Tanner, Ninjas, Identity

Dear Tanner Happy birthday son!!

Do you remember the days when Ninjas were all the rage? Remember when you and your friends would all dress up in black, like ninjas, and go have ninja wars? Yes, you were very goofy, and yes, it was dangerous with your sling shots and your acorns, but you looked really cool and you probably felt pretty cool. Well, your birthday blog is in celebration of your ninja days. No one should get so old that he forgets that, “I was once a ninja warrior.”

Dad and I have, since we first got here, been amazed at all the ninja headgear worn here. We wish we had collected more pictures of it, but we can’t always capture them as they fly by on their tiny motorcycles or as we fly by them in our truck. We have, recently, made more of an effort to do the photo journalism involved to capture photos for your birthday blog. And this is what we came up with--see below.

We have asked the question, "why are they dressed like that?" but we have not received a definitive answer. Some say to keep clean from dust and pollution. Others say it is to keep from getting darker skin. Others say it is to keep cool.

There is evidence that it might be a combo of all three. First reason: yes, it is VERY dusty and polluted here, especially if you are traveling by motorcycle or even any un-air-conditioned vehicle, OR if you are working on the road and have vehicles drive by you all day on the dusty roads. Second reason: people here go to great lengths to avoid getting dark, so why not this method of dark avoidance? Most skin care and hygiene products here include bleaching agents—your soap, your deodorant, your face cream, all claim to whiten in addition to their primary function. Some people won’t swim or exercise outdoors because they will get darker. If they don’t wear full on ninja garb, they will often walk with a little kerchief draped over their head for shade, and almost all women carry umbrellas to keep out of the sun. But, the observations which I attribute to darkness avoidance, could also be part of . . . Third reason, to keep cool: it is blessed hot here, and even if you have darker skin, if you are out in the sun, you can burn and over heat, so maybe ninja garb is partly just to keep cool. So those are very valid reasons to cover up, place a kerchief square on your head or carry an umbrella.

But back to ninjas. Keeping cool aside, there is the BEING cool factor at work here, and ya gotta know you just plain look cool when you have long armed gloves on and are sporting very groovy head attire. No one can tell who you are unless they recognize your ride, or know where you work, so that’s a plus too. Tan, when you are here, maybe we can rent you a motorcycle, and you can dress up like a ninja and borrow a sling shot. There are no acorns, but at your age, maybe coconuts are in order—you have earned the bigger fire power.

We love you so much, love thinking of you, love remembering the escapades of your boisterous youth (“doctor I think my son is hyperactive. No Mrs. Cropper he is just energetic.”) and enthusiastic adulthood.

Unlike so many people who want to be something they are not--lighter skinned, darker-skinned, younger, more beautiful--you have always been sure of your identity and willing to alter it for the better under direction from the Holy Ghost, not based on some wordly-imposed expectation. We have admired you for that. We see in this culture a tendency by the people to under value themselves. It is sad to hear a mother wish her newborn had a narrower nose or whiter skin. We commend you, Tanner, for knowing who you are and for evolving within the knowledge that you are of a son of God.

We are grateful and humbled by the miracle of being here, and acknowledge that without you, it would not be possible, at least not now. Thank you son, you have exceeded our dreams for you, and you have only just begun!

True ninjas can text and ride their motorbike!


























































































































You might recognize the last two ninjas posing with two of our mighty missionaries. They too know about identity. They spend all their days teaching and exemplifying through their missionary and community service that we are all children of our Heavenly Father. Here we are helping paint yet another school.









And of course, THE QUEEN NINJA!
WE LOVE YOU