Overseas we often experience some very cool encounters. You may have heard me tell of some. For example, one day I woke up with this one Kazak guy I had met years and years ago on my mind. But how would I ever find him? I met him during my first time overseas, and here I was in my third term, married, in a different part of the city doing something completely different. Well, I prayed God would do something, and then went out.

It was to the bank I had to go for rent was due. This means we use the ATM to withdraw renminbi. On this particular day I decided to try a new bank near our home, thinking it might save me some time. I stuck my Canadian debit card in, punched in the pin, waited…. and realized the machine had taken my card! Argh! What was hoped to be a time-saver was now turning into something I thought would suck the rest of my day out of my hands.

I managed to pray, calm down, and tried to call the number on the ATM sign but of course no one answered. Usually it is no use to go into the branch because everyone there will hum and haw and claim to not know what to do. But I felt compelled to try. In I went, saw the usual stiffening of everyone’s spines as they spy a real live foreigner walk in, and I head towards the most managerial looking person I can find. They can’t escape. I pull out another card, and with miming motions indicate that their ATM took my card and could I have it back. They reply, as far as my Chinese can discern, that they need their manager to check for me. Ok. I wait.

A few minutes later out of the office walks the very same Kazak guy about whom I had been thinking about that morning. The same Kazak guy who I thought for sure I would never be able to find. I didn’t even remember his home town. Him. Here. Right in front of me. And if I was surprised, you can imagine how shocked he was because he also had woken up that morning wondering if he’d ever see his old Canadian friend again. As great as it was that I did actually get my ATM card back, thanks to him, it was even more amazing to reconnect with him. God. Did. It.

But you know what is weird. in 20 years I have only ever bumped into an old school friend from Canada, in Canada, once or twice. Being back in Hamilton now, and driving around, going here and there, I would expect I would bump into some of my elementary, or high school, or uni friends. But nope. This only happens overseas. With Kazaks, and the odd Chinese, Mongol or Uighur.