Fall is here.. lalala!

Well hey there, everyone! *mr rogers smile*

So i dont really even know who reads this.. i may be writing completely for my own betterment.. but be that as it may... i will continue to write.

So i'm in portland, for now. Going to portland state uni... seeing what will happen next.
I never can seem to stay in any place for too long of a time. I enjoy being home, but after a few months, i want to be out traveling again. There should be some school where you are on one huge continual study abroad program.. and that still only costs $2500-3500 a quarter. no joke. that would be AMAZING. i would quit all of life and just do that for the rest of eternity.

I'm teaching theater, but my classes keep getting canceled. yeah.. bummer. I started with 4, now i'm down to 2, and one of those seems like it may be going soon. It's all due to low enrollment. Definitely a blow to the self-esteem when your classes are cancelled due to low enrollment! Luckily for me, i dont have self-esteem issues....... uh... just kidding. um the actual story is that all of homelink is experiencing the same low enrollment, so its not because of me or something. *phew*
About the class, though, i really like the kids. Its a bit strange teaching high schoolers since i've only been out of HS for 3ish years, anyway.. but its cool at the same time. We can have conversations about their teachers and about their homework and i know what they're talking about because i did the exact same stuff and had the same teachers. Which makes me feel old at times when i have no idea what they're talking about!

In that last sentence i had a definite problem typing 'idea' instead of 'ikea', and it reminded me of how much i love ikea. Ikea is great! Everyone go to ikea. in fact, hang out at ikea! They have really good meatballs. Well actually, their meatballs are only okay... but their alfredo is amazing! And its only like $1.50. Because ikea is mucho cheapo. eeyah. and then walk through the rooms and feel that evil spirit of covetoussness grab your soul, and fight the urge to grab the lady's purse next to you, scoop up a few brilliant, sweedish-named cushions from the display, and make a fervent dash for the checkout line before anyone figures out whats going on. Yep... good times.

In other news...
Classes are good.

Thats about all.
i think i'm gonna go to goodwill..

Peace!

Home at Last

Well, everyone, i'm home.
And i'm up at 2:30am writing this blog, because even though i've been in north america for going on 4 days, my body is still something of 15 hours ahead... still in Beijing time.

I've been trying to think of what to put in a blog... so much happened, that i could write for days and you still wouldn't get everything.

I guess the best way to sum up China would be "unexpected". I basically went with no idea of what i was going to be doing... except taking photos... and ended up having the time of my life. God really knows what he's doing!

In June, if you had asked me what I was looking forward to the most about this summer, I would have said just being back in England -- which is like my second home. But looking back now, I sort of ask myself "did I GO to england?" China was such a different world, and I was there for so long, that everything before it... including the last 19 years of my life.. seems to blurr. Hah! It's true though. My friend Evy, who joined me for the last 2 weeks of the trip, and I had this thing we would say when something was taking a really long time... as things often do in China. It was "Natalie (or Evy) doesnt remember a time before [insert situation]." Some of the great times we used this were after our 43-hour-turned-55-hour train ride across northern china, our stay in Bishkek - the capitol city of Kyrgyzstan (which, you know, is the world's #1 tourist destination..), and the time we were assigned to go outside and 'beat the carpets'... us being the most qualified to do that, obviously. And it's like that when I think about China. I dont really seem to remember a time before it..!


It was... incredible. Insanely impacting moments... whether it was standing on the Great Wall of China our first day in Beijing, thinking about how many milleniums it had stood, guarding the chinese people from foreign invaders.. or taking photos of laughing kids in the Sichuan earthquake zone... or just sitting along the hutong (chinese name for the ancient alleys near Tian'anmen Square and the Forbidden City) we stayed on, watching the people and eating the amazingly good bread rolls you could buy for 2 quai... 30 cents.


I've realized... God knows you better than you know yourself.
Before going to china, i just thought of it as the cliche missionary spot. I loved Europe.
Now, I still love Europe... its still the best place in the world, after Ptown, of course... but China -- its amazing, too. The people, the culture.. they're SO cool! Their obsession with beauty.. their genuine hospitality.. the way they run up next to you when you're standing around Tian'anmen Square chatting with your friends and pose really quick, take a photo, and run off (we call it walk-by photo shooting)... its just all amazing, and so insanely funny, and beautiful... all at the same time.
God knew I would like China, when it wasn't even on my list of 'have to go places'. I never really seem to go to those... haha! England wasn't one of those. And yet, I love it. China wasn't, either, and now i'm ready to tell everyone to go on vacation to Beijing. Who needs the bahamas? seriously.

Well lets see... what did I do? Short overview might be in order, huh?
Well, the first week in Asia I was in Hong Kong. We went to Gateway Camp, a massive camp for equiping missionary teams from all over the world to go into asia. There were 1500 people there, the majority of them connected somehow with YWAM, since Gateway was started by Dale Kauffman -- the founder also of King's Kids International. Lots of KKI teams. It was pretty sweet... and i found myself really missing my old KK people. :)
It was really awesome, to hang out with Scandanavians, Dutch people (we called them the orange people... because they always wore orange, their national color. and they were awesome.), Colmbians, Chinese, Swedes.... you name it. We had this massive "festival of the nations", and the south americans danced, the africans danced, the americans danced (line dancing... to my mortification), the belgians made waffles, the chinese passed out fans, and there was a huge 'parade of nations', with the flags and everything. it was seriously awesome. hanging out with the nations... its one of the most amazing things in the world.

From Hong Kong we went to Beijing... which is just... rad. so cool. such an awesome place. and it was such a great time to be there. We were there for a week, and we got there just 3 weeks before the oly's started. So everywhere, people were painting their shopfronts, landscaping, cleaning, the military was getting ready, people were so excited, everywhere... but all the tourists weren't there yet. There were westerners, but they were travelers. Backpackers. People that go places because they want to get to know the culture. Because they want to see the things that tourists dont care about. Because they love to sit in the hutongs and get to know the people, and the beauty of a place. Tourists just go, walk the great wall, take photos of mao's mausoleum, dont care about adapting to the culture, demand forks in restaurants, and everyone breathes a sigh of relief when they leave. Americans are notorious for doing that. Dont do that if you go somewhere... this is a side note: if you travel, try to adapt to that culture. it's really honoring of them, and it shows that you respect them as a foreigner in their country. they'll be nicer to you, and you'll have a better time, as well. PLEASE dont be like the westerners i see.. americans in europe and all westerners in asia... who just walk around, not aware of the cultural differences, talking exceptionally loud on english trains, putting their feet on things in china, making bad faces at food they're not used to... all those things are just horrible. stay home if you're gonna do that. dont give travelers a bad name.
okay back to the story..
beijing i cant even say everything about, so i'll stop before i write a novel.
[photo: forbidden city]


After Beijing we went to Chengdu, which is in Southwestern China, just a few hours' drive from the Tibetan area. For 3 days, we took a little bus up more into the mountains (which eventually turn into the Himalayas... not that we were anywhere close to those, though. it's a HUGE mountainous area), and taught english classes to kids up in the Earthquake Zone. (This is all in Sichuan province... you may recognize that name more than Chengdu)
It was really mind-blowing. Seeing the devastation... well, at first you just feel like you're looking at another 3rd-world country, but then the kids pull out cell phones, and you see a nice jacket hanging over the drying line, and people are wearing good clothes and shoes, and you realize... these people weren't poor. they were normal, middle-class chinese people who ran touristy hotels and inns for all the chinese city folk who come up during the summer to get away from the city smog, heat, and humidity. And now, their inns are piles of rubble on the ground, parts of their families are dead, their livlihoods are ruined for years to come... they're living in government-built housing, they've lost most of their posessions... and there are still aftershocks happening all the time. Not really enough to make more fall down, but enough to remind them what happened, and to put fear in them again. One aftershock happened the first night we were up there. it was just a 4.0, but it was a bit nerve-wracking, and i wasn't from there. i've been in many californian earthquakes, but there's just a different mentality you have about it after seeing all the devastation around you.
Probably the most mindblowing thing, though, was that the people, despite ALL that, could still smile. They could still laugh. The kids loved to play, and they were typical elementary-school-aged kids. The 'too cool for school' group of boys sitting in the corner not paying attention, the intellectual top-of-the-class girl who answers all your questions, the groups of shy middleschoolers who just stick together and look embarressed but pleased when you ask them a question... its the same as american schools. all kids, everywhere, are basically the same. i knew that before , but now... i KNOW it. does that make sense? hah
And the adults... the little old ladies of the town would stand outside the classrooms, peering in the windows, laughing - making fun of us, i'm sure of it - and hollaring things in to the kids every once in a while, making them laugh as well. I know people were laughing at us all the time, but it didn't make us feel bad. It was kinda funny, i thought, as well :) Its not like we could speak Chinese at all well... our meager attempts at "ni hao" (hello) probably had atrocious pronunciation... and our sign-language-meets-interpretive-dance style of communications we tried to use instead probably didn't make us any less an object of ridicule!


From Chengdu, I went back to Beijing for about 2 days. The group I was with for the first 3 weeks went back to the states, and in Beijing I joined up with a different group of people -- from all over: Egypt, the states, South Africa, France, & China -- and it was us who went to Kyrgyzstan.
The train ride was rediculous... there's no question about that.
Urumqi, i didnt see any of, except for the ride to the airport in the morning.
Bishkek... well lets just say that you are strangely aware of the fact that you are probably in THE most random place on planet earth... but that it is also very cool at the same time! They spoke russian, which makes sense, but which i didnt expect. And i found that I actually am very good at pronouncing Russian... unlike my Chinese skills. "Prevet" means hello, and next time I see the little russian ladies in Fred Meyer, I can greet them in my semi-good russian language skills. i'm excited for that moment.
The Silk Road Worship Art Festival was the reason we were in Bishkek... and it turned out to be pretty sweet. It was tight to hang out with all these Central Asian people... again, God knew I would enjoy the experience a lot more than I anticipated! I now have awesome friends in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Mongolia, & South Korea. Pretty amazing. And they're seriously rad.
Probably the funniest moment was "National Art" presentationd day... everyone was supposed to present a 'national art', like some national dance or song or something. Evy and I had a really hard time figuring out what to do... everything in America is originally from some other culture!! Eventually we decided on three things: First, we did an amazing performance, lipsyncing to the Beach Boys' Surfin USA. In probably the single most amazing moment of my life, all the awesome people from Uzbekistan ran up to the area in front of the stage and pretended to be our adoring crowd... trying to touch our hands, taking photos with their cameraphones... it was absolutely brilliant. Then, we taught them all "West Coast Slang". Ev is from Cali, and i'm obviously.. from Washington.. and enjoy saying words like 'awesome' and 'dude'. So, we taught about 80 central asians and koreans how to say, with feeling, "Totally awesome, dude!" It was great. And they actually were pretty good! Then for our grand finale, we taught them all the Macarena. Aaaand did it wrong. But oh well -- it was fun. And everyone LOVED it. I had people come up and shake my hand afterwards! Crazy.[photo: our awesome team]

I was sad to leave all the people in Kyrgyzstan, but Evy and I had to get back to Beijing. I actually didn't enjoy Beijing as much after the Olympics started... but it was funny how many people asked ME for directions. Actually I even gave the taxi driver directions at one point... i guess I know my way pretty well around the city! Evy and I didn't go see any olympic games.. thats a story in itself.. and I think basically it just wasn't God's plan for us. Its okay, though, becuase its not really the last time we'll get the chance to. I mean, come on -- i'm 19! And the 2010 olympics are in vancouver bc... so that will be an easy trip up to see them. Anyway, though.. i did enjoy the last few days, not doing any 'missions' stuff, but just hanging out in the city. I bought an entire seperate suitcase to carry home ALL the stuff i bought... and I took a bicycle ride through the hutongs... which basically was putting my life in danger... and we walked around olympic park a bit, as well. Coincidentally, while in Olympic park on Aug 12, we were interviewed by.. CBS morning news, ABC radio news, and some random LA news channel. Oh, and the day before we were used for a shot in a BBC news special. I guess we just attract reporters! It was really funny. The BBC lady actually RAN after us... to ask us to be in their shot! Crazy times. Oh, and Evy's parents saw us on CBS news early in the morning... so yes, i was on national news. it was sick.
if you want my autograph... i'll be here for the next 2 years..
haha

[photo: Beijing hutong]

After 3 more days in Beijing, on the 13th, I flew home... across the international date line... causing August 13th to be the longest day of my life at 40 hours (who said days were only 24 hours? obviously they never crossed the international date line.)... and my parents met me in the airport in Vancouver B.C. Canada, i quickly discovered, is basically just like America... at least Vancouver is... and then on the night of the 15th, I got back to home sweet home.

People keep asking if its wierd to be home, and I dont really know what to tell them. Sometimes i have these crazy moments... like how people are going on and on about how hot and.. humid (?? yeah i heard a lady say that) it is here, but compared to beijing, this is cool for me!... and walking into walmart today i was just HIT by the craziness of american consumerism, and the simplicity of the lives of some people. its strange to walk beside people who have been here all summer, working, gardening, etc. and i've been all over the world... yet we're both buying tshirts in the line at walmart. That's strange to me. But then at the same time, Asia and America are SO different that it almost feels like i've switched universes... just passed through some time/space continum to come home... and it seems surreal that I ever WAS in china.
And then watching the olympics is the ultimate trippy experience. Today on tv the news crew passed a lady who i had waved to just 4 days ago as I walked through a hutong. They were walking down the same hutong. And then the marathon is running past all these places that i walked, and i have memories there... and its a bit strange, and surreal, but at the same time, completely normal. i dont really know. maybe it would be easier if you just jumped into my mind and figured it out? I dont think i can really describe it.

But anyway, i'm back. And it's good to be back.
I've traveled all over the world... and I know i'll be traveling a lot more in my lifetime... i've seen China, I love England, and yet... Portland, Oregon is still my favorite place in the world. Home is amazing.

[photo: the rug-beating brigade. getting in touch with our oregon trail roots...]

"the prayer room is rapidly increasing in size and people will enter with a mad outcry..."

i thought i would start this blog with the words of Micah Miller Mosley, prayer warrior!!!

i know it doesnt even really make sense.
but that's what makes it brilliant.

i'm sitting in the entrance to the prayer center... with our american flag.. talking about dale kauffman's amazing hand motions... its great. :D

God's been teaching me a LOT this week here at the gateway camp. it's been such an awesome time.

I would love to tell more, but i will have to later. We're leaving in the morning for Beijing, and I'll update when i can, but i dont know if there will be many opportunities.

i love you all!

God save the Queen

The last four weeks here in the UK have been great. I absolutely love England... and it's been amazing to be able to spend more time here, bumming around London a bit more, seeing some more of the countryside... all of that. It's nice to be here in the summer, too, since I saw the other 3 seasons during my DTS.

Youth With A Mission is the same.. always the same! The community worship, the meals with friends, the creaky beds and tipping wardrobes, the waving people, the smell of gas-powered ovens, the signs warning against bathrooms leaking into floors below, lots of coffee and cadbury chocolate... its all the same. Sure, there's different people, and new ministries, but the best parts, they're still all there. And it's been great to be back!

Of the three weekends I've been here, i've been in London 3 of the 6 days, and I've discovered I really, really like the city. The National Gallery was mind-blowing. To stand in front of a painting by Leonardo DaVinci... and think about how he stood there, too... its incredible. And to see the large "Vincent" painted across Van Gogh's paintings was awesome. And funny. I love Van Gogh. His paintings were brilliant. Tate Modern was a new sort of experience for me. I'm not as much of a Picasso/Dali fan - normally i'm more a Monet/Van Gogh type of person. But walking around the Tate Modern i could feel my mind expanding. It's like exercising your mind - to learn to appreciate and find the beauty & meaning in things that aren't your primary taste. And I hope I accomplished something of that sort. [photo: national gallery]

I've made some great new friends as well, and had the opportunity to strengthen old friendships from DTS. It's been almost surreal, being back with many of my DTS friends, but now with a different sort of relationship to eachother. We're fellow staff, rather than DTS students. I rather like it, even though DTS was really great! It's interesting to have these new experiences. And it's cool to see how people have grown and changed in the year and a half since our DTS ended. There's some great new people on the base as well, and it's been awesome getting to know them. I feel really close to some of them already, even after only 4 weeks. But then, it feels as if I've been here for months, not just 4 weeks! England can do that to me. It's like coming home from Uni -- after a brief "ahh its great to be back" feeling, you just settle right in as if you've never left. It's something similar here.

Hmm - I should give a short summary of what i've been doing here, I suppose. Well primarily I've been helping to organize the communications plan for Beijing2London, the outreach organization/framework/resourcing group birthed by my friend Peter. I've been working on how we should communicate to people what B2L is and what they do. I've taken a bit of footage for a video, although most of the media will be shot in China, and I've had some meetings with others on the B2L staff to try and summarize/plan for the next 4 years. It's daunting, but we're making headway. I think it will be a continuous thing at least for me over maybe even the next year or so after i get back from China. When I'm not in the B2L office or slaving away in my 'home office' - aka my flat w/my computer - i'm helping my friend Whitney with the Cafe she's working on starting up. Painting, sanding, varnishing, stapling... its all in the job description. One very cool project i've been working on for her is the photos for the cafe walls. A new friend - Krissy - and I are in charge of that, and we're just waiting for the parcel with the photos to come in so we can work on getting them in the frames and arranged up on the walls! We've got some awesome shots, and I'm really excited to see how it all turns out. I'll keep everyone updated on that!

Well I think that's basically it. My time here has been great. It's been relaxing, fun, and QUICK! And I've learned a lot and I feel like I've helped out here... which is always a good feeling. :) I do miss everyone back home, but I still have another month left abroad. While my England visit is almost over, I still have a whole new adventure in Asia about to begin! Woohoo!

Family.

Family.

Christmas is a time when family gets together, and celebrates together.

This Holiday season, I have a newfound appreciation for my family.


I know know people who operate with rifts splitting their family apart; reconcilliation is unwanted. It's sadening. I think of those who are missing parts of their families, and how much they would love to have those family members back with them for the holiday season. Even more so, orphaned children - whose parents have died from starvation, dysentery, or AIDS, or maybe they themselves were just simply dumped off on the side of the street or the steps of a children's home. Where are their families?

But my family...
My family is whole.
We laugh.
We talk.
We enjoy eachother.


This season was marked by the death of my Great-Uncle Ralph - my grandfather's brother. He was 94, and we don't know for sure if he ever really accepted Christ or not.
But still...
my family pulls together, and enjoys eachother. Of the entire Christmas celebration, there was only one melancholy moment.
And it was a good moment -
a thinking moment.


My family has taught me so much:
Generosity. It seems to be the Fertig proverbial 'middle name'. My grandfather encouraged all of us during the family gathering to continue on in generosity with eachother.
Humour. It's a virtue too often looked over as less important. Humour has got our family through the best of times, and the worst of times. If you can laugh together, you can live together. Laughter really goes a long way. We enjoy being around eachother.
Grace. Live life with grace and dignity. Complaining is not encouraged. I saw this Christmas the black-and-white different between those who complain, and those who don't. My grandparents have ailments, and yet they joke and tell stories rather than gripe about this doctorand that medicine. Life is better when there isn't complaining. It's a valuable lesson - one i hope to remember.

It's possible to both cling to the past and look to the future. My grandfather is one of the most brilliant men I know. He was a professor at the University of Southern Calfornia, and one of the top 100 schollars in WWI history in the entire United States at one point. When asked this Christmas by my father how many books he thought he had read in his lifetime, Friendad (my grandfather) contemplated the question for a moment, and then replied, "probably around 10,000". I don't doubt it. You should see my grandparents' house -- ever spare inch is filled with books. In the room I am staying in, I was looking through the shelves, and stacked on one shelf in the corner of the room, I found a 1839 copy of the Book of Martyrs. 1839!! Where did he get that?! The entire house is simply filled with treasures just like that. I wish I had more time here, so I could go through it.
Yet despite the house being like a time capsule, my grandparents are very much interested in the future. I don't mean future as in computers and electronics and such... i mean as in US. My granparents invest in my cousins and I. We know they love us and are so proud of us. This morning my grandfather and grandmother took me out to breakfast. It was heartwarming to see this cute little old couple, still very much in love at 90 and 88 years old, sitting in the booth eating breakfast, and talking to me about places they'd traveled to and things they'd seen. Friendad took the time to compliment me on some things he'd noticed in my character, which was very encouraging - compliments like that aren't ones you look over or forget. I'll remember his words for the rest of my life.

I wish there was some way to record the information in a brain -- so that stories and facts could be retained for future generations. I'm sure that if I took the next 10 years and a whole lot of video tape, I would still not have recorded everything my grandparents know -- knowledge, wisdom, and old stories of places and people. It's such a wealth of information, and good laughs!


I seem to yet again be rambling.

The thing is -- I love my family. I, of course, am very biased, and think it's just about the greatest family on earth. We're so unique (others might title it weird) -- i mean, my dad and my cousin Flint had a 10 minute conversation about the living habits of box turtles at the dinner table last night! -- we're happy (i dont think i've laughed as hard in years as I did yesterday) -- and we definitely love eachother.


Thank you, God, for my amazing family.
I'm proud to be Fertig, through and through.

Do you know?

Do you know
How I love you so?
Do you know
How i love you so?

Jesus loved me so...

he gave his life for me.


I could come up with eloquent words and beautiful poems to describe the love that comes out of realizing that, but it would never begin to describe it.

You just begin to love Jesus with such an AMAZING, new kind of love.

And you can't force it. It isn't something that you say "Jesus died for me." The words and the realization INSIDE of you are two completely different things. You can know all the facts. you can read the story in the bible.. heck, you could even memorize it. But for it to really set into your heart and mind, that's a completely different thing.

Do you know?
How I love you so?

Do we really know how much Jesus loves us? How much he loves each and every one of us, individually? That he loves us SO much that he really would have died just for one of us? Wow. what can you say to that?
"How high and how wide, how deep and how long is the love of Christ..."

How high is it? Can we even begin to fathom it? I can't. I've gotten a glimpse... but even that is nothing to what He REALLY went through. what happened to him.....
i can't even begin...
where? where do you begin? where do you begin to even think about it... to take it into your brain? He DIED. he was CRUCIFIED. Not just stood before the firing squad. they MOCKED him, and WHIPPED him until almost nothing was left. they shoved a crown of thorns INTO his head, and then they put a beam of wood on His back and made Him walk through Jerusalem and up a mountain. There, they put Him on a cross. They NAILED his hands into the beams of the wood. It would have severed arteries and vains... torn muscle..
then his feet. one big nail. and then he had to STAND on them.

i'm not saying this for 'shock factor'. i think a lot, we minimize what Jesus really went through. the HORRIFIC details of it.

man. he did it for me. it was MY sins that nailed his feet to the beams. every time i have been mean, or thought something out of anger, or yelled at my parents, or anything like that... it was those things nailing Jesus to the cross. Just so I could be with Him.

It's amazing.

and all the time, what was going through his head?
i think, rather than complaining or having a pity party or being angry, he was thinking something.. like this:

Do you know
how I love you so?
Do you know
how I love you so?

Acts 2:17

"In the last days, God says,
I will pour out my spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your young men will see visions,
your old men will dream dreams.
Even on my servants, both men and women,
I will pour out my Spirit in those days,
and they will prophesy.
I will show wonders in the heaven above
and signs on the earth below,
blood and fire and billows of smoke.
The sun will be durned to darkness
and the moon to blood
before the coming of the great and
glorious day of the Lord;
And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved."