Salsa Sister in Nepal

I am staying at the Church Guest house top floor with a great roof top, which is being used for dance classes from 12noon-2pm. Yep, these young people keep coming and no one is turned away. Strangely, there are more lads than girls in each class - it must be the Nepali water!

Nepali service on Saturday at Patan Church was amazing and although I cannot speak the lingo, I felt so much at home. Such a contrast to the English speaking service on Sunday. I have been asking why can't (or won't?) people immerse themselves with the Nepali culture? During the service, I got a chance to speak about cricket and CMS. A teacher from the Indian International School was very interested and is going to speak to the Head Teacher. Steve may be able to enlighten me about this school.

We started coaching cricket on Sunday to 48 girls from Nirmali School, right opposite the mega, posh St Mary's School. We get there for 3pm for a 3.30-5pm session, but the Headteacher would like it extended to 6pm as of today! These girls come from a very deprived area with parents working until 8 or 9pm. So many of the girls stay on after our session to do homework. The Headteacher is a Christian and has asked me to teach them some salsa for a national schools dance competition!

KTM Sports Team
Labish is the chap who came to SACYN last year. He is employed by the Christian Sports Fellowship of Nepal to develop a sports ministry and John is his manager. He is also a student at Uni (doing his exams this week before joining us at school!) + works in his parents wee shop. On my first morning at KTM, he came over at 7am and took me around the backstreets of Lalitpur and we ended up at his parents shop for breakfast in their tiny kitchen. I thought this was very special, as I begin to build a rapport with him again after last year's SACYN. It is this sort of thing that is very difficult to do with an Encounter team but it got me thinking that perhaps a pair can go with a local person for an early morning stroll/prayer/cultural experience.

I understand this is the first time that SCF has offered cricket (football and basketball their focus). John and Labish have invited me to Thursday evening SCF meeting. There are three other volunteers Rashok, Nevin and Santos. Rashok's sister Romi is in Cape Town on a three month sports leadership training. Dharma's wife is expecting their second child in Oct, so working with the lads is a good learning curve for me (in fact, I am loving it!). I have encouraged them to speak English when I am around, as I it makes feel excluded when they talk in Nepalese. Most of them understand English but are not so confident in speaking it. I have also built in briefing and debriefing, but they are new concepts for them. We also engage in the psychological aspect to fitness and sports and the mega issue is healthy eating, which can be very expensive in Nepal. Anyway, I have encouraged them to eat more fruit and veg instead of all the carbs!!!

Plans changed yesterday (no surprise there!) and it looks like I will be going to Pokhara on Sunday for a week. Nandaram, the co-ordinator of the PKR team says that the schools will have a break the following week for exam revision, so John and I will adjust our KTM programme to fit in with PKR. I would value prayer for Thursday, as John is going to ask CSF if Labish could come with me to PKR. There are volunteer girls but if I get large numbers like KTM, I would need some help with the coaching and Labish would be ideal. It would give him some experience too of coaching in another location. I initially wondered whether someone going from KTM would be threat to the work in PKR, but according to John, the two teams have a great relationship and often share resources.

John is also negotiating my extended stay at the Church Guest House when I return from KTM. Going with the flow is just my cuppa!

Dharma's Church
I visited Dharma's Church in Sinmangal on Saturday. After the 3 hour service, the Pastor invited me for a drink and ended up meeting with his church leadership team (all men, of course!). We ended up talking about TAFTEE, Asia CMS, women's ministry and creative worship! They wondered if CMS was only interested in working with Patan Church! They are part of the NCFN with a growing children and youth ministry. There is an invitation for CMS to explore leadership training, co-mp/mp in a very poor area.


I must dash as John is taking me to meet the head of NCFN this morning.

I hope this gives you a flavour of what I am up to!


with love and prayers 'SALSA SISTER'

HIV-AIDS in Nepal - CMS Partners at work

CMS Partner United Mission for Nepal request prayer for about 70,00 people who are living with HIV and AIDS in Nepal. "Pray that they would be inwardly released from fear, anxiety, self-stigma, hopelessness, despair and depression; be healed of their emotional and spiritual wounds. Pray for believers who are ministering to those who are sick including those with HIV, and pray that more believers would feel called to demonstrate the Gospel in this way. Also pray that church youth groups in Nepal would be sensitised to the issues facing HIV positive teens in order to become more accepting and welcoming towards their peers living with HIV."
CMS Co-Mission Partner Bhibin Shakya is also working through NCFN, also a main partner of CMS, to promote education and awareness of HIV and AIDS in Nepal. Pray for him

Anjali Pradhananga

Co-Mission Partner Manoj Pradhananga writes today ...

"This is to kindly request you to pray for the health of my wife Anjila as the delivery date of our third child is approaching. We are expecting the delivery sometimes next week. We are going to see doctor for regular check up on coming Saturday and she may likely to advise the admission in the hospital. We appreciate your prayer.....Manoj.

Nepal Co-Mission Partners Marry Each Other

Diki (Laruatdiki) and Marama (Lalramthara) both co-mission partners from Mizoram and both serving in Nepal for the past year have married each other in Aizawl on 26th February. Congratulations to them and pray for their future life and ministry together. Diki has been pioneering a new community programme in rural mountain communities while based Lamjung District Hospital which is managed by CMS partner Human Development and Community Services (HDCS). Marama has been based with Mission Commission to Nepal in Kathmandu but will now join his wife in Lamjung where it is hoped he will be involved in teacher training and hospital administration support as well as local church involvement.

'a special place for Nepal'

My visit in the month of September organized by CMS was exciting and a time to understand missions cross culturally. A co-worker, Ram and I were asked to speak about the Church in Nepal and our ministries in several churches and groups.

I was surprised to see that people in UK have a very special place for Nepal, the Nepali people, and Nepali churches. CMS had publicized and prepared for us before we reached any part of UK. We were warmly welcomed by people. A number of people were encouraged and challenged to fulfill their responsibilities for church growth in the UK when we shared about the unusual church growth in Nepal. They expressed regret for the decline of the Church in their own country.

I am encouraged to know that people in the UK who never have seen us have been praying for us. One of the leaders, John Cooper, from Lachlade wrote to me, "I have been concerned about the health of your wife Anjila, and I have been praying for her every day." I was touched by this letter. I am convinced that we can learn a lot from the Church in the UK and they too can learn a lot from the Church in Nepal. I feel closer to them than before and am praying more seriously than ever before after this visit.

My special thanks go to the CMS family and hosting churches who made this visit possible

.

Manoj, Director, Leadership Trainig Depertment, National Churches fellowship of Nepal

Blood sacrifice

Mark writes from NEPAL (25th Nov)

Pray and remember before God, the mass scale blood sacrifice going on in Nepal around this time. India wouldn't allow the usual annual puja to happen this year, so they moved to Bara district in south central Nepal. Usually in Nepal, every October during the Dasai festival, there are huge numbers of blood sacrifices: but in Bara, there are reputedly around 250,000 blood sacrifices of animals from rats to buffaloes at this one site. May God have mercy...