Sheena's perspectives

Catching Up

Last night I began thinking; it has been quite a while since anyone back home has heard my perspective on South Asia and all that is new here. While I’ve been reminding Brian to keep up with the blogs as part of his schoolwork, I have neglected to report back myself. As you haven’t heard from me since May, we have some catching up to do.

Leaving KTM and the Himalaya of Npl was very difficult for me. For the first time during our entire duration in South Asia, I felt homesick. I hate to admit this, as I never want friends and family to be under the false impression that I don’t miss them or their companionship. However, we thrived in Npl, even though all the parasites thrived in us. It was very sad saying goodbye to our new close friends: our coworkers, national partners, and those we were working with. We went to my didi’s house the night before we left (we had gone once before we went to the mountains when our language was very poor) and enjoyed talking to her family in their own language this time. They were very impressed with our progress, and we promised to email and write. Friendships here in South Asia often are easier to form, and the one’s that become close, become very close – like family. These are people I already miss very much and desire to see again very soon.

However, after recognizing that I was feeling homesick for my home in Npl, we decided it was time to really get to work in our new location to the South East (but still in the North portion of the South Asia region working with our same PG). We have been helping our good friends and M supervisors move into their house (as Brian has already stated), and it’s a different process than in America. Here, we had to wash the walls first to make sure to kill all mold, and help them pick out their carpet and prime their bright orange walls to be neutralized to a light shade of brown. South Asians love bright colors, and it shows in all their décor.

Animals and Culture of South Asia

There are many things to adjust to in South Asia besides bright colors and loud noises. The other night at 4 A.M. we were awoken for half an hour by a cat fight. Once we discovered where the cats were from our window we took a candle from our room (the only thing we were willing to sacrifice) and broke the candle into pieces and threw the pieces out the window at the cats in an attempt to get them to stop. We were apparently the only ones concerned about this, but accidentally hit a house instead. Once we ran out of pieces of the candle, we had to retire in the hopelessness of the situation. Five minutes later, someone else decided to throw rocks at the cat (much more effective than a candle) and the fight ceased. People here also seem to have a fear of cats similar to our fear of mice. The other day when we went to a village, there were kittens running around. So I picked one up and pet it – and they all stared at me like I was crazy. I offered for them to pet it to, and they kept pointing out the fact that it has sharp claws and teeth. Once the kitten was trying to get away, I put it on the ground (to avoid those sharp claws), and it scurried away, but in the process it ran past one of the little girls. She began to panic and scream – exactly as we would do if a mouse of rat ran by. Suddenly, I realized the cultural equivalent of my actions, and how weird it must seem to them that I was affectionately holding their version of a rat. Scarier than the cats though, are the bugs. Here, spiders, mosquitoes, and cockroaches grow to about ten to twenty times their normal size! The cockroaches are the worst as they can fly – and are extremely hard to kill.

Arriving into a new town – and the work we did there.

After eating Domino’s for the first time in 6 months in a big city south of us, and meeting a brother from a neighboring country where no one from our company is working currently due to visa issues, we arranged time to head north to a restricted state. Very few tourists travel into this area, so as is normally the case, we got treated as if we were famous. By this, I mean we could not so much as come out of room without people standing around outside our door waiting to talk to us. They love that we know their language here (even though the dialect is like a Southern American talking to a British or maybe even a little more extreme). But regardless, we had friends waiting for us and following us wherever we went.

On Tuesday, we arrived from the 6 hour jeep ride. We arrived late because our jeep was broken for the first hour, and they had to fix it. However, we arrived and checked into our hotel. The hotel didn’t last long however, as the brother we were working with decided to move us into his house right away. We stayed with their family, avoiding the frog that liked to live in the bathroom outside our room. With us we brought 30 copies of the Good Book in their language, and 10 in English.

On Wednesday, we went around to do initial research for the M’s and were able to share our Father’s story and our story with about 30-45 people. We spent time learning about them, their pol. situations and their family structures. We learned about their PG divisions and worldviews. We gave out about 10 Books, and invited them to come see a film and to our Family meeting that night. That night, Brian spoke about the Samaritan woman and encouraged the new brothers and sisters. The room (normally about 10 people) was full with about 30 there that night. One man was requesting to be dunked, and others were all very encouraged by our presence. But the biggest blessing of the night as being able to distribute gifts. In the room, (besides the Books we distributed earlier in the day), there were only 2 Books that people owned before we arrived. We were able to give every new brother and sister a Book, which they received with such gratitude.

Our national partner’s wife told us later that evening that she had been yarping for Books just this Sunday, and claiming Mt 7:7 as a promise. She said that she was so encouraged, and told us all about her life story through tears. We yarped over her and her family that night. (As we also yarped for the food we ate pork that was still bloody…)

Over the next couple days, things were about the same. We traveled to 2 villages near the capital and interviewed 20-25 people each day, sharing the Story wherever we went. On Saturday however, we traveled to the West, expecting to be based in the city. Instead, we had to hike about half an hour down a mossy hill to get to our location. Brian wasn’t feeling well, and we soon discovered the amoebas were back. After yarping, and encouraging the group of brothers and sisters, we made a quick diagnosis, and hiked back up the hill to get to a doctor. Now this may sound easy, but don’t be deceived. The walk up the hill was steep and slippery. Brian’s stomach was in pain, and the only way out was up. As we were hiking up, it began to rain, and soon, the monsoon season presented its face again. Already drenched with sweat in 90-100 degree weather, the rains came pouring down. Refreshing, and discouraging at the same time. My heart was racing (as my family know is normal), so I just counted it as a good strong workout. When we got to the hospital, the entire building smelled strongly of urine. The nurse came, asked Brian some questions, and prescribed some medication with no real physical evaluation. Since antibiotics were prescribed however, we simply filled the prescription and stayed in a hotel for the night. The next day we returned back down to a city near home where we are helping to now find language teachers for future workers and other logistical stuff that might bore you.

While our time was cut short, we know that our Father’s purpose was still accomplished as we met together with brothers and sisters and shared with those who have literally never heard His name before! We challenged our brothers and sisters to tell others their story, and to overcome addictions such as alcoholism. About 100 people heard Hope offered and some believed – though how many we do not know.

The Harvest here is white, but the workers truly are few.

Yarp Ideas:

- Thank our Father for the experience that we had over the past week.

- Thank Him for keeping Brian safe during his illness in the village.

- Yarp that those who received the seed will receive it as good soil.

- Yarp for the new believers to become sharpened as a sickle for the field, ready to harvest new Brothers and sisters

- Yarp for them to be encouraged by their own brothers and sisters

- Yarp for supplies to be brought to them like the Good Book.

- Yarp for them to remain faithful through difficulty and hardship. These new brothers and sisters are being trained to go back out to their own village to work in the field to harvest new brothers and sisters as well. In the process, many face hardship, and are sometimes beaten or ostracized by family and friends.

- Yarp for those here struggling with alcohol addiction. Many, many struggle with this here. The enemy has his stronghold here. Please yarp for those trying to overcome to be perseverant and comforted by our Father’s strength.

- Yarp for us – we only have a little over two weeks left until we come home, and a busy time planned. We are doing a LOT of traveling during this time. Yarp for our safety in travel, and for a good debriefing time that is approaching.

- In this state that we went to, foreigners are only allowed in for 2 weeks every 3 months. The brothers are requesting a training soon, so please yarp this is possible for them.

Right now we are also really evaluating the work we did over the past 6-7 months and how it could have been done better and CPM methodology. Please yarp for us to have wisdom as we are considering how to better do this work in the future.

Recently, Sheena and I have discovered how busy we can become in a very short time. For those of you who do not know already, we have relocated to another area for this last month of our trip. This logistical and has nothing to do with security as many of you were aware that security issues were developing in the last country we stayed in. However we are still working with the same people group, just in a different area. While this transition has been a good one and allowed us to see a different part of the world, we have also had the opportunity in assisting our new supervisors as they are moving as well making life just a little bit busier around here.

Ware greatly enjoying our time here for it is alowing us to see a different part of the work that is being done on this side of the world. So far we have made a short trip with our supervisors to meet with a national partner that is doing great things for the Father in an area that has little to no gospel presentation and no foreign M's in their country from our company. Also during our time in our new city we have been involved in doing some ethnographic reasearch for the new team that we are working with. This means we are meeting with people in the city to find out what people groups live here.

Over the next few weeks we have many things planned and are going to be doing much traveling, meeting with other brothers and sisters, trying to do some reasearch (especially in villages) including trying to find where these people groups are and what would be the best way to present the Good News to them.

On the Road again

So as many of you may have noticed we have not posted a blog in a while. Recently we have been very busy as a team came into town and we were involved in helping with their orientation. So in the few moments that I have here with internet access, I just wanted to write a quick note to let you all know how we are doing. > > We are now in the process of changing locations, moving into a different city to help a couple start a new work. As for what else we have been doing, I (Brian) was able to share with a Buddy the other day. Also we have been very busy in establishing old contacts and saying our goodbyes. The last 2 weeks were full of goodbyes in our city.> > Well I will write more later but as for now I will leave you with the knowledge that we are safe and well. But please lift up the many students that are going out to work in the South Asian region. Also lift us up as we will be traveling again tomorrow to get to our final destination. We've been in transition for the past 2 weeks in hotels, and for the past 3 days in a city nearby to where we will be. We're surrounded by beautiful mountains again - though we haven't seen them yet past the fog, and wonderful Tibetan and Nepali peoples. Tomorrow we'll be helping our new supervisors for this last leg of our journey in their move into their new house. Once we have better internet access again, we'll update about our new work. I will be traveling a lot over the next couple weeks and will be preparing for conferences etc., so they may also be something you can yarp for.

Sheena's report back - the spider, the goat, Bob Marley, and the future

How we got Home...
On March 1 at 5:00 AM, I dressed into hiking gear, put on my heavy coat to block the wind, picked up my 35 pound Osprey pack, cinched it down tight, and put my day pack on my stomach. We left a note for my housekeeper, locked up the flat, and said goodbye to the guard. We walked down the stony dirt street by the dirt field (now ripe with a plant that we laugh about here), past the closed shops, around the great stupa where people were already doing their kora (worship) and sat on the stairs to wait for the J-girls. With Brian’s pack around 75 pounds with materials, we were already hurting. But as always, ke garne – translated, what to do?
The J-girls were running a little late, but once they got there, we loaded everything onto a taxi, cinched it down tight again, and then proceeded to the bus stop. On my way, I made my confession. I told them, “I don’t think I’m ready for this.” They laughed, and told me they’re never ready. From the bus, we watched the scenery change from mountains to tropics. Once we got off the bus, we went to the hotel, where Brian got sick with dysentery, went to the hospital, and we waited for recovery.
Once he was better, we then took a plane. A little plane, that can only fly at certain times of day, because when the wind gets bad in the afternoon, it could be swept into a crash landing in the mountain. I’ve never been in a plane so small. We were served little butterscotch candies surrounded by cotton to look like snow. From the plane, we took our possessions for the next 2 months and headed out, walking across town while checking in with gov’t checkposts.
Across town, we grabbed a jeep (fortunately they built a jeep road up into the area last year, because it would have been a long walk otherwise). We rode for 2 hours to our final vehicle stop. We ate lunch at a guest house, and then continued walking again. For 3 hours this day we walked (because the weight was so strong, and the altitude so high, we were not adjusted and it should have only taken us 1 ½ hours if we were acclimated – but there was no time for that). We finally got to our village. When to our dismay, we found out the guest home which would be home for the next 2 months was still closed! The owner hadn’t arrived back yet.
On the way, my always racing pulse was racing more! Due to the altitude, my heart was fast this day, (between 190 and the pace where my heart rate monitor couldn't monitor it anymore). So it was evening by this point. So as we met the children (who were begging for school pens, candy, and money – none of which they need from tourists) my J-girl friend explained to the villagers that we were the new teachers in town, and that I had a heart condition (not exactly true, but they don't understand fast pulse), and we couldn’t travel back with all of our stuff, so we needed a place to stay. They asked if we can eat Dal Bhaat (which we love) and sleep on the floor. We told them that would be fine.
So that night, Brian and I had a bed, and the girls slept on the floor… those lucky girls. See, the house is all made of mud (as are all houses around this area). And the bed is built into the wall somehow, but it was not flat, and there was no mattress, just a carpet. Soon, we learned, the bed is also slanted away from the wall, and its thinner than a twin, so we fell out of bed all night and didn’t sleep. But we got some rest for day 2, and made some new contacts for our village. We watched a movie with some of the children and made some friends. (Yes, in the mountains they do have electricity, and they will work hard to carry a TV on their back just so they can have TV). But this is a new thing. Our county is extremely behind on their technology.
On Day 2, the young boy who cooked and cleaned, and did household duties came back. He made us fried rice. He became a great friend, but he really couldn’t cook well. I was just beginning to conquer this whole “you can’t take a shower up here” thing, and learning that it really is too cold to change your clothes, much less shower, or shave, or do any hygienic practices etc. This is something I think I’ll never be able to truly communicate – the daily lifestyle is so much different. For the next 10 days, we made contacts all over the area through our J-girls, and people began to know what we were there to do. Only, the school master was missing, so we couldn’t arrange our platform immediately!
The Spider
About the 10th day, after visiting the ani gompa (a nunnery for Buddhists), I found the gas powered hot water shower, and it was past time to take one. I relished in the joy of hot water and squeaky clean hair. But then, while I was drying off and checking my belly button for any dirt, out crawled a spider! I panicked, and knocked it away from me, and continued to clean my belly button. Those of you who know me understand my extreme arachnophobia. Convinced it was gone, I made everyone I knew check their belly buttons too.
The Goat
One day, we decided to go to the neighboring village, just a half hour hike away. We gathered together our materials, intent on sharing our story with these unique people. The kids at the school saw us on the way, and ran outside to tell us goodbye as we walked that way. But as we were leaving, I began hearing crying noises next to one of the biggest suspension foot bridges I’ve ever seen in my life. I looked down, and finally found the source - a little baby goat stuck by a rock. It couldn’t walk yet, and there was no mother around or shepherd. So after much searching for the shepherd so we couldn’t be accused of stealing a goat, I took the goat in my scarf (it was still kind of a yucky goat, it had just been born that morning) and carried it back to our village. Walking through the village, I realized I need to explain why I have a goat. Then I realized, I know the name for sheep, but what’s the word for goat? So when I found the kids, I asked them “Not sheep - What is this?” They told me reepko bacha (baby goat) and then continued to ask me, “Miss Dolma, why do you have the baby goat?”
So I first got to practice with the child lama, then got to run and tell our story to our guest house owner, and the rest of the people in our national language. My guest house owner was very proud of her new possession, and took the goat to her goat house after giving the goat milk tea and feeding us popcorn.
The i-Pod and Bob Marley
One of the things we decided to bring for our trip was our i-Pods. When you have to hike 2 hours to get somewhere, music helps! So we each brought one. When our national partner found out, he asked to borrow Brian’s, and would listen to Bob Marley all the time (in addition to some Newsboys albums, etc). One day, when the battery died, he handed it to Brian and told him “Bob Marley is dead.” When we told him, yes that is true, Bob Marley is dead, he was shocked, and wanted to know all the details surrounding his death and family. Then he wanted us to write the lyrics to Buffalo soldier for him, so he could memorize it. We did, and now it’s his favorite English song.
In one village, we learned about a TB singer who came from there, and we bought his CD. Soon he wanted to listen to that on the i-Pod instead. So we converted it over for him on the i-Pod, and he listened to it, and let everyone else listen to it too. Then he had a great idea, he’d been working on a translation project (his wife works for another company doing similar work) about the story. He wanted to work more on this project, and asked us to transfer it to the i-Pod too. We did, and then we went all over the villages with people in lines to listen to this story in their language that they have never heard before!
When he left, we kept this story, and used it to share with nearly the entire village. Anyone who understood this dialect of TB was able to hear and understand. Some of the lamas listened to it 2 or 3 times. We also went from village to village with a new tool, and after they listened, we would ask them questions to see if they understood. Though we haven’t seen a commitment response, some villagers are now reading the story every day. Please yarp for them, as they now have the truth, that they can realize what they have, and be reconnected with our Father.
Back to the city – changes.
Monsoon season will be here in 5 days. That’s what everyone keeps telling us, even though it’s already raining everyday. But apparently 5 days is the magic number. I don’t know why. For my birthday, we went to tourist town. We bought 3 DVD’s all for under $5. I had some brownies that I made a couple days earlier, and steak imported from India. (Remember, it’s illegal to kill a cow in our country, although beef is our national partner’s favorite food). It’s been hot here though. While we were in the mountains, Brian lost 20 pounds, and I lost 30. So we needed some new clothes, and we only had hot mountain clothes, so we had to buy clothes appropriate for the weather too. With the change, we’ve walked past some friends around the stupa who didn’t recognize us initially due to our 2 month absence and weight loss. Here, they have no problem calling you fat either. So they tell me that before I was fat, but now I am thinner. And I just laugh with them now - they call themselves fat too and tell me we are same same. They also look at the ice water I carry around suspiciously. They will tell you that cold water makes you sick. So I always feel like they think I’m drinking poison, but I have to stay cool with no A/C! There is also no power to run the fan!
I also found out I love cooking now. After not being able to cook for 2 months in the mountains, and watching them cook as we sat around the hearth with them every night, I have gained excellent 'cooking from scratch' skills. Making tortillas? No problem. Kneading bread? No biggie. Making great veggie soup? Yummy. No powder spices, just the true raw organic cooking. And I learned to cook some ethnic food for all of you when I get back! I have my house-helper teaching me anything I missed while I was up there too. So be hungry when you see me next! I can’t wait to give you some of our delicacies! Just be glad when I cook for you, I can use water from the tap that isn’t guaranteed to make you sick! Ha!
Oh, and Brian got shaved, so all those bearded pictures, well, he’s no longer so bearded!
Pictures are on the new page (http://www.dropshots.com/SheenaBall) of the process of shaving from the street corner! You’ll want to view. There are also a few more pictures of me cooking momos, the village, and life back in the city from the past 2 weeks too. Also my house guest. It's worth a look. (Also, if you haven't noticed, some pictures have captions to explain what it is going on - some with yarp requests, if you have time)
Yarp requests
- We’ve been meeting with old contacts, finishing mountain debriefing with our supervisors, and polishing our language skills to non-mountain slang now. Yarp for them as we truly invest over these last 2 ½ weeks in country.
- We have summer students coming to work with our team in 2 weeks. We will be helping to train them about strategy etc. Please yarp for their safe travel.
- Our M’s in the next country we are going to (in June) are moving from one region to another. Instead of working on ch. planting, we will be working with another TB people group from a country to the east (also in our region, but a country where no M’s from the company are in). We’ll be training nationals who can go into the country and share the story there. Fortunately, the common language there is the same we’ve been learning here. We leave to go there in another 2 ½ weeks. And to answer the question everyone is asking, we still have until July 10th before we get back home.

The Adventures of Pokemon

Well to those that thought that we fell off the edge of the world you were wrong but not by much (you will understand when we are able to post the pics of some of the trails that we walked on). Anyways for most everyone we have been a little slow on communicating back. That is because there are only two internet stands within a 12 mile radius in which we were living for the last two months and both of these were far too slow for us to be able to post anything. It was barely able to work long enough for us to send an email back to our families. As for what we have been doing, well that is hard to tell. We have been working in a small school working with a group of young monks. We stayed with a wonderful family who owned the only guest house in the city that we were staying in. Also there was not even a completed road for any vehicle to be able to get to us. The family consisted of the father, mother, the cook/helper/go-for etc. and the shephard. For the last two months we lived, worked, ate and slept with this family and became a part of the family as well. We came to consider this our second homestay. Another interesting note about this family was that durring the time that we stayed with them, we only saw the father for 3 days. As for the place that we stayed, it consisted of a small room that had only a bed, a small table, and 2 chairs. Now, the walls were made of mud and that when the tempture got down below freezing (which it did all but a few nights toward the end of our stay), that it made the room very cold. Also, I believe that I forgot to mention that there was no heating system inside the home. (During this time we tried to post a blog stating how we stayed warm... we were unable to do so, but this blog will still be posted along with other short stories at a later date). During the day we would go to the school and volunteer teaching English. When I was young I would listen to my grandfather talk about how he had to get to school and how it was uphill both ways and I never believed him. Well now I do now, because for us it was up hill bothways - and sometimes in the snow. As for the school itself, it was usually utter chaos. There were three teachers (and us 2 volunteers) but for most of the time that we were there only two were present and then for a while there was one. Then on one day it was only us and the 20 students that happened to show up that day. On the positive side of this, we were able to share the Story with some of the students in their own language. Please remember to yarp for this village that the seeds that we were able to plant may take root and Grow in the Father's time. For a three weeks I had the geat pleasure to work with an incredible national brother (S) who worked as my translator, language helper and then became my very great friend. S and I traveled everywhere together (we would travel an average of 10 miles a day by foot). While I would never choose anyone else in which to have worked with, there was some very interesting thoughts that S has. He loves to tell the stories from his mountain village about the Yeti and Pokemon. Now this Pokemon is not like the cute loveable Japanese anime cartoon. This creature is very mean and will come into your house and steal your food and take your clothes and hang them in a nearby tree. If you are bold enought to tease the Pokemon then he will do even worse things than this which I can not write in a blog. If you email me, I will tell you. Anyway this became a very big joke between S and me, and anytime we would go into a valley (where Pokemon is claimed to live) we would tell the other one to be careful and watch out for the dangerous Pokemon. Well one day, as we were out visiting another village, we decided to go back another way and try and see a few more villages in the process. As we went up a very steep hill we finally came to the top and saw a house sitting all by itself, which is very strange in this area of the world. As we got closer, we saw that no one was home so we proceded just to walk by on the trail and continue with our journey. As we passed the house the BIGGEST POKEMON ever came at us from on top of the roof and tried to attack us. Now from S's stories Pokemon was very small the size of a cat but this one was the size of a bear, a very big bear. Needless to say we both jumped and then hurried down the trail. As it turns out it was just a average size dog but at that time it looked a lot bigger. On a more serious note: Yarp Requests- For our cook friend. (S) We gave him the Story and he has been reading it.- Our friend from the city living in the village. (M) Also reading the Story.- For the lamas (monks) we taught in the school. We also gave them the Story just before we left and shared it with the many times. - For our friend (D) who works in the monastery. He has many questions, and we gave him the Story before we left and had some great discussions with him. - For the guest house owner - (S). She asked if becoming a sister would make her rich. If so, she wanted to be one. Yarp she realizes there is a richness outside of money.- For us - we are now going back to the city to work here in this country for 1 more month before moving south. Yarp that we can reunite with old contacts and meet new friends. PraisesWe came back tired - but healthy and safe. We love the area where we worked and know a little more about our Father's plan now. We've learned more about strategy. PicturesWe have TONS of pictures. But it takes so long on a blog page wih the slow internet here and I found a great new program. So for the time being - we will post the link. www.dropshots.com/SheenaBall

We are trying to update, but...

We would like to post a blog, but are finding it hard up here.
With internet, loadshedding, and computer issues, and being a
mountain away, we finally wrote something on our laptops,
copied it to a cd, and brought it to the internet cafe, only to
find out that they don't have Microsoft Word.

From the remote areas...

I just wanted to let you know we are in the mts, but internet works very very poorly here. We are unable to blog due to the fact that the computer is literally shutting down every 30 minutes due to loadshedding power outages - even though we had to hike clear to the other side of the mts to get to an internet site. Sorry for that inconvenience.

We should be able to email a blog and emails in about 10 days when we head down to meet our supervisor.

I'm feeling better now, but it is cold up here! The temperature is staying around freezing and there is no relief inside or out.

We appreciate your yarps back home.

Just a picture blog

I feel like I've neglected my responsibility to show you our world while you are stuck back here and we are in this wonderful place. Brian will be blogging soon before we go to the mountains, but I thought I would add some visual aids for now. Due to the fact that we are on a power crisis in our country, and that I didn't have my camera battery charger for the first month, and that our internet connection is slow, pictures haven't been easy to post. These are small replicas of some that I have taken recently around the city. Today, Brian and I went to watch funerals at the major river. So most of these are pictures from today. Not all, but most. This river is a holy site for the city, and much life revolves around the river. They wash dishes, wash laundry, wash themselves, and gather water all from this river. They also dump the offerings into the river and the ashes from cremations. The monkies also play in this river. I added some captions, so that you might understand the stories to the pictures a little better.

These girls are washing their hair in the river. And this family is washing their dishes in the same river.

This is one of the "holy men." They want to take a photo with you and then charge you for it.
He is washing his garment in the river.

This woman is sweeping. What is she sweeping? Dirt, outside... we think she was actually trying to sweep away the trash. But as you see, dirt is flying. She is sweeping dirt...

The bell
Here, they ring the bells, in order to wake the gods. This reminds me of the story of Elijah calling down fire. I used this story in my English class (w/ moderations that would not compromise the story). It made the students very uncomfortable though because of the exclusivity of the proclomation.

This "holy man" is just sitting on top of the building... watching people go by. Laziness is completely frowned upon by our people group, but when I look at their lives, sometimes I just have to wonder what some of them do all day. Their lives are simple, but they do value a hard worker.

Monkies

This monkey is jumping across the river in parts to eat some of the offerings that have been tossed into the river. Sometimes he tried eating non-edible things like plastic too. He is young and learning... Looks cute, doesn't he?

This unfortunate little boy doesn't seem to think so. He's being chased by the monkey. He was washing up in the river when the monkey decided there might be food nearby. Children are frequently the victims of monkies.

But don't just assume he didn't go unpunished. Shortly after, he's hopping through the area again being chased by a bigger monkey. Cute? Sure. Just don't be deceived. They are mean. I thought I would get attacked today while taking a picture.

Temples

Temples are everywhere in the city. There are beautiful old buildings everywhere. Our city has such a unique architectual character to it.

This temple is built on an beautiful pond and was originally built about 300 years ago supposedly to help a queen overcome her grief over the death of her son.

I think it is the prettiest building in our city, but the gates ar never open, so we can't get very close.

This is the main temple in our city. Where most cremations are done for Hndus. Since this is a smaller version of the picture, I doubt you'll be able to see, but there is a bull tied up to a post around all the people, probably to be sacrificed.

Up the hill is a place far less busy. These are also smaller temples, but they look older. And there are so many of them. This is on top of a hill from the river. Few people take the hike up this far. The Hndu holy men enjoy sitting around and talking here though.

Offerings

As Hndus, they make offerings at the river. Sometimes as family and sometimes as an individual.

The white string around his chest shows that he is of the highest caste. He is a Brahmin, a priest, and people come to him to make their offerings.

This is a whole family performing offerings.

This is called puja in this culture.

They have also added some of the Tbtn culture as well. They all have prayer beads, similar to roseries that they are using while one man reads.

This woman is also making a form of a offering. This is near the hospices. This all also goes into the river, but there are many flowers they place here, and then they bow and touch their head to this board.

This is an area where only Hndus can get into. Foreigners are not allowed here.

Funerals

From what I could gather from a young man trying to be our guide, (I kept speaking to him in his language instead of English, so some converation was difficult) the building to the left with the doors is a hospice. Here, that means when they have the look of death to them, they bring them here to die. Then they wait. Once they die, they are cremated into this river.

This is a family standing around a body lying on the ground.

Once they die, they are first wrapped in linens because a dead person cannot be touched, and they covered in a garland of marigolds. They are laid on a stretcher. Then the stretcher is taken to the cremation poles.

Here the family carries the body to where the wood is laid. They take straw and soak it in the river. When they are ready for the cremation, they pick the body up on the stretcher and spin the stretcher around the wood 360 deegrees. Then they lay the stretcher down on the ground, pick up the dead body by the linens and place it over the wood. The light the fire under the wood and then place more straw on top of the body and wood over it. I haven't seen anyone cry at a funeral. Tbtns also cremate, but not in exactly the same way, and not at the river. At theirs, you cannot take pictures either.

Here are lines of cremations. On every post, there is a spot where bodies can be cremated. They do about 60-70 each day at this river at this temple.

Homestay, Language, Clothing, and Practical Jokes

Note: Our apologizes for the delay in getting our blog posted this month. Our school recently requested we e-mail our blogs for approval prior to posting, and there was some confusion as we never officially received approval to post. To everyone who has emailed us about how we are doing, thank you very much. We love hearing from you. Everything is well here, and we will get our next blog out shortly.
Hands, feet, etc.
Life is getting busier here in South Asia. We have been learning some important lessons. For instance, it is important to keep all hands, feet, and other body objects inside of the moving vehicles at all times. In addition, it is also important to remain aware of those who ignore this rule while walking down the street. Busses are often so crowded that the man in charge of collecting the money is hanging outside of the bus hollering the destination, with a wad of rupees in his hand. The other day, while Brian and I were walking to a meeting, Brian was struck in the shoulder by the man hanging out of the bus. Though there were no serious injuries, it was painful enough that we are being a little more cautious of the busses that go by, since they are not cautious of us. Children do a better job of avoiding being hit here than we do.

Language learning
On a more serious note – we apologize for our delay in reporting back to you. We have been very busy with our homestay and language learning lately. We switched language teachers to the company’s language teacher, and things are going much smoother. We can now introduce ourselves, describe ourselves, use descriptive phrases, command words, colors, times, numbers, bargaining, all food vocabulary, directions, and have simple conversations. We have mastered the basic grammar (as word order here is different than in English). We are also working on literacy, and can read and write – though we are still working on our vocabulary. We can also sing songs that relate to our project – though, anybody who knows us remembers, we cannot sing. :) These next two weeks of language before the mountains, we are concentrating on vocabulary related to our service here, so please yarp for us to retain what we learn.

Homestay
This picture quality is not the best, because the room is smokey and dark. This is the room we spent most of our time in over the last month. Learning to cook yummy food. We have not seen the lama since the night he taught us, we know many of you were curious about him. There are multiple monks who come and visit though as two of the sons in the family are monks. They practice with us a lot, and we are getting to know them and the other “regulars.” It is interesting to see that restaurants here are such a social thing, everyone knows our aama (the word here for mother). Ordering is also interesting, and it has been good for us to have our homestay in a restaurant because there is so much culture experienced this way. Here to order food, you travel back to the kitchen, talk with the chef, and place your order. You then go sit at the table and wait, or if you are good friends, you sit in the kitchen and talk while you wait. Our aama’s specialty seems to be chowmein. When you are done, there is no receipt or bill. You add up what your food costs, and go back into the kitchen to pay. With many meals, you may be given seconds as well. And they give you a lot of food! Sometimes, during slow times, you might ask the chef to have a drink with you. If this is the case, you pay for the chef’s drink as well. Even though we’ve paid for our homestay which includes all groceries and tea, many times, we will have someone buy us tea to sit and talk with us. And tea is NEVER to be refused. That is like the ultimate offense here. So we accept the tea, and then that person pays for our tea as well. Even though, we’ve technically paid enough to have tea for a year there!
Many of the children here will assume we are tourists and ask us for sweets after we have talked to them in their language. The other day, we gave the orphan in our homestay a fireball from back home. Now we actually got this Fireball in Delhi during orientation from a friend who worked here for 10 + years. And this is the little girl who is trouble and enjoys making fun of the lamas. Also, it is important to know practical jokes are appreciated here. And keep in mind, this is the same girl who finishes off my spicy breakfast with tears in her eyes and enjoys it. When we gave her a sweet, she immediately tore into the package to eat it, and popped it in. As you know with Fireballs, she was fine for the first minute, and then she started fanning her mouth with her hand. Pretty soon, she spit it out and held on to it. We started asking her spicy? Hot? This is a sweet. Everyone was laughing and having a great time watching her. We told her to eat, so she tried again. This time it was so hot, she spit it out again and began scraping her tongue with her finger to get the taste off. Then she tried licking it, and making faces, and trying to drink the water out of the bottle on the table. Only when she took a drink, she backwashed, and aama got angry and took the water away (backwashing is unacceptable in this culture) and put it on the floor to be washed. (Water bottles are communal here, you take a drink without putting the bottle to your lips – by the way.) It was fun to be able to share in their humor.

*We have now finished our homestay since this was sent for approval. The young daughter has asked many questions, and we will be giving her a book and movie before we go to the mts. Please continue to pray for her.
Food
One thing everyone always seems to wonder about is “What do you eat?” It is almost the same every day here. For breakfast, I am served what translates to be “potato soup and bread.” The bread is home made, and it just flour that is moistened, then rolled out to be in a pancake shaped, and cooked on the skillet over a gas fire. The potato soup however is a little more complicated to describe. This is potatoes, that are chopped up into bite size pieces, and put into a soup that is very, very spicy. Even the national have tears form in their eyes as they eat this, but it is addicting! You dip your bread into the soup and eat some of it when you eat the potatoes with a spoon. Gradually, I have been able to eat more of this soup. Once they finish their bread, they finish off the soup with a spoon – this I still have not been able to fully accomplish, and the little orphan girl we practice our language with often waits for me to eat my bread and soup, and then she finishes it for me, with tears in her eyes. Unfortunately, after becoming so used to this dish, many things back home that were considered spicy are now, not as challenging. We bought some chips and found a jar of Old Paso Hot Salsa. It simply did not taste spicy no matter how much I loaded the chip with salsa.
Brian gets served an omelet for breakfast every morning between two pieces of bread. We are also served two cups of milk tea. Milk tea is the best. It is female buffalo milk, and sugar, mixed into black tea. It is sweet and delicious.
About 4 hours later, after the customers are served their lunch (and customers, when eating out, will order a variety, like thentuk, chowmein, fried rice, etc.), we eat our lunch. Which is dal bhaat every day. Now we researched dal bhaat back in the states, tried some when we visited L.A. but still did not fully understand what it is. That is because Dal Bhaat is not consistent. Dal Bhaat consists of 3 elements. First, there is a plate piled with white rice – mounting rice. Then on the same plate the side varies each day from potatoes and wilted greens (cabbage, lettuce, spinach etc), chicken and fried potatoes, or broccoli and cauliflower with an assortment of vegetables. Consistently, there is also Dal, which is the lentils cooked in a pressure cooker to be a very creamy soup that you pour over your rice, and then also eat separately. Our aama also tries to serve Brian at least 2 heaping plates of this daily. She has learned I cannot eat that much, and will give me a little over half of what she serves him. My plate is smaller to begin with, because she feels the need to serve seconds. Something else interesting about lunch is while tea is served to you before your breakfast comes, you do not get served a drink for lunch until after you have finished. Then you may receive coke out of a glass bottle and opened with an old bottle opener (I’d heard about these from my mom and dad, but now I get to see them) or Tang (I don’t think it is recommended to drink the Tang, because there is no telling what condition the water is in, but there are medicines for whatever bacteria or parasites we could pick up, and Tang tastes good).
About 3 hours later, they are busy feeding us again! This is snack, which is another 2 glasses of milk tea or coffee. Now all you coffee drinkers out there, don’t get too excited… sometimes, it is hard to taste the difference between milk tea and coffee, except for coffee has a little more flavor. Along with tea, you are served some kind of bread, of either biscuits (which are cookies), plain sliced white bread, the bread served at breakfast, etc.
Around bedtime, you eat dinner. Now fortunately, we paid our homestay enough to get some really good food. Typically, we are served chowmein every night. If it was a busy day and the chowmein noodles are gone, we get fried rice, but thenthuk is also a normal variation. Often, there is more tea.
Tea is also served every time we meet with someone during the day. When our friends visit, our aama gives them tea for us. When we go visit them, we are also served tea. We find the food delicious on most days. Another snack that is served by Tbtns are momos. Momos are dough filled with meat of some kind. There were a lot of chicken momos, but there is talk about bird flu again, so we haven’t had much chicken these days. So often, they are pork momos, and sometimes, there are still little fragments of bone in them. Momos are like Tbtn butter tea to us. These items are taking some getting used to.

Losar & National Clothing
Well, Losar is here, and there. J Losar is the new year for Tbtns, but different Tbtns have different Losars, so we are enjoying many of them. This year the Dali Lama instructed Tbtns not to celebrate Losar, so some of them are, and others aren’t. Many of them are finding unique ways around these instructions as this is their biggest party of the year. I had my chuba tailored and wore it for the first time a couple weeks ago to one of the parties. We went around the stupa with the monkeys. It was fascinating to see people’s responses. In our city, I am supposed to wear Western dress (unless the occasion demands otherwise like Losar), and it became apparent why. The nationals here that are not Tbtn did not like it. No one said anything, but they always smile and talk to me, and they did not this time, even though we were with a national partner this day. The older Tbtn women and men really loved it. One man hollered out “Beautiful chuba,” and the women would tell me “Good chuba” in Tbtn. The older women would smile and nod. Our national partner kept telling me everyone was staring at me, which was a little uncomfortable. The younger women however dress in western clothes, and many of them seemed to have a negative response to a western wearing their traditional dress. I have purchased a second chuba for the mountains in the village, (they normally only wear 1, so it would be odd if I owned too many clothes) and will try when we are only around Tbtns in a more conservative area.
Fortunately for Brian, the national dress in North Face, so he hasn’t had to change a thing. I imagine no matter what, I will end up having to wear my chuba once we reach the mountains as I am losing weight despite the excessive amount they feed us. The big Losar event is next week for those celebrated, so we will have multiple pictures then.
At the last Lhosar celebration we went to, we were able to see bodies being cremated too. It was interesting to see the process of the lamas reading The Book of the Dead to the deceased as the flames consumed them. It was interesting to see.
Updates
· Our supervisor’s baby is doing better and was released two days ago from the hospital
· We’re preparing for the mountains and require a 3-month visa. We were able to get a visa, but it was twice as expensive as what is in our budget. We know our Father continually meets our needs, and we are over budgetted for the mountains, but please pray for our finances, that He continues to work these things out.
* We are also spending a good deal of this time training a new brother of 3 months. He could potentionally be a new translator for the team.

Pictures.

This is the inside of one of the monestaries. You can see the monk walking around . There are also flags strung up. We hike up a hill to a monestary train for hike in the mts.

This is the monestary that we hike up to. It is becoming very large, and more popular. they are currently adding additional dorm space for the new students.

This is the edge of the city. (Where we live is 3-4 miles away from where we are standing, all uphill) You can see the rice fields .

We found Walmart! This long blue tarp (actually multiple tarps) is covering a market. Inside here are lots of little goodies. I don't think foreigners go in here very often, because we got a lot of funny looks from people. But you can find shoes (as long as your feet are small for an Am.), belts, clothes of all fashions, jewelry, purses, wallets, no food, and some housewares. It was pretty neat to find. It's a fun place to go bargain. This structure is entirely held up by bamboo.

Interesting Fact: We live in the 2nd dirtiest country in the world.

Busses and Micros

In order to get a bus, we have to go to this park. This is a slow day of transportation. You also have to find the bus that goes where you are going, sometimes this is not easy. We thought you would like to see an idea of what transportation looks like in its most organized form here.

Hello again from South Asia.
Sorry for the delay updating our blog. As you may remember from our last blog, we spent several days in Delhi at an orientation and working with other Company students, so we did not have internet for much of that time.
Orientation
Since we are partnered up with the Company program, we were asked to complete their 10 day orientation in Delhi. This was a great time of encouragement and fellowship for us, since we had been in our city for almost 3 weeks by this point. As for how we spent our time in Delhi, most of it was a way to allow the others in the program to get adjusted to how life in South Asia is lived on a daily basis. For most of the students, this was their first trip overseas, and so there was a lot of info regarding how to get an auto, how to get simple everyday things at the market, how to learn language barefoot, and so on. It was interesting to see how the other students reacted to some of the situations that came their way. After we had been there three full days we moved from a very nice company owned guest house into a simple Indian style guest house. While at the company owned guest house it was very nice. The beds were soft, we had internet and a TV. But at the other guest house we had none of these things. When Sheena was showing the girls around and showing them the bathroom, one of the girls nearly started to cry at the site of the bathroom. Now to Sheena and I, this bathroom came as no surprise because it was very similar to our flat (just a typical Asian style bathroom), but it was very different from what many of the students were expecting. Also during orientation, Sheena and I were able to meet up with the SBU team that had been traveling in India. This was a great blessing for us for it allowed us to meet some very good friends and hear the experiences that they had had on their trip and what our Father is doing. We were also blessed to be able to meet with many of the company people who were a great help to getting us connected in our city, and who helped guide us in some of the different ways in which we can share the Story. Over all, we were very glad that we got to go to Delhi for this orientation, if for nothing else that we were able to eat pizza and McDonalds. There is definitely no McDonalds where we live – or anything close, however an interesting fact – in India, McDonalds does not serve beef, it is all chicken products, and French fries are made with sunflower oil. (Btw: for delivery, their phone number is 66-000-666 or if you're calling from a cell phone, it is 011-66-000-666.)
Home Stay
After we arrived back in our city, life became very busy again for the first few days as we worked with our national partner and some of the company people in arranging our home stay. This is a very hard task because we not only had to find our people group but make sure that they would speak the market language that we are learning so we would be able to practice. Here, people speak the market language in the city (in all kinds of dialects) and their heart language at home (of which there are countless different heart languages, so to learn the heart language is a goal eventually, but the market language is of immediate importance.) In the end our national partner found the right family for us to stay with. The family consists of a mother who owns two shops, a restaurant and a movie/phone center, and her two teenage children who live with her, a son and daughter. It has been a wonderful experience and they are really great helpers with language.
The restaurant is one small room with 4 tables that are like picnic tables. You could probably fit 24 people at most in the room. Then, through a curtain, across the hallway, and through another curtain, there is a small room. This room is a bedroom, the shop, the dining room, and the kitchen (all in one). There is barely enough room to move sometimes, and friends may also come into this room to eat. Sometimes they sit on the bed to eat. The cash register is the mother’s purse. You cannot use debit cards or checks here in our town.
Last night while we were sitting in the back room of the restaurant (where we spend most of our time with the family) a lama (Tibetian monk) came in and sat down. Since he was friends with the family he was allowed to eat in this back room where all the food is cooked. While he was eating, he realized that we were practicing our language with the mother and daughter and decided that he would help. So after he had finished eating, he began to point to different things and ask what they were. Since our language is limited, he used much drama to emphasize his points. When we got something wrong he would close his eyes and hang his head and proceed to correct us, but when we did get something right he would get so excited. This continued and the questions would become harder and harder but it was some of the best language practice that we have had up to this point. Another event that happened last night while we were sitting in the back room talking about their culture with the daughter we started talking about caste and she asked what caste we were. This lead us to be able to share the Story with her and she seemed very open to hearing about the Father but sadly she is so very trapped in her religion without really knowing why she does this.
We also practice our language daily with a little girl who is about six years old. She is an orphan who lives in the same building. While we were practicing our language, she grabbed a chopstick and ran off with it. She knows she is not supposed to play with the chopsticks, so when she was in an ornery mood. When a lama they are close friends with walked by, she yelled out, “Lama is dog.” The word dog here is very derogatory name to call a person. So she should have been slapped by any other lama in this culture. But this lama acted with some kindness and forcefully picked her up and set her outside of the shop while she was screaming the entire time.
All forms of Transportation
On a more humorous note, Sheena and I have decided to use all forms of public transportation to get to and from our language class in order to save money and thoroughly experience culture. This includes, but is not limited to, bartering with taxis, standing on busses (these busses are like normal transportation busses in the US except all the seats are overfilled with people stacked upon each other), and without even standing room only). Another type is a microbus, which is like a minivan with US seating for 8, but here it seats 18-20 with two guys hanging out the side to collect the money (usually these guys range in age from 7-25, because children can move in and out of these small places more easily). Finally, there is the tempo, which is the smallest, and cheapest form of transportation (this is cheap for a reason). These are battery powered and do not run on gas. However, the battery must be recharged every night by plugging it in. Since we are currently in a power crisis where we only have power for 8 hours a day (for 16 hours every day our power is turned off to conserve electricity), the tempos are having problems recharging, so these are more difficult to come by lately. A tempo has 2 seats open next to the driver, and then 2 benches as seats in something like the back of a small pickup with the shell on the top. Here nationals can fit 10-12 people inside, and sometimes two hanging out the back.
Today, after we got off the microbus, the money collector, who was about 18 ran out of change to give to the passenger. When the bus stopped, he jumped out of the microbus and ran down the street to a beggar sitting alongside the road. He proceeded to “make change” upon the random assortment of coins that the beggar had collected. Then he ran back to the microbus and proceeded to disperse the change among the different passengers awaiting it.
Yarp Requests
- Cont. prayer for Sheena’s cough
- For the daughter in our homestay as we share the Story
- For language learning
- For health as we begin training to hike through the mountains in March
- That we will be informative on training a new brother
- Our supervisors had their baby girl in Thailand 3 weeks early. She had to go through surgery 4 day after she was born, and is now in recovery. Please yarp for their family during this time.
Praise
Our city feels more like home everyday. We love looking out in the morning and being blessed by the view of the mountains when the smog is not overwhelming. After spending two weeks in Delhi, we were able to compare cultures, and we realize that our city is a perfect match for us. The people are friendly and smile constantly. The day I got back home, I went to a fellow coworkers house to have lunch and discuss plans. When we were walking back before a party that night to watch American Idol (the highlight of our weekend) we met an old man walking down the street. When we started speaking to him in his language he became so happy we were speaking to him. He started laughing and talking to us rapidly in his language. When he discovered we could not fully understand him, he proceeded to pull my hand out of my pocket in order to hold it while we walked down the road together. This is not uncommon. What makes this odd, is that while we are here, I can hold any man’s hand I want to and feel secure in that, but this culture would not allow me to hold my wife’s hand. While we walk down the street, we have conversations constantly with people we don’t know. Even with our limited language, they are so forgiving of our mistakes. Children greet us, saying “Hello tourist” in English, and giggle when we talk back to them in their language. While we were in Delhi, we felt so homesick to come back here to work. While we are here, though we miss our friends in America, we have discovered this is our home, and we are content here, even with no power or no beef.
We should have more pictures soon. Thank you for continuing to yarp for us.

Orientation

As we have previously expressed, the pollution in our city is thick. So thick, in fact, that on most days, we cannot see the majestic mountains emerging just beyond the hills in our city. In our valley, we reside at 5,000 feet above sea level. The hills rise up to 7,000 feet. And in March, we will finally climb those breathtaking mountains that constantly elude our sight behind the dirt and smog suspended the air we breathe. In the last photo Brian sent showing the view from our house, the hills appear to be the edge of the world. But the day before we left our valley to come south for orientation, the skies opened to reveal creation in its wonder. The picture above was taken from our rooftop; this was the only day in the 3 weeks we lived in the valley that we were able to see the mountains.

(Note: clicking on any picture will bring up a new window where the pictures can be viewed in a larger size)
This picture was taken on the same day. You can see part of the valley, the hills, and then the mountains in the distance. Living in the valley is wonderful. It is the meeting place where everyone goes in the winter because it is too cold in the mountains. We have met several people from the area we will be trekking to in March. Right now, they live with us mixed in with the other 700,000 people in our city.
However, even after all the research we've done, we are still learning new things daily. The people who live in our valley are afraid of the possibility of an earthquake. Every 75-100 years, our country has constantly been hit by major earthquakes killing a majority of the people. We are now at the 75 year mark from the last quake which was over 8. However, since we are in an under developed nation, we were most quickly informed to forget everything we know about earthquake safety. I vividly remember "bunny in the hole" drills in elementry schools in California, where we would quickly drop beneath our desks, cover our head, and hold on to the chair legs. I also remember being taught to run to a doorway if we were at home. Here, that is a request for severed limbs or instant death. Because all of the buildings are made out of concrete, an earthquake of similar magnitude causes buildings to crumble and levels just start crashing down on one another. The ground liquifies and the second floor becomes the first floor as whole levels disappear beneath the earth's surface.
Instead, we have been taught the "triangle of life." Rather than ducking for cover, here you huddle beside the furniture. This is supposed to create a triangle when the floor above you caves in of ceiling, floor, and furniture. The theory is that you will thus be trapped into a cacoon of safety for the next 72 hours until rescue workers begin looking for you.
So maybe this isn't the most optimistic outlook on life, but it's another way that we must rethink some of the things we have been taught since childhood as a part of living in a third-world country.
Another thing that is different here are the dogs. Most of them are mangy and sick. There are about a dozen sick dogs living around the stupa where the people do their kora daily. Kora is circumambulating around the stupa. (Our ESL students always want to know the English word for their practice of walking around the stupa several times in their act of worship, and all anyone has ever been able to come up with is "circumambulating." But while we walk around yarping, we often must step over these mangy mutts as they live there peacefully, living off the scraps the people drop. They do not name their dogs, but we have named our guard dog, "Jekyll and Hyde." By day, this dog is well groomed and sweet, but at night, he is chained right next to the only entrance. If we come in late, our Sherpa guard must hold his collar, and choke him while he barks and lunges visciously at us. We feel extremely safe with both our guard and his dog there to protect us.
We have been using the Story to teach English to our beginner ESL class. So far, the favorite story was Solomon's wisdom, and they were amazed that wisdom was given to him, not something he worked for. We have a monk in our class who was particularly interested in all of our stories. On one particular day, he was literally on the edge of his seat in his desk, and so engaged in the story that he leaned too far and lost his balance. He nearly tipped his desk so far it about landed on me and I had to jump back. Tibetans laugh quickly and easily at their mistakes however (and ours too) so he was good humored about it and we jumped right back into analyzing the story. He told me, "This is a very good story. It's easy to understand." However while we are away for orientation, he will be journeying back to his monestary to continue his studies. Please remember to yarp for him.
For the next week, we will be away from our home in Delhi where we are receiving orientation with the rest of the Hands On students. We're partially here for support for them, as we have already adjusted to our own place. Yesterday, we had a scavenger hunt in order to orientate the students to travelling around the city and asking for help. One of our tasks was to get Mehendhi (henna) on one hand. Another was to get a nose piercing. Don't worry, there have been no additions to my jewelry collection, though I contemplated this for the competion factor. If it were not for the fact that our PG does not pierce their nose, I may have been more willing to do so, but the Mehendhi did suffice my need for cultural extremes.
While we were waiting for 45 minutes while my hand was being decorated, we met an Indian girl who go very excited about scavenger hunts and quickly became our guide. She is a fashion designer and took me to stores to try on saris, buy kurtas, and find all kinds of various items on our list. We became friends and have planned tea for later during this stay. We have gotten to ride on bicycle rickshaws, autos (auto rickshaws), and walk through the city.
Since we are with a group, we will now be without internet until we arrive home. So the next blog may be a little while coming. We're anxious to get back to work at home with our PG, so remember to yarp for us while were in orientation away from our new friends that we want to engage in so much. We'll add more pictures in our next post.

Teaching English and Baby Animals

Upon popular request I (Brian) have been asked to write the blog page for this week. During this week Sheena and I were able to meet with an Indian American who is living in our country and he has been a great help in setting up a volunteer teaching position in a small Tibetan/English school. This is a great opportunity for us and has allowed for us to get to know many people that live in the area around our home. Though on first glance it would seem that this class is very western style class it does not take but a few minutes for it to come back to reality and realize that we are still in South Asia. So please yarp for our efforts in this class and for the furthering of relationships that can come from this.
Along a more humorous front I have two very funny stories that need to be shared. The first one happened when Sheena and I went to our didi’s house (reminder: didi mean older sister here, and when we refer to our didi, we mean our housekeeper) for lunch. With the culture that we are working in it is traditional for when the people have invited someone over for dinner to place the person in another room why the food is being cooked. This is what happened to us, which was fine because we were prepared ahead of time for this cultural habit. Now to the funny part of the story, after we finished with our lunch we were invited out onto the balcony, where it is much warmer than inside, (we will discuss this odd fact later), where our didi’s mother, aunt, and grandmother were all sitting around talking. When we walked up, and the grandmother saw us coming out of the house, she reached down into her robe and pulled out the biggest bottle of Ibuprofen that I have ever seen, and then began shaking it and yelling at me in Tibetan, in which I do not understand anything other than hello. My first impression was that this was some cultural difference that I was not aware of and that she was offering me some ibuprofen as a sort of after meal snack. This however was not truly the case, as it turns out another M had given her the ibuprofen for her knee, and we are still not sure if she expected us to bring out more for her or if she was just showing us that she had it. Either way it was an intense moment for me on how to handle the situation, and we are still working that one out.
The second story happened while we were walking around with our new Indian American friend. He is a person of peace (a Buddy who is a contact here) who has lived here for the past 3 years. He was introducing us to many of the local people that he knows. It happened that he ran into a Canadian nun that he is friends with and they began to talk about this small animal that someone had found. They were talking about how it had to be fed every two hours and could only be fed by putting milk on the end of her finger and letting suck it off. Then our American friend asked where it was and the lady answered that she had it with her and she patted her coat just above her chest. She then became very excited and told all of us that she had made a pouch to carry it around. It was at this point that Sheena and I, both being thoroughly confused, asked what kind of animal it was. Upon hearing this, the nun became very excited and unzipped her coat again and pulled out the pouch and opened it to show us, and on looking inside, we were both surprised to see a newborn rat lying inside. Now growing up on a farm, I am used to seeing many different animals and seeing them almost as pets, but this one took me back. Then after showing us her new pet she put it and the pouch back inside her jacket and zipped it back up. Now the point of this story is you never know what kind of pet someone will have even though I still think having a rat is a bit odd but oh well. We hope that you have enjoyed this small glimpse into our lives here in South Asia and ask that you continue to yarp of us for the following request:
^ Language – that we will be able to continue to learn and find good places to practice
^ English class – that through this class we will be able to create good relationships that will allow us to be able to share the story with them.
^ Our health – both Sheena and I have started to develop a cough and we are not sure if it is the being of a cold or just the pollution in our city.
^ For relationships – please keep asking the Father to provide opportunities for us to share our story
^ For a team – this week a short term team arrived in our city and are going with two guys from our team and a national partner to visit and work at some refugee camps that we will work at later on in our trip. Yarp of safe travel and that a good work will be do on this trip
^ Trip to Delhi – on the 12th Sheena and I are traveling to Delhi for training with Hands-On. Yarp that this time will be productive and we can continue to practice our language.
:) For our national partner S. who is attempting to arrange our home stay. That the family that he has found will be willing and to house us and that we will be able to share the story with them and establish a good relationship with them.
:) For K. and his brother R. who have become persons of peace around our stupa. They are very open to practicing language with us. And we have begun discussing sp. matters with them.
:) For another language helper who is a security officer around the stupa.

On another note, Sheena's family has asked what the flags are in the last pictures. These flags are Tibetan Prayer Flags, they believe that the words that are written on the flag are prayed every time the wind blows. Typically, these are prayers of blessing. Each color has its own meaning of different elements, like sky, earth, water, fire, and air. Since so many of you are researching our area, you can google it or just go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prayer_flags for more information.

Picures:

Cows run free here, but it is actually illegal to kill them. So we don't get beef. We get water buffalo to replace beef.

This is the view from our flat. Those are not mountains, those are called hills.

There is a monestary on the hill. We hang our clothes out to dry, we do not have a dryer here.

This is the road we walk on every day to go to the stupa. This is used for vehicles (one way at a time), and for people to walk on.

The other day, Sheena was grazed by a truck on this road.

She was not hurt though,

This is the main market. It is also the tourist district. Today, we went on a shopping spree. We spent 3600 rupees. We bought down boots, 3 north face fleece jackets, an arc'teryx softshell coat (remember, it is cold here and we are freezing). We also bought a light scarf for Sheena to keep from breathing pollution. While this sounds like a lot, this is less than 50 USD.