19 May 2012

It’s been another interesting day here in Kathmandu. Pres. Bishnu called about seven and said he would like to talk to us about the young Elder’s getting ready to serve missions. He asked if we could be at the church before 9:30. I told him ‘sure’ and that we would see him there.

Elder Bogati - going to London England

Elder Shrestha going to Minneapolis MN

 We did talk about the young men and what we needed to do to get them ready. Pres. Bishnu would like us to have them ready by the time we leave so the new missionaries won’t have to worry about that. They will be over whelmed enough without that – not knowing what needs to be done and how to go about it. And it’s one of the things we’ve done that we do enjoy.

Brother Raj Tamang baptized his sister Juni today, May 19th

Church was great. After the block, we had a convert baptism. Her name is Juni Tamang and she is the sister of Raj Tamang. He is a young man who returned from a mission to India a few months ago. He is now the Branch Mission Leader and is doing a great job. We are hoping he can find a job here in Nepal so he will stay in the area. That is a challenge for these young men. There just aren’t that many jobs around that pay any kind of decent wage.

Just before Relief Society started, we heard rumblings of a strike going on. A few people left - wondering how they were going to get home and if they needed to walk – it would be a long walk. We were happy when time came to come home, that the taxis and micro’s were running.

It’s been a relaxing afternoon. Now, we wonder what the rest of the week will bring. There is talk about a big three day strike starting tomorrow.

18 May 2012

We have sure had mixed messages today. First we heard the bandh was on, and then we heard it was off. Then we heard that one group cancelled their bandh, but another group stepped up holding a bandh. We have been at home all day. Sister Patch did call and said her kids had gone to school and it looked like the play for tonight was a go. We are happy about that. The plan is to meet them at Fire and Ice and have some pizza before going to the school.

Rakesh came by and he and Gene made calls and arrangements to reschedule the PAC Meeting. It will be held on May 23^rd. We are anxious to get it held and over with. Hopefully this will work out.

The last couple of weeks we have heard a cuckoo sound early in the morning and wondered what it could be. Rukmina and Laxmi told us it is a cuckoo bird. We were surprised because we didn’t know there really was such a thing. We heard it again this morning and decided to look it up.

We found out that the cuckoo bird lays their eggs in the nest of other birds. The mother cuckoo finds a next with similar eggs to hers. She then eats some of  the other eggs and lays one in its place. When the cuckoo hatches, and if there are other birds eggs in the nest, they will get rid of the egg, by maneuvering it up and out of the nest, it falls to the ground. The cuckoo is a very clever bird. We watched a You Tube video and it was very interesting.

We, along with the Deppong’s, met the Patch family at Fire and Ice and had Pizza before we went with them to the Lincoln School (the school their children attend) and watched Seussical the Musical. The son, 10 year old Ravi, did all the lights and sound, by himself. It was a cute program. The students did a great job and the set was amazing. Looked like it was straight out of a Dr. Seuss book. It was a fun night.

17 May 2012

What a day. We got up not knowing whether there would be a strike or not. It sounded like normal traffic. I studied English for a while. We are getting into a little more complicated stuff and it’s a little harder lesson. I’ve tried to come up with something to add a little spice. About then, Rakesh called and said traffic was very light and he wasn’t sure what was going on as far as strikes go. Gene and I both walked up on the roof. Things did look pretty quiet. There was a taxi or two and a micro or two, no buses. We did get ready to go to English and thought if we could get there and there were some women there, we would stay and if we had too, we could walk home.

We did find a taxi and headed over there. We did ask the taxi driver to wait a few minutes until we could find out if we would be staying. There was only one woman there. And they were surprised to see us show up. We did talk to Pratima and Sanjana for a few minutes. They asked if it would be okay to change the date for the closing program to June 8 as they had a conflict. We told them that would be fine. It sounds like they are taking charge of getting things organized and that’s fine with us. It has been a good experience for us and I think for the women too.

We returned home. The afternoon has been pretty quiet….too quiet Almost boring. Rakesh did stop by to talk about LDSC helping with some disaster relief in the eastern part of Nepal. There have been quite a few bad fires over that way and people have lost everything. Gene hasn’t been too excited about getting involved and said the timing isn’t very good for us, but we will send it in and see what happens. I don’t know if we can pull it off before we leave or not. We will wait and see what Hong Kong says.

Just a little side note: We thought you might like to see how we do the dishes. Actually Laxmi usually does them, but once in a while I get the bug. First of all you have to turn on the water filter above the sink and get some 'clean' water. Put it on the stove to heat and then one pan to wash in and the other to rinse. Then air or grab a dish cloth. Oh, my dishwasher is going to be nice!

The rest of the day we’ve done some reading. I made a potato salad and that tasted good for dinner. We talked to Alison tonight. She and Brent are figuring out cell phones for us. That will be nice to have when we get home.

There’s another bandh scheduled for tomorrow. And then again Sunday thru Tuesday. I think we might go stir crazy.

16 May 2012

It’s a beautiful day again today – though it looks like another hot one. About 7:30 am, we walked over to Deppong’s so Gene and Hari could give Elder Deppong a blessing. Ollie is having a little bit of surgery – a Basel cell carcinoma taken off his cheek. The blessing was nice and I think they really appreciated it. The surgery was this morning.

We walked back home and when we got here, Nick was here and soon after that, Krishna came. Nick and Gene also gave him a blessing. Nick has participated in blessings before but had never had the opportunity to actually be voice. He did the anointing. Gene had told him how and he did a fine job. Then Gene sealed the anointing and gave Krishna a blessing. It was a good experience for everyone. Then Gene went with them to get Krishna’s wisdom tooth removed.

While they were gone, I have worked more on the Branch History. I am really making progress. I have been finding a little bit of clip art on the internet and it adds a lot. Gene told me I’m doing too much…. That the next missionaries might not want to do all this. And it’s not that much really. And ‘have I wanted too?’ Not really, or I wouldn’t have waited so long to get it done. I just have a few more things and then it will be wrapped up. Hooray!

Gene and the young men returned home. Krishna was in quite a bit of pain. He took his medicine and went to sleep. A while later, I did give him a little soup and he slept again. He woke up about 5:30. I fixed him some mashed potatoes and some butterscotch pudding. It wasn’t rice and dahl, but he was very appreciative. After a little bit, he said he felt pretty good and felt like he could go home. Nick was here and we all told him to be sure and take his medicine and if he needed anything, not to hesitate to call.

Sister Deppong called and said they were doing fine. While Ollie was in surgery this morning, she had them ex ray her ankle. She thought she had twisted it while they were in Lukla. They had just called her and said she had a slight fracture. They are going back in to the clinic tonight to see the orthopedic guy.

15 May 2012

The morning was fairly quiet. No Bandh today so that was good. I decided I should look at the English lesson for Thursday and that took a while. We are going to start talking about verb tenses. Somehow, we need to find a way to lighten things up and have a little fun with it.

We did walk over to the photo place and pick up the photos we had developed for the Branch History. I have worked on that for quite a while this afternoon. It’s turning out pretty good as I’m putting photos with the text. I did the temple trip today. I am still waiting for people who went to get me their ‘temple stories’. I would like to add that along with their photos. I will work on it again tomorrow. I really would like to get it wrapped up.

While we had power today, I made some granola. I finished up the raisins the kids bought and added some peanut M & M’s. We have about another cup of M & M’s.  That’s about enough for one more batch. That will be about right.

Laxmi and I walked over to the chowk. While we were out, we took a pair of Gene’s shoes to a shoe repairman. He glued and stitched them while we waited. And he only charged 30 NRs. I did give him 40 NRs. That’s about 50 cents. His little shop was just that - very little The door is right on the street. It was about three feet wide, if that. We were happy to find him and he could repair the shoe. It's hard to find a shoe cobbler at home.

Laxmi brought in a zucchini from her ‘garden’. I cooked it up with some onion, tomato, oregano, basil, and when it was about done, added some cooked, cubed potatoes and then sprinkled it with Parmesan cheese. It is very good. It was good for a change.