Greetings from Nepal! Thanks to my brief stint as a yoga teacher, I am already pretty good at the Nepali greeting, "Namaste."
Our beautiful home for the month, Asha Nepal, outside of Kathmandu.
The last week has been one of the best on the World Race! After a few days on the beach in Zanzibar, we met back up with our entire squad in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, for one night before our much anticpated Qatar Air flight. We are all slightly obsessed with flying Qatar because it means AC, a clean pillow and blanket, American TV shows and movies, a good meal and free wine. We had an overnight layover in Doha and the airline put us up in a really nice hotel. We were only there for a few hours but I managed to squeeze in three hours of sleep, two trips to the gourmet buffet and my first bubble bath in nine months.
We arrived in Kathmandu, Nepal, on the evening of October 1. My team is living about 30-45 minutes outside of the city, and working with Asha Nepal, a home for sexually exploited women and their children. Most of the women have been rescued from sex slavery and brothels in India. Asha means 'hope,' and here they receive needed care, love and training.
The website for Asha Nepal is http://ashanepal.org/
The director does not get back until tomorrow so we're not entirely sure what our ministry will look like but I'm excited to love on the women and adorable children that we'll be living with, especially the three babies! Over the course of the past year I have discovered God has given me a heart for vicitms of sex trafficking and I have a feeling this will be one of my favorite ministries on the Race.
The scenery in Nepal is aboslutely gorgeous! We are surrounded by mountains, and apparently the Himalayas can even be seen from our rooftop on clear days. Within walking distance there are waterfalls, hiking trails, a botanical garden, a grocery store and a resort with a swimming pool.
We are beyond blessed with nice accommodations this month. Warm showers, Internet, a room twice as big as the one the five of us shared last month and delicious (but very spicy!) Nepalese food.
Squatting doesn't seem that bad when you have this view.
The view from our hike yesterday.
I am somewhat relieved not to be doing straight evangelism this month. Our squad has teams spread out all over the country and some of them will be trekking to unreached villages to spread the Gospel. Please keep them in your prayers as well, since only about two percent of Nepal is Christian, and Christians are often heavily persecuted here.
Asia has hands-down been my favorite continent so far, and I am excited to be back! I love the culture here and even though he's still many hours away, it feels good to at least be on the same continent as the The Big Guy again. We're both eagerly waiting to meet his brand new niece, Brooklyn Grace. Congrats TJ and Carrie!
*Photos by Kathryn Chinn
