With this the police walked away. A lot of our time is spent in the struggle to communicate. Even when English is spoken it often needs to be interpreted and, even then, it is wise to go over it from another angle to be sure everything is understood. By now our team could probably beat anybody at games like charades, Pictionary, and sign language. It takes time to just try to discern what is really going on inside of people or the circumstances that you are forced to work with.
Nothing is as it appears.
Or in India, you may be threatened by a man who does it with the nicest smile. Ninety percent of the time you are ministering to someone's need, whether it is through teaching, praying for the sick, or bandaging a finger that has just been split open with an ax. One time in the Ukraine, a man walked a long distance to our house to ask if we had any eyeglass frames that might fit his lenses. Interestingly enough, he had lenses with no frames, and just before we left the America we were given a set of frames with no lenses. Our hosts always go to great lengths to feed us their best, but each country thinks of hospitality in terms of abundance.