-^-for posterity-^-

what warmth the vietnamese have!

oh, to be in hanoi on a sunday morning. a sticky sunday morning riding along in a cab watching all the people move swiftly through the chaotic traffic. the looks on their faces, in my estimation, are a combination of callousness and innocence. the world through their eyes would be a mighty strange place. a place i would like to more fully understand.

we were going to church. this is the hanoi international church or something like that and it's located in one room at the bottom of some type of convention center. i didn't pay too much attention to where we were going. i was fascinated with the faces.

this church is lead by no one in particular to my best judgement. it is ecumenical and the service is made up of singing, reading of scripture and then the interpretation of scripture by some person. today we learned about fairness. what an interesting topic in church full of very wealthy foreigners in socialist vietnam. my mind was rarely at rest.

we left from there to have lunch. it was good and i began to notice that hanoi was less and less a dream. i'm beginning to become frustrated with the language but find it very difficult to learn it because i'm not completely immersed. there are too many english speakers around. it's difficult to learn anything without practical application. i'll have a much more rewarding time learning the langauge in ho chi minh city.

i was then left at the mcc house to go about my business for the afternoon. i spent that time reading, writing and reflecting. i am not busy enough to allow time to take hold of my life so it leads to a lot of time reflecting on the duration of my stay. two years is beginning to seem like a long time as much as i would convince myself otherwise. don't get me wrong, i'm very excited about spending this time here, it's just that not seeing certain people for two years will be very difficult. i will come to terms with it and if i don't, i'll lose some valuable time learning about the culture because of it. better to come to terms with it now.

tomorrow is full of nothing. i'm supposed to go out and buy a surge protector because my old one went up in smoke and i have a letter to send out. more time learning about the culture and figure out this confusing language.

good-bye all. do all things out of love. nothing out of fear. this is how we are taught to live.