الإنجليزية الأمريكية (American English)
One of the things I find interesting about living abroad and learning a new language is the way my relationship with my native tongue has changed. Working in an environment like this, you come across people from all over who may be less than used to speaking English, and I find myself learning patience when people take a bit longer to express themselves, or learning to guess meanings when what they intend to say is unclear. Doing so helps me grow and try to be a better listener. When I speak, too, I have to be careful about how fast I speak or how my accent is coming across, and it forces me… Read more >>True Enough?
Living in a different culture is an interesting thing. As I stretch and adjust to my surroundings, I am forced to examine the way I do things and ask if what I do is because of my personality or inherited from my culture, something that glorifies God or just something I do without much thought. Such introspection engenders growth, but not without a fair share of discomfort. For instance, truth-telling where I live is viewed quite differently from where I come from. People swear to God all the time, even responding to something amazing you say by saying, “swear to God?” The funny thing is,… Read more >>
Ordinary
One year in, and it is bizarre to think about the things that have become ordinary. Buildings in several shades of brown, ranging from once-glorious to yet-unfinished. Streets occupied by a donkey-driven cart, a tuk-tuk, a motorcycle, a microbus that looks weeks, days, hours from falling apart. Drinking coffee in bright plastic chairs in the street, watching soccer with strangers in a language that is inching towards familiarity. Answering the well-worn script of questions about why I'm here and how I've come to speak this language. There are things I can see in myself that are more… Read more >>
A Change of Pace
So I am terrible at blogging consistently, but I finally have something that would be really easy to blog about! I just got back a couple days ago from a trip that was entirely different from my normal routine here. I went with a group of other workers to a refugee camp in a country south of mine to help with a trauma healing workshop, and it was an unforgettable experience! Everything in that country was so much more stereotypically "Africa" than I am used to! The dirt was red, there were termite mounds, there were kids in various states of (un)dress running up to say "Imfinethankyou" in… Read more >>