God wanted me to learn how to live in the moment, to focus on “this”, whatever “this” is right now, in front of me. Over the last year, maybe several, slowly He has taught me in practice to be flexible with anything, content in whatever situation. A saying brought to me many times was very applicable: blessed are the flexible for they will not be bent out of shape.
We were supposed to be in the countryside all month, but with the visa issue we ended up staying at a pastor’s house for the first week to spend time with his family and bless the young people and kids there as well as rest. They were so hospitable.
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SECOND WEEK
Second week we moved to the outskirts of the city where the guys took the brunt of the work mixing and laying cement for a church/ Bible school. They had some sketchy squatty potties that you prayed the boards wouldn’t fall in. We had a house of our own which was a huge blessing to have a bedroom for the girls and one for the guys as well as a large living space where we did many worships sessions, devos, team time, murder in the night game (FREAKED ME OUT), and just spending quality time together. We took turns cooking the meals which mainly consisted of the three food categories: rice, eggs, and some veggies. Sweet chili source is also a thing on our team (besides me), and you can’t forget about the Mongolian version of Nutella.
These first two weeks we were also blessed to have Tom, one of the squad leaders, with us. He brought a unique and positive humor to our team as well as so much godly wisdom and character. We definitely adopted him in our O’hana. Our last day with him was our adventure day.
ADVENTURE DAY
We moved all our belongings to our original hosts’ house where team HKS was in the city of UB. They were happily surprised to see us and it was so good to catch up with them. We then hit the city by visiting the local Buddhist temple, an empty wasteland filled with earthly treasures and lost people. Oh, how the Lord moved my heart for how important our job as believers is to tell others about Jesus and His hope and grace. We then went to the square where many shops full of school supplies were set up. Being Saturday, we also saw many people dressed up in typical wedding outfits celebrating their special days. Then we dropped off Tom before heading to the city overlook—flights of stairs up a hill that, you guess it, overlooked the city of UB. Eric held a golden eagle and many of us wondered at the murals of the celebration of the soviets. We then headed to the international food court where we got platters of sundry foods such as rice, different meats, and some veggies. There was also seaweed in the mix which made me happy to have some darker greens. Filled, we walked around the indoor market for a while just “window shopping’’ for nothing really important. Our last stop was a bumpy drive up the mountainside which involved me laying in the backseat just ignoring all the stops and go’s and lurches. We hiked up the hill and enjoyed the vast scenery of the woods while some of the teammates enjoyed climbing up and down the face of the cliff. Adventure day was complete after freshly sliced sausages, cheese and bread with soda (a Mongolian regular).
THIRD WEEK
WAIT! Before anything else is mentioned, we took REAL SHOWERS for the first time since launch!!! Granted, they were public showers, like the kind where everyone has their own shower head but in the same room. But there was a sauna, and we’re all girls right??? I just wanted to be clean. It was a-maze-ing
After an amazing church service where there were a few non Mongolian missionary groups, a speaker from Thailand, and pure worship at our host’s church where HKS was staying, we ate some Cup of Chicken (bowls of different meats and then plain rice), or a salad in my and Kenz’s case, some of our teammates went out to get the food for the week. After they got back, we loaded up all our packs and gear and headed out to the countryside. Little did we know that a supposed two and a half hour drive would take us about six and a half hours due to breaking down (check out my blog “Breakdown, Blood moons, and Backpacks”). We ended up late to our yurts for the week staying about 35 minutes from the tourist spot of Chingis Khan’s great statue. All seven of us bunked in one yurt with four beds since our other yurt was being used for the night. The next two days we loaded up some of our gear and headed to our host, Gumba’s, winter house to build fences which was further out in the countryside. We girls took turns cooking—-very much a cultural thing for the women to cook and clean and the men to work, yet the men DO know how to help in the kitchen and clean very well also. I also rode one of the horses -being led- which I think they thought I wanted to ride after I tried to describe that they had good horses, and I had two horses of my own. It was a comfortable but very odd saddle.
While we were back at the yurts we each randomly volunteered to cook food for the team. Scrambled eggs with veggies was a regular breakfast, lunch and dinner were usually rice with meat and veggies as well. Hudson and Jo have been unashamedly obsessed with the local Nutella. I have been eating a lot of oatmeal and craving rice, beans, bananas, boiled eggs and sometimes prunes which is a blessing because all of those foods are cheap. Thankfully, Mongolian culture eats a lot of meat, so we usually get an adequate amount of protein. When we visited other yurts in the countryside, they would give us a bowl of hot Mongolian milk tea, Kazak bread which is similar tasting and looking to donut holes (says my team), hard sharp cheese (A-MAZE-ING), and sometimes a sweet cream to go on the Kazak bread.
The weekend involved meeting some American university students from California, forty of them to be exact, who are doing 10 countries in 5 months. All of them were believers which was fun to worship at the small church together and have some new white English speaking people around us. Monday we headed back into the city back to HKS stopping at the Chingis Khan statue and for some of the teammates to ride camels. This week was one of the weeks we actually had a slightly consistent team time schedule even if we didn’t have any wifi.
FOURTH WEEK
Tuesday we got up at 5:30AM to catch the city bus to get to the Chinese Embassy to get appointment tickets to get our Chinese visas. We waited several hours until it finally opened at 9:30AM. They only took two non Mongolians in at a time. TJ, Hudson and I were trying to stay warm on the wall and side-by-side penguin huddled. As the line started getting smaller and closing time at 12:30 got closer, I started praying for God to let our whole team in and get us appointments on Friday before our squad debrief started. I kept praying until miraculously they slowly let every one of my teammates as well as the three from HKS through, AND we ALL had appointments set for Friday morning! He is faithful! Wednesday and Thursday we stayed at our host’s house more outside of the city and helped build a squatty potty, shovel a TON of rock dirt, weed, and the guys killed it at making a ton of cement. Friday we woke up early again and headed to the Chinese Embassy to get our appointments which consisted of standing in line waiting for the lady to call you to the window. Unfortunately, she sent me and several other teammates back to redo paperwork at least three times. But then we got our receipts and headed to Tom ’n Toms (coffee shop) to suck up the wifi (still having trouble uploading vlogs) and get some food at the Circle Y (like a gas station store). Saturday we made our sabbath to finish some laundry-we have a small machine to use!- as well as me heading with some HKS girls to lazily shower and scrub grime off in the public shower (Asian life, no shame), getting a lot of Jesus time in, and trying to upload the vlogs.
DEBRIEF STARTS SEPTEMBER 1 then we are praying about where God wants us to be in China as it will be an ATL (ask the Lord) month. Also planning on picking up our Chinese visas on Wednesday if we get approved.
God worked in each of our lives in Mongolia.
My Jesus time mainly consists of siting down with my mat—sometimes after I do some yoga/PiYo—and my Heb/Greek Bible, journal and my pens and just asking the Holy Spirit where He wants me to read. I have been all over the New Testament focussing on Matthew a lot but dabbling in several other books wherever He leads me. Three of us on my team play Hallal, my guitar, I am helping Eric and Hudson improve, and they seem to be enjoying it. Definitely looking for new worship songs if anyone has any recommendations!
PS my blog as well as all my teammates are going to be put in passcode mode while we are in China. The password is OHANAFAM, and you will need to log in every time to read the blogs or donate.
PSS the Lord has been providing and there is only a total of $1780 left to be fully funded! The goal is to be fully funded before we leave for China on September 7th! He will provide as He promised.
STAY TUNED FOR FUN-possibly awkward-FACTS ABOUT MONGOLIA and being a World Racer!
//week one at Mumba’s house
//week two laying cement for kids to play on eventually
//week two pup pic
//adventure day after week 2–rock climbing
//week three-our yurt for the week
//week three–horses of course
//week three fence building
