Today we were heading out of town to visit a couple of villages where the team has been out ministering before. It would be a 2-3 hour drive to get there, so we started early with breakfast at 6:00 before loading up three 4WD vehicles for the twenty of us who were going.
The roads getting through Kathmandu were bad enough; then we got out of the city and they got even worse. After about an hour we came to a turnoff, where the real off-roading began – very rocky and steep, some of it worse than what we went mountain biking on! We stopped a couple of times, but towards the end I was feeling really queasy.
The first village we stopped at was Sikre. The team had passed through here by ‘accident’ (or Divine appointment), and were able to minister to the people with tarpaulins and food, and were warmly welcomed. We received another warm welcome today. Many of the houses were damaged in the earthquake and had been partially rebuilt, but I guess it is a slow process when most of their effort goes into farming, and if you don’t have building materials available. Several buildings were once 2- or 3-storeyed but had been converted into 1-storey out of necessity. We saw a new one being built, with people sawing planks lengthwise from logs using a double hand saw. We talked with a few people and prayed for them.
From there we drove another 20 minutes or so to Liptol, the village of one of the Bible college students, Soba. We had lunch on the side of the track before heading on foot down to the village, taking blankets with us to give to people there. Soba’s house was the first one we came to, and again had once been three storeys but was reduced to one. Some of the other houses had not even fared that well, and were just piles of rubble.
A relative of Soba’s who was also a believer invited us to her home. There we met a man called Bizay who had recently come to faith, and as a group we were able to encourage him, through a translator. From there it was back to Soba’s house to distribute blankets, beanies, sweets and stickers. A couple of the leaders (Bond and Gerry) shared a few words, including the gospel message and to say that they would be back in a few weeks with a medical team and more supplies.
After we left we prayed for the people in the village. It was an amazing day. Then began the long drive back to Kathmandu – just under 3 hours, for a distance of around 30 km.
Next day
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