My team and I made it safely to our host home on Saturday. We are living with a pastor and his wife and children in a town outside of Hyderabad. The church is connected to his house and the property is gated. We are not allowed to leave their property. We are sleeping in our tents inside of the church. If you put 8 tents inside of the church, you’d barely be able to move around. Luckily, we only have 6 ladies. 🙂
Our host family is so precious!! They are such God-loving people. They are so generous and kind, and we are so blessed to be with them. The children are a lot of fun to be around. I have really loved helping them with their homework; it warms my teacher-heart. I even helped one of the girls draw xylem and phloem. It’s been a few years since I did that! Haha The youngest is around the age of my students, so it makes me miss them… Especially my rascally boys!
Yes, we have bucket showers and squatty potties this month. Our drinking water is brought in daily as the water from the well is not safe to drink. In order to wash our laundry, we must fetch water from the well. We hand wash our clothes in buckets and hang them on a clothesline to dry. We have been eating LOTS of rice and curry. On Tuesday we had a hard-boiled egg as part of our breakfast. It’s amazing how thankful you are for food you’d never expect to be thankful for when you know your body needs some protein! Our host mom also made us a breakfast grilled cheese with onions, potatoes, and peppers on Thursday after asking us about foods we liked from back home!
Our Typical Week
Sundays: Breakfast is at 9 and church is at 11. We must break down our tents and store all of our belongings in a back room during church. There are about 50 people who attend every Sunday, mostly women and children. The service does include a message from one of us as well as songs and worship, testimonies, and a message from the pastor. Church lasts about 2 hours. We eat lunch after church. Our first Sunday included helping with our host children’s homework in the afternoon. Dinner is around 9.
Mondays: Our “off-day” is Monday. Since we cannot leave the property, we have to get creative. Our first day off consisted of working out, painting our toe nails, listening to music, reading, napping, and games. We are hoping to plan trips for our next off-days.
Tuesdays-Saturdays: We have breakfast at 9am and lunch at 1pm with our hosts. Between 4:30 and 5:30pm we head out to the villages- usually an hour to an hour and a half away. In the villages we are with a local pastor that is not our host. We begin with a prayer walk and invite the people to a safe location for a service. We sing, share our testimonies, and give a message. The whole service lasts about 45 minutes. We eat dinner in the village before returning to our host home around midnight. In the villages we are treated like royalty. We are given the best food. On our first night of ministry we were served chicken curry and Sprite while everyone else had potato curry and water. We are also given the best seats for meals which is typically inside the home or at a table while everyone else eats outdoors/ on the ground. No one else eats until we finish, and it takes a lot of work to get them to stop piling the food on your plate! The people in the villages are beautiful- so kind and so generous. Our experiences in the villages are very different from our experiences in town where we are stared at and people stop in the middle of the street to take pictures of the Americans. On Wednesday we were in a very poor village. We were in complete shock, but let me tell you, the joy was thick and contagious!
Please continue to pray for India, T Squad, and Team Chosen Servants. I can’t speak for the other teams, but my team has been experiencing extreme culture shock. We have had difficulty adjusting to the heat and food as well. Also, please pray for our host family. Pray for good health and a growth of their sweet church.
I truly cannot thank y’all enough for your prayers. More and more, I’ve come to realize how blessed I am to be so supported by my family and friends in the States. I miss y’all immensely, but I know that India needs me. Keep this beautiful, broken land in your prayers!
PS: You should definitely check out some of the amazing things God has already allowed us to be a part of here in India. Read Malorie’s blog & Sara’s blog for beautiful stories of God’s healing hand.
