more introductions

Hi! I'm Christina, the other "oh-so Chinese" American on our team. While I've been told there are a fair number of Chinese in Cuba (did you know there is a Chinatown in Havana?) I am fully expecting everyone to think Esther and I are sisters...and having the same last name doesn't help.

I live in Mountain View and lead a pretty blessed little life. I go to work, hang out with friends, pay the bills, watch TV, attempt to exercise...and sometimes my own little corner of the world starts to feel like all there is to this world. While I love to travel, I usually check off whatever Rick Steves or Lonely Planet tells me I have to do and call it a trip. It's all boxed up nice and neat and somehow I manage to box up God right along with everything else.

I remember once on a trip to Mexico, I needed a ride to the bus station and managed to catch one with a French couple going in the same direction. So there I was, a Chinese-American, sitting in a car with two random French people, speaking to each other in broken Spanish. (Well, mine was pretty terrible, theirs was quite good.) It was this crazy cross-cross-cross-cultural experience that was hilarious and awkward and beautiful all at the same time.

I wonder at times if heaven will be something like that. This clash of cultures, only it won't be a clash. It'll somehow come together the way an orchestra warms up and suddenly a cacophony of sounds becomes a beautiful harmony. Because when all our little corners and boxes come together, open up and intertwine, we become the full magnitude and beauty of God's creation.

That's why I want to go to Cuba. Because in learning about another culture, another way of life, another people, I learn more about God. I learn more about the enormity of His heart; I experience new aspects of His creation; I witness another level of His beauty. I want to see what God is doing in Cuba; how He is working in the hearts of the people there. In a country where you're taught that there is no god, how is He moving in people's lives? And how do they live out their faith in that environment?

- Christina

Wondering...

My friend Cara told me this weekend that she has never met anyone who asks as many questions as I do.  I don't know if it's a good, bad, or God forbid, annoying thing, but she reminded me that it's a pretty core part of "Esther-ing" (being Esther in the world).

....live in the reality that the world is so complex and big to understand it, to contain just a piece of eternity in your hands, you must ask questions...

So, as I prepare for the trip, here are some of the questions I am excited to ask Cubans in Cuba: 

1. What is Fidel like?

2. Could you live without fried plantains because I can't live without red bean Popsicles for long periods of time?

3. Is ballet a manly man's sport in Cuba?  If not, why are there are so many more male ballet dancers in Cuba than in America?

3. Is Cuba legitimately friends with all the other five remaining communist countries or would Cubans call them "frenemies" (friends who are also enemies)?

4. Does America's War on Terror bother you, especially since we house potential terrorists in Cuba @ Guantanamo Bay?  (my students want to know)

5. Did you know that there are people like Christina and I who grew up in America and speak fluent English, but we look oh-so-Chinese because we are ... well, oh-so Chinese?

6. Most importantly, do you like watermelon... because I am instant friends with anyone who loves watermelon, literally.  I mean that.
 

-esther

Hello from Oscar

Hi, my name is Oscar. I was born in Cuba. Here you see me eating a popular dessert in Cuba -- cheese and guava paste.

When my family and I left Cuba for the US, I was a passenger in what was probably the first hijacking of a Cuban airplane in route to Miami, so instead of landing in Miami in 45 minutes, we landed in Kingston, Jamaica. Eventually we made our way to Miami – two days later.

I was 17 when hearing an evangelist speak I felt that God was calling me for mission service but did not know where. The only place I could think of was Cuba because it was close to my heart, but that seemed impossible at that time.

Where I lived before I left Cuba

Last year I went with my wife Rachel to Cuba – first time since I left 50 years ago.It was through this trip and visiting 4 pastors that I heard God’s whisper – “now is the time to do something in Cuba.” As we talked with the pastors we marveled at their ability to do so much for their communities with such limited resources.

House in Cuba where my mom grew up

Hearing from the pastors the circumstances in their life when God called them, how God moves in their lives and the community, made me realize that God could use me to walk beside them in their work. And that’s why I’m going to Cuba. I want to be there to love, encourage, and serve a community that’s always had my heart.

But our team is not going alone. God has touched the heart of many – friends, family, our brothers and sisters in Christ, our faith communities – who have prayed with us, contributed, supported us. They too are responding to God’s whisper to love, encourage, and serve – to be an instrument to help others find Jesus in Cuba.

- Oscar -

Hello from Rachel:

Let's get the introductions out of the way....


Hi, my name is Rachel and Cuba is my birthplace.

Actually Havana although my birth certificate says Pinar del Rio...but that's another story. Still in Cuba, though.

I love Cuba. I love the people. Their warmth..., their wit..., the way they move to the beat of the music

I bet you were expecting a photo of scanty clothed women :-D

And, I am more in awe of their ability to “conseguir” [con-say-geer] than of the many old cars that cruise the streets of the capital.

Conseguir is one of those words that gets lost in translation. It means “to get”. But conseguir is hard. The word itself connotes that meaning.

It requires street smarts, salesmanship, pushing the envelope, achieving through any means possible. A lot of conseguir goes on in Cuba to get the basic needs of everyday life. Cubans are experts at conseguir.

Many times I think that we are so stubborn that God has to conseguir us. He gently moves us in the direction He has designed for us. He loves us through the process; He pushes the envelope of what we perceive to be the limits of our possibilities; He is there to help us achieve what we cannot even imagine. And then, we stand back in awe of what God has made possible -- what he has done. How wonderful is that!

That is what compels me to go to Cuba. I'm sooo expectant of what God is going to do that I can barely wait.


- Rachel

Greetings from Florida

Warning:  This post has not been written or approved by your regular blogger, Esther.
To get the introductions out of the way, my name is Paul. Unlike the rest of the Cuba team, I’m from Jacksonville, FL – some 2,662 miles away...

Tangent: the mileage is according to the “walking” directions from Google maps. What I find amusing is that Google finds the need to warn you sidewalks may be missing during portions of the trip, but doesn’t really see any need to warn you that you’re planning to walk over 2,500 miles which should take well over a month, but I digress….

Having grown up in Florida, and going to college in south Florida I’ve been asked many times why I would go to Cuba. I was told “What a waste of vacation time? Why don’t you just take a weekend and go down to Miami, it’s the same thing?” While Cubans have definitely conquered Miami and are making their way north into Broward, there’s still something missing…

While it’s not the most apparent from looking at me, I am a first generation American on my mother’s side of the family. With that, the opportunity to go to Cuba holds a special meaning – it’s the chance to see where my grandparents grew up and where my mother was born. Up until now, my impressions from Cuba have come from stories my grandparents tell me and the I Love Lucy reruns from when Lucy went to Cuba and met Ricki…

As Esther pointed out, Cuba does seem to be frozen in the same time as those I Love Lucy episodes, but that’s the key to why a weekend in Miami doesn’t constitute the same as seeing how people live in Cuba.
I’ve never been to a communist country. I’ve never been to a place where you can be thrown in jail simply for saying the wrong thing or uttering a sarcastic joke. I’m well aware of the spoils I get from my family’s decision to leave Cuba 50 years ago (in January), but this trip represents a glimps of “what if…” to me. What if they hadn’t left? What if I was born and raised there? How would life be then?

Next week is the final countdown. Friday, I leave straight from work to Broward county and then meet up with the team Saturday morning (meeting Christina and Esther for the first time). In addition to praying for our safety and praying that God touches the hearts of myself, my team mates, and those we meet in Cuba, I ask you to pray for time management, that we can all finish our pre-trip to-do lists.

A Higher Synthesis:

"Communism is beautiful in theory," I said to my dad.  At the time, I was in college, trying to find an explanation for why some of us live so well while others live with so much less.  The violence part of the theory freaked me out, but I  liked how at the end of history, poor people supposedly finally win out because there's equality forever. 

My dad disagreed.  "Communism is, in reality, quite impractical, for it never takes into consideration the fact that people are self-interested or the fact that people often act out of pure selfishness.  But, Capitalism does.  That's why it survived and thrives," he explained.

And, it's true.

Capitalism has thrived in our increasingly globalized society while in communist Cuba, time has stood eerily still.

People still drive cars from the 1950s.  Buildings are falling apart. 

Cuban Americans returning to Cuba for a visit bring literally hundreds of pounds of stuff from America for their relatives in Cuba who live on much less.

While scholars in the West point out this out as another reason why the communist experiment failed, Castro blames the United States for Cuba's economic problems, citing our refusal to trade with them as one reason why Cuba hasn't been able to flourish as communist theory predicted. 

So, who is right - us or them?  And more importantly, which system is better - capitalism or communism?  Which system better distributes wealth and power?  Which system better protects human dignity?  Does capitalism protect us against the ills of communism and vice-versa?

I know that on some level, I'm asking good questions, but the wrong ones.  Well, they're wrong because the communism vs. capitalism debate doesn't get to the heart of the issue.  Because, what I really want to know is, "How do we make a global society fundamentally just again?" 

Martin Luther King, Jr. was onto something when he said, "Communism forgets that life is individual. Capitalism forgets that life is social, and the kingdom of brotherhood is found neither in the thesis of communism nor the antithesis of capitalism but in a higher synthesis. It is found in a higher synthesis that combines the truths of both."

 

I imagine that the kingdom of brotherhood is a place where people love Jesus radically.  I have no idea what the kingdom of brotherhood He is talking about looks like practically.  But, I know I want that.  I want the healing, wholeness, and goodness that that type of just kingdom would usher in to our broken world.

-esther

---

My prayer is that as our team embarks for Cuba, a society quite different than the comforts of America, that Jesus would remind us that the answers to what will make the world good and just again lie not in human institutions, but in the truth of the gospel that "while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."

 

Hot Weather:

It's been very hot (and a bit humid) in the Bay Area this week.

I know for many of you who didn't grow up here, this weather is seemingly perfect, or just a tad bit uncomfortable.  I used to think of myself as a humidity trooper, considering I grew up in the very sticky, sweaty state of Maryland.  When I was teaching in the South Bronx in New York City a few years back, we didn't have air conditioning (or classrooms without rats, but that's another story).  I remember trying to teach in 96 degree weather with a 8 foot tall massive fan blowing. I had to actually yell so the kids could hear me.  That's what I call the peak of my heat resilience.

However, since moving to California, I have become weak.  When it gets really hot (like 100 degrees), I don't function at full capacity.  Sometimes, I even get a little grumpy, which is a bit hard for me to admit since everyone thinks teachers should have an endless supply of patience.

This is all to say, today, I woke up thinking the hot weather this week is probably practice for Cuba weather, which Rachel has warned us will be like Hawaii but with mosquitoes.  (Wonderful!)  So, what does it look like to practice acclimating?  Should I sit outside for a few hours in the direct sunlight and attempt not to get burned?  Should I practice being hot and sweaty and more importantly, really nice for a whole day?  It seems almost pathetic to talk about this aloud.

This is, what my small group at Highway jokes about as, a "first world problem." I worry about the heat, when the heat is probably the last thing Cubans themselves are worried about.  It made me think on a more macro-level about how we in the first world are so removed from the problems that face ordinary people living their lives on the other side of the globe.  We worry about the cheapest place to buy gas, having BPA-free water bottles, and our mortgages.  They worry about how to live on less than a $1/day, how to walk five miles to get access to clean drinking water, and how to get a loan to develop their micro-business to put food on their table when so many banks are wary of loaning $ to the poor.  This is not to say that our problems aren't real problems.

But, if I am serious about helping Jesus build the Kingdom of Heaven on this broken side of eternity, don't I really, honestly need to be much less worried about the weather in Cuba?  For if I really, as I responded to Jehaan's question in Post-College group last week about what we want to value in 10-15 years, don't want to turn completely inward when I am old, then I need to be more in tune now to the footprints of Jesus in this world.  Yes, I want to settle down and raise children who love Jesus ridiculously, but I don't want that to be the only thing that matters.  Esther, in a decade from now, still wants to love what Jesus loves, like spreading the gospel to the ends of the earth, protecting the widows and the orphans, and justice because it is at the core of His character.   

So, in conclusion:

As Rachel, Oscar, Seth, Paul, Christina and I prepare to visit Cuba in July, my prayer is that the trip focuses us all on something more deeper, meaningful, and significant than worries about the weather - that instead, we become in tune with the movement of God in our lives and in the world... and that we join Him, in whatever that might look like in America, in Cuba, or ... the ends of the earth, for that matter.

-esther

Where in the world is ... Remedios?

It's a good question, honestly.  It's ironic that I am a history teacher, because I have never actually taken a geography class, so these kind of questions always humble me. 

Cuba is 90 miles south of Florida and Team Cuba (Rachel, Oscar, Paul, Christina, Seth, and I) will be helping out at a youth camp in Remedios.




Remedios, about four hours away from Havana, the capital of Cuba, is in the province of Villa Clara.

introductions are needed:

Somehow word got out.  Or, maybe it just slipped out of my mouth that I blog and thus, have suddenly, magically become Team Cuba's designated blog-girl.

Since it will become official with the posting of this blog, I think I should introduce myself.

Hi!  My name is Esther, like the book, and I live the glorious life of a history teacher during the school year, which I find inspiring and beautiful on most days.  In the spring, I heard from Seth, one of the pastors on staff at my church,  Highway Community share about how he was leading a trip to Cuba during the summer. 

To Cuba?

How wicked (pardon my "East Coast-ness") cool is that?!

For those of you aren't history teachers (and consequently, don't have to memorize random facts about the political history of nations for a living), this is why Cuba is such a fascinating place to visit:

1) Cuba is one of five communist countries left in the world.

2) Cuba and the U.S. haven't really been on friendly terms since the Cold War.

3) The U.S. government has attempted to oust their former leader, Fidel Castro multiple times (638, if you wanna be exact, according to Castro).

4)  Guantanamo Bay, the military base that until recently held most of America's War on Terror suspects, is in Cuba.

5) It has historically been very difficult to visit Cuba if you are an American citizen. 


Cuba is also really interesting to me because it's a communist country.

Communism has left a permanent imprint on my family lineage, from my great grandparents down to my parents.  Both my parents grew up during the Communist Revolution in China and they also, to this day, love Jesus dearly.  But, how does the communism and lovin' Jesus thing work together, exactly?

For Cubans, more specifically, they were asked during the revolution to pledge their allegiance - which meant that to be a Cuban citizen was to embrace the title of "atheist."  What does it look like to love Jesus authentically in a communist country?  And, what does it mean to cross cultural and language barriers to partner with them in building the Kingdom of Heaven that Jesus preached so much about in the Scriptures?

These are just some things I'm thinking about as our Team, Rachel, Oscar, Seth, Paul, Christina, and I prepare for Cuba.  Thank you for listening and coming along for the journey, both in prayer and love for us and the gospel....