How a mug I bought in ‘Nam is tied to my favorite Bible verse
Last week, I visited the Bat Trang (pronounced “bat chang”) area in Hanoi, which is world-renowned for its exquisite and intricately designed pottery and dishware. I wanted to find a memento by which to remember my time living in Vietnam, and since I’m always in the market for a cool looking coffee mug, I figured this was the place to go.
I ended up finding the perfect mug, and I’ll describe it in a moment, but first a little bit of backstory.
Back in the late ’90’s, I attended a very small Bible college in Washington State, near Tacoma. I’m sure you haven’t heard of it, yet the people who operated it, and continue to operate it, are convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that the world will go to hell if not for their existence.
Well, with such a burden of responsibility on their shoulders, the leaders of the school saw it necessary to cleanse its students of even the slightest sexual impurity with absurd rules regarding how boys and girls talk to each other (I’m being honest, I was a boy at the time). The rule was we weren’t allowed to talk to them at all, except for Sunday nights after the evening service, and only after the Master Pastor gave his blessing on doing so.
So assuming you got the go ahead from the One Who Knows, the boy would approach the girl he wanted to talk to, and in full public view of peers and socially superiors, ask the girl if she wanted to talk. If she said “yes,” there was a designated area in the room for the two to nervously chat with each other. And if she said “no” well, you were left standing their looking stupid and utterly humiliated.
It’s weird to even think about this Orwellian scene, but again, I was a boy whose undeveloped brain had been thoroughly captivated by these people, and quite frankly didn’t really know any better, so I just went with it.
I think there was 3 separate girls I asked to talk, and they all rejected me. One girl I asked twice, and she said no both times. In hindsight, I know why they rejected me. I’ve always been one of those guys who looks angry, but is really quite happy – and is wondering why everyone is looking at him funny. I’d dated girls before I went to this school, but I always had the benefit of developing a bit of rapport with them before “going out” or whatever we called it back then. Here, I didn’t have that. It was very much a “judge a book by its cover” type of situation.
I really wanted to get married, but it just wasn’t the ideal scenario, to the point I just quit asking girls I liked, even if it seemed like they might be interested in talking to me. It just wasn’t worth the humiliation. It was quite discouraging, but in discouraging situations, you look for ways to brighten your spirits.
So one day I was reading the Bible, and came across this verse: “Hope deferred makes the heart sick; but when the desire comes, it is a tree of life.” Proverbs 13:12 It was one of those verses that just leaps at you, and seems to speak to you in that moment. This isn’t just the Bible that does this; other people of other faiths say the same thing about sacred texts they read.
This is well over 20 years ago I had this experience, and now fast forward to this past Thursday, and Sana and I are on the plane from Doha, Qatar to Washington, DC. Her long-awaited visa has been completed, and we’re on our way to finally begin our life together without needing to be separated for months at a time so I can take care of business here in the U.S.
That Bible verse came to my mind, and I thought about how dejected and utterly frustrated we had been at times dealing with the many delays in the process. Our hearts were “made sick” many times because of “hope deferred”; but now here we were, on the plane together, and the feeling inside is quite amazing. The desire came, and it truly felt like a “tree of life” inside me.
And then I thought about that mug I had bought in Bat Trang. A simple, white mug with a simple tree painted on it. Nothing fancy, but it’s green and vibrant.
I didn’t know why that mug just stuck out to me at the market and was basically saying, “I’m the one you’re looking for” but there it was. That verse from so many years ago was in my subconscious and there it was, even while I wasn’t thinking about it.
I love telling stories like this. It’s one of the reasons I love to do podcasts, and help others produce and manage their own podcasts. If you’re thinking about getting into the game so you can share stories of your own with whoever is interested, give us a look and see if we can do business!
P.S. If you want to see the mug I bought, click this link.