Christmas markets 2011

What is Christmas like in Germany (and Switzerland and surrounding areas)?

Starting the first week of Advent and continuing through Christmas Eve, big cities and small villages all host a Christmas market every weekend, usually on the main square or a main street in their old town areas (historic downtown areas). Vendors set up booths which they decorate with Christmas lights and decorations of Santa Claus and so forth. They sell hand-made crafts and food or drinks. The items sold are generally wood-carved items (toys, decorations, kitchen utensils), jewelry, colorful paper lanterns, nativity scenes of all shapes and sizes, bees wax candles that are sculpted into complex figures or designs, handmade soaps, knitted scarves, mittens and gloves, hats and sweaters, and so on.

Lots of people bundle up and then gather on the squares to sip traditional hot drinks:

• a warm, spiced wine called gluhwein (it means “glow wine”)
• a hot punch for children
• spiced cider
• hot chocolate and various espresso drinks.

They serve the drinks in specially designed ceramic mugs that they rent to the user; you can return the mug to be washed and reused and get your deposit back, or you can keep the mug as a souvenir.

The mugs are different from town to town.

The foods are

• warm crepes with Nutella spread or other kinds of fillings or spreads,
• hot waffles with warm berries and whipped cream,
• dampfnudeln — a potato dumpling that is puffed up and looks like a dinner roll, served with a warm vanilla sauce, warm berries and cream
• potato pancakes — shredded potatoes mixed with onions and garlic and probably held together with egg, then deep fried and served with cold apple sauce
• various kinds of bratwurst and sausages and mashed potatoes, French fries or baked potatoes
• schneeballen (literally means snow balls) -- these are balls of pie dough rolled up and then deep fried, and rolled in all kinds of different toppings; the original was rolled in powdered sugar. Now they also have them rolled in chocolate sauce, or caramel sauce, or filled with coconut cream, apple cinnamon and sugar, etc. They are crunchy and kind of dry. :-)
• iced gingerbread cookies
• various kinds of hard candies, gummies and licorice

As people mill around the colorful, lighted booths, often there are musical groups that perform Christmas music, and there may be lighted carousels for children to ride on, and other seasonal forms of entertainment.

This year, during a trip to Frankfurt to make a video testimony, Laine and I explored two Christmas markets in Heidelberg and Frankfurt. Because Andrew and I don't have Christmas decorations in our apartment (they're all in a box in Kansas City) and I didn't bring Christmas music with us either, the markets helped me to feel like it really is Christmastime now. :-)

Ahh, technology

When you have an office job, sometimes it's difficult to think of interesting things to tell people about it. And when you work with people across numerous timezones, in dozens of languages and through all kinds of technology, you sometimes forget that this is unusual.

In my job as a reporter for Nazarene Global Mission, I get to interview and collaborate with people in every region. This requires serious creativity in crossing the above list of boundaries.

Recently, I interviewed Giovanni and Alissa Monterroso, missionaries in Guatemala. To make the call free, we did it over Skype. I was in Germany and they were in Central America, so we had 5 to 6 hours' time difference to deal with. Part of the interview focused on a pastor they work with, and he only speaks Spanish. Giovanni offered to bring Francisco into the conversation via telephone, and to interpret my questions and Francisco's answers.

While I sat at my desk in Germany, in Guatemala, Giovanni made a phone call to Francisco. He was across the room from their computer, so Alissa sat near the microphone and passed my questions and Giovanni's answers back and forth.

It went like this:

Me: How long has Francisco been a pastor?
Alissa to Giovanni: She wants to know how long he's been a pastor.
Giovanni, in Spanish to Francisco, asks my question. A pause. Giovanni repeats Francisco's Spanish reply to Alissa.
Alissa to me: He says he's been pastoring 12 years.

And so it went. This may have been the weirdest interview situation I've experienced in my 12 years of reporting.

Another time, a few years ago, I needed to interview a Spanish-speaking missionary in Mexico. I didn't have anyone lined up to help me interpret. I took three years of Spanish in high school -- not enough to conduct an in depth interview, but enough so that I know how to pronounce the words even if I don't know what they mean.

I called the missionary over the phone. We both sat at our computers while we talked on the phone. We both had Google.com/translate open on our computers. I would type my English questions into the website and hit translate. The Spanish words came up. I blankly repeated them over the phone. I know the translation wasn't exact, but it was enough to get my meaning across. The missionary heard my question in Spanish. He typed his Spanish response into Google.com/translate, which spit out his answers in English. He was able to read them back to me, although I believe he also didn't know exactly what he was saying. Again, it was a very close translation. I typed his answers into my Word document as he read them.

We went back and forth like this for an hour until the interview was complete.

Ahhh, technology.

So, I may have a desk job, but sometimes I sit back and realize what I'm doing is pretty crazy and lots of fun.

English class in full swing

The English class that I teach on Thursday nights is in full swing, since we restarted in September after a summer break. All the participants are divided up into four different classes based on their proficiency level, and spend an hour in various classrooms listening, discussing and working on English grammar (which they seem to unanimously hate -- not that I blame them).

I'm enjoying being a full-time teacher now, although I also find it challenging since I don't have formal training in this area. I'm learning what helps my group of 6 to 8 students most and what is less helpful -- they prefer talking and discussing so they can practice pronunciation and be forced to remember words they've learned before. They also like it when, after they have read a section of text out loud, I read it to them again myself so they can hear how the words are normally pronounced by a native speaker.

The thing I enjoy the most, however, is the people I am getting to know better, bit by bit, each week. The class is allowing me to develop relationships with wonderful people in our village as well as nearby villages. It also allows me to learn about some of the struggles and challenges they face, so I know how to pray for them.

Many tourists who visit Busingen and the Rhine valley believe it is an idyllic "paradise" because it is picturesque and politically stable, offering a peaceful lifestyle accompanied by the easy accessibility to many desirable material things.

But just like anywhere, people here grapple with serious health challenges, ill family members, financial setbacks, struggles to find steady work, loss of loved ones, and unrealized dreams. Tonight, in our class, we discussed dreams and goals for the future, and what can prevent one from fulfilling a dream. Several people described dreams that they have, as well as the unavoidable life obstacles that mean their dream will never be realized.

I am grateful for the time we spend together each week, and that I can serve them in some small way as they work hard to improve their English skills, but also that I can think of them and pray for them in more specific ways.

Pray with me for this service that our church offers, and that God can use it to encourage and draw many local people closer to Him.

Opportunities to Share

There is a great deal to think about after spending nine days in Turkey for the Eurasia Regional Conference.

Already, we are part of an international community in Büsingen. The people we live, work, and worship with come from all over Europe and places as distant as the U.S. and parts of Africa. At the conference, pastors, leaders, and lay people from all across Eurasia - from the Northern Europe and the UK clear to Southeast Asia - came together for the first time in four years. Our international community was magnified to amazing proportions. So many cultures, languages, and experiences of being Nazarenes gathered in a single room, worshiping the Lord we have in common in spite of our many other differences!

Reports from the fields across the region all agreed that the challenges are great, but that God is building his church. Economic instability, poverty, anti-Christian hostility, or widespread secularism - none of these serious challenges can stop the Lord from doing his work. Christians are being faithful in the face of persecution, obediently generous despite financial difficulty, and people across the region respond to the Spirit's call in societies where religious faith is derided and treated with suspicion. Whatever the difficulties, obstacles, challenges, and reasons why it is impossible or ill-advised, if God is working and his people are faithful then who or what can stand in the way?

Even while Christians were gathering, the Spirit did not limit His presence and work to the worship services and workshops alone. Outside the conference itself, I enjoyed the opportunity to meet two Muslim men - one a hotel guest, the other an employee - and trade perspectives and experiences of our different faiths. In a place where hundreds of years ago Christians and Muslims would have been killing each other, we sat down, and talked, and - most importantly - listened to each other. It was my hope that both men perceived something different about this Christian than they might have expected. Somewhere farther along in their journey, I pray they will remember having experienced and heard the Lord speaking to them through our conversation and the peaceful way it was carried on.

Following the end of the conference, Gina and I paid a brief visit to the city of Istanbul. A man selling wares at one of the markets spoke briefly with us, attempting to explain why Gina and I ought to convert to Islam. He was plainly spoken and quite direct in his approach, yet we could both sense the genuineness of his concern and compassion for our spiritual well-being from his point of view. In the other two instances, I took the opportunity to speak as well as listen, sharing a Christian perspective. There was no such opportunity here as I discerned the conversation might unintentionally degenerate into an argument, or a spirited debate at the very least. We listened, thanked him for his kindness in speaking with us, and left his store.

Now that we have returned, the pastor of a new church plant in Bulgaria will do a directed study in church history with me over the next ten weeks. I will also have the opportunity to preach at our local church at the beginning of November. Just before Thanksgiving, Gina and I will go to Geneva, Switzerland where I will take the GRE test at the university.

We're grateful the opportunities we've had not only to serve our local church, EuNC, and the Eurasia region on a daily basis. But we always want to be prepared for every opportunity outside the Christian community to share Christ, whether through the words we speak, the way we listen, or the way we live. Whether or not those we encounter are prepared to receive Christ, it is our hope and prayer to lead others a little closer to Him. This is true wherever we find ourselves, whether volunteering in Germany, attending a conference in Turkey, or back home in the United States.

Rising above

There are times in everyone's lives when it seems like your day or your week is a carefully stacked Jenga game, and that someone has pulled out one of the critical blocks that keeps your precariously balanced tower upright. One thing goes wrong, and then the whole thing collapses.

We've had that kind of week. It's not that anything terrible has happened, it's just that countless details in work and daily life seem to have gotten overwhelmingly complicated, or not be working as they should. Deadlines are missed as miscommunications arise; bills that you paid months ago by phone are not credited to your account, and new invoices show up at your doorstep with additional penalties and late fees and demands that you pay them within the next five days; computers (not one, but two) crash beyond repair; carefully crafted schedules are disrupted by numerous unexpected interruptions; projects stretch on longer than expected.

It's not so bad when just one or two things cause some minor stress. But when everything happens at once, it's like being in a tornado. And you warily wonder when the next lightning bolt will strike, the next thing will go wrong.

We notice this happens a lot when we're approaching something important: In this case, a ministry conference that we leave for on Monday.

It is important to us to be fully present in next week's ministry opportunities, tuned in to where God wants us to be and what he wants to say to us and through us, ready for those divine appointments that we couldn't plan, no matter how carefully and intricately we schedule our time. We really wanted to give ourselves the buffer of a quiet weekend to prepare our hearts and minds.

Right now, as work piles up and deadlines loom, it seems especially difficult to shift our focus toward God, rejecting distractions and obstacles that would prevent us from giving him our full attention.

We would value your intercession for us now and over the next few weeks, so that we can rise above what seeks to disquiet and distract us from what God has in mind for us.

Thank you for your partnership in our calling!

Does this mean I've adapted?

When you relocate to a very different place, whether it's across the country or out of your home country entirely, you grapple long and often with that thing we call "culture shock."

I prefer to call it "culture stress," because it's not that you are in a constant state of shock; it's more an on-again-off-again state of stress.

Some missionaries have told me that it's sort of like the stages of grief, in that you don't go through the five stages of culture shock in a linear order and then you're done; you go through them once, and may revisit previous stages again, periodically, after you think you've adapted to your new home.

I've also been told that it takes five years of living in another country before you finally begin thinking like people in that country. The same is true when you return home.

So, I suppose it's a bit optimistic to think we've completely settled into the culture here. And I'm not sure if I should be oddly encouraged by an experience I had over the weekend: I became completely enamored with a street I was driving on while going to a friend's house.

It's the first place in Switzerland that has even remotely resembled America to me in any way. In fact, as I cruised this street, everything began to be surreal and I felt disoriented. The narrow, two-lane road was very straight, and lined on both sides with automobile dealerships, complete with the balloons and garish sale ads; there were fast food restaurants -- Burger King and McDonald's -- as well as the big billboards advertising that they were up ahead.

There were one- and two-story office buildings with plain, unattractive designs and corrugated metal rooftops, as well as small, strip shopping centers and big shopping centers, and gas station after gas station after gas station (you don't see them so close together here, usually).

I'm not saying Switzerland doesn't have these things. But I've never before seen them arranged all together, with the architecture so completely ripped off of EveryTown, America.

I began driving with one hand and snapping pictures with the other.

Then I was struck by what I was doing. All my photography in Europe has been of the picturesque half-timber homes and businesses; the Medieval, frescoed villages; the tiny cars and historic farms and castles -- everything that was previously foreign and interesting and photogenic to me.

It was a bit embarrassing, then, to go slack-jawed and camera frantic over fast food restaurants and car dealerships -- stuff that not even two years ago I would not have dreamed of photographing. You'd have thought I stepped straight out of the bush.

Either the architecture that I grew up with is now unusual and foreign to me, or I am a bit homesick. :-)

-- Gina

A New (And Different) Academic Year

My work at EuNC has continually evolved from before I even arrived nearly two years ago. Originally tapped to run the library, I taught a class on campus, then started developing and teaching online courses, co-taught another class on campus, and became heavily involved with mentoring and supporting the campus students.

This week, a new academic year began and the campus is just as quiet now as it was the day after everyone left. They're not coming back, at least not anytime soon. Yet, make no mistake, EuNC continues in a new and expanded form so that students do not need to uproot themselves (or families), deal with hassles over visas or luggage or airfare, and can study for Christian ministry in their own immediate context. God knows what he's doing in Europe, and he knows how the people he calls into ministry over here need to be prepared.

For the next six weeks, each learning center is being carefully evaluated by members of administration located both here on campus and in the various areas of Europe. The primary focus was always on the campus, but that focus has now shifted to the learning centers. They are the new "faces" of EuNC. What's working? What needs improved? How do we solve various problems involved with decentralized education? Such questions are being dealt with over the next six weeks, and while not every detail can be known or anticipated EuNC is moving forward with a clear sense of mission and direction.

Several students have consistently asked me "How are you doing? How are you coping with the change?" Well, so far I'm doing just fine, and I don't anticipate a change for the worse. I knew they were leaving, I was prepared for the fact that they would not come back in the fall, and I quickly made the adjustment to a new routine. I miss the hilarity and the questions and the activity, and I miss the tight-knit friendship that developed between myself and several of them. Yet I'm enjoying the extra time, space and quiet as well, and don't anticipate getting bored with that. I like the fact that I'm getting to know remaining faculty and staff better. I like a lot of things about the change, though I definitely miss the students and very much hope a campus program will re-start sometime in the future.

I remain gladly available for however EuNC may see fit to use me over the next few months. I am developing one last course, Church History II; writing a brief series of Bible studies for "Engage" magazine; and exploring various possibilities and opportunities concerning our future once my work officially comes to an end at EuNC in December (we stay until the end of Gina's contract at the end of January).

Yet, as quickly as things change, who knows? I think and pray about the future regularly (most times, simultaneously). But not with a sense of worry. I've lived in ambiguity enough in the past that I'm learning a certain pattern for how I best make big decisions. It still feels funny not to have the slightest idea what is coming or what it will mean or where we will end up, but I have every confidence that it will be the right thing.