Summer. this is the first summer i haven't been in nc or va at all and i was pretty sad to be missing all the things that go with summer there. but, hong kong surprisingly delivered a lot of things that summer inherently meant: the beach. a trip to the pool. boats. humidity. sunscreen. the ocean. sunglasses. i wore almost every skirt and dress that i own here and rarely have a chance to wear. and our last day there we got really good burgers. (the first time we had ever eaten grass-fed beef and while we couldn't taste the difference we were that much more satisfied that it was healthier for us.) hong kong is nothing like nc in the summer, but it felt eerily similar in the things that define summer to me. and it made my heart happy.
Timing. as we headed home and i looked back at the great week we had, i was so thankful ultimately that jarred recovered from his surgery so quickly that we got to relax and enjoy all that we did. it very easily could have been 3 days spent entirely in our hostel with him flat on his back recovering. what a blessing that he had no complications. it was also a blessing that the surgeon made him stay to have a post-surgery check-up on Tuesday (which went great, but jarred left the office and forgot the socket-swisher syringe that the doctor gave him, which left him devastated for like 30 minutes once he realized) because that morning i woke up with a rash that i had had a few weeks before and a dermatologist was able to fit me in that afternoon long enough to diagnose me with eczema. that's not fun, but i am thankful i was in a place that last day where i could get to a good dermatologist and not back here already. and it is also a blessing that apparently all over asia doctor offices stock all the medicine they might need in their own office and we didn't have to figure out a pharmacy system in hong kong. tuesday night jarred got really sick and was up most of the night with a fever. and when we woke wednesday morning it was pouring for the first time since we got there. it was a good time to leave. we pumped jarred full of enough motrin to clear customs' temperature controls and headed home. he spent the next 2 days getting over the flu, which i then came down with today. we were glad to be back in our own bed at least.
Culture. the last major thing that was a great blessing in hong kong was a complete surprise. jarred and i love where we live and wouldn't trade it for the world. but a couple of days into our stay in hong kong, i noticed that i was living differently, like my guard was down. because it was. there was this sense of freedom, peace, and calmness that i didn't realize we live without on a daily basis here. i wasn't constantly worried about being ripped off. i wasn't pointed at and laughed at, or talked about by people who think i can't understand them. as i lived in hong kong, so close to our home here but worlds away culturally, i realized that my daily stress level here in asia is leaps and bounds above where it is living in america or elsewhere. it was an interesting revelation, and one that made me so thankful for the blessing of this past week in hong kong and for a loving Father who knows what we need even when we don't.
so we are back home in our apartment. and there is one furry little black pup that is glad to have us back. and i'm sure he'll like us even better once we are both fully over the flu.
