"Drink is the enemy. Love thy enemy!" - A Missionary Position on Alcohol

"Drink because you are happy, but never because you are miserable. Never drink when you are wretched without it, or you will be like the grey-faced gin-drinker in the slum; but drink when you would be happy without it, and you will be like the laughing peasant of Italy. Never drink because you need it, for this is rational drinking, and the way to death and hell. But drink because you do not need it, for this is irrational drinking, and the ancient health of the world." - G.K. Chesterton

We keep a spreadsheet with the names of our fellow missionaries. It has two columns, "Lushes" and "Prudes".

Occasionally we share this fact with friends here (generally those we've already determined are in the "Lushes" column). They usually laugh, then think for a moment and ask if we can share the spreadsheet with them.

Culture Shock Round 2: Working with Americans

“There is nothing the matter with Americans except their ideals. The real American is all right; it is the ideal American who is all wrong.” - G.K. Chesterton

In a previous post I explored what it is like to be plunged into a foreign culture. When working with a team, though, it sometimes feels like you are in two foreign countries at once! I would love to be gracious and say that all cultures are equally guilty of this but I simply cannot do so with a straight face.

Understanding Culture Shock

“A man is perfectly entitled to laugh at a thing because he happens to find it incomprehensible. What he has no right to do is to laugh at it as incomprehensible, and then criticise it as if he comprehended it.” - G.K. Chesterton

Although the term “culture shock” is fairly well known, it has a very different meaning within the context of longer term adaptation vs a quick vacation or short term work trip.

We've all heard the travel braggart who never gets culture shock... “I guess I've just travelled enough that nothing shocks me.” Ha! Pride cometh before the fall, as the saying goes. And what a fall it will be!

There's No Such Thing as a Missionary

"The devotee is entirely free to criticise; the fanatic can safely be a sceptic. Love is not blind; that is the last thing it is. Love is bound; and the more it is bound the less it is blind." - G.K. Chesterton

Second post in and here I am undermining the whole concept of this blog.