Angels with Citrus

What do angels look like?

This is not a question that sprang from the mouth of my five-year-old daughter. This is a serious topic I’ve been pondering lately as I look outside at these busy Chinese streets (especially after today).

The picture of “angel” I hold in my mind is dominated by big bird wings, Icarus-falling Led Zeppelin T-shirts, and brightly lit halogen faces. Thanks to those prophetic Old Testament books and Revelations, I also envision a boulder-sized wad of grotesque eyeballs covering eagle heads, lions’ claws and sundry other Animal Planet leftovers my brain can’t quite choke down. And then I step back from the mystical and remind myself that angels (like Jesus himself) have often shown up veiled modestly in nothing more than… human flesh. (The scandal!) When our eyes see only the God-inspired dust puppets we pass on the street every day—we may be missing the Michael Landons that lie beneath. Just how often do we miss encounters with the divine in our oblivious disregard of the stranger?

You might be thinking I’m some kind of angel nut. I’m really not; but I do read a little. Lately I’ve been reading Henri Nouwen’s book Reaching Out (when you live in one of the poorest provinces of China and you don’t speak very good Mandarin, you have time for such leisurely activity). In his book, Nouwen talks about three movements within the spiritual life: the movements from loneliness to solitude; from hostility to hospitality; and finally from illusion to prayer. In the section on hospitality Nouwen draws attention to our misunderstanding of what it means to show hospitality. Here’s what he says:

At first the word “hospitality” might evoke the image of soft sweet kindness, tea parties, bland conversations and a general atmosphere of coziness. in our culture the concept of hospitality has lost much of its power and is often used in circles where we are more prone to expect a watered down piety than a serious search for an authentic Christian spirituality. But still, if there is any concept worth restoring to its original depth and evocative potential, it is the concept of hospitality. It is one of the richest biblical terms that can deepen and broaden our insight in our relationships to our fellow human beings. Old and New Testament stories not only show how serious our obligation is to welcome the stranger in our home, but they also tell us that guests are carrying precious gifts with them, which they are eager to reveal to a receptive host. When Abraham received three strangers at Mamre and offered them water, bread and a fine tender calf, they revealed themselves to him as the Lord announcing that Sarah his wife would give birth to a son…When the widow of Zarephath offered food and shelter to Elijah, he revealed himself as a man of God offering her an abundance of oil and meal and raising her son from the dead…When the two travelers to Emmaus invited the stranger, who had joined them on the road to stay with them for the night, he made himself known in the breaking of the bread as their Lord and Saviour.

When hostility is converted into hospitality fearful strangers can become guests revealing to their hosts the promise they are carrying with them. The distinction between host and guest proves to be artificial and evaporates in the recognition of new-found unity.

Nouwen goes on to stress that hospitality is not limited to receiving a stranger into our home, but that it is a “fundamental attitude toward our fellow human being” that allows us to open ourselves up to people we don’t know and create a “safe space” (wherever it may be) where they can be themselves and engage with us. When host and guest meet in this type of space, secret treasures may be revealed…if we’re looking for them.

So at this point you might be asking, “What does all this have to do with oranges?”

I’m getting there.

So, from my urban perch on the Tibetan plateau I went out today for a haircut, not expecting much in the way of the “mystical”. I don’t have mystical days too often even though red-robed monks wearing Air Jordans often pass me on the street. The only semi-mystical experiences I can remember involved an angel-shaped cloud (angels again!) that I’m pretty sure God put there for my benefit, but that’s another story, and a mistaken instance when I thought God wanted me to go get a job as a waiter at a TGI Fridays (for which I had no prior restaurant experience nor qualifications to work.) I didn’t get the job. (Big surprise there.) Needless to say mystical is not the norm for me.

Today I was expecting a haircut and I got one. Nothing quasi-mystical about what scissors do to hair, even in Asia, but as I was walking from the bus stop back to my house I got stopped on the street by a stranger. Having lived cross-culturally for a little while now this is not an uncommon occurrence for me:

Exhibit A: Joe Pesci’s Tibetan twin flashes golden pinky ring and necklaces with Dalai Llama’s picture on it at me and then invites me to breakfast.

Exhibit B: Chinese guys who look like Alias mercenaries pull up in a black sedan and invite me into their vehicle. Yeah right. Upon further interrogation, I realize that they are only looking for an English speaker to translate the flashing dashboard lights…in their Buick!?! Dictionary in hand, I come to the rescue. Change. Oil. Soon. They smile and nod in appreciation.

Exhibit C: Walk-by laptop salesmen. As he almost passed me on the street this young student stops all of the sudden to ask me if I wanted to buy his laptop. He had it in his bag and pulled it out. Very nice! Did I mention I’d never seen him before? Did I mention I never buy used hardware…on a blind date…in a foreign country?

So at first I didn’t think much of this stranger, let’s call him Exhibit D. This latest gentlemen, who stopped me with a word, had some distinct features. He was Chinese but I reckon he probably wasn’t the ethnic majority, i.e. Han Chinese. Perhaps he was a Muslim minority, Hui or Uighur? His eyelids did not extend down to cover his piercing greenish-hazel eyes. No slant there. Just greenish-hazel eyes. Is that a color? His eyes weighed of intelligence, they seemed to know things, they held a glimmering intimacy with beauty— even though I feel a bit girlish describing him that way.

What struck me next about this mysterious stranger was that he spoke very quick, very clear English which is extremely uncommon in this backwoods, yak-eating, hoe-downish part of China. He said:

“Hello, excuse me, may I ask you a question?”

I said, “Sure.” (I’ve been learning a lot from Nouwen, you see.)

“There is an old English proverb that goes something like this…”

(An English proverb? I hope it’s one I’ve actually heard.)

“When the going gets tough…(pause)…the tough get go-ing.”

(Good, I’ve heard that one.)

“What…does this mean?” he asked. He tilted his head - the universal sign for curiosity - and stared at…no, straight through me with those jade eyes.

(Uh, what does that mean? Processing…processing…loading…loading…you can almost hear the silicon chips clicking from my ears. The cooling fan is blowing faster. Damned Java script! It’s the obvious questions that always stump you.) In probably only a second I respond with words…

“It means that in…uh…hard times…the…uh…”

He interjected with, “hard working man…”

I respond almost simultaneously with his last statement, “Tough…hen lihai de Ren…” (I thought some Chinese might grease the wheels in our communique.) “Yes, they might be hard working, but they are also hen lihai…very strong. The strong…do something about it. They do something.”

I could see that a light bulb went off and was hanging above Exhibit D’s head. He said, “Ohhhhh, so ‘get going’ means they do something then. Do something! Oh, I see. Thank you very much.”

And like that, he was off - walking down the sidewalk away from me. I barely had time to say anything before he left, but in a fit I did finally turn and yell at his back, “You speak English very well!” It felt like something at least.

I didn’t immediately think that Exhibit D with his greenish eyes and good pronunciation was an angel. Why would I? But I did think what he had asked me had an element of intrigue. The encounter stuck with me like a piece of corn wedged between my teeth that I knew I’d I have to dig out later. So, in order to catalogue this event for further processing, in my typical counter-intuitive form, I quickly forgot it ever happened.

I went home, showed the wife and kids my new mystical-free hair -do, and then remembered something else I’d forgotten: Go to the market and pick up fruit and bread. So I quickly put my shoes back on, stepped out of our apartment and walked to the outdoor market across the street.

Upon entering the market, I saw a familiar face. Who else but the tough-get-going guy - Exhibit D! He smiled at me. I smiled at him. And as we coasted towards one another he immediately started to fidget with his plastic bags.

Inwardly I responded in my oh-so-typical fear-the-stranger fashion. A wave of worry, confusion and fear doused me thoroughly. In the time it takes to moan, I thought a million things like this:

Oh, no! He wants me to buy some of his fruit.

He’s a salesmen after all!

We’re intertwined in the complex web of Chinese “guanxi” (relationship) now and I’ll never get out of it!

He’s out to swindle me somehow.

He’ll trick me into going to his house for dinner and then he’ll drug me and sell me into Mongolian slavery somewhere along the Silk Road.

Gypsy!

Fire!

Poison!

Bandit!

And then in the time it takes to let off a slightly longer Charlie Brown SIGH, I came back to reality. Why would I think such absurd thoughts like this? Obviously, Exhibit D had come to the market to BUY fruit not to SELL it to me. But it is this type of paranoia that I have been trained in. My culture tells me that strangers are people who put razor blades in Halloween candy; they are perverts who look for stragglers at mall playgrounds, they are CEOs who were formerly employed at ENRON. They are people who are out to get me and the rest of the world. They are they baddies.

They can’t be angels…can they?

Instead of enticing me to buy or knocking me over the head with a prayer wheel, this kind gentleman simply pulled a ripe orange from his bag. In giving a tree’s gift, this man was offering me a sign of his own gratitude…for what? For explaining a proverb.

My first thought upon seeing the orb: Am I still living in the 21st century or have I suddenly been transported back to an innocent, more beautiful time? I know it sounds funny, but I felt so humbled by this act of goodwill.

I did the right thing. In true cultural form I attempted to resist the gift at first, waving my hands at it and mumbling courtesies in Chinese, but then quickly (perhaps a bit too quickly) I relented and accepted the outstretched orange offering.

As it touched my palm I thanked him (which isn’t really necessary in this culture but I am a foreigner after all) and we walked off in opposite directions. It wasn’t until Exhibit D was out of sight that I recalled Nouwen’s words. The ones about treasures that are hidden that can only be unearthed when strangers feel it is safe to meet and allow one another past their defenses. It wasn’t until I was buying my own fruit a minute later that I wondered about angels and what they might look like. I wondered why that proverb was on that gentleman’s mind today, especially when I had been thinking earlier in the day how “tough” it can be to live as a stranger here in China. I had been thinking about all the years of preparation it took to get here and how the table gets turned on you as soon as you arrive. You are baby again, starting life all over, learning to walk and eat and speak, and one year in this foreign life still feels like it is ALL going to be uphill for quite some time. It’s tough. In the midst of these brooding thoughts along comes a stranger (yes, those people of dread) who asks me what “tough people” do during “tough times.”

Well, they get going don’t they? They do something (whatever something is for them). They don’t sit around bemoaning their immaturity or their hardship. They grow up - in order to overcome the difficulties that the tough time avails. They prove their mettle and persevere because they know Who holds them and Who visits them in clever epidermal disguises. And they don’t expect to get an orange in return.

But sometimes an angel throws you an orange anyway.