Conforming and Solidifying...

Well, I did it.  I finally started a blog.  The skeptic in me says that this won't last long, but I really would like for it too!  So many of you always ask for more information and insight on what it is like living in Indonesia. Hopefully I will be able to convey updates via this blog as it is easily accessible and quite easy to maintain.

I should have started this in March of 2005 when I first arrived in Surabaya.  Wishful thinking, I guess. But, if I have learned anything from living in Indonesia for the past three and a half years, it's better late than never.(Indonesians are INFAMOUS for their tardiness and unreliability...but that can be overlooked (to an extent)).

Anyway, I can tell this is going to a rambling place and basically an outlet for me.  Honestly, that is something I need.  Imagine being cut off from all your friends, family, church, community organizations and everything else from the first 25 years of your life.  Throw that in with the frustrations of learning a new language and conforming (or at least attempting to conform) to a new and completely different culture and you have my life for the past three and a half years.  

That having been said, moving here was the best decision of my life. It removed me from all of my comfort zones that I had let rule most of my adult life up to that point.  As a result, I have grown leaps and bounds not only in my personal maturity level and self-esteem, but also in ways that I never imagined.  I still believe that my relationship with Christ shapes who I am as a person, but I realized that my view of that relationship was so distorted by my lack of meeting new and drastically different people that I am accustomed to.  I feel like I have only been exposed to one side of the spectrum in the States.  The process of realization began when I moved to Charlotte for University, but the solidification process began when I moved overseas.  

Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, Animists and Atheists are just some examples of the range of beliefs I encounter here on a daily basis.  I am so thankful for the immersion of diversity that I have experienced and continue to explore everyday that I live here. The hardest thing to grasp is perhaps the most simple:  God created all of us. So, what is the problem?  Why is the world the way it is? Why do most of you think that all Muslims are terrorists? Have you ever met anyone from Indonesia?  Pre-judgements such as this make the world a more difficult place.

I have lived in Surabaya, Indonesia for the past three and a half years.  It is the capital of East Java and the second largest city in Indonesia, the fourth largest country in the world. 

This next statement might surprise you.  I feel safer in this city of nearly five million people in the third world than I do driving through many areas of my hometown of a few thousand.  

Keep in mind, I stick out like a sore thumb.  At 6'2'', I literally tower above the Javanese people who average about 5'6'' or so.  Oh, and I have white skin that tends to act as a siren drawing attention to my difference in (or lack of) skin pigmentation.

As I begin this blog, I hope to show all of you who choose to read a bit of my life here.  The good, the bad, the smelly, the utterly hilarious and the unbelievable.  

Stay tuned and let me know if you have any questions.  If you ask me a specific question, I will be happy to answer it for you.  I look forward to writing and hope you look forward to reading what I have to say.

Blessings,

Jonathan