It's hard to describe what it's like here. In short, it's hot, it's not always pleasant every moment of every day. But I love it. I know there is nowhere else on earth the father would rather have us be. When I think about the miracles that got us here, I praise him constantly. A verse that has really encouraged me this week is Paul in Romans as he reminds us of our calling. "We have recieved grace and apostleship through him to bring about the obedience of faith among all the nations on behalf of his name." (1:5). This is an immensely dark place. I can hardly fathom the deep oppression these people are under. Yet there is hope because we and our national partners have brought the light to this place.
Here's a quick rundown of how the week went. We arrived Tuesday morning in our little city (of about three million people) to find that no one was there at the airport to pick us up. The guards wanted us to leave and we had no idea where to go. I remembered only one word in our language at that time, "ni hoy" which means "no." This is a very useful word when a man who will later expect money is beginning to pick up your bags for you. Firmness is a must in our culture. We have learned to negotiate with auto drivers this week, who will often want a much higher price when they see that we are foreigners. Sometimes, walking away and finding a different cab is what you need to do. But as to our arrival, we called our friend who came to pick us up after learning that the driver who was to come get her had never arrived. This is Asia, after all, and things do not always happen the way we expect them to.
Since Tuesday we have been living at the office of our NGO who are our partners here, learning about local culture, building foundations for language, learning about local religion (Hinduism and Islam in particular), eating local food, and of course shopping. Women here do not show their legs for any reason, so we must wear pants each day. Jeans are appropriate with a long shirt called a kurta in the city, but never in the village or at a formal event. Our outfits are known as "salwar kamij" (pronounced sahl-wahr kah-mees) and they are beautiful. The fabric is light cotton and very comfortable. They come in an unimaginable variety of patterns and colors, some of which we know we could never pull off, though South Asians look beautiful in them.
Food is also an interesting part of our life. Eating is always done with the right hand. Forks are virtually unheard of and spoons are for serving only. All food is communal and is eaten using your hand only. Our right hands will probably be permanently dyed yellow from the daal spice that we pour over our rice each day. A typical diet here consists mostly of potatoes, cooked vegetables, chicken pieces, rice and daal. In the city we are spoiled by a variety of non-local options as well, such as KFC. I can't stand American fast food usually, but here it is absolutely delightful, though the KFC chicken is a bit spicier than at home. It has been really refreshing to accomodate slowly to our host culture this week and enjoy great fellowship with the team of Americans who live here also. They have taken us out to eat and shopping and taught us the basics of traveling and hailing a cab (which I am grateful for).
On Wednesday night, we visited a local home for the first time. There was a worship service known as 'puja' being held in the home that evening. A family will hire a Brahmin (high caste) priest and have him perform ritual prayers and incantations while burning incense. The family spends all day preparing the fruit and other foods that are to be offered to the god in question. We were welcomed to observe, take photographs if we wished and ask any questions we wanted to. Our new friend from this family, who is about our age and speaks excellent English told us that her family wants to thank the god for a good year and ask for continued blessing in this new year. I was a little surprised to discover that she had absolutely no idea what any of the words the priest was saying meant because they were in Sanskrit! It seems that a knowledge of the language does not matter so much as the fact that the words themselves in that language are a sort of magic utterance (a common theme in religion here). The family welcomed us so graciously and we enjoyed talking and laughing with the younger girls. The girl's mother hugged each of us goodbye and the father said that 'You are all my child now.' Ask the father that our team will have further opportunities to build relationships in this family and share the truth. Hospitality is a hallmark of this culture, and the way to build relationships best is by making connections and being invited to someone's home.
We are both still feeling pretty well and have had a very restful week with several full nights of sleep. Tonight we will leave the comfort of our large city for a village that is about a twelve hour train ride north in the upper part of our province. We will live at the home of a woman who runs a local school. About seventy children live at the school for various parts of the year. We will be constantly immersed in language. Our partner here who has visited there says her biggest problem was being overwhelmed by having too many language helpers. Because this woman is a believer who is greatly respected in her community, we will have multiple opportunities to share the truth every single day. Since most of the children and teachers do not believe, we will begin by sharing a story from the word (from creation to the Son) each day. We hope to teach the children to act out the stories and memorize them to tell others. Apparently some of the young boys play guitar, so maybe there will be singing too! There are also henna designs to learn that correspond to the stories, which is something the young girls are really excited about. We are so excited to have this great opportunity to learn language and to bear witness for six weeks. I actually can't imagine a more perfect way to spend my time. We will be free to do as we please, whether that be watching the women do daily chores and cooking or teaching a class of preschool aged children. It's as if the father knew exactly what the perfect circumstances for us will be. I know that each day will be hard. We are totally abandoning our privacy and our right to wear Western clothing at all.
That said, we will be out of internet contact for these next six weeks. I can't wait to tell you all the things the father does while we are there. Please lift us up as we adjust to this new stage of our life here. Know that we are thriving here, dear friends and family.
Here's a quick rundown of how the week went. We arrived Tuesday morning in our little city (of about three million people) to find that no one was there at the airport to pick us up. The guards wanted us to leave and we had no idea where to go. I remembered only one word in our language at that time, "ni hoy" which means "no." This is a very useful word when a man who will later expect money is beginning to pick up your bags for you. Firmness is a must in our culture. We have learned to negotiate with auto drivers this week, who will often want a much higher price when they see that we are foreigners. Sometimes, walking away and finding a different cab is what you need to do. But as to our arrival, we called our friend who came to pick us up after learning that the driver who was to come get her had never arrived. This is Asia, after all, and things do not always happen the way we expect them to.
Since Tuesday we have been living at the office of our NGO who are our partners here, learning about local culture, building foundations for language, learning about local religion (Hinduism and Islam in particular), eating local food, and of course shopping. Women here do not show their legs for any reason, so we must wear pants each day. Jeans are appropriate with a long shirt called a kurta in the city, but never in the village or at a formal event. Our outfits are known as "salwar kamij" (pronounced sahl-wahr kah-mees) and they are beautiful. The fabric is light cotton and very comfortable. They come in an unimaginable variety of patterns and colors, some of which we know we could never pull off, though South Asians look beautiful in them.
Food is also an interesting part of our life. Eating is always done with the right hand. Forks are virtually unheard of and spoons are for serving only. All food is communal and is eaten using your hand only. Our right hands will probably be permanently dyed yellow from the daal spice that we pour over our rice each day. A typical diet here consists mostly of potatoes, cooked vegetables, chicken pieces, rice and daal. In the city we are spoiled by a variety of non-local options as well, such as KFC. I can't stand American fast food usually, but here it is absolutely delightful, though the KFC chicken is a bit spicier than at home. It has been really refreshing to accomodate slowly to our host culture this week and enjoy great fellowship with the team of Americans who live here also. They have taken us out to eat and shopping and taught us the basics of traveling and hailing a cab (which I am grateful for).
On Wednesday night, we visited a local home for the first time. There was a worship service known as 'puja' being held in the home that evening. A family will hire a Brahmin (high caste) priest and have him perform ritual prayers and incantations while burning incense. The family spends all day preparing the fruit and other foods that are to be offered to the god in question. We were welcomed to observe, take photographs if we wished and ask any questions we wanted to. Our new friend from this family, who is about our age and speaks excellent English told us that her family wants to thank the god for a good year and ask for continued blessing in this new year. I was a little surprised to discover that she had absolutely no idea what any of the words the priest was saying meant because they were in Sanskrit! It seems that a knowledge of the language does not matter so much as the fact that the words themselves in that language are a sort of magic utterance (a common theme in religion here). The family welcomed us so graciously and we enjoyed talking and laughing with the younger girls. The girl's mother hugged each of us goodbye and the father said that 'You are all my child now.' Ask the father that our team will have further opportunities to build relationships in this family and share the truth. Hospitality is a hallmark of this culture, and the way to build relationships best is by making connections and being invited to someone's home.
We are both still feeling pretty well and have had a very restful week with several full nights of sleep. Tonight we will leave the comfort of our large city for a village that is about a twelve hour train ride north in the upper part of our province. We will live at the home of a woman who runs a local school. About seventy children live at the school for various parts of the year. We will be constantly immersed in language. Our partner here who has visited there says her biggest problem was being overwhelmed by having too many language helpers. Because this woman is a believer who is greatly respected in her community, we will have multiple opportunities to share the truth every single day. Since most of the children and teachers do not believe, we will begin by sharing a story from the word (from creation to the Son) each day. We hope to teach the children to act out the stories and memorize them to tell others. Apparently some of the young boys play guitar, so maybe there will be singing too! There are also henna designs to learn that correspond to the stories, which is something the young girls are really excited about. We are so excited to have this great opportunity to learn language and to bear witness for six weeks. I actually can't imagine a more perfect way to spend my time. We will be free to do as we please, whether that be watching the women do daily chores and cooking or teaching a class of preschool aged children. It's as if the father knew exactly what the perfect circumstances for us will be. I know that each day will be hard. We are totally abandoning our privacy and our right to wear Western clothing at all.
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| Guess which mountain?? |
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| A local school. |
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| The puja ceremony. |
