It is too cliche to respond that there is no such thing as a typical day, though this is close to the truth due to the nature of our work being based on relationships and spending time with people.
One day, we are spending time with someone, and then spend several days investing in the relationship. The next days, it is different. We do so many different things to get these relationships to begin with: teaching English, meeting needs, playing "football" (soccer), just walking around town meeting people and having tea.
The intent is always the same, like job interviews or even dating: trying to develop relationships and "get them to the next level" as we share what God has done in our lives and wants to do theirs.
These pics show sights and activities of an actually typical day for me as I've gone out to meet with people and see what God does. Fortunately for you, the sounds and smells are not able to be reproduced here, but you are welcome to come out and experience them in person.
A little "shop" consisting of an old woman with her stuff hanging on a sign board of an actual store on whose steps she is sitting as well. The umbrella fastened to a stick stuck in the ground of course is a wonderful touch of professionalism. Seriously, it is little "shops" like this that give a wonderful community and closeness to the character of the streets.
The water ball hawker's little green cart: the little round things in the glass casing are a type of puff ball hollow inside so that you can fill it with spices and such contained in the various bottles, and all of this street food delight contained on a single pushcart restaurant!
"Buddha Park," as it is called when we speak of our usual meeting place on this part of town near an important stupa, is the location of three extremely large idols of three different gods of Tibetan Buddhism. It is across town from where we live.
The "sidewalk" consists of whatever piece of flat, clearish area you find next to the road. This is a "two vehicle" one-lane road, as is very typical in the city.
Interesting decor on an old house was pic-worthy.
This hovel is a great old house's front porch. This pic was taken as I bent over to actually see inside, the roof about only chest high.
An acquaintance from before was busy on his way doing "kora," circumabulation, which is essentially a core religious work for Tibetan Buddhism by circling around a auspicious object, such as the stupa on this part of town. He was also sporting this awesome hat, and he appreciated my compliment of his big hat.
Looking down at the main stairwell up to the stupa, I was glad that I had taken the much quicker back way. This photo only captures about a fourth or less of the total amount of steps.
The "all-seeing, peaceful eyes of Buddha" on the four-faced stupa were being renovated, thus the painted sign. I wondered what I would think if I came to see my God and "Under Renovation" was painted on his face.
The sun was trying to peek out from behind the monsoon clouds. The sunlight was dim, but that was only from the perspective of us underneath the dark, covering clouds. The sun was actually still just as bright and brilliant as always, whether we could see it as so or not. God is like this, desiring to burst through the clouds of darkness of the minds and beliefs of those throughout the world.
Foreigners in the background, this man went about his religious rituals at the idols that are inside the base of the stupa. This particular idol did not have the locked bars covering it.
Some lovely red-dressed women were part of a Tamang celebration around the stupa.
This lady needed a little step-up to be able to reach in to touch the idol inside the base of the stupa.
A little girl plays with the leftover candle wicks at the bottom of an idol. Her little vest with ties on top and in plaid is very typical Nepali dress for children: I love it.
This lady lights candles, or butter lamps, offered before an idol.
Indians visiting Nepali go around the stupa spinning the prayer wheels.
Some rice had been stuffed into the mouth of an idol
The women there for the celebration were having a great time: here, they are laying out mats to sit on.
Two friends from the States Don & Wes visiting for a couple weeks have "sweet tea" at our friend's shop. After walking around the stupa area looking for some friends and people we know, or just some people we could talk with, we came to our friend's shop to visit with her about things like, her health, how huge our American friends were, how they must be "wrestlers," "How are your wife and kids?," one of our friend's story of who he is, and where we are going later.
The stupa area's trash is fodder for monkeys looking for an easier meal than stealing their food from people around the stupa. The mother monkey was picking up pieces of trash and feeding it to her baby: thank you mom for clean food!
Our resident visiting entomologist Tim was sizing up this roughly 5 inch long caterpillar. We had been studying cordyceps fungus.
Back from across town, a local Indian beggar poses for a pic in his new shirt.
Monsoon season has been successful in getting rid of 90% of the dust by creating mud. A local wandering cow with a bum hind leg leaves after eating all the discard from the corner fruit cart.
A big local monastery's gate out on the main road is at the entrance to the road to the monastery that goes behind a huge school on the right.
The highest seat in the hla kang, or god house, of the monastery is occupied by a pic of a now-deceased rinpoche, or high teacher.
A Buddha idol of about thirty feet is at the center of god house with numerous various idols on either side.
The main doors of the god house are huge.
This is a view of the idols to one side of the large Buddha which is behind the seat of the high rinpoche.
Tim talks with our friend Nima who is a monk here. The guys from the States were leaving the next day so we spent a couple hours with Nima, and he was happy to be sharing with us about the god house idols and instruments they use for worship, as well as the leather, knotted discipline whip, whoa! The intricate paintings on the walls took two years or so to complete and illustrate various stories of Buddhist leaders.
About five hours after leaving Nima, we've been to another monastery to practice English and talk with the senior monks. They were interested to read my Tibetan-English book that I've been studying for language practice.
After leaving them, we came to a third monastery to visit with some monks that had free time from 5pm to 9pm, another four hours. At this monastery, we met with "Bautista" and "Jungle Monk" to go have tea at a place down the street to talk about: different kinds of tea, whether I should address the older lady at the tea restaurant hole-in-the-wall as "auntie" or "acha"/older sister, when will the monks clean up the field at their monastery to play soccer, the monks pitched-in and paid the gate-keeper of the monastery to clean it up so they could play next week, do they drink "chang"/homemade brew, why does "Jungle Monk" go to the village and wear a wreath of leaves, why does the Christian God demand salvation and judge sin, what does holiness and perfection mean, and of course sing American hip-hop songs played for our benefit on the cell phone of some guys also in the tiny room.
The pic: the squatty potty elevated to the level of the window was quite necessary after 4 hours of tea drinking, as well as smelling like moth balls (commonly used as deodorants in bathrooms) with a touch of strong, pungent, profuse, gagging, suffocating urine.
9:45pm, I am back home. Tomorrow, I make plans for following up on the relationships we've made today.
No comments:
Post a Comment