I Will Change the Things I Can Change and Live With Those Things I Can't Change

This is my mantra for the remaining 16 months, change what I can and what we can afford  to change and learn to live with those things that I cannot change or cannot afford to change.  We've come to learn that the Nepali way is very different than our way, when things are broken, the attitude is "that's too bad or I just don't how to fix it."  This does not set too well with Kent and so he's been fixing things or seeing that things get fixed.  We change what we can and live with what we can't.  We live in this BIG white, old, musty, house, we have power sometimes, sometimes not, we have warm showers sometimes, right now we have water everyday but we understand that there may be days we don't have enough water.  These are things we have no control over.  And so we look around and see what things we can afford to do and what things we'll just have to live with.  You've seen the yard project, the part we've worked on looks so nice, and when it's monsoon people won't walk into our gate and fall on the bricks because they are so slick, they can now walk on the grass.

Rukmina now calls this her "Garden of Dreams" because it reminds her of going to the temple in Manila.

Kent is trying to show Hari how to stencil. Hari doesn't like the stencil look, he wants to paint it all in.  This was a funny project.  Kent cut a flower stencil, Hari didn't like it, he said the flower petals weren't even.  Kent said  "I know, flower petals aren't all even",  Hari cut the 8 petal flower, all equal. We had to have a family council to see which one everyone liked the best.  Everyone but Hari liked Kent's flower but we didn't want to hurt his feelings so we compromised and used them both.

Then Hari, Rukmina and Kent decided to write in Nepali, "Garden of Dreams", they each wrote a word.  Kent's, Hari's and Rukmina's.  Hari is trying to get us to plant the rest of the yard in grass, but it's too expensive.  We'll just live with what we can't change for now.  We have to be careful that we don't do too much otherwise the landlord will raise the rent.  We are in the middle of one more project, something we can change and make us feel better about where we live.  We're having the kitchen and the office painted.  We spend a lot of time working on projects on the computer and the office was pretty yucky.  And if I have to spend time in the kitchen I want it clean and bright.

The landlord sends his painters over, they have no painting equipment, no brushes, no ladders, no plastic.  Kent and Hari go to the paint store and buy what they need and bring it back to the house.  Buying things are so interesting here, most things you have to buy, you have to tell them how much kilos you want.  I have no idea how much a kilo is,  Kent tries to figure out how many kilos of plastic to cover, cabinets, etc.  He did pretty good.  They're mixing all this paint out on the front porch, and making a mess.  When they came I asked them if they were raamro painters (good).  They assured me they were.  I told them "no mess, no paint on windows, light fixtures, floor, etc."  They assured me they would be careful.

Yeah right!

Rukmina gets on them for making a mess and then she gets in and cleans, cleans, cleans.  The kitchen is done, I'll send pictures when we get the new curtains up.  They are working on the office right now and it will be a much better place to work.

Here is what we've been doing all week.

I have had an infection on and off since we've been here, I've tried 2 antibiotics that I brought from home and they didn't work.  I've been putting off going to the doctors, I've seen the hospitals here and just could not bring myself to go, but I need to get this taken care of.  Rukmina takes me to the Tourists Clinic, it is very nice, clean and pretty modern, really modern compared to Nepal's standards.  I'm sitting waiting for the doctor and thinking "how can this be?"  My heart aches for the Nepali people and the standards which they live by.  Things could be so different for them.  Anyway I am feeling better and a very nice doctor from Israel treated me.  I told him about our daughter attending a semester in Jerusalem, through BYU.  He talked about the beautiful Jerusalem center and how the windows open up to the old city with a wonderful view. He said it is the most beautiful building in Israel.   The doctor's office visit was a much better experience than I had thought, I could go again if I have to.  The next day I chipped a tooth.  :(     I'm holding out hopefully until I get home to get it fixed.

The Nepali Dental clinic, luckily if I have to go there is a Tourists Dental Clinic

On Sunday, not our church day, we wrote up Monitoring Forms and sent them off to Dr. Ashish who is heading up the HBB study here in Nepal.  He has a difficult time getting back to us and so some days things go very slow.  We also skyped Dr. Clark regarding his trip coming in January.  He is going to do more HBB training at the biggest government hospital in Kathmandu.  When we went to this hospital in August, they had a brand new CPAP machine sitting in a corner, that had been given to their hospital.  Dr. Clark asked why they weren't using it?  They told him that they didn't know how to use the machine.  So Dr. Clark and another Dr. are also going to train them on the use of the CPAP machine.  

Monday, Kent and I planned firesides for the branch.  President Bishnu has asked for our help with getting the youth more active, more motivated and to help build their testimonies.  We sat and looked at all the resources the Church has on their website, it's amazing.  We made an outline for President Bishnu to look through.  In our branch the youth may have an activity and everyone attends it.  The YM/YW, the YSA and the Single Adults.  We called the Mission President and explained our situation and he said, "No, absolutely not", they should meet individually.  He cautioned us that we would probably be told "but that is how we always do it."  Yes, and that is exactly what happened.  We explained that importance of each of these groups meeting separately, that they will feel like they can bring their friends to activities, topics can be discussed age appropriate and so on.  We have our first YM/YW fireside at our home this Satuday.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Elder and Sister Gong and President and Sister Sackley arrived on Tuesday for a quick visit.  Our assignment for the day was to show them the Cyber Center for the blind and disabled and the sewing center.

Rakeesh had everything planned, he picked them up from the airport, they went to READ Nepal, Leprosy Clinic where Rempps were waiting to show them the projects we've worked on,  a roof for their sewing center and the chicken project.  They then went and met with the Ex Prime Minister, then came over to the cyber center. 

Elder Gong, Sister Gong and Sister Sackley

Later that evening, they met with about 40 Government officials, including the President of Nepal

The next morning we met for breakfast at their hotel with the Branch President and then they were off.

I went the day before and bought Sisters Sackley and Gong a pair of Nepali earrings and Elder Gong and President Sackley, Gurkha Warrior ties.  They had no time to shop so we thought they needed something from Nepal and it is fun to shop for things here, most of the time.

We spent the rest of the day grocery shopping and running a few errands.  One day I sent Rukmina to get me 4 apples, she asked how many kilos, I only want 4 apples I told her.  You can't buy 4 apples you tell them how many kilos you want and that's what you get.  They have a very old scale, they then put a weight, .5 kilo, 1 kilo, 2 kilos and then put enough fruit on it to balance the scale.  I got 7 apples.  Sometimes things in the grocery store are very cheap, other things are very expensive.  I get 2 chicken breasts for 300 rps. about  $3.42, we found a 6.5 turkey, it was over $100 dollars.  It's very inexpensive to eat out, so we eat out a lot.  

Fire and Ice is one of our favorite places, usually lost of tourists at this place

These are homemade potato chips from Fire and Ice, ohhhh they are yummy

Fire and Ice pizza, under $5.00

We found a new French restaurant called Chez Caroline

Me eating Creme Brulee

This French restaurant cost us about 1,000 rps, $11.50 for this meal

We had to take this picture of the smallest bake potato we'd ever seen.  Greg ordered this.

We can always find good places to eat that don't cost too much, we do usually have to take a taxi to get there but we're considering using a tuk tuk more often, they are really cheap.  Lots of pizza places, better than any pizza I ever tasted in Italy.

On Thursday, we met with President Bishnu,  he came over for breakfast and we had a discussion about firesides.  He was excited and explained to us that never before have missionaries come and helped the "branch", they helped individuals way too much, but never the whole branch.  Asked for help with procedural things and the "church way" rather than "Nepali way."  He was grateful, we pray for this little branch everyday and to be guided to know the things that we should do to help.  Later Rakeesh came over and we discussed the ways in which he is going to help us do HBB the correct way, with government approval and I showed him an idea for a logo that Josh designed for a new NGO that he is going to start, just so he can help us.  It's called RISE.  It was just an idea.  .

On Friday, I made bread, and some lemon cookies.  It was nice to work in a freshly painted kitchen and it was clean everywhere.  Later that evening we took Rakeesh and his family to dinner for helping us with our VISAS.  Our visas had to be changed from tourists visas to working visas.  Last time the Rempps did their visas the person they met with wanted money and he wanted a job for his niece.  Rakeesh came to their resuce.  He wasn't going to let that happen again to the missionaries so he did all the running around, waiting, and all the paperwork for us. We'll have to do this 2 or 3 more times while we're here the Church pays for our Visas but unfortunately it's pretty expensive.    It was a process and very time consuming for him.  It was just a small way to say thank you.  We really couldn't do the things we do without him.  Elder Gong told him that they would like to invite him to a conference at BYU in October.  He is so excited! Hope it all works out.  He's been there before.  I think I already mentioned that he wants his kids to attend the Y.

Rajeesh, Jeerit, Sunila, and Rakeesh at Roadhouse Cafe

Jeerit and Sunila with their Mickey Mouse drinks (coke float)

Kent and I, Rajeesh, Jeerit and Sunila

Saturday was fast and testimony meeting.  I do like meeting with our branch.  We had a brand new RS sister on Saturday, she has just come from YW and they had her teach the lesson.  What a good job she did, sorry I don't have a picture. We had a sister visiting from Pokhara, she is a member from Hungary and is married to a Nepali, she joined the church in Hungary and met her husband in China when they were attending a medical conference.  They are both doctors.   We came home and took a nap, fixed chicken spaghetti,( I don't dare to buy the water buffalo meat) and relaxed the rest of the day.

Dr. Clara and Rukmina translating some hymns into Nepali.  We are going to get the YM/YW to learn them so they can sing them for a sacrament meeting.  

I love taking pictures of funny signs, I sometimes think they hear a word they like the sound of and then use it in their signs and language.  It's really funny sometimes. 

 Homely Chinese Food Anyone?

This is where we take our rugs to be cleaned, again clean is relative here,  it's a good thing it doesn't cost me much because they are NOT very clean.  This guy needs a NEW SIGN because his dry cleaners is anything but NEW.

This is a laalu paate rukh ( Christmas tree)  these flowers are poinsettias, but they grow on trees rather than a bush like we know.  They are just starting to bloom.

This little neighbor comes out every morning with a cup of rice that she feeds the pigeons.  There are usually about 7 pigeons, they sit patiently and wait for her every morning and then fight over who gets to eat.  

Usually the fattest one wins.

Last night  Rakeesh took us to meet one of his doctor sisters, and skype Dr. Clark who is attending a HBB conference in Chicago.  Great meeting, she'll be a lot of help in getting this project going next year.  Rakeesh has a famous actor brother and sister who is a dentist in Ohio, a sister who is a doctor in New Jersey and his doctor sister here in Nepal.  Pretty impressive family.  We went to her home it was beautiful, Kent said he felt like he was in a fancy penthouse, I asked him when was the last time he was in a penthouse, but it was beautiful and did not feel like Nepal at all. She'd even come home from work and fixed us dinner, a yummy sweet and sour dumpling soup, pretty hot but very good, along with a Mutton (goat) rice that was good too.  A great productive evening. 

One last thing

We are considering doing a branch project, we have a little piece of land that our landlord owns connected to our property.  This is called a small initiative that involves the branch.  We would plant a community garden for the members of be able to harvest needed crops, onions, potatoes, cauliflower, tomatoes, etc.  They'd be responsible for clearing and getting it ready and then planting and caring for the garden.  It's just in a discussion stage right now but  Hari has planted a garden within our gate to see how things grow.  Right now we are growing potatoes, garlic, coriander and some other plant that I don't know the name of.  We'll see how it grows.  They grow gardens a little different than we do here, we'll see how this one turn out.