Flat Becca comes to Beijing

When we came home for Christmas, we discovered that one of my cousin's daughters was participating in a school project similar to Flat Stanley. The young daughter created a flat impression of herself called Flat Becca. Below are pictures we took of Flat Becca visiting our friends and neighborhood.

Lunch with Philippinos, a Singaporean, a Frenchman, a Hungarian

Ready for a Chinese New Year celebration

Our local bus stop.
This year we learned how to read the signs and figure out which bus goes where.

A nearby mall

Chinese New Year decorations for sale.

Our local subway station

Which restaurant did we visit?

Buying flower pots & potting soil.

Sanyuanli Market

One Sunday afternoon a friend took us to a food market that we had heard about. It was quite a cultural experience.

 

We wondered how the vendors got into their stall until we noticed the little hole at the bottom.

How did Beijing prepare for winter?

Now that we are celebrating Spring Festival, I thought I would post pictures of how Beijing prepared for winter. Actually I took these photos in December but then got super busy. We feel Spring in the air now with temps consistently in the low 50s F. Maybe our Greenville friends should visit us as I hear they have a Winter Blast.

Waiting at the bus stop after the government turned on the centralized heat (coal).

Every shop has these heavy quilted, insulated curtains over
their doors even when the glass doors close.

Commonly seen electric scooter.

Even elderly women prepare for winter by exercising in the plaza.

What's inside a Toothpaste Tube?

Last night as I lay in bed trying to go to sleep, I did my normal thing. I thought about all kinds of things. I think if all the letters, speeches, talks, posts, entries, reviews I create in my head while trying to go to sleep actually got onto paper, I would have written volumes by now, maybe tomes. How many of the world’s problems, or my own, would have been solved if my unspoken thoughts actually made it out of my head? Maybe none!

One of the things on my mind is why we are here in Beijing. Yesterday was a particularly frustrating day. Mark had plans for the day that didn’t happen because other things took so much longer than expected. He went to prepay the electricity so we don’t run out over Chinese New Year. He went to three different banks, all of which asked for a Chinese bank account atm card, which we don't have. Finally someone at the last bank used his own atm card and Mark gave him the cash instead of the bank directly. We had never had that much difficulty before. Then we went to return Nate & Julia’s vacuum cleaner. We intended to take it back and vacuum their apartment before they returned last night.  We couldn’t get a cab so we ended up carrying the vacuum on the subway. I didn’t think to put it in an IKEA bag so we could carry it easily. I never thought we wouldn’t be able to catch a cab. So we took the subway and when we got to Zhichunli (3 stops from getting on, one stop away from our destination), Mark asked if I had their keys. OOPS, I forgot their keys. So we got off  to decide what to do. Mark really wanted to meet up with Hector. We finally just went back to our apartment and texted Nate & Julia to ask if we can return it Monday. Mark punted meeting Hector. However, Mark carried a bad attitude most of the day.  As we walked back to our  place, I told Mark he needed to lock himself in his room with his Bible and pray and not come out until his attitude changed. Finally he just laid down and took a nap.

 

So why are we here? I think God has us here to sanctify us. The minor point is the ex-pats; the major point is us. Maybe here is the only place God can squeeze us and refill us. I feel like the toothpaste tube that gets squeezed. We know what’s inside only after we squeeze the tube. And it isn’t pretty! Life is hard here. Life is frustrating. Life takes time. We can’t get a cab. We travel an hour almost anywhere we go. Events take longer than we think they should. We get home late many nights. We can't understand the Chinese when we ask them a question.

We have to always come back to whom we serve – ourselves or God. If ourselves, then we get upset when things don’t go the way we want. If God, then His plan is bigger than ours. Life is about Him and His glory, not us. I have to remember that Jesus died for my sins, and I have many. In Jesus, we are totally, completely, thoroughly, eternally forgiven. When life is Romans 7, then I have to press on to Romans 8. I must preach the gospel to myself every day.

Romans 7 ¹⁵ For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. ¹⁶ Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. ¹⁷ So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. ¹⁸ For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. ¹⁹ For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. ²⁰ Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. ²¹ So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand.²² For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, ²³ but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. ²⁴ Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? ²⁵ Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.  8 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.² For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. ³ For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, ⁴ in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (ESV)

Lord, I pray you will keep us here until we are holy. Never let us go. Sanctify us. Use whatever means necessary. And give us your grace through the process.

From Here to There

As Mark & I rode in a taxi last night, I thought of a blog post describing how we get from one place in the city to another place. 

So how do we get from here to there? We now live about 250m further from the bus stop, a total of 500m walk. We walk to the bus stop to catch a bus to the subway. Two buses turn left and go nearest to the subway station. Other buses stop short of the subway station at the main intersection, then we have to cross the intersection one direction then turn 90° and cross another street then walk a bit more to the subway. Other buses turn right, away from the station, and stop further down the street.  We then have to walk to the main intersection and cross twice. Our timeframe and the time of day determine if we catch the first available bus and get off wherever it stops or we wait for one of the two ‘subway’ buses. We also find that the time of day affects the frequency of the buses. Rush hours of course mean that the buses come closer together and we are more likely to catch the appropriate bus. We find that evenings, past suppertime, both buses and taxis don’t come by as often.

Sometimes in an effort to save time, we take a taxi. That works okay if taxis are nearby. Last night we looked for a taxi for about 10 minutes. The downside of taxis is that they use the roads, which means they get caught in the traffic of thousands of vehicles.  Also, it seems that many taxis now rely on a smartphone app so they don’t pick up random passengers. Sometimes we wonder, too, if taxi drivers see us as foreigners and think we don’t know any Chinese or where we want to go. It is fun to see them relax when Mark speaks to them in Chinese.  It's also a great time to practice speaking since most taxi drivers don't know English.  Normally a taxi ride is quicker. I must say that our BJ taxi drivers maneuver the traffic excellently. Their skill amazes us in how they work their way through and around other vehicles. They do things on the road we would never see in the States. Yet they are careful.

We find our most reliable and efficient mode of transportation is still the subway. It’s always on time; it doesn’t have to battle other vehicles; and it goes everywhere in the city. Several notable events took place regarding the subway while we came home to the States. They opened two new lines and are working on a third new line. But the biggest change was the price increase. Up until the end of 2014, one could ride the subway anywhere for any length of time for only 2 yuan (=.33 USD). However, now the price structure incorporates distance. Therefore the shortest trips cost 3 yuan (=.50 USD) and the longest trips cost 7 yuan  (=1.15 USD), an increase of ½-3½ times. Still cheap compared to many cities’ subways, but we find ourselves reloading our prepaid subway cards a lot more often now.

So we are still learning to time our travels to arrive in a timely fashion. We seem to always be late wherever we go. Ughh!

Home Sweet Home - pictures

Our home for the next 2 1/2 years.

Because the countertop is cracked to the left of the stove, we negotiated with the landlady to replace the countertop with a white speckled solid surface. We think it will brighten up the kitchen. In addition, we will get a countertop to cover the wooden heating unit to the right of the picture where Mark can chop vegetables. :) Can't wait to see what it will look like in March.

The drying room off the kitchen. We now have an electric dryer, but I will probably use both the dryer and the drying room as Chinese dryers don't dry clothes very well or at least take a very long time (several hours). I found by hanging clothes here in the drying room and opening the window just a little, clothes dry overnight. The challenge came when we had overnight guests and I had towels in the washer but didn't have the dryer yet. How was I going to get sheets and towels dry for guests?

South facing living room. 

Facing north. The kitchen is to the left, opposite the coat rack.

Master bedroom

The one bathroom

The spare bedroom and Mark's office. Ready for guests. Come see us!

 Sorry the pictures turned out so dark. The apartment is really bright with the sunshine streaming and the white walls. Now we need to find some soft textiles - rugs or wall hangings.

Finally!!!!

Finally - I can access my blog! Since we moved into our own apartment, I had not been able to access some very important websites. Like this blog site, LogMeIn, and of course Facebook. We finally solved the issue tonight! OK, Facebook isn't critical, but it sure helps us peek into our Facebook friends' lives.

When we arrived back in BJ on January 14, we pretty much hit the ground running looking for our own place to live. Gracious friends of ours, Nate & Julia, let us stay with them until we found our own place. We spent a wonderful five days with them until they returned home for a 3 week vacation. We then had their place as long as we needed.

We benefited from the special time we had with Nate & Julia and their 4-month-old son Isaac Paul. What a joy to watch the new parents grow in gospel-centered parenting. Even though Isaac is so young, Nate & Julia have developed a vision on how to bring the gospel to their family, how to live in God-centered grace. Nate & Julia exemplified God's grace to us as we shared their 600 sf first floor apartment.

We found our apartment soon after arriving and spent several days negotiating, signing, cleaning, moving, and buying. We looked at several apartments before going home for Christmas so we knew a typical 'flat'. When we walked into our current apartment, the wonderful sunshine streaming through the southern exposure picture window attracted us. We could put up with a lot with terrific sunshine! We aimed for a furnished apartment but here 'furnished' means something different than in the States. When we rented a furnished apartment in TN for two months, we only had to bring our suitcases of clothes. Here, however, is a different story. The 2-bedroom apartment came with a clothes washer in the bathroom; beds, wardrobes, desks, one chair in the bedrooms; an entertainment center, coffee table, side table in the living area; kitchen table with 4 chairs, and a shoe cabinet. We have had to supply refrigerator and sofa (that comes off our rent so will stay with the apartment), all kitchen supplies, all bed & bath linens, microwave, dryer, desk chairs, etc. We still need a toaster oven (for baking) and a vacuum. Therefore, I made my only two trips ever to IKEA here in BJ.

We thank the L for his provision for a home. We hope to use it to serve and show hospitality. We already have monthly guests lined up through April. We look forward to restarting our monthly Guys' Nights of dinner and discipleship and having BBC friends over. The other day one young man even spent the night on our sofa before IKEA delivered the remaining bedding.

Now that I can access the blog, I will post pictures soon.