Welcome to Dahua

These Guys are everywhere in Dahua- tied to trees along the street

Ezra took this picture out at the farm this summer, I've never seen a day this clear in China yet, but atleast I know they exist.

I’ve had some pretty wild curve balls thrown at me, especially since I met and married this guy named Ezra.  I knew when I married him that he was a dreamer, I guess I didn’t expect that he’d be such a follow through-er. That is why I end up in places like Dahua, China.

Recently we all took a trip to the  “village” of Dahua. The police needed to see our pretty little faces in person so we could get registered in preparation to receive our residency visas.

Quite honestly I am never comfortable in Dahua, I feel like I’m on the edge of the Earth, like I couldn’t be farther away from home. It might as well be a different planet.

But at the same time I am mesmerized………mesmerized by the way the way people interact, the places that they live, the food they eat, the work they do to make a living.

900-year-old women carry their grandbabies on their backs

People sell hunks of meaty-who-knows-what on the street corners

Many men spit, smoke, have really long finger nails and hairs that grow out of their face moles (I’m talkin 2 inches)—it must be unlucky to pluck those honkers.

Women wear high-heels to ride their scooters and weed their gardens

Little children toddle around in the dirt in front of their family owned shops

Huge loads of “whatever” are Hauled “however,” on a back, bike, or bus

Groups of people sit at little tables out on the street playing games, talking, and eating

Small ugly dogs scavenge the streets for scraps, so do little old men and women

People squat while they wait for the bus

Honking is how automobiles speak to one another

And I still can’t get over these mountains, so abrupt and mysterious.

I can hardly believe I’m in this place seeing what I’m seeing and doing what I’m doing. Traveling through Dahua, China is an experience I never would have ever wanted and yet, I’m grateful for it. Experiences like these ground me, they help me to focus on what is most important in my life.

This is a quote by Marjorie Pay Hinckley, I absolutely love it.

“I don't want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautifully, tailored clothes, my hair expertly coiffed, and with long, perfectly manicured fingernails. I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the wheels from taking kids to scout camp. I want to be there with a smudge of peanut butter on my shirt from making sandwiches for a sick neighbors children. I want to be there with a little dirt under my fingernails from helping to weed someone's garden. I want to be there with children's sticky kisses on my cheeks and the tears of a friend on my shoulder. I want the Lord to know I was really here and that I really lived.” 

I admit that sometimes I get caught up wanting the “shiny sports car” kind of life. But then I remember what this life is truly about---it’s not about having the ideal, it is about “getting mud on the wheels” it’s about giving and learning and loving.

We all have different circumstances, but we also each have a choice. We can choose each day to spend our time doing things that really matter.

As a new Mother, occasionally I wonder if what I am doing: feeding babies, changing diapers, and singing silly songs is really that important. But I know that although I may not see the significance in the daily tasks I undertake, God does. My good works, however small they may seem to me add up to something meaningful.

Here in China I may get a little bit more dirt under my fingernails than I had hoped for. But I also have an abundance of opportunities to let my light shine and bless the lives of Heavenly Fathers children that are all around me.