Escapism

I've been having some problems with this blog, in the form of uploading photos, so I'll stick to a purely text orientated post.

I've been thinking lately about escaping. I don't mean escaping literally, like an animal escapes the zoo, but more metaphorically. There are things in everyone's life that they want to 'escape' or that they run from. It may be doing the dishes, a hard conversation that needs to be had, or at times the outside world. My musings haven't been about what people escape from though. It's been about what people use to escape, how they 'get away' from things for a while. I've realised that I use TV. I escape into other people's lives (even if they're not real) to avoid dealing with mine. It might sound a bit dramatic, but following the lives of others makes me forget about what I should be doing, what I'm not doing, or how I wish my life was different.

What about you? What do you use to escape? What do you fill your life with when you're avoiding something? Hopefully it's much more healthier than mine. It then gets me to thinking...what should we be running to? Should we be running at all? I wish I was the type of person who just dealt with things and did what was needed, when it's needed. I don't know many people like that. Actually come to think of it, I don't know if I know anyone like that!

Anyway, I'd love to hear form you about what you use to 'escape' your reality.

the Phenomenon that is Queen's Day

Today, the 30th April, is Koninginedag, or Queen's Day. Let's start with a bit of history. The Netherlands has a monarchy and since 1890 this monarchy has had a Queen as the head. For the last 33 years Queen Beatrix has been at the helm of this small country. Queen's Day is the yearly day of celebration of the Queen, and is pretty much the biggest day in NL. Although the 30th April is really the old queen, Juliana's, birthday, they've stuck to that day, because Betrix's birthday is in the middle of winter, and therefore not the best time to party. Anyway, for Queen's Day the Dutch (and many international visitors) dress up in the national colour- orange. So the whole day you can see people walking around in orange in every form. Sunglasses, hats, fake hair, leis, pants, stockings, t-shirts, scarves, earrings, feather boas.

Just an example!

Now, onto what makes this year's Queen's Day a very special one. Today Beatrix abdicated and her son, Willem-Alexander, became the king of the Netherlands. This is the first king in over 100 years! This means that it is the last Queen's Day!! Well at least for a while. Next year will be the first Koningsdag or King's Day and it will be on the 27th April, which is the new king's birthday. I find this change a bit crazy. I mean after a century of women on the throne and about 60 years of celebrating on the same day, things just change. That said, it's also an exciting time as it ushers in a new era in the life of the Netherlands. Here's some photos of how I spent Queen's Day. Happy last Queen's Day!!

Lunch with friends

Drinks in the Grote Markt with the TV coverage of the offical Queen's Day stuff on the big screen

Temptation

The subject of FAT (see my earlier post for a description of FAT) this month was 'Temptation'. It was very thought provoking and an interesting topic to investigate. Here are some of the thoughts that stuck out to me:

Being God's Children

The way that we relate to God influences how we live our lives. If we see him as a demanding controlling entity in our lives, we will most likely rebel against him. If we see him as someone who will judge and punish us, fear and guilt will be our motivation to obey him. Although God has all things in his control and he will be the one to judge us at life's end, these are not the way that Christians should see God. Those who believe and trust in God have become his children. As God's children we should want to please our Father by obeying him and living for him, not becuase we fear him, but because we love him. I think that this is an important distinction when it comes to the motivation for obeying God's word. It's not because we want to work our way to heaven, or because we're afraid of what God will do to us if we don't obey, but it's because we love God that we want to obey him and his word.

Knowing your enemy

It may seem a bit harsh saying that we have an enemy, but it's the truth. As a follower of Jesus, you will be attacked in various ways. Some of these ways may be obvious, but the vast majority will be subtle. The Bible says that 'your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour' (1 Peter 5:8). We need to be aware that our enemy doesn't just want to hurt us a little, or make life a little hard for us, but that he wants to devour us, to totally destroy us. To do this he has a lot of tactics, which include lies, slander, accusations, temptations, and many more.

Society itself is at many times also one of our enemies. There are things that socitey says are 'correct' or ok, but are against what God wants for our lives. Socitey will often present it's views in ways that make them seem harmless, which can easily lull us into believing that they are harmless. We need to make sure we know what parts of society are with God's word (such as helping those less fortune) and what parts aren't in line with God's word (such as sex outside of marriage). We need to be critical of our society in order to know what we agree with and what we don't. 

How to deal with temptation

We are tempted to believe the lies of the devil and the lies of our society. We need to resist these lies and temptations and to trust in God's word. In order to do this, it's important to know what God's word is for us. Each time we are tempted or challenged, it's hard. Once that challange is over, another one comes at us. It's not an easy life, being a Christian, but it's a worthwhile one. It's one where we have the strength (from God) to overcome and to live the way that God created us. It's a life where we already have victory because of Jesus and his victory over evil and death through his death on the cross and his resurrection to life.

These are just some of the thoughts for the workshop, and I wanted to share them with you. I hope they have helped!

when people really know you

In some of my earlier posts I've been talking about how I'm missing the company of people who really know me. I've moved around a lot in my life, roughly every 3-4 years I've moved to a new town/city. It's made making friends easier, but I've always wondered what it would be like to have a friend that's been your friend for ever. I think I have a bit of that with my friends in Adelaide. That's the place I've lived for the longest amount of time consecutively- 5 and a half years. I know that doesn't sound like long, but it is for me.

I was reminded today of how good friends are that know so much about you. They know what you're thinking about, how you're feeling, what are the important occasions in your life and they've been there with you through those previous times.. I know that this doesn't stop me from making more great friends, but sometimes it's just easier to not have to explain things every time you do something, or you're thinking about something. Let me try to explain.

Today is ANZAC Day. To the Aussies and anyone who knows anything about Australian history, you might know what this means. To everyone else, I need to explain it. It's a day of rememberance for those who fought, and especially those who died, in World War II. We especially remember the landing at Gallipoli. It's also a day to remember those from other wars and those currently serving. It's a public holiday in Australia. So that's not really something that is only relating to me, but it's one part of the story that I would need to explain. Ok, so second part is that there's a game of Aussie Rules Football that is played by the same two teams every year on this day. Those teams are Collingwood and Essendon. I would have to explain this to anyone who doesn't care about footy, or about those teams. I go for Collingwood- something else to explain. If I was really in an explaining mood, I could also explain the game of footy, as most people in NL don't know a thing about it! Anyway, the next thing to explain is that, apart for the last couple of years, my family and I have been going to this game since about 2000. Half of my family is Collingwood (my Dad, one of my brothers, and I) and the other half is Essendon (my Mum and my other brother). For me it's an important day/few days that I get to catch up with my brothers and their families (who live interstate) and to spend some quality time with them doing something that we all love. So that's what I would have to explain. I guess it's not that much, and if someone was interested, it would be great to explain it to them. But what I'm trying to say is that it's refreshing to have a friend say 'so did you find somewhere to watch the game or was it too sad not being there?'. There was no need to explain which game, or how I might be feeling about being away from Aust when the game was on. As I said, refreshing.

Anyway, so this was just one little story of how it's nice to know that you have friends that know you so well and remember things about you that are important to you. Do you have friends like that? I hope that you do, even if you're not currently with them, like me. Please cherish your friends and don't take them for granted!

The image of a tree

Over the weekend I was fortunate enough to be on the planning committee of a retreat for International Students throughout the Netherlands. Although it took some energy to prepare, it was great to finally be away on the weekend with the other staff and students. There are many things that I would share with you from the retreat, but there's an image that came to me while I was spending time with God on the Saturday morning. It's a bit hard for me to share this, because it's quite personal, but I want people to know a bit about where I'm at and my journey with God, so here goes.

At the retreat we were in beautiful surroundings. There was forest pretty much all around us. As I was thinking about the trees, I had the image that I was a tree. I'm currently a tree that has no leaves and feels spiritually dead. I think that's how I've been feeling lately. I tend to spend time reading God's word only for work, and not for myself. I feel like I'm a tree in the middle of winter, that is just surviving. I've cut off so much of myself in order to just survive. It sounds harsh, and it's not necessarily a bad thing. God's word tells that 'there is a time for everything' (read more in Ecclesiastes 3) and I feel like I've been having a time of survival. The image that I got was more than this though. I had the feeling that Spring is coming, that I will soon start to blossom and new life will come from me again. I will no longer be surviving, but I will again start to thrive. This image brings me such a sense of joy and anticipation that I can't express it.

I don't really know what this image fully means, or how it's going to come about. I do know that it excites me and it helps me to understand and explain a bit of how I've been feeling. Let me leave you with a Psalm that has stood out to me, and continues on with this tree theme/idea:

Psalm 1

'Blessed is the man

    who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked

or stand in the way of sinners

    or sit in the seat of mockers.

But his delight is in the law of the Lord,

   and on his law he meditates day and night.

He is like a tree planted by streams of water,

    which yields its fruit in season

and whose leaf does not wither.

    Whatever he does prospers.

Not so the wicked!

    They are like chaff that the wind blows away.

Therefore the wicked will not stand in the the judgement,

    nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.

For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous,

    but the way of the wicked will perish.'

Easter Wekend

So last weekend was Easter. Hopefully that's not news to you! Anyway, I took the chance to visist my German 'sister', Julia. In 2004-2005 Julia came to Australia on exchange. She lived with my family for the year and went to school with me and everything. Needless to say, we became very close and is now known as my 'sister', because she's the closest thing I've got to one (minus my lovely sister-in-laws!).

Julia and I in the car on our 'road trip'

So anyway, I took the chance to head to Germany for 4 days. Thursday after the Bible Study at the Haagse Hogeschool, I took the train to Groningen, which is in the north of NL. I then took the train to a small place in Germany called Leer. I always get a bit nervous as I head out of NL and into a country where I don't know the language at all. My German is atrocious, so I always double check everything and ask people if I'm on the right train (in English). Anyway, I made it safe and sound to Leer, where Julia was waiting for me on the platform. It's an amazing feeling when you're in a foreign place and you see a dear friend waiting for you. It lights my heart in a very special way. We then drove to her place in Oldenburg, so that she could pack for our 'road trip'. We spent a bit of time looking at photos from her exchange in Australia. Man we were so young then! We then drove to Hannover, where Julia's mum and younger sisters live- all 6 of them! They have a lovely big house and when we got there, and for the following day, it was completely ours! Julia's mum and the youngest sisters were off in the north of Germany at a horse riding place, and the older sisters were off with boyfriends. It was a strange feeling being in that big house with no-one but Julia and I around. It was definately more quiet!! Good Friday we went to church, which was unfortunately all in German. Thankfully, it was just reading from the Gospel of Matthew the story of Jesus' death on the cross. This meant I was able to read along in my Bible and listen to the songs that were sung by the choir in German.

Saturday brought the arrival of Julia's family, and therefore much more noise, back into the house. We were able to head into the city for some shopping. Mostly just looking, except for a Hannover mug to add to my collection. We also meet up with Julia's boyfriend, Carsten, and had lunch at this amazing Turkish resturant. I was so full afterwards that I could hardly walk back to the tram! Saturday night was a chance to join in with the neighbours in a tradition in Germany of the 'Easter Fire'. Basically we just sat around a small fire in the neighbour's backyard and drank Gluwein (hot red wine) and other hot drinks. We had to cover our mugs though, because it was snowing! I found that quiet funny. An Easter Fire is traditionally used to burn the things in your life that you want to rid yourself of, so the neighbour had some papers to burn.

Sunday was the start of daylight savings, so I got a bit confused about the time. I wasn't sure if my phone changed automatically, so I changed it myself, and then it changed itself. Anyway, I think everyone was a little sleepy and not so organised. We planned to go to the church for breakfast, but we didn't make it. We had a nice breakfast at home, intending to get to church after, but we again didn't make it! So we spent the day at home. I was able to talk to my parents and my Poppa over Skype and we even had a sauna, which is in the shed out the back. It was so great to have some warmth after such a long, cold winter! In the afternoon, Julia and I packed up and left for Osnabruck, which is where Carsten and his parents live. It was so nice to meet them, but was a bit hard due to me not knowing German and Carsten's parents not having used their English since high school! With all the German that I heard, and didn't understand, over the weekend, I realised that my Dutch actually isn't that bad. Just don't tell anyone that I know here in NL, because they'll make me talk Dutch!

Anyway, on the Sunday night, we went with Carsten and his friend to a big Easter Fire, which was much more like an Aussie bonfire. It was great to stand around and be warmed by it's flames. After a while we headed to a really old cute bar in the city centre to talk and eat some more over a glass of beer/wine. It was great to just chat about so many random things.

A German BBQ- fat sausage in a bread roll!

Me by the Easter Fire in Osnabruck

Monday was a tour of Osnabruck, which is a really nice place. We then hit the road again in order for me to get back to Leer to catch the train back to NL. Needless to say, it was a busy weekend, but it was such a great one! I hope you all had a great Easter weekend too. I'd love to hear what you got up to- just leave a comment.

Tram or Bike

This is a question that I keep asking myself lately. I bought a bike before Christmas, but haven't used it very much. There's pluses and minuses for each, which I go through every time I think about this decision. I've made up the list below to help you think through what goes on in my mind.

 

So, at the moment I usually end up taking the tram. Mainly because it's cold outside (yes I know that riding will warm me up), and becuase it's exercise. Hopefully I'll ride more if the weather ever improves. How do you get around?

Oh and one more thing... I miss my car!