Recent developments

It was hard to come up with a title for this blog post, so I apologize for the mundane title it now has. However, hopefully the pictures in this post compensates for your interest.

Life has indeed progressed most rapidly in recent months, so rapidly that I have not had time. Yes, not had time. This is of course a concept worth to be reviewed with more details, I mean the concept of "not had time". Here it acts just as an open excuse for the negligence this blog has experienced in recent months.

May went by with travels, grandma's funerals, busy working weeks, and relatives visiting us.

June went by with some travels, some busy working weeks, some visiting relatives and related bureaucracy, some self studying, and some preparatory works for small group studies.

July went by with seeing off wife and baby, intensive self studies, frequent hospital visits (non-serious nature), emergency business travel, and traveling to the other home country on earth.

The past 2 weeks has been busy with meeting friends and family, traveling, camping, re-capturing our previous life, and partially meditating on our future life. Still ahead is the last part of this holiday trip and then returning to the current home country and the everyday life there.

I am good at giving long lists of what I have done, here comes a short list of what I have found out or pondered about:
- Life in China is very hectic, too hectic. We need to do something about our life there to get things rolling smoothier.
- Life in Finland is very nice, but we do not belong here no more, at this phase.
- There are tremendous opportunities for "doing good" in China.
- There are marvelous friends in our lives, which we will treasure and appreciate.
- Loving parents and family are gifts from God.
- The Creation is so beautiful, after spending 6 months in BJ, the appreciation of pure nature grew tremendously!
- Positive attitude and a clear purpose help to sustain us, all based on the goodness and immanence of God.
- I have learned to use more superlative words to express myself. Perhaps I have now had more superlative emotions? :)

Coming and going, now we are kind of used to it. People meet us and ask when we will leave. It does not feel bad, rather very encouraging: the short moments spent together are much appreciated, and we all know that our family does not belong here, for now. Knowing where we are and why we are, it is very assuring. God is a God of assurance. He does not leave anything uncertain.

Soli Deo Gloria!

Paul's first letter to Timothy, Chapter 1, verse 9: He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. 

Paul's letter to Philippian church, Chapter 3, verses 13 and 14: Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. 

The letter to Hebrews, Chapter 3, verse 1: Therefore, holy brothers and sisters, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, whom we acknowledge as our apostle and high priest.

Scenery (notice the magnificent clouds)

Picnic in the park, with dear friends

Picnic / swim in the beach, with dear friends, and wonderful weather

The tasty table at a birthday party. Wonderful makers of the cakes and snacks. :)

Earth and sky

Awe struck. "How great, how awesome art Thou!"

Culture Shock - Beeng There Done That Wrote That Blog Post

Speaking about culture shock, someone said that first 3 months in a new place is the honeymoon phase. Then begins the culture shock phase which might last from some weeks to half a year. In my case, it seems that my culture shock arrived after 1.5 months and lasted ~4 weeks. Now I'm writing the blog post about it. :)

Culture shock meant for me:
- a sense of being lost: what am I doing here?
- feeling low
- lost the track of time usage (fortunately found it just around the corner)
- occasionally missing the quietness of my home country (on earth)

Now, as I think I've entered into the "normal" life phase, I've gained and lost things.
Gained:
- goals for the near future
- routine
- the sense of belonging
Lost:
- the close relationship with my home country (on earth) --> by this I mean the sense of belonging. I feel detached.
- some memories regarding my "previous life" in my earthly home country --> starting to forget some names of some friends, starting to forget some people and things, starting to forget.

Still not satisfied:
- time usage
- some things that are still not settled

Forgetting is deeply human, I've been told, or I've figured out. Sad but true. Fortunately, forgetting does not mean devaluation nor does it imply lack of concern. I am forgetting, but am not overlooking. I'll be trying to stay tuned and keep up the communication homeward.

In all these things, I am deeply grateful that God is here. One song that I want to sing, both deep within and aloud:
God of this City - Chris Tomlin

Looking forward to May, June, and July, and all things He will bring. :)

This is a bicycle, I wonder whether it moves better on the land or in the water. Any experiences anyone?

Friendship: Now and Back Then

Finally, I aim to clear my list of blog topics by posting the thoughts. This one is about friendship, what's different now and back then?

When I was a kid, friends came easy, because I was good at school and generally held to be a "good kid". This was of course in China, where the goodness of a person (even a kid) is measured by how useful he can be. Well, fortunately not always. Anyhow, I was a good kid, obedient to the teacher (mostly), diligent with my home works (comparatively), and eager to play with other kids (always). Friends meant having good time, being out from home and doing things other than school work. Friends came easy and brought many good adventures and joys of childhood.

Due to moving from China to Finland, I lost most of my childhood friends, simply because of lack of communication, and later on the lack of common topics to talk about. In Finland friendship is different: you are a friend if we get along, if we enjoy things together, and if we have time to be together. My early Finnish friends were from school, and church. The friends from church stayed quite well for some years to come, friends from school vanished mostly due to time and life.

I wasn't until high-school that I started to make best friends, the definition being: consciously forming and up-keeping the friendship. At the same time I experienced the possible shallowness of human relationships, in addition to the pain of having friends: separation by time and space is a vital part of any friendship on earth.

At some point, years later, I really felt that my heart was divided into many pieces, some left in USA with warmth, some left in Russia with appreciation, some left in China with a sense of belonging, some left all over Finland with smiles and fond memories. The pain of the divided heart became so great that I doubted my will to move anywhere anymore, I just wanted to settle. Until, a godly friend commented to my feelings: the divided heart is not a problem, as long as they are divided according to the will of God. Eureka! My pains settled, my heart stopped bleeding, and I started to value friendship with an open arm, again.

The recent years, due to dating, engagement, marriage, and eventually the birth of Viivi, I have found that the role of friendship has unfortunately decreased, quantitatively. There simply isn't enough time to care for the existing friendships, not even talking about creating new ones! I've felt sad that my path has been separated from my friends and we are growing apart. Family is of course top priority, but isn't there a way to keep up the friendships as well? The bottom line seems to be: our society (Finland) cruelly separates people into categories: children, teenagers, students/young adults, singles, couples, families, work communities, church communities, etc. Any lasting friendship between categories seems to be hard to establish, or keep up. Inevitably friends drift away, not willingly, but passively, time for sharing grows few, chances to travel or do things together become rare, even a deep discourse about vital issues has a time limit. I am sad, again.

The old saying goes: new friends are like silver, old friends are like gold. I want to treasure the gold God has bestowed in my life, at the same time I long for the ability to engage with new friends. Fortunately, family as such is not a restraint for new friendships, rather it opens up doors to a completely new world of people and lives. My current conclusion is thus: at every stage of life there are valuable friendships to be formed, and all friendships should be cherished and tended to. Everybody needs somebody, a friend is a friend, no matter the circumstances or time or space. "Friends are friends forever, if the Lord's the Lord of them..." True friendship is also possible with people of different religion or worldview.

 Friendship, in its true sense, should never be despised nor overlooked.