Home Thoughts From Abroad

International schools face a lot of staff turnover. Most staff are young and looking for a year overseas to add to their resume or pay down a student loan before heading back into the jungle that teaching in Ontario has become. If they are older, they have family committments that keep them from investing too much time on foreign shores. Folks in the middle are rare, and are usually on the international school circuit as a career choice. Not a bad choice either, as there is a lot to see in this beautiful world, and a teaching certificate is a more or less universal passport.

New this year are Amy and Michel, a youngish couple (from our perspective) from Toronto. Amy has done some teaching in China, but Michel never so much as got in an airplane until a year ago. He is doing real well in a foreign climate and loves the food, but is not terribly impressed with the crowded conditions found here in public transport. Amy is just loving it and is game for just about anything. Her can-do spirit is especially evident in English 3U, jumping in with lots of ideas and enthusiasm.

Jim and Shelley are from Ottawa and closer to our age. They were married three months before us, and this is their first overseas experience. He is teaching Computer Science, and was one of the developers of the Math Trek program, software that is widely distributed in Ontario public schools. Shelly has been in administration for the last dozen years and is happy to be back in the classroom teaching Challenge and Change. They are thoroughly enjoying their time in Malaysia and can’t wait to see more.

We have a barbeque planned for this afternoon, just to get to know one another a little better. Its a good excuse for a Canadian comfort meal in a relaxed setting. If the evening is fine, we might go for a swim after! After all, if you live in this climate, you might as well enjoy it.

The flip side of the lovely trip downtown on the weekend is the haze that settled over the city on Monday. Kuala Lumpur, like Los Angeles, is a city set in a bowl surrounded by hills. Pretty site, but a meteorological trap for airborn pollutants that drift in from the sea and settle of over the city, sometimes for days.

Indonesia, like Brazil, practices slash and burn agriculture, and the resulting thick smoke drifts across the Straits of Malacca. There are all kinds of agreements between the two nations on when and how much of this can be done, but no one enforces any of it and there are whole months of the year when the haze over KL looks like the picture above.

Its bad for the eyes, bad for the lungs and even worse on the economy which depends heavily on tourists and the traffic at foodstalls to keep the dollars flowing. No one feels much like going outside when it is like this, and employee absentism, already a growing problem here, becomes much worse in the haze. All you can hope for is a good rain or a strong wind to clear the air.

Our first pastor – Carl Seyffert, bless his memory – was a tour bus operator in Niagara Falls before the Lord called him into ministry. He never lost that tour guide enthusiasm. Everything was great, everything was interesting, every new thing was worth learning. I just love that attitude in people. Maybe that is why I was so happy to take some of the newbies on staff – Shelley, Jim, Michel and Amy – around town for the first time. It was great to share their enthusiasm for this place.

By now I have a pretty good little route mapped out. We start at the old train station. Not KL Sentral, with its overwhelming busyness, I leave that to the last. But the original train station built by the British in colonial times. Spacious in its Victorian splendor, with delicate minarets at the corners in deference to the host country in which it was built, it is a fitting start to the day. From there we walk to the Central Market for a look at the local folk art in masks, kites and batiks, and fuel up at the food court noted for its variety and cleanliness. Then it is across the river at the Post Office, with its modern take on the Western/Muslim fusion of architecture, the Dayabumi Tower. We take a short hike down Jalan Raja to Merdeka Square, the place where Malaysian independence was declared. On the one side is the Royal Selangor Club, an Edwardian-style building that was the hub of colonial social life. On the other side of the square is the former administrative offices of British rule, now renamed after the Sultan Abdul Samad, which housed the Malaysian Supreme Court until just recently. Although Moorish, rather than Asian, it too shows the deference of the British for Muslim sensitivities.

Then we walk past the funky and organic picture plant sculture/fountain and the Masjid Jamek, the oldest mosque in Malaysia, also built by the British for their Muslim hosts at the spot where Kuala Lumpur was founded. A short hike up Jalan Melayu brings us to Little India where we do some bargaining for ‘designer’ perfume, watches and handbags. On Jalan Tuangku Abdul Rahman we stop at at the Colliseum Cafe, the oldest restaurant in KL for a much needed drink and cooling off. We need it on the next leg, a hard slog in the sunshine without much shade, to the Malaysian Tourist Centre, point of origin for the Hop-On-Hop-Off Tour and the native Malaysia dance held daily on this site. From there it is a short walk to the magnificent Petronas Towers, where we spend a happy half-hour gawking at the Gucci and Cartier merchandise on display.

We exit on the south-east side into the City Centre park, alive with tourists like outseves and Malaysian families relaxing for the afternoon. We mark out the Aquarium for a later visit, but do go into the Jewelry Exhibit in the Convention Centre where Shelley demonstrates an amazing knowledge of gemstones, which can’t be a good thing for Jim! Then it is on to the Trader’s Hotel, site of the SkyBar, arguably the best view of the Towers anywhere in the city. We relax by the pool sipping coolers while the lights come up on the towers and the fountains begin their dance in the park. Weary from walking, we take a very reasonably priced taxi van to Chinatown for a seat in an outdoor hawkerstall restaurant that allows up to do some serious people watching while getting a really good nosh of Chinese food.

Another short hike brings up back to KL Sentral, a lot quieter in the evening, where we catch a cab for a twenty minute ride back home for 18 ringgits. Split three ways that comes to about 2 bucks each. I made a few wrong turns in the day and led us to a couple of dead ends, but I got it mostly right, and the newbies ended up with a favourable impression of their new home in Asia; one that I hope will help to balance out the workload and the sense of homesickness that gets to all of us from time to time.

Steve’s days in Canada came to a close with a lovely visit with our friend Kim McNamara.  It felt so strange to be in Bolton having a BBQ without our dear friend, Bill.  However, it was good to be able to reminise and to look at pictures of the amazing experiences we shared during our year together in Malaysia.  Reading the tributes to Bill that were written by the many people whose lives he so positively influenced helped us to come to grips with this loss in our lives. Kim told us of the hundreds of people whose lives Bill had touched who came to the funeral. One group of students took a cab all the way from Guelph to Toronto to be there to pay their respects.
                                                                          
Friday morning Kim and I dropped Steve off at a the airport and then I had another two full days with Kim.  We even tackled some pool jobs to make our time useful.  On Saturday, Ken and Susan, two friends from that first year who knew Bill and Kim well, came out for the afternoon to to visit and relax by the pool. It was good to see them again.

Kim wanted to be sure that we thanked her friends in Malaysia for the gift of a vase in memory of Bill, and the many thoughtful cards and notes that Bill’s colleagues and friends in Malaysia had sent. Following a suggestion by Gan Yen Sen, the business award at Taylor’s College has been renamed in Bill’s honour; a fitting tribute to a unique guy, and one of the finest men we have ever met.

I think we have created a monster, Pam and I. It was not our intention to start a journal with this weblog. We just wanted to keep in touch with our family and friends. But then the inevitable happened and we decided to download our first year into book format in case this site crashed and we lost all our memories.

Like every solution, this one comes with problems. Not that the project was time-consuming and tedious. It was, but well worth the effort when we saw the final results. But rather that it was SO good a way to record this adventure we are on that I am inclined to do a better job of capturing what we have been doing.

So if you are an occasional reader, you might find the next week or two a little too much. You tuned back in and we were five miles down the road in terms of the number of blogs posted. If you are a regular reader you are about to be snowed. And if you are the chief cook and bottle-washer of this weblog, you are in for a lot of work!

Forgive the utilitarian nature of this post. It is really nothing more than a public service announcement. Steve arrived back in KL, Malaysia Saturday morning, but Pam remains in Canada until July 25th. Both of us can be reached through our regular email.

Pam has a very important meeting next week at Trans World Radio headquarters in Cary, North Carolina and would appreciate your prayers for the success of that meeting. I start back to school tomorrow and would appreciate your prayers as well. We are grateful that we got the chance to meet so many of you on our recent trip home, and regret missing many more of you because of lack of time. I promise to update some posts as soon as I get unpacked.

There was a time, not long ago, when there were few grandparents. Those of us born shortly after the war with four grandparents were rare indeed. I was named after my grandfather who died the year I was born. Dad’s parents were both dead and that left us with one grandmother – a real sweetie, by the way – and that was more or less standard.

Our grandchildren have four, and the way marriages are going these days, that is probably less than average. I don’t know how it is in most families, although I can well understand that there might be some friction among the grandparents at Christmas. For us there is none. We live on the other side of the world. Our daughter-in-law’s parents are basically the only grandparents our grandchildren know. Our son makes a huge effort to keep us connected through Skype, but nonetheless while we are home we are essentially babysitters.

That role was very much in evidence at the wedding we attended for Nicole’s sister. Our job was to get the kids there, keep an eye on them during the celebration and get them home again after the dance. Sounds simple enough, doesn’t it? But Ben is much like his father was at his age. He has an almost irrepressible energy and a fearlessness that spells trouble for whoever is trying to look after him. I caught up with him just in time to see him disappear out the front door into the parking lot. We had a little walk while he investigated ‘Where’d the car go?’ and returned him to his by then frantic mother.

What we saw of the wedding looked lovely, and I’m sure that Pat is delighted to have both of his daughters wed and settled into marriage. Their oldest has been a huge blessing to our son, and their children are a delight to be with, even for as short a time as we get. There will come a time when we can develop a proper relationship with them, but for now we are grateful for whatever time we can get.

We are patient people or we couldn’t do what we are doing in Asia. But there are some things in our lives that are difficult for us to wait for. Holding our grandchildren is one of those things. It has been just under a year since either of us have seen or held Ben and Abi, and that is a long time for new grandparents.

But our daughter-in-law’s sister was getting married and there were rehearsals to arrange and dresses to pick up so we had the delightful duty of looking after our two grandchildren for the day. We of course took them to the mall and McDonald’s and we felt so comfortable and happy looking after young children again. It reminded us of the joy we had raising our own children.

Both of them – all children? – love music, and were so happy to have me play and sing for them. They are just delightful children, and it was wonderful to see and hold them again after so long. It is without question the hardest part of serving the Lord overseas to be away from our family for so long.

Okay, maybe in-laws is jumping the gun. Liz is just dating this guy at the moment. But when your grown daughter invites you to dinner with the parents of the guy that she is dating you know it is getting serious. The Epps are a very nice couple, and their son Greg is a very decent young man. He is studying journalism at the moment, and he has travelled and taught in China, so he has some understanding and appreciation for what we are doing (as opposed to most people who think that we are more than a little strange for livng and working out of Kuala Lumpur).

Dinner was barbequed steak and potato salad, two things that we cannot get in Asia and miss dearly. They were both exceptional, and we had a very fine evening getting to know people that have become important to Liz. In the morning we attended Foothills Alliance Church in Calgary where we heard a good sermon on Ecclesiastes about living and enjoying the life that God has given to you to enjoy. Certainly for Pam and I at the moment that is something that we clearly understand and subscribe to.

In the afternoon we drove downtown to see Liz’s new apartment and take a stroll through the park that borders the river. The park was alive with strollers and cyclists, joggers and lovers, and nobody made strange as I practised my Tai Chi by the river. I was impressed with how multicultural this city has become since I saw it last. I saw and heard a dozen different nationalities and languages, and given that we enjoy the mix of cultures we find in Malaysia, felt very much at home. Calgary is growing to be a cosmopolitan city, and with its wide open spaces and nearness to some of the most spectacular scenery in the world, become a desirable place to live.

Saturday broke clean and clear, one of those days that lets you know that you are fortunate to be Canadian. The drive out to Banff, just over an hour from Calgary, solidified that view, as the Rockies grew closer and more impressive. We arrived in Banff at midday and took a leisurely stroll through town so I could buy the obligatory tourist cap. Then we headed down stream along the Bow River, to where it breaks into brisk rapids and an impressive chute. Where the Sarcey joins the Bow we stopped for a late lunch at a patio overlooking the river and the mountains in the near distance. The air was clean and the sun was warm, and it made you happy to be alive in this great country.

After lunch we took a short detour to Miniwaki Lake on the shores of the Palliser Range, another beautiful site. The water looked so inviting, but the glacier fed lake was only one or two degrees above the temperature of ice, and none of us wanted to put our hearts under that kind of excitement.

Dave drove conservatively home through a steady downpour that gathers quickly in this part of the world. I must confess that the steady drone of the tires was too much for my jetlagged body and I napped a good part of the way home, which is why I am posting at 3 in the morning. I’ll get some pictures up at daybreak, but they won’t do the country around here justice.