Author: Amy Medina Page 59 of 235

Four Months in America

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On August 19, 2017

In Other

Last week, when Johnny arrived in Tanzania and got into the taxi that would take him home, Gil asked him, “Do you know where we are going, Johnny?”

My 5-year-old, jetlagged, very confused son answered, “To Uncle Brandon’s house?”

Oh my sweet boy.  We have really messed with your mind.  Uncle Brandon’s house is now 10,000 miles away.  You are going home now.

We spent four months in the States.  It was jam-packed with memory-making, especially with family.  My kids spent days….weeks with their cousins, often living in the same house.  Other family members rearranged their lives over and over again so that they could spend more time with us.  Lots of swimming, lots of games of Wiffle Ball, lots of bike riding.

We drove as far north as Concord and as far south as San Diego.  We drove from southern to northern California and back again at least five times.  Gil and I traveled to Austin for a conference and I traveled by myself to Minneapolis for a week.  We hugged so, so many people.  We were listened to.  We were spoiled.  And the ice cream.  Oh, the ice cream.

And the shopping.  Ridiculous amounts of shopping.  Enough to fill up 18 pieces of luggage.  We bought out Amazon and the packages arrived daily on the doorstep of wherever we were staying.  “Wow, you must use a lot of deodorant,” the cashier at Target told me as she beeped through 14 canisters.  “Um, yeah, well, we live in tropical Africa,” I told her.  And she didn’t really know how to respond to that.  People usually don’t.

I did get so tired of living like a hobo, organizing my kids’ clothes again and again, adjusting to different beds again and again.  The travel and the chaos was often exhausting.  But I am so thankful.  Thankful that my kids had a chance to interweave their lives with their cousins.  Thankful for the reminder of all who hold us up with their prayers and giving.  Thankful that we really do get the best of two worlds.

Thank you, family, friends, American Church.  You are so good to us.

This was June.  I get tired again just looking at it.
Look at that….speaking at Faith Community Church on a missions panel….actual evidence that we did work on this home assignment!  We really did do a whole lot of speaking and presenting and meeting with supporters….we just never took pictures of those events.  
And of course….there’s the obligatory medical tests whenever we visit the States.  Medical care is improving in Tanzania (for people who have money), but there are still some things (like allergy testing) that we need to do in America.
My favorite.  Cousin love.
We visited a lot of supporters, but sometimes those visits are just really, really special.  Lois is one of our biggest prayer warriors and one of this blog’s biggest fans.  It was a treat to spend time with her.  
Sigh.  We love grandparents so much.
And there’s the other ones.  I get a lump in my throat every time I see these pictures.
And Johnny just about sums it up.  

Medina Life, July 2017

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On August 17, 2017

In Other

We are all back in Tanzania and new things are happening (more about that later), but first I need to get caught up on July’s pictures.  

Appropriately for America, Wiffle ball replaced soccer as my boys’ game of choice.  They played almost every single day.
Dodger fever, with their cousin
Celebrating the Fourth with family
My littlest boy’s first time watching fireworks
On vacation in San Diego with Gil’s family, playing Wiffle ball (of course)
and there’s the whole Medina gang
still on vacation
cousins
keepin’ it real….my kids are modern American kids too
Enjoying friends at Faith Community Church
So the soccer love still came out when Dad and Josiah had a dream fulfilled….watching Manchester United and Real Madrid play live in Santa Clara
San Jose’s classic:  Happy Hollow

cousins
cousins and Babu (grandpa)
Me and my bro
cousins again
This time at a San Jose Giants game (Triple A), and Grace got to be a junior commentator. My little ham rocked it.

When I Was the New Missionary

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On August 10, 2017

In Other

I was 22 years old, I had just finished my teaching degree, and as far as I was concerned, I was ready to be a missionary.  After all, I had been an MK and thus knew everything there was to know about missions in Africa.  And for that matter, I pretty much knew everything there was to know about life.  Like any 22-year-old.

I went to our mission organization’s candidate school twice.  Once while single, since the plan was to head to Tanzania after my first year of teaching.  Then this dream guy named Gil Medina messed with my plans and I ended up getting married instead.  So two years after my first time at candidate school, and 9 months after getting married, I went again–this time with Gil.

Visiting the States always brings back so much nostalgia for me. So much of my history is in America; it floods me with memories.  And this time around, I was reminded of that pre-Tanzania season of my life.  I was invited to be a facilitator at our mission’s missionary training a few weeks ago–this time as the experienced missionary.  So I spent a week in July with our mission’s newest crop of missionaries.  And I saw myself in them, 18 years ago.  

Candidate school, 1999

You would think that after being a missionary kid, and attending candidate school twice, that I would have been ready for my new life overseas.  I sure thought I was.  But in reality, I had no idea what was about to hit me.

I had a massive panic attack and mental breakdown ten days after arriving in Tanzania in 2001.  As a result, I was barely coping for the entirety of the first year we lived there.  I dug up my old journals last week while at my parents’ house, which flooded me with even more memories.  This is what I wrote a few days after that breakdown.

August 10, 2001
Everything within me is wrestling.  I scream, “I hate this!  Let me go back!”
And the pain of missing people sinks into my soul and creates an overwhelming sadness.

I’m telling you this for a couple of reasons.  Partly because it’s good to look back and see how far I’ve come.  Even though that period in my life was certainly the darkest I’ve experienced, it’s reassuring to remember how God showed up in the midst of that pain–even though I couldn’t see it then.  It’s comforting to understand now how necessary that pain was, and how profoundly it contributed to who I am today.

But I also wanted to give you the backstory to this piece I wrote for ‘A Life Overseas.’  I wrote it on the plane as I was coming home from helping to facilitate the new missionary training.  It was such a privilege to spend that time with about 40 new missionaries–many ages, many walks of life, headed to countries all over the globe.  And I hope that the beginning won’t be as hard for them as it was for me.  I know that even if it isn’t, it will still be hard.  But I wanted them to know that it’s worth it.

I wrote the following piece through tears.  Tears in remembering, but also tears of great thankfulness and joy.  Because, oh, how it’s been worth it!  That’s what I wish I could tell my 22-year-old self, sitting in candidate school.  She had no idea how hard it would be.  But I’m sure glad she didn’t give up.

Here’s an excerpt, but I hope you’ll read the whole thing.  It expresses a great deal of how I feel about the last 15 years of missionary life.

Dear New Missionary,

It’s going to be hard.  Really hard.

And it won’t just be the things you anticipate will be hard.  Sure, there will be the bugs and you might hate your kitchen and driving might terrify you.  You might cry because the potatoes are just not cooking right and you accidentally insult someone and no one speaks to you at your new church.  Your kids might get a strange rash and you will buy the wrong medicine and you’ll wonder what on earth you were thinking to bring your family to this strange place.

Then there’s the fear.  You won’t let your kids play outside without you; you’ll hold your purse a lot more tightly; you’ll worry about the pollution affecting your lungs.  You’ll sleep a lot less soundly and get up at night just to check out the windows, one more time.  It might feel like everyone is smirking at you behind your back.  And you’ll wonder why you ever thought you could have an impact on this new place.

But then there will be the things you didn’t anticipate would be hard.  Your sin won’t stay in your home country, in fact, it will seem to ooze out of you in buckets.  Your team leader won’t have enough time for you, and you’ll feel left dangling, high and dry and bewildered.  The poverty surrounding you will hang constant guilt around your neck.  You will communicate like a two-year-old.  You’ll lose your sense of self-respect.  You won’t feel good at anything anymore.

You will, in essence, lose yourself.  And it might feel like dying.

But, in that losing, you will find yourself.  And in that dying, you will live.



Read the rest here.

I Am Not Cut Out For This

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On July 29, 2017

In Other

I’ve had that thought hundreds of times over these past sixteen years of missions: I am not cut out for this.

I am probably the least adventurous person on earth.  I need a plan.  I need a schedule.  I need things to go according to plan and to schedule.  

I hate transitions.  I hate change.  I think I would be happy if everything in my life could stay exactly the same, always and forever.  

Yet here I am in a life that is full of adventure, whether it’s as simple as a chicken on the loose in my house or as scary as a snake in my daughter’s bed.  I’m living in a culture that does not value plans or schedules (but thinks people are a lot more important…I guess there’s a point there).  And even when I try to live by a plan anyway, then I lose electricity or the store is out of sugar or the rain has closed the roads.

And now here I am, facing another international move, yet again.  We leave America on Wednesday to return to Tanzania.  The anxiety keeps me up at night and wakes me early in the morning.  I despise saying goodbye to the people we love; it rips my heart out every time.  But I know that even once I get back and get settled, that I will continue to thrust myself into these transitions over and over again.  I have put down roots in Tanzania, but I am a guest.  It will never be permanent.

I think to myself, Why on earth did I choose this life?  I am not cut out for this.


So why do I keep doing it?

You could call it a calling, but that makes it sound so noble and sacrificial and godly and stuff.  When in reality, I want to do this.  I want this life.  It’s complicated, isn’t it?  Because if I say I want it, then that makes it seem like there are no sacrifices and I never get sad or have regrets.  But if I say that I am just being obedient to a calling, then that makes me seem like a martyr.

Choosing this life is both of those explanations.  Yes, I hate spontaneity and change and transition–but I’ve lived long enough to see the joy that makes it worth it.  Yes, I’m not too thrilled about living a life in two worlds and all the packing and the sense of rootlessness.  But there’s that joy again.  The joy of learning from other cultures.  The joy in living a life of purpose.  The joy of living a life with less.  The joy that comes from anxiety that is cast upon Him.

And really, we’re not cut out for a lot of things, are we?  We get into marriage, or motherhood, or the menial job, or the stressful job, and we think, I’m not cut out for this.  But we keep doing it anyway, because there’s always joy.  Joy in doing hard things.  Joy in getting through a day we never thought we would live through.  Joy in knowing that no matter how bad it gets, this life is not all there is.  

But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’  Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.


My Kids Don’t Have to Be Good at Everything

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On July 20, 2017

In Other

Being an American parent is exhausting. 

Your kids are supposed to participate in sports (more than one) and music and math and competitive spelling.  They need to have experienced horseback riding and seen the National Parks and gone to a Broadway show and know how to build a robot.  Oh, and of course, they need to know Latin and be classically trained.



And if they haven’t accomplished all these things, you are letting them down.  You have failed as a parent.

I feel this even in Tanzania.  I have tried for three years to find Grace a piano teacher with no success.  I don’t want to drive her an hour each direction every week, and I haven’t been able to find someone close by.  She keeps reminding me that she wants to learn piano, but she’s finished fifth grade and it still hasn’t happened.  Which makes me feel like I am depriving her of something really important.  Because everyone knows that every child is supposed to learn an instrument, right?

There are other things my kids miss out on because we live in Tanzania–gymnastics, Children’s Museums, craft stores, beautiful parks with towering oak trees, watching seasons change.  Lily reminded me recently that she would love to take ballet lessons.  Not going to happen.

I am a collector of lists of children’s books, as my favorite activity with my kids is reading out loud to them.  But every time I get a new list, I panic slightly because there are just so many good books out there that my kids need to read.  And I can never catch up.  For a moment I think, But their lives will be tragic and deprived if they haven’t read every single one of the Little House books!  How will they survive?  And you wonder why Gil thinks I’m dramatic.



There’s this intense pressure in American culture that your kids must be good at everything.  And if they can’t be good at everything, then in the very least, you must expose them to everything and teach them everything else.  And if they don’t, they are really missing out and will probably become hobos when they grow up.

But I’ve had to remind myself that I need to step back from the frenzy and ask, Who says?  Who says that my kids will never learn discipline if they don’t learn to play an instrument?  Who says they won’t learn teamwork if they don’t play sports?  Who says that they won’t be good thinkers if they never learn Latin?  Who says they won’t learn to love their siblings if they are not homeschooled?

Of course, those are all good things.  But somehow we’ve convinced ourselves that we aren’t succeeding in the rules of parenting if they don’t get all of the good things.  Can’t there be more than one way to successfully raise and educate a child?

So when I start feeling the pressure and the panic that my kids are missing out, I try to remember what they do have, what they have learned.  My kids know how to navigate multiple cultures and countries and international travel doesn’t phase them.  They are great swimmers who love snorkeling. HOPAC shines when it comes to performing arts, community service, and ethnic diversity.   In our home they’ve learned to be hospitable to our many guests, and my girls have learned to love cooking as much as I do.  So even if Grace never gets piano lessons (though I am still looking!), no one can ever accuse her of being deprived.

If my list of what my kids are learning causes your stomach to tense with stress, then make your own list.  Maybe you’re passing on your gift of creativity, or gardening, or adventuring.  Maybe you’re using YouTube for art lessons.  And honestly, the vast majority of middle-class American kids will never be deprived in the true sense of the word.  Even if your kids never learn music or sports, even if they never master another language or horseback riding, they still will be some of the most privileged kids in the world. 

 And, of course, the qualities of courage, kindness, patience, and humility are by far what will make a child successful in this life–and those can be learned in a million different ways.

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