We left Amsterdam last Tuesday, after a whirlwind week of packing and saying our goodbyes. Hi to everyone there and we miss you already!
Aidan did great on the flights-just played and slept. But we were all glad when it was over!
We’re in IL now; enjoying time with family, adjusting to life back in America, and trying to get over our jetlag. Aidan is loving all the space (and toys!) at Grandma and Grandpa’s, and yesterday he had his first taste of turkey.
One of those little details about our lives in Amsterdam that I will miss: my bike.
My friend Mohand, who is a bike-whiz of sorts, reconstructed it from various pieces he found abandoned in a trash bin. It looks awful (the above picture is flattering), but it actually rides very nicely. It’s only flaw is that the front brakes don’t work, and the back brakes don’t work very well. This always made for interesting riding. I was going to fix them but I just never got around to it.
I especially love this important detail:
The good old Torpedo shifter. The funny thing is that the bike doesn’t have any gears; it’s a one-speeder. But I never could figure out where the cable went to-it just disappears into the frame. Imagine my disappointment when I pulled the lever and no torpedos came flying out.
Dear friends and family,
This is an update we have not been looking forward to writing! But, nevertheless, here it is:
The big news, for those of you who don’t know yet, is that we are leaving Amsterdam.
In September we were informed that Becka and Aidan’s visa applications were rejected. We filed an appeal, and up until just a few weeks ago, it seemed as if our appeal would be successful. However, on November 13 we were informed that the decision regarding Aidan was final, and that we needed to leave the country as soon as possible. (Obviously a “no” for Aidan is a “no” for the whole family). Our case is very unusual; despite the very strict immigration laws in the Netherlands, this type of thing rarely happens to American citizens working as volunteers. It was quite a surprise. We will be leaving November 25 for the U.S.A.
We are very disappointed about the decision. It feels like an interruption to all that we have invested in the past eight months-our ministry, relationships, language learning, and studies. After all our travelling in the past four years, we were looking forward to establishing ourselves in Amsterdam and committing ourselves for a longer season in one place. That is on hold, at least for now.
So what next? To be honest, we really haven’t had much time to process everything-the last week has been very busy with packing, saying our goodbyes, and trying to prepare for returning home. We are not really sure what to expect in the coming months. Our immediate plan at this point is to briefly return to Illinois, before heading on to California. Becka’s family has been going through a very difficult season, and we feel that it is important for us to spend some time there with them.
We are tentatively planning to return to Amsterdam sometime next year, but we need some time to process everything and pray through what God is saying to us in all of this. Would you pray for us during this time? In terms of our visas, we need to be out of the country for at least three months before we can re-apply. However, we also have to assess our chances of this being successful, and when the right time to return is. We are considering a few different options, including:
1.) Finishing our degrees, we have a few courses left in YWAM’s university system. We could potentially finish these in Switzerland next year, and then return to Amsterdam in the fall.
2.) Spending some extended time in the U.S., working/raising more support before returning to Amsterdam later next year. Maybe applying from the States, so we don’t have to move until we know we are accepted.
3.) Something we don’t yet see will come up and it will be obvious it’s the right decision.
Mostly we are trying to think through, “What is the best for Aidan?” He’s already seen a lot of changes in his short life; so far he’s taken it all in stride, but we want to do what is best for him.
To all of you who have supported with your prayers and money: THANK YOU! Saying those words never seems like enough to express our gratitude for all that you’ve done for us. For us to have a community of people standing with us, believing that we can make a difference-it means everything to us. We’ve said this so many times before, and we hope you understand how true it is: we couldn’t do it without you. Thanks for partnering with us to serve Jesus. Practically speaking, we will try and send out a newsletter shortly after the holidays to communicate our plans for the next year. Depending on our decision, it may be necessary that one or both of us will work in a salaried position for a while, and if this is the case we will let you know. As always, please feel free to contact us if you have any questions.
We would appreciate your prayers in the coming weeks/months as we make decisions and consider our future. We are looking forward to seeing many of you in the coming months; it’s not the best circumstances to be coming home for the holidays, but it will be nice to be home nonetheless…
Love,
Chris, Becka, and Aidan
Moderation, frugality, and self-discipline. I came across a quote this morning from this article and thought it was quite the observation:
…but it occurs to me that the Netherlands is a great example of a prosperous culture in which modesty and frugality are deeply embedded in the national psyche. They may not have religion any more in Holland, but they are faithful to the ideal of unostentatious living, and self-discipline. As I always tell people, the reason soft drug legalization can work in Holland but would be a big problem in America is the same reason that all-you-can-eat pizza buffets wouldn’t work in Holland. It goes deeply against the grain of the culture.
A more interesting question: Christianity has played a very influential role in Holland’s past. Could it be that current cultural values of moderation, frugality, and even humility find thier roots in this religious past? But if this is true, then why is it that in America, which is currently a very religious nation, the cultural norm is excessive consumerism, materialism, and ostentatious behavior? Fascinating.
Immigration is on my mind these days, for obvious reasons. To put it bluntly: this is the first time we’ve ever experienced being rejected for a visa, and it’s not fun. Even though it was Aidan who was rejected, it’s hard not to take it as a family rejection (like what are we supposed to do-just send him home!?)
But the truth is that in our broken world it’s a privilege, and not a right, to stay in another country. It’s been our privilege to stay in the Netherlands these past eight months.
Sometimes we can take it for granted; that the world is full of borders, and that these borders do not have to open for us. By “we” I mean all of us who were born in certain countries; countries like America, Canada, a Western European country, or Australia; in which case we are largely used to crossing borders effortlessly. I know others most certainly don’t take this for granted.
It seems to me that this is one of the great injustices of the world: your nationality will largely dictate how much you are able to travel. As someone who loves to travel, this seems painfully unfair. And I know that as an American citizen, a holder of one of the strongest passports in the world, I will rarely, if ever, feel this injustice.
One incident always stands out to me when I think of crossing borders and immigration: I remember crossing the border from Burundi into Congo. I was a little scared, this being only my third or fourth land crossing in Africa-it was Congo after all. (Later on, I would come to appreciate African border crossings for the colorful experiences they are.) I labored through the Burundi side, crossed over to the Congo side, and soon it was my turn to duck my head and enter the little shack that was serving as an immigration office. Inside, I sat on the wooden stool as the man clumsily flipped through my passports and immunizations. I paid the fee, fifty USD if I remember correctly, and he stamped a visa into my passport. He waved my immunization booklet at me, menacingly, and sent me next door to a similar shack, where a woman took my passport and booklet, flipped through it with a look of disgust, and tossed it aside. She wanted a bribe. Something about not having the right immunizations, and therefore I would have to pay for them to be done (which really meant “give me a little something because I know there is no way you are going to take a potentially dirty needle with God knows what inside of it in a shack in the no man’s land between Burundi and Congo”). I had done my research, and I knew that I had met the legal requirements. So I said no. The lady didn’t like that, so she continued to press her case, threatening to hold me there if I didn’t pay up.
It’s not that I was against bribing, which in these situations is less about morality and more about economy (for example, our bus driver had to pay out numerous “gifts” during our journey, just to use the road.) But I was cranky from the bus ride, and I knew what I had, much like Paul in Acts 22: a citizenship that gave me an advantage, and an expectation of a certain level of treatment. I picked up my passport and walked out. She didn’t stop me. She couldn’t. If she had, she would have been going against the unspoken hierarchy of power and passports. Mine was significantly higher up the chain then hers, and we both knew it.
Had that woman visited my county and attempted the same, it would have gone much differently. But most likely she will never make it to my country, because she will have to acquire a visa first; a visa that will probably cost her thousands of dollars, a lot of time, and even that will be no guarantee that it will ever materialize, purely because of the lettering on her passport.
After considering this, I later realized the arrogance in what I did. Even though I was “right” in the sense that I had done nothing wrong in refusing to pay the bribe, I was wrong in my attitude toward that woman, as a visitor. The attitude came from a sense of power, and the assumed rights that go with it. It was a subconscious posture-I wasn’t even aware of it until I reflected on it later, and then I deeply regretted it.
I’ve thought of my experience in Congo often as I’ve passed through immigration in various parts of the world; it helps me remember that my presence in any given country is a privilege-not a right-and a privilege that few in the world have. For whatever reason, God, who determines when and where we are born, saw it fit to give me an American nationality. It’s not completely without its downsides, but at this point in time, it sure makes crossing borders a lot easier, at least in most places. But I don’t want to take that for granted, or lord it over others.
So as much as I would like to scream, “it’s not fair” about our current situation, I will restrain myself, not only because life is rarely fair, but because there are others who have far more reason to say those words than me. For the eight months we were here, and however long we stay if we come back-it’s our privilege.