I’m not sure if you noticed, but I haven’t posted in a while. About 3 months to be exact. Yeah, umm…sorry about that. Not that I didn’t have anything to write about—the past 3 months have been one big, crazy, amazing adventure—I’ve just had some difficulty getting my life into words. Anyways, I’m going to make it up to you. No, honest, I am.
As I’ve mentioned before, the second half of DTS is a 3 month outreach that offers opportunities to apply the knowledge of lecture phase. My DTS was split into 2 outreach teams—one team traveled to South Africa and India and my team traveled to Nepal, India, and Thailand.
In the beginning of October, my team flew from Perth, Australia to Bangkok, Thailand, spent 18 hours in the Bangkok airport—which, coincidentally, is not as big an airport as you would imagine—and then flew to Kathmandu, Nepal. We spent 2 nights at a backpacker’s hotel which boasted spectacular views of the Himalayas. Through the smog that always clouds the city, you could almost make out the staunch point of Everest, or so we were told.
After a few days acclimating to Nepali culture, we boarded a teeny tiny plane at the teeny tiny airport bound for Biratnagar, Nepal. There were 20 seats on that plane, and I was painfully aware of the lack of space, until we reached a few thousand feet and the Himalayas started floating past my window. I’ve seen mountains before, heck, I live in the Blue Ridge Mountains, but I’ve never seen anything as spectacular as those snow capped peaks, jutting up from the clouds.
We landed in Biratnagar alive and with reasonably good circulation…phew! I snapped a picture with an airport official because I won a gift certificate for a spa while in transit—literally the second thing I’ve won in my life. We spent the night with a young missionary couple and their wide-eyed, German-English-speaking, son. In the morning, we caught a bus for Birtamode. I’d like you to close your eyes for a moment and imagine riding down pocked dirt roads, your knees pressing into the seat in front of you, your shoulder glued to the person next to you, sweat trickling down your back, the smell of body odor and incense swirling in the sticky air, Nepali pop music blaring in the background—it was glorious. If there’d been any doubt as to where I was before, after that 3 hour bus ride, I knew I was in Nepal.
In Birtamode, we stayed with an amazing family who gave us beds to sleep on, cooked us 3 meals a day, did our laundry, and taught us Nepali dance moves in their spare time. For the next 10 days, we traveled all over the Nepali countryside doing open-airs. Open airs are public programs designed to catch and hold people’s attention. Our open-airs focused on human-trafficking prevention—we usually presented a drama about human trafficking, gave some general information about trafficking, presented a personal testimony, did a skit or two, and ended with a presentation of the gospel. The open-airs presented excellent opportunities to talk with people about trafficking, God, or politics and I was able to have some excellent conversations despite the language barrier.
On the weekends, we taught at several church services and were given the opportunity to present a 2 day seminar on human trafficking at a local church. We drove to and from all our events in the same yellow taxi, 12-15 people crammed in the back, jamming out to Nepali pop. It was in these times that our hosts taught us such popular dance moves as the “screwing in the light bulb,” “macarena with a twist,” and the oh-so-hilarious “how-to-eat-a-fly-and-still-look-swag.”
Our time with this loving, sacrificial family ended too quickly. At the end of our time in Nepal, we drove to the Indian border in our beloved yellow taxi, stayed the night in a terrifying hotel, and said goodbye to our friends before boarding a train bound for our next great adventure: Kolkata!
As I’ve mentioned before, the second half of DTS is a 3 month outreach that offers opportunities to apply the knowledge of lecture phase. My DTS was split into 2 outreach teams—one team traveled to South Africa and India and my team traveled to Nepal, India, and Thailand.
In the beginning of October, my team flew from Perth, Australia to Bangkok, Thailand, spent 18 hours in the Bangkok airport—which, coincidentally, is not as big an airport as you would imagine—and then flew to Kathmandu, Nepal. We spent 2 nights at a backpacker’s hotel which boasted spectacular views of the Himalayas. Through the smog that always clouds the city, you could almost make out the staunch point of Everest, or so we were told.
After a few days acclimating to Nepali culture, we boarded a teeny tiny plane at the teeny tiny airport bound for Biratnagar, Nepal. There were 20 seats on that plane, and I was painfully aware of the lack of space, until we reached a few thousand feet and the Himalayas started floating past my window. I’ve seen mountains before, heck, I live in the Blue Ridge Mountains, but I’ve never seen anything as spectacular as those snow capped peaks, jutting up from the clouds.
We landed in Biratnagar alive and with reasonably good circulation…phew! I snapped a picture with an airport official because I won a gift certificate for a spa while in transit—literally the second thing I’ve won in my life. We spent the night with a young missionary couple and their wide-eyed, German-English-speaking, son. In the morning, we caught a bus for Birtamode. I’d like you to close your eyes for a moment and imagine riding down pocked dirt roads, your knees pressing into the seat in front of you, your shoulder glued to the person next to you, sweat trickling down your back, the smell of body odor and incense swirling in the sticky air, Nepali pop music blaring in the background—it was glorious. If there’d been any doubt as to where I was before, after that 3 hour bus ride, I knew I was in Nepal.
In Birtamode, we stayed with an amazing family who gave us beds to sleep on, cooked us 3 meals a day, did our laundry, and taught us Nepali dance moves in their spare time. For the next 10 days, we traveled all over the Nepali countryside doing open-airs. Open airs are public programs designed to catch and hold people’s attention. Our open-airs focused on human-trafficking prevention—we usually presented a drama about human trafficking, gave some general information about trafficking, presented a personal testimony, did a skit or two, and ended with a presentation of the gospel. The open-airs presented excellent opportunities to talk with people about trafficking, God, or politics and I was able to have some excellent conversations despite the language barrier.
On the weekends, we taught at several church services and were given the opportunity to present a 2 day seminar on human trafficking at a local church. We drove to and from all our events in the same yellow taxi, 12-15 people crammed in the back, jamming out to Nepali pop. It was in these times that our hosts taught us such popular dance moves as the “screwing in the light bulb,” “macarena with a twist,” and the oh-so-hilarious “how-to-eat-a-fly-and-still-look-swag.”
Our time with this loving, sacrificial family ended too quickly. At the end of our time in Nepal, we drove to the Indian border in our beloved yellow taxi, stayed the night in a terrifying hotel, and said goodbye to our friends before boarding a train bound for our next great adventure: Kolkata!
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