Read This to See if Joyce Runs Over a Cow
(also read it cuz I spent way too long writing it)
I don't know where to begin about Uzbekistan. I told you on July 28th a brief sketch of the country. I'll tell you about some things that you would see if you came to Uzbekistan so you get the context, then I'll tell you some high-lights for me. I, actually, don't like to tell these details sometimes because I find beginner travelers and/or people who don't travel to industrializing nations really over-emphasize these points often intentionally or unintentionally with a kind of superior attitude. It's just life an industrializing nation-no reason for us to be snooty about it. With that out of my system-if you were to go to Uzbekistan right now probably the first thing you would notice would be that it seems like you went back in time 50 or 60 years as far as technology goes. Almost all the cars are 1950's style and any other form of technology is about the same. You would also notice that there are often a couple cows roaming freely in the street or along the street as you ride around in the back of your 1950's taxi with your smoking in the car every 15-30 minutes taxi driver. You'd also notice the toilets are some what crude porcelain holes in the ground with no toilet paper available.(which if you're a smart traveler in the 2/3's world you'll have tissue in your purse which you must throw away in the small garbage can next to the toilet NOT in the toilet...the piping can't handle toilet paper. And if you clog up the toilet with the toilet paper the cleaning lady will surely be yelling about you, "stupid foreigner" in some language you don't understand.) Another thing you would notice would be how many of the women dress. Especially in the rural areas almost all the women wear long, airy, loose fitting dresses and the older women wear scarves around their heads (usually more in a Russian style than Arab style) However, maybe one girl out of 20 girls walking by you will be wearing a sexy tank-top and pants. These girls tend to be Russian most of the time. Most of the people in Uzbekistan are of Uzbek ethnicity which means they are Muslim, which means they are more conservative, which means they should dress accordingly. But if they are of Russian ethnicity their culture is actually quite different from pure Uzbek culture. However, I believe this is different in the capital city, Tashkent, where everyone tends to be more liberal. I'm speaking mostly from my experience in Fergana, a semi-large by Uzbek standards city, in the conservative country side.

I was just up getting some tea and because of the music I'm listening to thought of how they dance in Uzbekistan. It's really amazing. I actually tried to see if I could still remember how to dance in their style in my living room. :-) But I just couldn't remember, the dance style is so different. You could say, "All Koreans sing and all Uzbekis dance". For enjoyment in groups Koreans sing and for enjoyment Uzbekis dance. So when I was over at this Uzbeki girl's house with a bunch of other Uzbeki girls for dinner after they wanted to dance. Their native music is more Indian or Arab style and so is their dance style. It's so beautiful, artful and sexy. It's kind of similar to how a belly dancer dances if you've never seen Indian dancing. It also reminds me of Spanish dancing, too. So the Korean girls from my team and I tried to dance with them but we looked so stiff and clumsy compared to them. I actually picked it up a little after dancing awhile but as I said I can't do it now (or maybe it was the non-Arab music I was dancing to).

Now on to my personal high-lights. I also could say a lot of things about what it was like to go on a missions trip with a group of students from a different culture than my own. I was the only "white person" on my team and the only person who couldn't speak Korean. There was one other male prof. on the trip who is Korean American so in many ways we are the same culturally. That helped to have one other American on the trip but he still had an advantage over me obviously because he speaks the language and is a part of Korean culture more than me. Being the only one that was totally non-Korean was educational but hard at times. But most of the times it was fine. One thing of many things I gleaned by being with a Korean team is what God is doing in the Korean mission force. I stayed with various Korean missionaries. Their dedication to the field and to souls is really inspiring and challenging. They are doing a lot of great things, for example, I visited a dental clinic and children's hospital that offer free services to Uzbekis totally ran by Christian Koreans. (They are secretly planting churches through these organizations...even though Uzbekistan says it has freedom of religion-it doesn't really...Uzbeki Christians are highly persecuted and missionaries not allowed in the country) Did you know the second highest missionary sending nation is Korea, after the States? And perhaps per capita Korea sends the most missionaries world-wide. I really thank God that I've had the unique experience of working for God with a culture other than my own, I think it will enable me to think beyond cultural restraints more easily and it makes me a more diversified person and future missionary.

Ok, now I'm really going to talk about my personal high-lights. I think one of the things that sticks out the most in my mind is the class I taught for a week in Fergana University. I had 8 students in my class, one of them wants to become the future president of Uzbekistan (he's almost fluent in Korean and English) From the beginning it was clear to me that these students were very smart and eager to learn anything they could. Because of the economic state of Uzbekistan they just don't have the materials or access to information that we have. I felt like they knew about everything they could know about. They were thoroughly versed on politics and geography-I felt more than a lot of students I've taught. Right away we started talking about deep things freely, they delved into the discussions without hesitation. The first day we discussed relationships and they went around the classroom surveying their classmates about different opinions on relationships as one of the lesson activities. We had many interesting discussions about marriage customs and dating customs. For example, usually in Uzbekistan men marry around 20 to 23 and women marry from 17 to 22. And when you get married you live with the husband's family until you have enough money to build your own house. By the end of the week, we had discussed abortion, Iraq, the Palestinians, Christianity and Islam and the spiritual world.

Probably the day that penetrated me the most was the day I gave the students a survey on the "supernatural". It was so cute and I still laugh about this when I introduced the topic for the day one student that's really funny said, "This is just what the doctor ordered!" I thought it was so hilarious that he said that. Anyway, that's not the point. The survey has different unexplained supernatural experiences on it such as out of body experience, fortune teller, ghosts and UFO's. It's really great for discussing spiritual issues. They go around the classroom and ask their classmates if they believe in these things and why or why not. We got into a very deep talk about worldviews and discussed the different answers to world view questions. Such as, what are humans?, Is there a God?, and why is the evil on earth?. For each question (there are more questions) we wrote together on the board how different worldviews answer these questions. Such as how would a naturalist answer "what is a human?" or how would a Hindu answer this question. So we went through all these questions but at the end I said ok, now we've discussed what different worldviews believe. But how do you know which one is right? Should we just believe the worldview of the culture we were born in (because what if it's wrong....cuz they believe Hinduism is wrong but they could've been born in India) or should we test our own worldview and others to see which best explains reality. Well, the truth is they were mesmerized and I think impacted. So this led to other discussions and I told them most of my family isn't Christian. Christianity was something I found as I was searching for truth (humanly speaking). The implications, of these ideas for them, of course, were that they shouldn't just believe Islam cuz there parents believe it. So that was a very thought provoking class.

The most exciting thing that happened, though, was that at the end of the one week camp we had church at the missionary's house and many students came. We invited them to join us but wanted to be very clear that it was church so they wouldn't feel tricked. Well, more of them came then we thought would (maybe 15) and prof. Abraham shared the gospel. And after the church service the missionary spoke in Uzbek and told the students if they were interested they can come every Sunday and the service will be in Uzbek. (By the way, we were in the missionary's living room not a church building) Here's the most amazing thing to me though that after the missionary said some stuff in Uzbek to the students the students started discussing emotionally something. After I asked one of my students what he had said. He said that he had told them that Uzbekistan isn't like some Middle Eastern countries that think Christianity is wrong but that it is possible that Christianity is not wrong because we both believe in Moses and Jesus. This was quite a amazing thing to come from his mouth and could be quite a transforming idea to Uzbeki culture. Basically, it means they are open to hearing the gospel and won't out right reject it like some Muslim countries. So hopefully that faithful Sunday a church was born in Fergana. So please pray for those students that I taught and that continue going to that missionary's house! Ok, I can't write anymore. But I hope you read this cuz I spent too much time writing it. :-)