Sojourners' Truth

Third Culture Kids

Josh and I recently bought Lonely Planet's book Travel with Children. While reading the chapter about long term travel and living abroad, I came across a section about Third Culture Kids (TCK), or kids who spend "a significant amount of time in a culture other than that of their parents." In addition to the "works cited" section of this book, a simple Google search shows that there seems to be more and more research about and resources for TCKs. One finding of this research that the book's author highlighted was that Third Culture Kids "make roots more in people than in place." Something about this statement struck me as important and familiar and I couldn't stop thinking about it. It sounds a lot like how we are called to live as Xtians – investing in people not places and in relationships not possessions. It's probably very obvious, but it took me a while to "get it." As Xtians, we are ALL Third Culture Kids. We spend a significant amount of time in a culture other than that of our Hvnly Father. The scrptrs remind us that we are "aliens and strangers in the world." (1 Ptr 2:11) and He himself tells us that his "Kingdom is not of this world." (John 18:36). Maybe if I was living more with the mindset of TCK, it would be evidenced in my life by where I identify my roots and invest my resources. The problem is that I frequently forget that I am not of this world. Addresses & mortgages, schedules & routines, things that seem so permanent, all become priority while I have neighbors I've never met and friends who need help in bearing their burdens. How many times are we told to "love one another"? How many times do I have to be told? It's funny how a Lonely Planet guide book can be so convicting.

One of the huge blessings we've enjoyed after moving here has been the opportunity and ability to travel. We are seeing places and experiencing cultures that seemed like outrageous, unattainable dreams just a couple of years ago. Before we were able to travel, it was very easy to see the differences between our culture and others. Now with each trip, the world seems to get smaller and it's a lot easier to see the similarities. Here is a picture of our TCK on our recent trip in July. We were in Estonia when Harper noticed, across a giant square, this woman from Kuwait who was wearing an abaya. We thought it was funny how disinterested Harper seemed in all the people around us who "looked like her", but she was immediately drawn to this woman who was both covered and speaking Arabic. We also thought it was funny how we both felt an almost immediate kinship with this woman and her family because we all lived in the same general location. Maybe it's not all that unique, but it felt pretty special to be an American family connected to a Kuwaiti family during a brief stay in Estonia. I think it was just a snapshot of making roots in people and not in places.

Finland, the Baltics, and Poland

We just returned from ten days touring Helsinki, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland. The weather was incredible - sunny skies, cool breezes, and big puffy clouds in the sky. Except for Helsinki, each city we visited had a Medieval past. The walled "old cities," castles, and hundreds of churches were all so impressive.

We learned a lot about the Soviet Occupation of the Baltic States and of Poland, something I knew very little about. One of the most moving museums we visited was The Museum of Genocide Victims in Vilnius, Lithuania. Housed in the former KGB headquarters, we were able to tour the actual KGB Prison in the basement of the building. It was a prison and a place of torture and terror for 51 years (from 1940 until 1991). We saw the cells (including a padded cell and isolation cell), shredded KGB documents, the guard look room, and the execution room. On the upper floors, the museum chronicled (with writing, pictures, and artifacts) the Soviet Occupation of Lithuania. Pictures inside the actual prison and museum were not allowed. We also visited the Museum of Soviet Occupation of Latvia which was extremely interesting.

As a "vacation" from our vacation, we spent a night and day at the Estonian Baltic Sea Resort in Parnu. We stayed in an old hotel built in the 1930s (during the brief period of Estonian independence sandwiched between the Russian and then the Soviet-Nazi-Soviet occupations). We were the only American tourists there, which made it kind of cool!.

In Poland, we spent a day visiting Auschwitz and Birkenau (Auschwitz II). It happened to be on the 4th of July, which made us all extremely grateful for the freedoms we enjoy daily. The grounds of Auschwitz were originally a Polish Military Base. During their occupation of Poland, the Nazis turned into a work/death camp. It is the third Nazi Concentration Camp we've visited and it was still so hard to see. We saw the room in which the Zyclon-B gas was tested to see if it could be used for mass killings, barracks, and the execution or "death" wall, but the most moving exhibit, to me, was the collection of the belongings of the people sent to Auschwitz. There were cases of eye glasses, dishes, personalized suitcases, hair, and shoes. There were even cases of baby clothes and of children's shoes. It was so difficult to hold Harper in our arms and stare at those shoes, just thinking of all the children, just like Harper, to whom those shoes belonged. We finished the visit at Birkenau. The Nazis built Birkenau as primarily a death camp. It was built to hold up to 200,000 prisoners. Some of the original buildings are still there. We saw the wash and toilet room and one set of barracks. The crematoriums were burnt to the ground by the Nazis near the end of WWII, and the museum as left the ruins of them as they were. We walked past the infamous dividing platform where a doctor stood as the people exited the train cars and pointed to the left or the right. If the doctor thought the person was fit to work, he was sent to the barracks. If the doctor did not judge the person fit to work (i.e. elderly, pregnant women, and children), he was sent immediately to be killed. We saw the Holocaust Memorial and the plaques written in every language spoken by the prisoners. Even though it was a difficult place to visit, I'm thankful that we did. Ellie Wiesel said, "for the dead and the living, we must bear witness."

We ended the trip touring the Old City in Krakow Poland. We stayed in this very nice hotel (thank you Graham and Cathy!) overlooking the Main Market Square. We could open the windows and hear the bell tower each hour and even the live trumpeter who, every hour, plays to commemorate the trumpeter who lost his life playing from that very tower warning the Krakow citizens of the Tatar invasion.

It was an incredible trip!