Sometimes we don’t have words to express our feelings, but our hearts are true. This was an amazing place we were able to live for seven years. We will never forget it!

June 29,2020 marks our Leave Day. Do you have a day that marks when life quakes or plans tumbled? Should we even memorialize such a day? I hope we never forget any of our seven years in Asia. Every end of June will be a sort of anniversary. It will be a blend of stories, laughter, and tears.

On our Leave Day we will remember the day we left our home. Sure, America is our home too. Or at least it was. And it will be again. I’m speaking for myself here, of course, because my children will have their own stories, and they’ll need to tell them. Their relationship with America (and Asia) always was and always will be unique. Different than mine.

But some things we shared.

We will remember greeting the locals as “爷爷， 奶奶， 阿姨， 叔叔，哥哥，弟弟，姐姐，妹妹” with family names (grandpa, grandma, aunt, uncle, big or little brother, and big or little sister) that brought a sense of unity and closeness even with people you had never met before.

We will remember the smells. . . there were some interesting ones too! Like stinky tofu, spicy Sichuan peppers, the many varieties of noodles, pickled vegetables, fresh ginger and garlic, and hot steamed buns with fresh, warm soy milk.

We will remember our favorite “fast food” places to eat out: oil tea 油茶, mifen 米粉, mantou 馒头, baozi 包子, jiaozi 饺子， noodles 面条, oil sticks 油条, chive wraps 韭菜盒子, fresh coconut milk 椰子奶, pan seared green beans 干煸四季豆, creme puffs 泡芙， and so so so many wonderful fruits and vegetables.

We will remember our friends from school, teachers, neighbors, and other close friends who made it feel like home and accepted us like family.

We will remember driving in the CRAZY traffic with apparently no rules of the road on our three wheeled scooter! We always ALWAYS got some many comments and stares when we were driving that thing.

We will remember hiking up Chuan Shan 穿山 and rock climbing at Bai Mian Shan 白面山, Yao Gu Shan 腰鼓山, and the Big Crag with friends.

We will remember our trips out to remote areas and getting carsick on the bus on the winding mountain roads.

We will remember all of our different pets we experimented with in apartment living: tadpoles, frogs, turtles, birds, rabbits, ducks, gerbils, and a cat.

We will probably always love Chinese food the best. We prefer to eat with chopsticks when we can.

We will search youtube for Chinese stories, songs, and movies to bring a little touch of the familiar.

We will remember the ladies dancing in the square in the evenings to very loud music!

We will remember the kids being treated like celebrities because of their white skin, blonde hair, and blue eyes.

On Leave Day we will remember. And we will pray.

We’ll pray for East Asia, for our friends there, and for the Church that’s blossoming into its identity.

And Lord willing, we’ll do this every June 29th: the day we gave almost everything we owned away and left behind our lives of seven years and all of the people in it.

June 29th you won’t find us sitting around the table drinking tea and cracking seeds and nuts with our friends.

Instead, we’ll mourn what was, and we’ll be grateful for it too.

And we’ll move on, whatever that means.

He is the God of June 29th, but he is also the God of June 30th, and July 1st. And if he’s true, if he’s real, he’s got us, and he holds us in his strong right hand.

And he will hold us on every Leave Day, and every day after that too.