing new promises in this section are:

• No more punishment for sins of your ancestors. If they sin, they will be the ones that will receive God's judgment. (29 & 30)
• Direct access to God. Everyone can be in relationship with Him. (34)
• The Kingdom of God will be extended to the outcast and unclean. (38-40)

There's a lot more there, but I just wanted to get that little bit out there. This passage is an absolutely amazing bridge between the old and new covenants.

Ginger Bread: 1 - Cheapo Mixer: 0

I'm working on making ginger bread cookies. The motor on the $10 mixer I have just died because it couldn't handle the thick batter. Now I understand why some people spring for the fancy $12 mixers.

Helping Mario Jump

Do you remember back in the good old days of Super Mario Brothers, how people would often jerk the controller in the direction Mario was jumping to "help" Mario make the jump? Well it looks like that will actually be a reality in Nintendo's next generation gaming console.

Not Worth It

As I've mentioned many times now, I have recently become quite a reader of classic literature. For the past couple of months I've been trying to read The Last of the Mohicans. Just by mentioning that I've been reading it for months tells you that this cannot be the most grabbing book I've ever read. This weekend as I pulled myself through another chapter, I realized two things:

1. Even as I was "reading" it, I wasn't actually paying much attention to what I was reading. Consequently, I didn't even have a great sense for what was going on, which made it even worse to read.
2. Having this as the novel I'm currently reading tends to turn me away from reading toward other activities like dinking around online doing nothing.

The upshot of all of this is that I decided to just put the book back on my shelf. There isn't much point in doing pleasure reading that isn't actually enjoyable. Honestly stubbornness is the only reason I stuck with that book as long as I did. Maybe someday I'll decide it's worth it to read it, perhaps a different edition would help me get through it.

All that being said, I cannot say that this is an awful book. A quick look at the comments on Amazon shows that people pretty much either love this book or hate it. Unfortunately I'm in the second category. I you decide to read it, perhaps you will be lucky enough to be in the first category.

Advent

I spent a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend with an aunt, uncle, and two cousins in the Sacramento area. I don't get to see them often enough, and it is always great when it works out. We ate too much food, played a few games, watched an old movie, but mostly just enjoyed being with each other. I think that the time really helped to put me in a good mood for the start of the season.

As of today we have entered Advent, the four weeks leading up to the birth of Christ. Since Christmas falls on a Sunday this year, it means that Advent will last for a full four weeks. In spite of some of my frustrations with this time of year, there is still a a lot about this time of year to love.

Recently I've been thinking a lot about how much I enjoy the Christmas music. I can't explain exactly why I love it so much, but I do know a few reasons. Partly, it is special to this time of year. I only get a month of it each year, and I'm always sad to retire it when the season is over.

Another reason I love Christmas music has to do with the way my family celebrates Advent each year. Every night during Advent my family has a time of "Advent Candles." We all sit around a table with four candles in the middle. Each week of Advent we light one more candle until all four are lit during the final week of Advent. During this time my family sings Christmas hymns together. That was such a huge part of Christmas for me growing up, and I miss the fact that ever since I started college, I've only gotten a few days of it each year. Still it has left me with a love of the music of the season.

Holiday!

As most people are, I'm taking Thursday and Friday off for Thanksgiving. This will be the first time I have had more than a weekend off since I started at Toyon on July 11th as a full time employee. I've fallen into the routine pretty well, but after four and a half months, I'm glad to have a four day weekend. I will be heading up to Sacramento early tomorrow morning to enjoy the holiday with extended family. A blessed Thanksgiving to everyone.

Running with Horses

As you may remember, my Church has been studying Jeremiah for the past eight weeks, and we will continue studying it right up until Christmas. There are a lot of insights that I've gotten from the studies, and I wish that I had taken the time to share more about what we were studying. Still, I'll take a bit of time now to write some of my thoughts from our studies.

The first portion of Jeremiah is very dark and depressing. Israel has been destroyed, and the southern kingdom of Judah has fallen away from God. They have forsaken Yahweh and chosen instead to follow the gods of other nations around them. Jeremiah spends his life preaching to people that don't want to hear him call out their sin and proclaim God's judgment. It has really helped my perspective of the world to see how Jeremiah struggles with God. When Jeremiah pleads for God to restore Judah as an obedient, holy people, he gets the following response:

So do not pray for this people nor offer any plea or petition for them; do not plead with me, for I will not listen to you.
(Jeremiah 7:16)

How awful is that? Judah has become so sinful that God has to tell Jeremiah, "Don't even bother praying for them. My judgment is coming and it will not be held back." Later Jeremiah complains that God isn't doing anything about the sin and injustice in Judah:

You are always righteous, O LORD,
when I bring a case before you.
Yet I would speak with you about your justice:
Why does the way of the wicked prosper?
Why do all the faithless live at ease?
(Jeremiah 12:1)

When I'm upset about the evil I see in the world, usually I want to hear God's promise that He will take care of things and bring about justice. That isn't what Jeremiah gets. Instead God questions Jeremiah:

If you have raced with men on foot
and they have worn you out,
how can you compete with horses?
If you stumble in safe country,
how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?
(Jeremiah 12:5)

Paraphrase: "I'm telling you right now, things are going to get much worse. If you can't deal with problems as small as these, how will you deal with bigger problems?" That isn't exactly comforting to me, but it is telling of where I look for security. I look to the world for security and I want God to make the world secure. God never promises that. Rather he promises eternal security with no particular guarantees about my present life. When I remember that, and can start to change my focus accordingly, that does bring comfort from the evils of the world.

Holiday Rant - Right on Time

Last year I had this mini-rant a week before Thanksgiving. Once again I am going to take this day, the Thursday prior to Thanksgiving, to talk about a frustration of mine regarding the holiday season in America.

It doesn't surprise me that once again I am seeing the Christmas season start before Thanksgiving is over, and I still don't like it. I have, however, come to realize that this is part of secular America I'm just going to have to live with. Yesterday while I was driving home, I heard something on the radio that made it worse. I was listening to K-LOVE, a national Christian music station. They starting talking about Christmas. I immediately thought, "great, even the Christian media can't be patient." They said something like "Christmas is about..." followed by some list. I don't really remember what all went in there, except the last one, "...and shopping." At first I figured that they were going to make some sarcastic point, but no, it was all about K-LOVE's Biggest Christmas Ever! In particular, a contest that will send the winners to the Mall of America for a $1000 shopping spree.

It is incredibly upsetting to me that a radio station claims to be about Jesus, but is seeking to build up holiday shopping excitement rather than excitement about celebrating the gift of Jesus' birth.

Happy November Birthdays

Since it seems like about half of everyone I know (at least from college) was born in November, I figured I would write a personal happy birthday message to all such persons simultaneously. If you were born in November, even if I don't realize it and even if I don't know you, then this is to let you know that you are special to me.

Happy Birthday person born in November!

Thanksgiving Plans

It looks like I'll be heading up to the Bay Area, and possibly a bit of Sacramento for Thanksgiving this year. I'm planning to drive, so if anyone else I know in Southern California wants to carpool up there, let me know.

Unexpected

I am sometimes a little surprised at the ways people reach this blog, particularly some of the web searches that lead here. Today I saw that someone got here by Googling for Santa Barbara Drunken parties. Even more surprising to me is the fact that I'm the number one link. Now maybe it's just because Santa Barbara isn't big on partying. I mean think about the colleges here: Westmont, Brooks, and UCSB. Only one of those them even makes the national top five list as a party school. Clearly Santa Barbara just doesn't have much of a drunken party scene.

I wonder how long my blog will hold this distinction.

A Tale of Two Nights Swing Dancing

Last week when I arrived for Wednesday night swing dancing I was greeted by about ten women, who were very excited to see me. I was only the second man to show up, which meant that they could now get one out of every five dances instead of one out of every ten.

Fast forward to this week. Last night I arrived at about the same time. This week I was the fourth man with no women there yet. Fortunately a women showed up before too long. At that point I think we had about six men for her to choose between. After a few songs another women showed up, and before too long we had three women for our six men. As the night went on, many more people showed up. I don't think we ever reached equal numbers, but it got close enough that I never had to sit out a dance unless I needed the break.

Hopefully next week things will balance themselves out...

Halloween Dilemma

On Saturday I was headed down to Oxnard for something, and asked Philip (my roommate, just in case you forgot) if he had any use for going down with me. He didn't want to go down, but gave a Walmart gift card he's been hanging onto since graduation. Oxnard (40 miles away) is the closest Walmart to us. Needless to say, he's just been wanting to get this thing used up. We talked about what we could use, but could only come up with one thing: Halloween candy to pass out.

So now we have $20 worth of Halloween candy, which is a considerable amount since Walmart is so cheap. We can't even fit all of it in the gigantic bowl we have. So we are all set to hand out candy to kids tomorrow night.

Here's the dilemma: A friend at Church just invited us to go to a "Harvest" party at their house tomorrow night. Both of us want to go, but that doesn't leave anyone at home to pass out the candy. We talked about it and decided that we would just both go, and not worry about whether or not kids got enough candy. So now we have a giant stash of candy, and I'm not sure what we'll do with it. Based on the rate at which either of us eats candy, it would probably last until Halloween of 2007 with just the two of us eating it. I guess we'll just leave a big bowl out and encourage guests to have at least as much as they want, and preferably more.

Almost Ironic

Yesterday I received a Harvey Mudd College alumni directory in the mail. I flipped through to see if they had gotten my address correct. "Beaverton, OR" - Apparently not.

The doubts started creeping into my mind, did I really give them my new address? I thought I did, but I wasn't sure. Did I have any evidence of giving them my new address? Suddenly it hit me, they mailed it to me at my current address. They must have it. Hence the irony, that they managed to mail a book of addresses to the correct address, without actually putting my address correctly in the book.

The irony factor, however, was dulled when I looked in the front cover to see that they used the addresses they had on April 1, 2005, months before I moved into my current apartment. Oh well.

Is it Really Me?

Every other Friday night there is Swing dancing in Santa Barbara with a live band. Generally I haven't been going, but this week I decided that just dancing on Wednesday night wasn't good enough. I had a great time, but one thing in particular stuck out to me. One woman I danced with thought she remembered me, and she seemed vaguely familiar to me too. Anyway, when I told her my name I got a response I'm not used to, "Are you the really good Phil?"

Now, I consider myself to be a fairly good swing dancer, but not good enough to have a reputation, even in a smaller area like Santa Barbara. Honestly, even though I kind of like the idea of being that good, I suspect there must be some other Philip in Santa Barbara that has this reputation, and I don't think it's my roommate.

Ok, one other memorable thing. One of the women I danced with decided to give me all of her weight when I dipped her at the end of the song. I wasn't expecting it, because that isn't the common way of dipping in social situations. It wasn't graceful, but I managed to keep us from falling. If she had weighed even a little more, that might not have been the case.

Anniversary Post

Yep, that's right. I've been writing on this blog for a year now. Although I have to admit that recently I've slacked quite a bit. Sometimes it is a lack of things that seem worth writing about, but more often I'm just too busy/lazy to write. Here are a few things from the past week that I had wanted to write full posts about, but never got around to:

• Last Friday (October 14th) marked my being back in the United States for four months. That is somewhat significant to me because it means I have now been back for longer than I was away.
• Last weekend my Dad came down from Portland and visited me. I had a great time with him, and was reminded just how lucky I am, and how much I take it for granted that I have a good relationship with my parents.
• Last Sunday I had some conflict with another man at Church. I was pretty upset when I got home. Tuesday night we got together with two other people from Church, and they helped us talk through a lot of it. Things certainly aren't perfect, but they are a lot better, and we couldn't have gotten there just the two of us.

I was also intending to spend some time reflecting on life from the past year, perhaps commenting on some of my favorite posts. Along those same lines, but much lazier, this post is the one that I hear about from other people more than any other. Of the posts that I remember off the top of my head, this is the one that I had the most fun writing. Anyone else out there have some posts that stand out to them out of all my blogging from the last year?

A Bit of Irony

About two minutes after I made my last post, the power in our apartment went out. I don't know how long it was out (at least 15 minutes), but it was back on in the morning.

On an interesting side note, three out of my last five posts have involved the topic of a power outage. I certainly hope that this won't be a long term trend.

Even in Santa Barbara

When I got home from work today (about 7pm), the stop light nearest to my apartment was out. Later, when I went to go swing dancing (about 9:20pm), that light was still out, and I noticed that all the lights in stores and at gas stations surrounding that intersection were out. I hadn't noticed anything else earlier, but at that point it was still dusky. Coming home from dancing (11pm), all of those lights were still out. I was used to power outages like that in Kolkata, but it seems kind of weird in Santa Barbara.

IV in IV

Last Friday night some people from my Church (myself included) went to help out with an IV (InterVarsity) outreach event in IV (Isle Vista). In case you aren't familiar with it, IV is an area near UCSB primarily inhabited by college students. There is a huge drunken party scene there. IV decided to go down there to just bless IV on a Friday night with free doughnuts and root beer floats. It was an interesting night, and certainly gave me some flashbacks to my college days at Mudd. People were all over the map when we talked to them. Some were incredibly thankful. Others didn't trust us at all and figured there had to be something wrong with the doughnuts. I saw a lot of the tugs of peer pressure. There were people that wanted to stop and talk to us, but their friends pulled them away to get to the next party. Here is the conversation I got a real kick out of:

Drunken Woman: What's wrong with these doughnuts?
Me: Nothing, we didn't do anything to them.
Drunken Woman: No really. I just had one, what did you do to them?
Me: Nothing. We're here with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. We're just handing out doughnuts and root beer floats to bless the neighborhood.
Drunken Woman: Oh, ok. Can I have another one?

Another Great Reason to Bike to Work

Time: 6:00pm.

Me: I'm heading out for the day.
Office Mate: Wait! I need some help figuring out what in the world you did to this code. It doesn't make any sense anymore and I need to work with it now.
Me: Geee... I'd love to help you, but I biked to work today, and if I don't head out soon it will be dark before I get home. I don't want to get hit by a car.
Office Mate: Grumble. Fine, you win. It may be expected of engineers to swamp their lives with work, but I can't ask you to trade your life for work... this time. Mark my words, we will meet again... slacker.
Me: So I'll see you tomorrow morning?
Office Mate: Naw, I'm going to ditch work the next two days and enjoy a four day weekend. If anyone wants me, tell them I'm really busy with some project they aren't involved in, and that I may be hard to track down for a bit.
Me: Ummm... Ok.

Alright, so it didn't go quite like that, but the idea was there. Sort of. My office mate wanted help with some code that I had modified, specifically how it interacted with other code that someone else had written. I only took five minutes to help him, so I just explained it to him then. It occurred to me, however, that if it was a more involved problem, then having a bike as my transportation would have given me a strong reason to wait until the morning to deal with the problem.

Changing of the Guard

After a 4.5 year stint as the President of Toyon, our President stepped down because he wanted to get back to his first love, the engineering work. Today was our first working day with the new President (previously a VP). As such, there were plenty of jokes about how things would be with a new president. It only got worse in the afternoon when we had a 30 minute power outage - during which time sirens could be heard nearby.

More Spam Issues

I've been getting more comment spam, and it isn't from "anonymous" posters anymore. In an effort to stop that, I'm turning on Word Verification, the only other protection I'm aware of that's built into Blogger. I know it's a bit of a hassle, but so is having to delete comment spam, which is likely to only get worse with time. On the plus side, I'm turning anonymous comments back on. If I need to, I may end up turning those back off, but I'm hoping I won't have any more trouble...

Ye Olde Vegdahl Family Recipe

I was in charge of bringing after-study dessert. After giving it some thought, I was inspired to use a recipe my Dad sent me back in college when my suite was in charge of snacks for the InterVarsity meeting. We never ended up using it then, so I dug through my old emails and used it now.

It was a recipe for cinnamon rolls, and based on the instructions my Dad gave me, I can tell that they go back at least to his Mother. They took quite a while to prepare, and I did have to make one substitution when I realized I hadn't read the ingredients closely enough when I went shopping, but I think they came out pretty well. As the old saying goes: "Just like... Father... used to make."

Thanks for sending me that recipe two years ago Dad!

Better Lucky Than Good

Last Saturday Ian talked me into coming with him to a big Magic pre-release tournament in LA. I had been debating whether or not to go, but I had a blast, so I'm glad I did go. I've been an off and on, very casual player of the game ever since middle school. Prior to this weekend, the last time I played was probably about eight months ago. I expected to be kind of rusty, but I was actually fairly pleased with how well I played.

Anyway, Ian and I played in a special partners format. The two of us were one of 24 teams. It was run as a five round of Swiss-style tournament. Ian and I fought hard through the first two rounds without much difficulty. We hit round 3, and had a match that went from a good start to them coming from behind to hand us our first loss. Round 4 we won fairly easily.

Going into the fifth and final round we knew we had a good chance of getting a prize (top 4) if we could win this round. The other team got off to a quick start, and we helped them out with our only truly bone headed mistake of the night. It wasn't looking good for us, we only had a few turns left to live when I was lucky enough to draw a card that neutralized their primary threat. Still, it was an uphill battle ahead of us. We reached a point where it was a simple race to slowly kill the other team. In the end we emerged victorious thanks to several cards that we drew at the perfect time, some careful playing, and overly cautious play on the part of our opponents.

Result: 3rd place out of 24 teams (Not too shabby) and a heck of a lot of fun.

Note regarding the title: Back at Mudd some of us used the phrase "Better lucky than good" to describe games that contained both a factor of luck and skill (primarily Magic). We got a laugh out of it when one person clearly played better, but lost because of the other player's dumb luck.

Jeremiah

My Church is starting a twelve week study of the book of Jeremiah. Obviously in twelve weeks we won't be able to cover everything in the book. Still, I'm excited about this. I've never studied Jeremiah before, and my study of the Old Testament prophets in general is sparse. I expect it to be difficult, convicting, and a great time of growth.

4000% Price Hike

On Saturday I got my first haircut since getting back from India. In Kolkata I could get a haircut for 15 rupees, about 35 cents. This one cost me $14. It was a nice haircut, but I'm pretty sure that it wasn't 40 times better. Oh well, it's still a bargain when you factor in the price of getting to the barber.

Ok Heart, Settle Down

Last night I glanced out at the parking lot behind our apartment building and noticed that my car was not in my parking spot. I had an initial panic reaction, thinking that my car must have been stolen.

After a few seconds I calmed down enough to remember that when I came home, someone else was parked in my parking spot, so I had parked on the street instead. That car had since left, leaving the unusual situation of me being home but my parking spot being empty.

Dear Anonymous

I've been starting to get spam on my blog posts, and it mostly comes from anonymous users. I really liked the fact that Blogger would allow anonymous comments, but I'm afraid that I had to disable them to prevent the spam. If you want to leave comments, now you'll need to go through the trouble of creating an account.

Another Book Down

As you may remember, I got into reading classic literature while I was in India. The books were very inexpensive and other forms of entertainment were sparse. I brought a lot of books back with me to the US, and just finished reading Victor Hugo's The Hunchback of Notre Dame. It was an interesting book. There were lots of very slow sections, the worst of which was a 30-page description of the layout of Paris in the 1400's - I had to skim/skip most of it for the sake of not just putting the book down forever. On the other hand, many parts of the book were very engaging. I have never seen the Disney version, and now I'm curious to see what they did with it. The book did not strike me at all as something that would translate into a Disney movie. Then again, the original Little Mermaid wasn't quite what ended up in the Disney movie either.

Healthy Church

My Church just finished a three week sermon series looking at what marks a healthy Church. I could list the marks that they gave, but really it wouldn't mean a whole lot without going into depth on what they really meant by each point. It was an interesting thing to think about, and I thought our pastors had a lot of good thoughts on the matter. If you're interested, our sermons are posted here. So far only the first of the three is up. Usually they seem to get around to updating it once ever couple of weeks.

Another thought I've had about Churches is the difficulty of what they try to do. Especially when I came out of LAUP, it was easy to be critical of Churches because they weren't giving the same hardcore teachings that I received at LAUP. When I think about it though, I'd be concerned if all of the teachings at a Church were on that level. A young Christian, for example, really needs discipleship to solidify the basics of Jesus. I wouldn't dream of putting someone through an intense study of Amos before they studied the Gospels. On the other hand, there's a lot of people that really need those deep and challenging teachings. I would also be worried about a Church that wasn't seeking to challenge people any further than a basic understanding of Jesus. After that, throw in issues of age and people that are all sorts of different places in life and come from all sorts of different backgrounds.

Don't get me wrong, I think LAUP, and other programs like it that are wonderful and I wish there were more of them. I'm just saying that when you take a group of people who are all in their college years, and further filter them down by requiring a certain amount of spiritual maturity, it's a lot easier to target discipleship at them. It just seems amazing to me that a Church body would ever be able to meet people at so many different places in life.

Saddle Sore

I rode my bike some this weekend and, then I rode to work for the second time today. On the way back home, the seat under me really didn't feel so good. After I'd been going for about 5 minutes or so, it stopped bothering me as much. I guess I either got used to it or maybe just went numb to it. In any case, I don't like it, and I'm starting to wonder if this is an issue where I need to give myself time to heal, or if it is something where I just need to push through and my body will get conditioned to it. Is there anyone out there with any insight from experience?

Pimping My Ride

I decided that my wheels weren't everything I wanted them to be, so today I bought and installed some accessories. I added a rack, a bottle holder, and front and back reflectors to my bike. I think I've now spent about the same amount on bike accessories as I did on the bike itself. I expect that it will actually be worth it because I'll start riding to and from work semi-regularly.

Oh, I was also pleasantly surprised to find that the local bike shop I go to gives out the reflectors for free! As Ian pointed out to me, it may pay off by helping to keep their customers alive.

Biking

Two weekends ago I finally bought a bike. It has been on my list for a while, but I stalled because I didn't want to pay the price tag for a new bike or reasonably good quality. Luckily I found an inexpensive used bike that seemed to be in very good working order, so I bought it.

Ideally I'd like to ride my bike to work on at least a semi-regular basis, but for someone who hasn't really used a bike much in the past 8+ years, the 6 mile ride to work (plus another 6 miles back) seemed like it might be a bit too much for me at first. In an effort to work myself up to it, I've made it a point to get out riding on the weekend. Last Sunday my roommate and I went out for a 12 mile ride. It kind of wiped me out, but gave me the confidence that riding to work was within my ability.

Today I tested that theory out, and I'm happy to say that I did make it all the way to work by bike. I even took a slightly longer route than I had to (maybe 2 extra miles) so that I could enjoy a bike trail rather than the road. I certainly don't expect that I will bike to work every day, but I'm hoping I can manage it at least a couple of times each week.

Lonely Day at the Office

My company has a wonderful policy regarding holidays. They are all floating. As a result, I'm at work today even though it is technically a holiday. It turns out, I'm the only person from my building that decided to come in this morning. I know other people are still working because I've been getting email, but all of them are in our primary building. I have to admit, it's kind of weird being the only one here.

Someone is a Bit Overly Paranoid

We all know Google, the search engine, the mail, the maps... I always thought that everyone loved them as much as I do. I recently discovered that there are people that fear Google and have created a site explicitly stating why Google is awful. They call the site Google Watch. I read a bit of the site (it is pretty extensive), and a lot of it pretty amusing. In particular, one of their fears regarding Gmail:

Google offers more storage for your email than other Internet service providers that we know about. The powerful searching encourages account holders to never delete anything. It takes three clicks to put a message into the trash, and more effort to delete this message. It's much easier to "archive" the message, or just leave it in the inbox and let the powerful searching keep track of it ... Google wants very much to get to know you better.

Wow! I never realized what a risk I was taking. From now on I will only use my own mail server, and to be doubly safe I will only keep hard copies of all my email. I'll even take their advice and refuse to write to anyone at a Gmail account.

Fortunately I don't have to waste my time writing a full response to their site. Someone else already has. Check out Google Watch Watch.

Home Group Dinner

Right now our home group is on a four week break between sessions. Rather than just calling off meeting all together, last week we got together for dinner and an evening of fellowship. Bill and I did our best to cook a meal of Indian food. It was my first attempt at making anything more than a lassi or chai. I can't say that it tasted quite the same as it did in India, but we did manage somewhat similar flavors. It was quite a feast, and I really enjoyed doing it. The most amusing event of the night was when Sierra (the Palladino's five-year-old) daughter informed me that I was eating like a baby because I was using Indian "silverware" (my right hand).

Stolen

As I often do on Wednesday nights, I went swing dancing. Last night I had a new experience. One women actually stole me away from the partner I was dancing with. I've never had that happen to me (other than in a birthday dance). The story changes a bit when you know the details, so I'll just leave those to your imagination.

Home Group

I love my home group so much! I just discovered that I can actually upload pictures on Blogger, so here's a picture of us that we took last night. There were a handful of people missing, but that seems to happen every week, especially during the summer.

Back Row: Joyce, Bill, Kristina, Phylene, and Sarah.
Front Row:Me (Philip), Ron, Tim, Steve, Diego, and Heidi.

I Wonder...

My blog recently got a hit from someone searching Google for Nabo Jibon. What caught my attention was that it was someone from Spain. During my time at Nabo Jibon, there were a handful of volunteers from Spain there too. I wonder if it was one of them that happened to stumble upon my blog.

I'm Male Again!

I finally got my new (and correct) license from the DMV!

Joining in Suffering

So that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.
(1 Corinthians 12: 25-26)

Over the past week, two friends have hit particularly difficult events in their lives. Both have opened deep parts of their hearts to me and brought me into their pain. It has had an amazing effect on me. I feel honored that they would trust me with the pain in their hearts. I feel honored just to be able to sit with them, listen to them, cry for them, and pray for them. I feel pain at the hurts they are experiencing, yet I also find great hope in the healing and transforming power of God.

More than that, God has shown me healing for the hurts that my heart is holding. So many times I have felt locked out from people in my life when I know they are hurting. I've felt the unspoken message again and again of "I don't trust you." I know that isn't what people are trying to say, but all too often that is how it has felt. There was something so powerful for me about being let in. For someone letting me be a part of their lamenting and healing process. It is amazing to know that they trust me with the weakest, most vulnerable parts of their heart.

This relates directly back to India too. As my time in India went on, more and more I had trouble bringing myself to care about the pain around me. It didn't matter if it was the pain of boys at Nabo Jibon, the pain of people on the street, or even Todd's (my closest companion throughout the journey) pain. My heart was just closing. A lot of it was probably just being overwhelmed by the magnitude of the pain around me. I hated feeling numb inside, but eventually I just came to accept it. The past week I've been able to suffer with people to a depth I haven't been capable of for months. Somehow Jesus has brought me back to a place where I can weep and cry out to God for the pain of those I love. It has been something I have really needed, even if I didn't realize it.

The Jungle

That's my new nick-name for the office I share. We've got plants, we have fish, and starting today, I noticed that we have crickets up in the ceiling. I have no idea how they got up there, but my ears tell me they are there. I think if we add some vines, it'll be the closest thing to a jungle anywhere in Santa Barbara.

First to Work

I just got into work about 10 minutes ago, and I was the first one here. More precisely, I was the first one to arrive at this building, which is our secondary building. Still, it was a new experience for me to turn of the alarm system when I came in the door.

What Does That Number Really Mean?

I am looking through a 61 page document at work. Right now I'm on page 63. You might think I'm crazy, but the page I'm on says 63/61. The second number being 61 made a lot of sense to me... right up until page 62. Now I'm wondering what it really means.

Will My Personal Information Ever Be Right?

I just got my first ever box of business cards... and my name was misspelled (Phillip instead of Philip). Maybe in another month I'll have a second iteration with a less obvious error. On top of that, the California driver's license in my wallet says that I am female. Supposedly a correct one should be coming in the mail any day now. I'm wondering how long to wait for it before going in to the DMV to harass them about it. Supposedly they can take up to 60 days to arrive, so even though this one came in a week, I have a feeling that at the DMV they'll just tell me to keep waiting since it hasn't been 60 days yet.

More Free Stuff

Yesterday I was at Ian's helping him fix up a sail boat his cousin gave him. We needed a few supplies, so headed off to the hardware store. We were only a block away from his apartment when Ian spotted a Foosball table on the side of the road. The following exchange occurred:

Ian: Dude! A free Foosball table!
Me: Really, where?
Ian: At the side of the road. We are so picking that up on the way back.
Me: Do we really want to risk waiting?
Ian: No, let's grab it now!

So we turned around, grabbed the table, and carried it back to Ian's apartment. The table needs a bit of work before it is ready for a game, but the price was right. Oh, and we need to figure out why there are two audio plugs coming out of it...

A Day Worth Reliving

Today (Saturday) was the sort of day I wish I could relive. All too often I have days where I might want another chance to not make some mistake. Today wasn't one of those days. I would enjoy living through today again exactly the same. It was just a wonderful day. Highlights:

• A free pancake breakfast with Ron, and some other people from home group.
• I enjoyed a few hours with Diana from my LAUP team. In two weeks she is leaving to spend four months in Sri Lanka. I'm so excited for her to have this opportunity!
• I spent the rest of the day with Sarah, a women from my home group. She is hoping to go to India next summer. We talked a lot about India, but I also just had a great time getting to know her better.

People, that's what made today great. God continues to place so many wonderful people in my life.

One Man's Recycling is Another Man's Stuff to Give Away

I just took out some recycling to our apartment recycling bins. At the top of the bin was a copy of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. As far as I can tell it is brand new except that it is missing the dust jacket. I figured "what the heck" and grabbed it. Seeing as I haven't read the first five books in the series, it seems unlikely that I'll read this one anytime soon. If anyone wants it, just let me know and it's yours. If I don't get any takers within a week or so, I will probably see if the library or a local used book store wants it.

Saturday

Last weekend I was down in LA. The primary reason I went down was to go to this year's LAUP visiting day. As usual, once I've got an excuse to be down there anyway, I quickly fill the rest of my schedule visiting people. As it turned out, Saturday ended up being quite a roller-coaster of a day. Here are some highlights and lowlights of the day:

• In the morning, a group of ten of us hiked up part of Mount Baldy. There wasn't much parking at the base of the trail, so Jon and I used one large parking spot for both of our cars. There was just barely enough space to park like that, and no room to get out once I was parked. Apparently that's what trunks are for.
• After the hike Jordan and I were going to carpool to the LAUP event. That's when we discovered that Jordan's car had been broken into. You can read his description of it here.
• I drove to the LAUP gathering along with some other Claremont folk. By the time we fought through a lot of bad LA traffic, the official time slot was past the halfway mark. Fortunately things like that never end on time anyway, and I was grateful for the time I got.
• Phone message #1: My Mom let me know that my cat, Grey, had been put to sleep and was buried. When I left home to come down to California this time, I knew that it was unlikely that I would see her again. Just seeing her after coming back from India was an amazing gift from God (See this and this). Certainly I wasn't happy to hear it, but it was a lot easier to deal with than it had been in India.
• Phone message #2: Recently my Grandfather had been diagnosed with cancer. This message was the news that the cancer is still localized so that a single surgery will remove all of it.

There was other stuff that happened too, but that hits the basics. I could also get a lot more into the emotions the day left me with, but I just don't have the time. I can thank God for one day like that, and also thank Him that not every day is like that.

Car

One of the main events from the last week was that I finally bought a car. It was something that I needed to do, but that I really didn't want to do. I ended up going through a dealership mostly because it was easier (although obviously it costs a bit more). I've never bought a car before, but I've heard plenty of horror stories about used car dealerships. I was pleasantly surprised by the way they treated me. They really seemed interested in making it a good experience for me, not just selling me something quick and getting me off of the lot. Some of the things that come to mind:

• They told me exactly what I would have to pay on top of the price of the car (just sales tax and California licensing fees), and they actually meant it. I've heard plenty of stories about extra "dealership" fees and there was none of that for me.
• They paid to put insurance on the car for the first 21 days so that I could drive it home without having to figure out insurance immediately.
• Since I drove a car down, I had the problem of needing to get two cars back up. At no cost, they had one of their men come pick me up and bring me back down to the dealership (about 45 miles away) to pick up the second car. They didn't have to do that, I had already bought the car.

So anyway, the car itself is a 2002 Saturn SL. It is a fairly simple car, but I wasn't looking for anything fancy, just something reliable and efficient. It has a reliability record higher than Corollas and Civics for that year. The specs claim it gets 40 MPG on the freeway. I've been keeping track of my mileage, and thus far I've been getting a bit over 37 MPG. Most of that was on the freeway, but in did contain a fair amount of stop-go LA traffic. Overall I'm fairly happy with my car buying experience. More than that, I'm just glad that I don't need to worry about it anymore.

Speeding Up

I'm three weeks into work now, and I've really been noticing how fast and busy the pace of life is here in America. I've been thinking back to this post that I wrote early on while I was in Kolkata. All the lessons that Kolkata taught me about slowing down are quickly slipping away. Last week in particular was really frantic and busy for me. I did get to do a lot of things that I needed and/or wanted to do, but in general I don't think that pace of life is worth it. I will be able to enjoy life a lot more by just slowing down and being where I'm at.

On a related note, I have a lot I'd like to write about. Over the next few days I'll probably write a few posts relating some of the major (or at least interesting) events of the past week.

Travel

I found out yesterday that I am likely to make my first ever business trip sometime in mid-August. We are currently working out the date with the client (located in Fort Worth, Texas). I will probably reach a point where these trips will just be part of my job, but for now I'm pretty excited that I get to travel for business.

I Really Should Have Been More Careful...

I went to the DMV today to apply for a California driver's license. I didn't have an appointment, but was pleasantly surprised that I reached the front of the line before I was even done filling out the forms. I took the test, and as always there were a handful that I wasn't quite sure about. Fortunately I still passed and they have me a California temporary license. What I didn't realize until later was that they had somehow mis-entered one piece of information for me:

Sex: F

From now on I'm triple-checking that whenever someone tells me to verify that my information is correct. I did check my name and address, but I guess they expect you to check those, so they hide the errors elsewhere.

The primary result is that I have to go back to the DMV again tomorrow. Hopefully it will be even quicker tomorrow than it was today.

I'm sure there's a lesson in here somewhere, here's one possibility: It doesn't take an operation to legally change your gender?

The Letter of the Law

This weekend I read through the California Driver's Manual so I can make sure to pass the written test and get a California license. Overall it was pretty boring, however I did learn something about the appropriate use of firearms while driving.

It is illegal to shoot firearms on a highway or at traffic signs.

This leaves me with several questions:

1. Is it legal to use firearms in all other circumstances while driving?
2. When it says "at a sign" does that mean you can't shoot at the sign itself, or you can't shoot at anything while you are located at a sign?

Although the manual doesn't mention firearms again, I think there are other laws that may come into play.

Don't litter the roadside with bottles, cans, paper or anything else. The law says you may be fined up to $1000 and you may be forced to pick up what you threw away. Littering convictions are shown in your driving record. (Emphasis mine)

So your real incentive not to shoot off your firearms the rest of the time is that you will be penalized for littering the roadside with bullets. I certainly don't want my driving record to show that.

I Love My Home Group!

I wanted to post this right away after our home group session on Thursday night, but at the time sleep seemed more important. Then I just sort of put it off for a few days. Anyway, Home Group was wonderful this week. It was a bit smaller than usual because of people who were out of town and one person that just wasn't feeling well. I'm not sure if the smaller size helped to improve our usual dynamic, or if it was just an amazing night on it's own.

This month we have been meeting for dinner before Home Group each Thursday. It's been really great since it gives us more time to talk and find out what's going on in each other's lives. While we were waiting for dinner to be ready, the topic of vulnerability in community came up. We talked about how critical this is to communities, both how it helps to grow communities, and how the lack of it hurts communities. It is one of those things that I know is true, but recently I've had a lot more trouble living that out.

After dinner we had set aside some time for me to tell the group about a bit about my experiences in India. We did eventually make it to the study, but it was much later than we usually start, so we kept the study fairly short. After our study we just took some time for people to share struggles and pray for each other. We probably spent more time on that than we had on our study, and I'm glad we did. Some people are going through some really hard stuff right now, and it gave them a chance to really share about it. After we were done praying, I really just had that wonderful feeling that only comes from knowing that you are in a group of people that really cares about and loves each other.

Is That Really a Feature?

I'm reading through microcontroller documentation at work right now. In a section on its flash memory I found the following:

Features of the flash memory include: ... Segments A and B are also called information memory.

Now maybe it's just me, but an alternative name for something doesn't seem like it should count as a feature. If this new definition catches on, new cars will have the "feature" that seats are also called butt holders.

Cleaning Out My Closet

I intend a bit of a double meaning with that title. First of all, when I arrived in Santa Barbara my closet was full of paper from my apartment-mate's unpacking. In the three weeks he was there prior to my arrival he hadn't gotten it cleaned out. When I arrived, we discovered that the recycling bins for our apartment can fill up pretty quickly, so it has taken us a few cycles to get it all out there. Fortunately, this afternoon I finally took the last of it out. Now I have a wonderful, empty, half closet!

The more important meaning was that last night I got together with the McCulloughs (members of my home group at Church), and started talking and praying through some of the pains that I brought back with me from Kolkata. The short version is I had a lot of struggles with community (i.e. my team) while in Kolkata. I never talked about it much on my blog because I didn't want to put those things up in a public place. The major upshot of my struggles is that I have had a much harder time trusting and giving myself fully to community. After a month of being back, I was overdue to finally start dealing with this. Things are getting better because God is faithful. I am so grateful to God for giving me the love and support of the McCulloughs.

I don't want to put any more details up here. I just wanted to say enough to let people know a little about what has been going on for me and how you can be praying for me.

Weekend in LA

As I mentioned on Friday, I went down to LA last weekend. The primary motivator to get me down there was a LAUP (Los Angeles Urban Project) alumni luncheon. I also took the opportunity to visit a few other people and stop by IKEA on my way back. It was generally a wonderful weekend, although I had forgotten how bad LA traffic could get. Multiple times I was stuck in traffic that I almost wondered if I would ever get out of.

The LAUP gathering was wonderful. Four of the six people from my team last summer were there. The two that missed have large bodies of water separating them from California, so I guess that's excusable. I don't think I've seen more than one of them at a time since last summer. Even just having four of us together sure brought back some great memories.

I had never been to an IKEA before, but I'd heard a lot of good things about them, and my room seemed a little low on furniture. I was quite impressed with their selection and prices. The furniture generally isn't fancy, but it seems quite sturdy and is very functional. Not everything was cheap, but enough of it was that I didn't have any trouble finding what I wanted at a price I was willing to pay. Another benefit of IKEA (depending on your viewpoint) is that you get to assemble the furniture yourself. For me, that's kind of a fun thing to do. I stayed up until 2-something in the morning putting it together. I didn't quite finish, but only because Mr. Cook (my apartment-mate) pointed out that the other people in our building may not appreciate the sound of hammering in the middle of the night. I finally have a room that is almost set up.

Too Little Time

It's amazing how much faster my life moves now that I'm back in a job. My lack of posts over the past few days hasn't been a lack of things to post about, but rather that I just haven't gotten around to writing the posts. Anyway, I'll give a quick highlights list for this week:

• I met with Mike Willbanks, the college pastor at my Church. I want to get involved with the college ministry, so we talked about possibilities for that. It sounds like I'll be co-leading a dorm Bible study with him at UCSB once the school year starts back up. I'm pretty excited about that. In the mean time we'll keep meeting once a week over lunch to talk and pray about it.
• At home group last night I was able to catch up a bit with people as well as meet a few new faces. It was Drew's last time at home group for a while, so we sent him off with prayer. He will be spending the next six months in New Zealand at a Bible college. It is so amazing to see what God is doing with his life.
• This weekend I'm heading down to LA for a LAUP alumni gathering. Four of the six people from my team last summer will be there, so I'm excited to see them.

Second First Day of Work

Today is once again my first day of work at Toyon. If you have been a long time reader (or just aware of my life in general), then you know that I worked here as an intern for four months prior to traveling to India. Well, now I'm back as a full time employee. That means that I'll probably work just about as hard as before, but that I get paid a lot more and get benefits. Oh, and now I'll be able to do jobs that last more than four months.

It was good to get back. A lot of people seemed happy to see me. I filled out a bunch of paperwork, set up my computer (a brand new Dell workstation), and did some background reading on one of the projects I'll be working on. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that I'll actually be working with computer hardware on this project. Everything I did as an intern was software, and although I do like software, I missed not doing any work with computer hardware.

I also met a new (relative to when I was an intern) employee who was born in India and came to the US for grad school and decided he preferred living here. His wife is even from Kolkata (although I suppose it was still Calcutta when she last lived there)! It was fun getting to talk to him and knowing that there's another person here at Toyon that has walked some of the same roads I walked.

Oh Boy...

In case you forgot, I am now living with a roommate also named Philip. The rest of this post depends heavily on remembering this fact. (Although now that you know the dependence of this post on that fact, you probably could write the rest of the post yourself...)

Within the first six hours or so of arriving at my new apartment, I found something I didn't recognize, but that had my name on it, and assumed it was for me. It seemed a little weird to me that those things were there for me, but it took a little while for it to click with me that those things were not actually for me. In particular, when I found a packaged tape measure in my room, with a note on it from Uncle Jim (I have no Uncles named Jim) to Philip, I thought it was really nice of my roommate's Uncle Jim to give me a tape measure. It wasn't until at least an hour later that I realized it was a gift to my roommate, and he had left it in my room.

Hopefully I'm getting better. Since that first night it hasn't happened again... yet.

Back in Santa Barbara

I've spent the past few days in a U-Haul heading south, but the upshot is that I arrived back in Santa Barbara. I'm excited to be back and see people again. I was lucky enough to have someone else find an apartment for me, so now all I have to do is setup my room. The big question about the apartment that was looming in my mind was answered, would I get good cell phone reception in my apartment... I do! Just to complete the list of blessings, I even have a car that some people at Church were generous enough to lend me for a few weeks until I can find my own to buy. God is good.

Kolkata Wrap Up Letter

Well, I finally wrote a wrap up letter and I'm posting it up here. It took me a while
since I had no idea what I really wanted to write. I still wasn't sure what I wanted to say, but if I didn't get it out now, I never would. Here it is:

Hello again everyone,

I'm back from my four months in India. I arrived back in America a bit over three weeks ago. This is a wrap-up letter summarizing some of my final thoughts from the trip. I wanted to write this sooner, but for a variety of reasons it has taken me a while to actually sit down and write it.

First of all, I want to thank all of you for the support you have shown me through all of this. Thank you for your prayers, your emails, and eagerness to hear about everything I have experienced over the past four months. Your loving support was a great help in sustaining me during my time overseas.

Much of my difficulty in writing this was that I wanted to have a nicely finished experience from which I'd figured everything out. I was waiting until things clicked together for me so that I would have clear and complete thoughts to write about. So far that hasn't happened. Certainly some things have become clearer as I've taken the time to reflect, but I doubt that everything will ever be entirely clear to me.

The lack of simple, clear answers was actually a huge lesson for me. I really like things that can be "solved." I like tackling a problem and being able to create a final solution so that I can move on to the next problem. The issues of poverty and injustice in the world just aren't simple enough for that. I didn't expect to erase poverty from Kolkata, but it was a shock just how complex many of the issues are. In fact, I doubt I ever saw the full depth of complexity for any problem there, but what I did see was still overwhelming. A big lesson for me was that it I couldn't do anything more than the small things. It is not in God's plan for me to singlehandedly solve the problems of the poor. Rather, God's plan is for me, and for every follower of Christ to grow in obedience. Through us God does do amazing things, but He can only work through us when we are obedient to doing the small and simple things.

Prior to going on this trip I had some experience with poverty in America and some knowledge of poverty elsewhere. My knowledge of international poverty, however, was limited to an intellectual understanding. Although I knew in my mind some of what goes on in Kolkata, it was only intellectual, which meant that I was still very distant from it emotionally. It seemed more like a fictional story than a reality. This trip certainly changed that for me. Although there was very little over there that actually surprised me intellectually, it was still a great shock to experience it firsthand. The poor, the forgotten, and the oppressed are no longer just ideas to me. They are people that I have met. I have talked to them. I have heard their stories. Now they have names and faces. I know that I have changed the ways I deal with the realities of poverty, although I cannot say exactly how.

Going into this trip, I was seriously asking God about my future and the possibility of long term missions overseas. Right now I do not know if I will ever end up overseas again. This trip showed me that I can handle the environment, but I never had a great sense that God was either opening or closing this door for me. For the time being I plan to stay in the United States. I will keep myself open to the possibility of a future overseas, and I will keep praying for discernment on what God has in store for my future.

Thank you again for all of your support.
In Christ's Love,
Philip

My 4th of July

I was lucky enough to spend the 4th of July up in the Seattle area with an aunt, uncle, and two cousins. Apparently a lot of that area bans fireworks all together. In fact, they are just down the street from one of the boundary lines. This year and next year fireworks are ok, but it is likely that in 2007 fireworks will be off limits for them too.

In just got me thinking about what makes sense for firework laws. I probably don't want to know how many Americans loose fingers, eyes, and other body parts from fireworks accidents this time of year. I guess a lot of that is personal risk though. I'm sure that every year there is a lot of property damage as well, and often it isn't the property of those shooting off the fireworks. How many homes burn down from fireworks each year? Is it worth for the fun of having personal fireworks? I certainly don't have a perfect answer.

I was also reminded of last year, when I spent my 4th of July at LAUP. We were always left wondering if what we were hearing was just the bangs of fireworks, or if there were gun shots mixed in too. It was until sometime after the 4th that we were relatively confident that the bangs we heard were in fact gun shots. Since I spent my time exclusively in middle class neighborhoods this year, I really didn't wonder about that too much.

Back From Pittsburgh

We got back from Pittsburgh yesterday morning. It was a nice trip. I got to see and learn a lot of my family's past. In particular the parts relating to my parents meeting, the early years of their marriage, and the first two years of my life. I also got to meet a bunch of my parents friends from way back when. Now I'm working on getting myself together to get down to Santa Barbara in time to start work on the 11th.

Done with Word Made Flesh

This morning I had a phone debriefing with Sarah, the short term coordinator at Word Made Flesh. I felt pretty good about it. I came out of the trip with some frustrations about how certain things had been run. I wasn't really sure which things were because of my unreasonable expectations and desires, and what I had good reason to be frustrated about. I think Sarah gave me some much needed clarity in that. I certainly don't have a perfect understanding, but I feel better. Especially during our last 6-week stretch in Kolkata, a lot of that stuff just became really hazy to me. Even some of the questions that Sarah asked helped me think about things a little differently. That phone conversation is likely to be the last thing to wrap up my Servant Team, especially after Sarah told me that the proposal is optional. I guess they're trying to ramp up to them being required, but aren't there yet. She told me that they love to get them, but that I shouldn't force myself to write one just for the sake of doing it. Honestly if I had a topic that was both something I felt might me useful, and was something I had the experience to actually write about, I probably would write one. Unfortunately, I doubt something like that will come about now that I'm back in the US.

In Pittsburgh

We (my Mother, my Father, and myself) arrived in Pittsburgh last night. We didn't do a whole lot other than pick up our rental car and go to spend the night with some of my parents friends in the area. Today (I'm pretending it is still Friday) I got to see a bit of Pittsburgh, including the Church I was baptized in. It was a giant old Church building with beautiful stained glass windows. It also has two pipe organs which are apparently used for pipe organ duets! I'd love to hear one of those someday. There aren't too many places that can manage something like that. Overall I kind of like the feel of this city. It doesn't feel quite the same as anywhere I've ever been on the west coast (although it's closer to that than it is to India).

Um... We Don't Make That Version

When I read my Bible often feel like I wander around a little, not really knowing what to read. I like to read a little bit from a lot of different places, but I also don't like flipping around all over the place and keeping a bunch of bookmarks in my Bible. The short version is that I decided to get a One Year Bible. This will also make sure that I finally get around to reading all of those Old Testament books that I've never gotten around to. I had a few disappointments when I went to get one, but still decided to buy it. First, I was hoping to find it in NRSV, but as far as I could tell they don't print it in that version. Second, they only print versions that start on January 1st. I was starting on June 22nd and they don't print a version like that. Oh well, I think I can manage. For the record though, I did not fall five and a half months behind, I just started in the middle of the year. If I stay on track (which it will be a miracle if I never miss a day) I should finish it on June 21st of 2006.

Presentation

Last night I gave a presentation about my trip to India and Sri Lanka at Church. I think it went pretty well. That was at least the feedback that I got from people. Thank you to everyone that made it there to listen about my experiences. At some point I'll probably get some sort of a wrap up letter out. I'm leaving for a week in Pittsburgh tomorrow, so hopefully I'll get around to doing it after I get back next week.

A Look Into My Future

On Thursday my parents are taking me on a week long trip to Pittsburgh. That's the city I was born in and spent the first couple years of my life in. This will be the first time I've been back since my family moved to Oregon, so I can't say I remember the place at all. I'm looking forward to learning a little bit about the unremembered years of my life.

When I get back from Pittsburgh, I'll be moving back down to Santa Barbara. Starting on July 11th, I'll be working at Toyon again. I've already lined up an apartment and a roommate, which should make the whole process a lot easier. I'll be living with a man who was in my high school youth group, although I haven't really known for the past five years. So far there is only one problem with our situation: His name is also Philip. I'll sure we'll figure something out... or just create a lot of confusion. My Dad shared with me that when he was my age, he also moved in with a roommate that shared the same first name. He also let me know that six months later he got married. For the record, I don't expect that part to happen on the same schedule.

Sunday

Yesterday was my first Sunday back in America. I went to Church At Andrew's Lutheran Church, the Church I grew up in. It was pretty good to be back. I received a lot of warm welcomes. Tomorrow night (Tuesday) I'll be back there giving a brief presentation on my trip. It's at 7pm if you're interested in coming to see and hear a bit more about my trip.

After Church my family drove down to Corvallis to spend Father's Day with my grandparents. It was great to see them again. My grandfather printed off this blog and kept the entries in a binder for the time I was in India. I had no idea how much I had written, but it pretty well filled an entire 2-inch ring binder. Hopefully at some point I'll get around to rereading through all of it myself. A good chunk of my journaling in India was done in the form of this blog.

Life Back in America

I haven't posted anything the last few days. I haven't really had anything motivating me to post. Life back in America seems a lot less eventful than it was in Kolkata. Then again, I haven't really been doing much of anything. I can't say I've noticed any violent reverse culture shock yet. Everything seems about the same as it was before I left for India. Sometimes it almost feels like Kolkata was just a long dream. America is just such a different world that it almost seems like the two couldn't possibly both exist.

When it isn't raining, I've been enjoying just walking around the neighborhood. Sometimes I'll talk on the phone, sometimes I'll just think. There are so many ways that I just couldn't get this simple experience while in India. It is so quiet and peaceful. The temperature is comfortable, rather than 100+ F and humid. Above everything else, strangers don't stare at me everywhere I go. I love just being a normal person again.

Back in America

I made it back to America safely yesterday. I've already enjoyed a few good American meals, and things taste about the same as I remember them. Here are a few other things that I've noticed since getting back:

• The computer I'm using seems pretty fast (it's actually about 6 years old). The internet (dial up) feels as fast if not faster than most of the connections I used in India. The monitor can support a resolution above 800x600. I'd forgotten how much more that lets you fit on a single screen.
• The tap water is safe to drink again! I got to use tap water instead of bottled water to brush my teeth last night. I even drank a little bit of it without any fear of diarrhea.
• I'm back to using western style toilets and American toilet paper. I'm sure I'll get used to it again, but right now it seems weird. I can honestly say that I like the Indian system better. The combination of squatty potties and Indian "toilet paper" leaves me feeling a lot cleaner than the way we do it over here.
• I can control the temperature of my water again. In India, it was rare to have taps with more than a single knob. If the weather was hot and sunny, then you got hot or warm water. If it was cold, then so was the water. Our hotel in Darjeeling was supposed to have hot water, but it didn't work most of the time. After taking cold showers in Darjeeling, taking a hot shower on a cool morning has never felt so good.

Last Post From India

This morning our team arrived by train back in Kolkata. Our retreat in Darjeeling went pretty well. The first part of it was kind of rough for me, but by the end I think I got what I needed to end this trip. It wasn't what I expected, but it showed me what I needed to see. I will probably have a lot more reflections on this trip once I've returned and had some more processing time. No promises about what will make it up here though.

In about ten hours April, Kristen, Rachel, and myself will be on a plane out of Kolkata. On Tuesday night we should all be sleeping in our own beds back at home. Thank you again to everyone who has been praying for me during my four months in Asia. I definitely needed the support.

Almost at the End

Tonight is our last night of debriefing. Tomorrow we will leave Darjeeling and catch a night train back to Kolkata. We will arrive back in Kolkata on Monday morning. Our flight out of Kolkata is late that evening. Tuesday evening I'll be able to sleep on a real American mattress for the first time in four months. Well, I'll be able to lay on it anyway. Jet lag will decide if I'm able to sleep...

It is so crazy to realize that my four month trip to Asia is nearly over. I wonder what it will be like getting back. I've heard that reverse culture shock can be pretty nasty after a trip like this.

Little Adventure

The past few days haven't held a lot to share about. We've been having team meetings every night. Our mornings and afternoons have been free for whatever else we want to do. Today Kristin, Melissa, Todd, and I went for a bit of a hike. We caught a share-jeep (crowded jeep with a fixed route at a reasonable price) to the beginning of the trail. We hiked up to the top where there is a wonderful view of the Himalayas... at least there supposedly would have been if we hadn't been stuck in the middle of a cloud.

Right as we were about to head back down, it started raining pretty heavily. Between the four of us we only had two umbrellas, and that just doesn't work well for long distances. We hid under an overhang for a while, then had four Indian men invite us into their home. They maintain a cell phone tower at the top of the hill, and live in an apartment up there. After talking with them for about fifteen minutes, the rain let up, so we started back down. It wasn't long before the rain started back up, so we shared umbrellas as much as we could, and rushed to a little shack we had seen on the way up. The rain wasn't light, but it started coming down even heavier within thirty seconds of entering the stand. We waited and waited but the rain didn't seem like it was letting up. A jeep came along (it was a wide vehicle accessible path), and we hoped that they could give us a ride down. Unfortunately they were already packed with people.

We waited longer, and eventually the rain let up to only a light drizzle. We decided to take our chances with this, knowing that it was probably an hour or so to the next shelter. After walking for about ten minutes, a small van came up behind us with an unoccupied bench seat in the back! We motioned them to stop and were able to get a ride from them. The seat was only side enough for three, so Melissa laid down across the other three of us. It reminded me a bit of trips to 21 Choices back at Mudd... It wasn't the most comfortable drive, especially on a bumpy road, but we were grateful for it. After about fifteen minutes we reached the bottom and caught another share-jeep back into town.

In Darjeeling

Our team arrived in Darjeeling yesterday. I'm glad to be here, just getting away from Kolkata is enough to boost my spirits. Since Darjeeling is way up in the mountains, we couldn't take a train all of the way here. We hired a jeep to drive us from the train station to our hotel. The drive up the mountain was gorgeous, although a little unnerving when we had to pass other vehicles on a road that seemed almost too small just for us. At least once we had to back up to a wider part of the road to let others drive by. When we got into town, the driver stopped somewhere that wasn't at our hotel. He told us that the road our hotel is on is closed to traffic. This seems to be true of many roads in Darjeeling. They found a man to guide us to our hotel, then turned around and drove off. As we started to walk with all of our luggage, it started raining heavily. We hurried on, certain that our hotel couldn't be too much further away. After our guide stopped to ask for directions for a third time, we decided to try our luck using a map in a Lonely Planet guidebook. It turned out that we had been going in a sort of wrong direction, although our "guide" hadn't taken us too much off course. Eventually we did find our hotel and checked in. We hung our clothes to dry, putting on whatever seemed to be the driest. It wasn't the best way to start our trip, but I'm glad we're here. From now on I'm going to listen to my Mother's advice and take the time to pack in plastic bags when it is important for my clothes to be dry on arrival.

Done with Kolkata

Last night was my final night sleeping in Kolkata. This morning was my last time at Nabo Jibon. Tonight our team leaves for Darjeeling for a week long debriefing retreat. We will arrive back in Kolkata next Monday, and I will have part of the day in the city before catching my flight back to America.

I feel like there's a lot of potential for this retreat to really help me come out of this trip well. I need that pretty desperately right now. Ever since we came back from Sri Lanka I've felt like Kolkata has just been wearing me down more and more. Don't get me wrong, there have been good things, but everything seems like I go one step forward for every two steps I take back. This past week I've seen that a lot. I've been getting frustrated and angry a lot more. I've lot my patience with some of the kids at Nabo Jibon. A single interaction with a beggar left me fuming internally for two days. It wasn't that it was particularly different than other beggar interactions I've had, I just can't handle it anymore. I've closed off a lot with my team. I have to force myself a lot more to interact with them. Things that I was once passionate about I hardly care about anymore. Multiple times I've wondered to myself what the point of me coming here was, or at least the point of anything after returning to Kolkata from Sri Lanka. I think about going back home and just trying to forget that this place even exists. This isn't the way I want to be ending my stay in India. I want to get some good processing of stuff before I return. I know that I've gotten roped up in a bunch of lies and that I'm blind to the truths that I desperately need. Please, please, please be praying for me. I know God can do a lot for my heart in a week and I need it so desperately.

New Team Members

Our team has gained a few members recently. Actually the new members have probably been around for a while, but we only recently found out. Their names are Mobo, Jimbo, and Flobo. They are an amoeba, giardia, and worm respectively and are living inside three of the people on my team. They are all taking medications, but the combination of the parasites themselves, and the medication can really wipe them out. Please be praying for fast and complete recoveries for the human members of our team.

Daya Don

Today Todd and I skipped out on Nabo Jibon to visit Daya Don, the Missionaries of Charity home that Rachel and Kristen have been serving in during our time in Kolkata. The home is for young handicapped kids. The kids are generally younger than the boys at Nabo Jibon, although there is some overlap. Daya Don also contains a mixture of boys and girls. The home is run by the Missionaries of Charity sisters and resides in a building in the heart of Kolkata.

Although it was nice to see the place that they have been serving, today wasn't a normal day. Instead of having an unstructured morning to just play with the kids, there was an Indian worship group that came in and sang Bengali Christian songs for them. They also gave a small sermon that must have been intended for the volunteers. Once they had left, we had a little unstructured time to play with the kids before lunch. Kristen and Rachel told us a bit about different ones. Soon it was time for lunch, after which we changed them (if needed) and put them to bed. That was the extent of our morning at Daya Don. Although it was a nice experience, I'm glad that Todd and I have been going to Nabo Jibon. I feel like it is a much better environment for me.

So That's Where it Comes From...

[Warning: The following post may be a little more descriptive than some of you will appreciate.]

Yesterday I was with someone when they bought chicken to cook for dinner. This was my first experience buying uncooked chicken meat in India. Now if I remember correctly, in America we grow chicken inside of styrofoam trays with plastic wrap on the top. In India, they grow chickens into these funny looking birds that are alive and flapping about inside a little enclosure. It seems like a funny system to me, but perhaps those styrofoam trays are hard to grow in this climate, so growing chickens in bird form works better for them. Who knows?

Anyway, my companion told the chicken salesman the weight of chicken he wanted, and the seller found a chicken of approximately that weight. The chicken was flapping around like crazy, but the seller held it tight with only one arm. Using his other arm he used a knife to slice halfway through the chicken's neck. He then dropped the chicken in a large bin, placed a board over it. We listened to the chicken flop around in there for about five minutes. My companion explained to me that this was to let the blood drain out of the body. Eventually the noises stopped, and the salesman pulled a red, lifeless chicken out of the bin. He finished cutting the head off, and then chopped off both feet. I then watched as he pulled the feathers and skin off of the chicken as if they were merely a wrapper. He sliced the body up, put the pieces in a bag, and handed us the bag. A few hours later we were eating a wonderful chicken dinner.

They may have a different system for it here in India, but the chicken still tastes pretty good. You just need to learn to get over seeing it butchered in front of you.

Celebration Day at Nabo Jibon

Today was a special day for the brothers at Nabo Jibon. There were three new brothers taking their first vows. Before they can take their vows, they go through two years of training as novices. Catholic brothers and sisters from all over this part of India were in attendance of the ceremony. Todd and I made it too, which was a little hard since it was part of a 6:30am Mass. Usually Todd and I aim to catch a 7am subway train to start our commute, so this was a lot earlier. It was also complicated by a subway that doesn't run that early, and buses that don't run anywhere close to as often. Somehow, beyond reason, Todd and I still made it there in time for Mass in spite of leaving late.

After Mass breakfast was served. The brothers had asked Todd to perform a song during that time, and Todd had talked me into singing one with him. Todd and I gave them "Lord, Reign in Me," followed by Todd performing two more on his own that I didn't know. After the mini-concert, Todd and I grabbed breakfast and joined some of the brothers from Nabo Jibon. During this time we also got to meet the current area brother superior (No, I don't really know what he does or how big "this area" is. His title just sounds impressive).

At 9:15am they had another ceremony to initiate the new novices (brothers in training). Then there was a third ceremony to transfer some position of leadership from one brother to another. Between all of these ceremonies, I only got to spend a little time with the boys this morning. I'm not really complaining though. It was really great to be able to celebrate all of these things with the brothers. They have really done a great job of welcoming Todd and I into their community during our months here in Kolkata. I'm going to miss them.

That Explains the Price

About a week ago I was at a bookstore in Kolkata and bought a classic work for a mere 50 rupees (remember 1 US dollar = 43 Indian rupees). Previous classics that I have bought were all from another publisher, and cost more like 88 rupees. I started reading it a couple days ago and found that the quality of this reprint is noticeably lower than that of the first publisher. I think it has averaged more than one typo (that I noticed) per chapter. Some of the pages are printed crooked. There were even a couple pages that were starting to fall out. My guess is that this is a really small publisher in India that has simply taken a classic work, republished it (I have no clue how copyright laws are in India), and then sold it dirt cheap. This theory is somewhat confirmed by the publishers email address, publisher_name@hotmail.com, and address in Delhi. In any case, the book is still quite readable and enjoyable. For a bit over a dollar it's really hard to complain all that much.

One/Two Week(s) Left

Two weeks from tonight I'll be on a plane flying out of India. One week from tonight our team will be on a train headed for Darjeeling for a one week debriefing retreat. It's kind of crazy to think that four months is almost over. My mind has certainly been shifting homewards in a lot of ways. Sometimes it takes a real effort to keep myself present here in India. Keep praying for all of us. I think that's a struggle most of us are facing.

Me of Little Faith

I got a much better email from my Mom today. I don't think she'll mind if I post a section of it.

Grey seemed to be a bit better when I got back. Last night, her appetite was back, to the point where she yowled at me when I didn't get her food to her fast enough. She ate about 4 times as much last night as she had in a whole day earlier in the week. And no signs of the intense pain in her mouth. This morning she asked to go out to relieve herself, (she has just been using the floor inside most of the time recently) and then trotted around a little in the backyard and didn't want to come in right away. The improvement is dramatic. So I cancelled the appointment to have her put to sleep.

Praise God! I'd been praying for it, but I really didn't hold out any hope that she would get better. In fact, I was even wondering if she would pass away on her own before she was put to sleep. This morning I woke up and assumed that she was dead. When I checked my email I was expecting a confirmation of that. I am absolutely amazed to have gotten the email that I did. I really don't have enough faith in God to answer my prayers. She's still an old cat, and I know she won't live forever, but now that she's eating again I know she has some life left in her. I'm very thankful. Even if she only lasts a little while longer, I'll be thankful for all of the time that God gives her.

Thank you so much for all of your prayers and supportive emails/comments over the last few days.

Reflection on Suffering

[Edit 05-28-05: I accidentally posted both my first attempt at this post (which I didn't like, didn't finish, and really wasn't a great expression of my true feelings) in addition to what I meant to post. I just removed what I had never intended to put up there in the first place.]

When I found out that my cat was dying, it brought me to tears that unlike any I have experienced since my first day at Kalighat. In fact, ever since those first few weeks in Kolkata, I have shed relatively few tears for anything. This brought up a question that I am stealing from a M*A*S*H episode, but that I'd like to think I would have come up with on my own: If I cry so much over the death of my cat, why don't I cry for the pain, suffering, and death that I see around me every day in Kolkata? Just to be clear, I'm not questioning the tears that I shed over my cat. I understand those and think they are appropriate. I'm wondering why I no longer feel the pain around me. Every single person in Kolkata is deeply loved by God. It breaks God's heart that so many people are living in so much pain. Sometimes I wonder if my heart has become as small, cold, and hard as a frozen pea. Although it has been a gradual decline with plenty of ups and downs, I have reached the point where my heart rarely breaks for any of the pain around me. Somehow I need to learn to let my heart break again. Somehow I need to get over the difficultly and the pain. At least once more before I leave, I need to feel the deep pain of this city. Even when I cannot do anything tangible to change their situation, I need to be with them in their pain.

The Pain of Loss

I found out yesterday that Grey, one of my cats back home, is dying and will be put to sleep this Friday afternoon (Oregon time). As many of you know, I'm very much a cat lover. That alone would make this hard for me. What makes this even harder is that she is the cat that first made me love cats. As long as I've loved cats, she has been at the center of it. Every cat I love or have ever loved, was because I first loved her. Whenever I returned to Oregon after a semester at college, or after working in Santa Barbara, I wanted to see her as soon as I was home. It is hard for me to think about returning from four months in India and not having her there to welcome me back.

Although it is hard being on the other side of the world while this is happening, I'm not sure it would be any easier being there either. I so much want to hold her just one last time, to let her curl up in my lap and take a nap. One time wouldn't be enough though. It wouldn't make it any easier to say goodbye. I remember saying goodbye to my cat Dusty almost three years ago. I was the one that took Dusty to the vet. With a trembling hand I signed the form authorizing for him to be put to sleep. I held him and gave the nod to the vet. Seconds later I felt the weak beatings of his heart stop, and I knew that it was over. I don't think that was any easier. Honestly I'm somewhat relieved that I don't have to sign that form this time.

Finding out while I was in a public internet cafe was hard. I dealt with a few other emails to try to get my mind off of it. I printed off a copy of the email from my parents, and headed home. I fought back tears most of the way. I felt overwhelmed as I squeezed into a crowded subway train. The Indians always stare at me because I am white. Their stares felt even worse since I knew that my face was covered in tears.

When I got home I went over to the girls place. We were meeting for a community fun night, so even though I was showing up early, I knew that in all likelihood there would be multiple people there. At this point I was no longer weeping, so it may not have been entirely obvious how I was doing. I hung out for a bit until Kristen (non-leader) asked me how I was doing. Unable to talk about it, I simply handed her the copy of the email. As she read it I started to cry again. She offered me words of comfort, and gave the email to someone else. I talked about it a little as each members of my team took turns reading the email. The more I talked, the less I could talk because of my tears. April offered to pray for me, which I easily agreed to. I wept even harder as she prayed for me. I felt the love of the people around me and somehow that gave me the strength to truly let go. It is an awful, terrible, scary thing to feel pain that has no answer. It is even worse to be alone in that pain.

After that we sat in silence for a while as my tears continued to flow. Eventually other people cautiously started talking. Listening to them distracted me from my pain, and eventually we were able to spend the night telling stories and laughing together. I think it was really good for me to have that break and just enjoy the company of my team. Eventually I returned home. I looked at a picture of Grey that I brought with me to India. I turned off the lights and cried myself to sleep.

I have a lot more reflections already on my mind about this, other things going on for me in Kolkata, and how all of it ties together for me. Hopefully I'll get those written up sometime in the next few days.

Struggling, but Improving

I don't have the time, emotional energy, or clarity to post much right now. I've been struggling a lot off and on since returning to Kolkata from Sri Lanka. The past few days were really hard. I just had an encouraging talk with Kristin this afternoon, and I have a few new insights that I think will be helpful. Still, I need a lot of prayer. I'll post more when I have the chance.