Love Stories Series: An Opposite Kind of Love Story- Rachel from Wokabout.net

Love comes in all kinds of forms and can be found in all kinds of places. Meet Rachel.  An Australian married to an American living in China.  I was excited to receive an email from her because I had never met her, never noticed her around my blog before, and hadn't found her blog yet either.  So you can imagine my surprise and excitement when she wrote that she had been silently visiting my blog and really wanted to participate in the Love Stories series.  She quickly turned in her story and  I quickly became a fan of this wonderful lady.  When love transcends all obstacles you can see why this Australian has an opposite kind of Love story...

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Once upon a time, there was a quiet, little girl who lived in Australia.  She was the oldest of six children (four sisters and one brother), never had her own room, home-schooled, never had a boyfriend and dreamed of saving the world.

Far away, on the other side of the world, there was a young, confident, American boy.  He was the youngest of three children (in fact the boys well and truly out-numbered the girls in his extended family), had his own room, went to regular school, was a bit of a flirt...but also dreamed of seeing the world outside of the USA.

So while the young American boy was still going to school and working in the US, the little Australian girl began her mission to save the world (and fill up her passport with stamps along the way).  She volunteered at sewing workshops in the villages of Vanuatu, ran children’s programmes in Singapore and did school programmes in East Malaysia.  All the time she was acutely aware that she was called to live full time overseas...she just didn’t know where.

Finally the American boy had enough of his lifestyle and packed his bags for Australia where his plan was to spend 7 months in Bible school.  He hoped to find direction and see the world at the same time.  He got a little more than he bargained for.

It was at this Bible school the young American met the little Australian.  He visited Fiji on the way and was bitten by the travel bug.  It also didn’t take long before he was smitten with the girl but it did however take a while for her to come around.  She was simply not interested.  

Then...she found out he was interested in living in China, a country that had been on her heart for sometime.  So she thought, perhaps, the relationship was worth a shot.  However, they both had to wait till the American graduated the Bible school before they could date.

Their first trip overseas together was to the Solomon Islands.  However, they still weren’t technically dating yet and spent a good deal of that trip being mad at each other.

Finally, the young boy graduated and the two decided to date.  Then after dating two weeks, the boy returned home to the US and the girl continued working in Australia.  Then the boy returned and they enjoyed a few months on the same continent before the girl left for the Solomon Islands again.  Then she went to Malaysia for three months while the boy stayed in Australia.  Then the boy figured if they were both going to stay in the same country for any period of time, he better marry the girl.  

So the boy asked and the girl said yes.  They decided to get married in Australia, on the beach, at sunset.  The little girl wore a gown that she made herself and the young boy wore a sarong (that he chose himself).  They incorporated their love of different cultures as much as they could in the ceremony.  Then they packed their bags and moved to the USA.

They only planned to spend one year in the States before moving to China but life has a habit of getting in the way and finally they despaired of ever moving to China to save the world.
So after three years of working hard, saving money, and countless problems with green cards and visas, the global financial crisis hit and the young boy lost his job.  So they both thought, what a perfect time to move to China.  

So they moved to China to study Mandarin and see what they could do to ‘help’.  Pretty soon, they found out that no matter what they did, if they could just show the world -- or more specifically China -- what it was to be gloriously married, they would count themselves successful.  With young Chinese girls lining up to make themselves available to the young, dashing American boy, living in China as a married couple didn’t prove itself easy at first.  So every day, they found they have to work very hard to keep their relationship and after a trip to Thailand earlier this year, they found out they were expecting their first child!  So they won’t be able to get this baby tattooed with “made in China”...oh well...maybe the next one…

They can’t wait for October when the new family member will join their ultimate adventure, living in China, saving the world...impacting and changing individual lives

There’s a lot more to their story that can’t be written here for security reasons and lack of space but if you’d like to read more of their regular adventures, feel free to stop by their blog www.wokabout.net for a little look-see!

Its not the end, but they are most certainly living ‘happily ever after’

Make sure to visit Rachel's blog documenting their life in China, their love for each other, and the newest member of their family- yup, Rachel's expecting a precious little bundle.