Fighting Hunger, Giving Hope

 I volunteered at a food bank this past weekend. I like the idea that people are working together to meet a need in this city. Their motto is, "Fighting hunger. Giving hope." Before we began our volunteer work, they showed us a video introducing us to the problem of hunger in LA and what the food bank is doing about it. Honestly, I didn't know much about it going into it, but I was there to learn. One thing that struck me was watching the interview of a little girl sharing about how she didn't have a snack to bring to school, and therefore, she would just drink water until her stomach was full. They also mentioned how public schools are working together to provide free breakfast and lunches for students of low-income families. And when I heard this, it hit me--something I never realized before--my family was once one of those families.

There was a time when my older brother, Peter, could buy school lunches for just a dime. This was when my older brother moved on from our K-8 private school to our local public high school. (At the time, my younger sibs and I were still in private school.) I wondered why Peter could buy lunches for so cheap, and my parents explained that they qualified for a program that let him do so. I had no idea it was because we had little money. I mean, 3 of us were still getting private school education, for goodness sake! But I'm guessing that tuition money was borrowed, probably from relatives.

That moment was very humbling--realizing my family was once a recipient of the collective efforts to fight childhood hunger. I don't know about you, but whenever I volunteer, I have this mentality of, "I'm gonna be a do-gooder and help someone less fortunate than me." There's so much pride hidden beneath those good intentions. Maybe I think I'm better than them because I don't have that problem of hunger, or homelessness, or domestic violence...or whatever need/issue we're currently fighting against. I think Jesus did it best when He came to earth. He had no needs (a man perfect in himself) and yet we are seeped in it. But Jesus didn't have this hoity-toity attitude of "Oh you poor things! You're lucky I'm here to help you." But He considered himself low, a servant. That is amazing. I need to take on that attitude.

I Feel Like I Believe in Martians

I love love LOVE Donald Miller. Not only is he hilarious and refreshingly honest, I like how he thinks very deeply about God and life. I want to be his friend and have meaningful conversations with him all the time.

In this short interview, he says,

As a Christian, as someone who believes in Jesus and believes the Bible is the word of God, there are times that I wake up and say, "This is crazy! This is crazy that I believe in this. I feel like I believe in Martians!"

When I heard him say this, I was like, OMG YES. That's exactly how I feel about my faith. In my mind, it is the most bizarre thing ever, and yet, there is something within me that causes me to believe. I don't think I'll ever get over it.

American Idiot

I love musicals. I love rock music. How could I resist a rock opera based on music by none other than Green Day? I used to love Green Day in high school. I don't care for their lyrics, but their music can sometimes be very beautiful. I first heard about the musical "American Idiot" when I was in New York a couple years ago. They were set to perform on Broadway, but I wasn't in NY by the time they arrived. Now they are in LA and I knew I had to go.

And it was the worst musical I've ever seen! Most of the time I couldn't figure out if there was an actual plot. It was just a lot of cursing, drugs, sex, and "f-ck the world, I'm gonna do my own thing." The content was weak, BUT I thoroughly enjoyed the music. Hearing female vocals in duet with the guys' made it so much more moving. But good thing I bought the discount tickets for this one. I guess I got what I paid for.

Where Litter Becomes Art

This is Seattle's Gum Wall. One of my favorite parts of the city. When I was explaining it to my co-worker, she said, "They let them do this?!?" Yup. You're not supposed to stick your gum on other people's things, but if everyone is doing it, then it makes it okay.

I bought bubble gum for the first time in like 20 years and I was practicing blowing bubbles all day. Sadly, this was the biggest bubble I could make.

I have made my mark on Seattle!! Find my orange blob of gum in the center of a flower on the opposing wall. I started my own gum wall, OH yeah!

PTX

Pentatonix is the single best thing that has happened to music this year. Their style totally fits my taste in music. This one is freakin amazing.

Facebook-Free

I deactivated my facebook account a while ago, and it has been so liberating. I used to surf facebook every day (second to checking email) simply because new information, pictures, and messages were being posted every minute. Its not like the facebook beginnings when everything was mostly static and all you had was a profile and wall. Now you can post your entire life on facebook, updating it every minute if you wanted to. I suddenly knew the mundane details of people I barely knew, as well as good friends. Time goes by, minute by minute, and you realized you wasted a couple hours viewing, commenting, and gaming.

Now that I don't have facebook, my computer usage has dropped considerably. After a few minutes of checking and responding to emails, I honestly don't have much to do online. So I just get offline and move on to other important things. Its been great. Yeah, it would be nice to know what's going on with my friends through facebook, but it feels more real when I can ask them to their face, "How are you?" and not already know the answer simply because I read their status update. I feel like it authenticates my true friendships and frees my time for other interests.

North Korea

I just finished an engaging book about the lives of North Korean defectors called Nothing to Envy. I always kinda knew about North Korea, but I don't think I was ever aware until reading this book. When I was reading through it, I was constantly in shock and in anger about the condition of the country. The dictatorship. The famine. The economy. The brainwashing. I just couldn't believe it. You hear all the stats in the news, but they are just numbers. But when you hear the stories of people who lived and suffered through it...man, it just hits the heart. The images that stick in my mind are the tree bark they would pulverize to make digestible, the man who was publicly executed for a "crime" committed merely to survive, the children with normal-sized heads but incredibly stunted limbs, and how Chinese dogs ate more food than North Korean doctors. Crazy stuff. Ridiculous stuff!

I also watched this documentary of Lisa Ling following a humanitarian eye doctor into North Korea. It is a rare moment when Kim Jong-Il allows any foreigners into his country.

So after the blind are healed and able to see again, they immediately praise the great leader, Kim Jong-Il, whom they worship as a god. They believe he is so good to them and all blessings they receive come from him. They adore him. My initial reaction to their outbursts of praises to Kim Jong-Il were, "These people are psycho! Don't they know that this man is the reason for their suffering?" But I also had this wild and crazy thought that these people don't look so different than Christians. Think about it. When suffering comes, we learn to still praise God because we believe He is good. When healing comes, we credit God instead of the doctor that treated us. In a way, we're a bit "psycho" ourselves. Non-Christians look at us and say, "Why do you believe God is so good if He allowed all this shit to happen?" I don't know, sometimes I feel that Christian spirituality is a little too far-fetched for me, a little crazy to actually believe. Yet He grips my heart in a way I can't really explain to others, or even to myself!

If anything, I guess this shows how our hearts really were created to worship something or someone. Its just a matter of who or what.