Cold shower or no shower?

Mongolia has many proud traditions and several major holidays. Each year during July, Mongolians celebrate a 3-day festival called Naadam, where the "three manly sports" are exhibited: wrestling, archery and horseracing. I'm personally looking forward to it since I've never been in the country during Naadam before.

Currently I am "celebrating" a lesser known but significant 3-day annual tradition in June, the Mongolian hot water shutdown. Well, that's what I call it, anyway. Each summer the entire hot water supply in the city of Darkhan is completely shut off. I am told that this is so that maintenance can be performed on the pipes to clean out sediment buildup in order to be prepared for the winter. The cold water from the taps is frigid - and I'm not exaggerating - the toilet tank has a continual sweat on the outside because it's like ice water inside. So, taking a cold shower is like standing under ice water.

Faced with this predicament, you start to ask yourself questions like, "Is my hair really all that dirty? Surely no one will notice if I skip a couple days? How many pots do I have to boil water at the same time?" The first time I experienced this, I was a bit shocked. Now, I'm just somewhat amused. I fill up my big thermos with hot water and do the best sponge bath I can come up with. By Wednesday night at 8pm, when the hot water returns, all of Darkhan will be rejoicing in the shower.

Which option would you choose?

Hongor village water update

The Hongor water situation is stabilized, for the time being. For the last two weeks, we've been providing clean drinking water to the people affected by the water contamination (see my previous blog posts). Twice a day, a large utility truck parks inside the village and allows everyone to come and draw water. I like going out there when I have time just to visit with folks. This boy told me that he is eleven years old. After some effort to mount his bike, he manages to pull that water canister behind him while riding his bike.

By God's providence, we had already planned for a small team from Baylor University to come and do some well work this summer. Later this month they will arrive and commence an effort to de-contaminate/purify the wells in Hongor. Our hope and prayer is that we can help get the wells fixed. Until then, however, we are committed to providing the daily water truck. Thanks so much to those of you who have made a contribution, it is truly preventing a toxic situation for many people, including this boy and his family.

Chicken Gordon Blue

Ordering off restaurant menus in Mongolia requires the spiritual gift of discernment. Basically, you have to read between the lines and use your experience to predict what you're going to get. I've learned over time that what the menu says is not exactly what you'll get, but generally what you get tastes pretty good. So you just order in faith and it usually turns out fine.

Recently I had dinner at one of my favorite restaurants in Darkhan, called "Nice Cafe." Real original, right? One of the items on the menu was called "Chicken Gordon Blue." The short description read "chicken chest and cheese." It's difficult to find decent chicken, but I decided to try it. Turns out, it was disappointing. It consisted of two very thin, dry pieces of breaded chicken with a cheese slice melted in between them. And when I say cheese slice - think of the plastic-wrapped Kraft singles you buy in the grocery. The good thing is, food is so cheap that you don't feel too ripped off about a bad $3 meal.

I'm eating at home a fair amount, too. Choices at the food stores are slowly improving. This year's greatest news for me is that you can now buy SLICED BREAD at the grocery store! Up until this year, you either sliced your own bread or bought sliced bread in UB, the capital city (a 3 hour drive one-way). The funny thing is, I would bet the only people who buy the sliced bread are the foreigners. But isn't is strange that previously you could have your pick of the latest cell phones, but sliced bread was just too much of a luxury?!

The simple life

Ways I can tell that my life has dramatically simplified:

1. I have one key on my keychain.
2. My church building has one room.
3. I'm learning my letters and numbers (in Mongolian!).
4. I only have 8 hours per week planned in advance.
5. I take afternoon naps a couple times each week.

More to come on this, I might keep a running list.

Hongor water contributions

I neglected to include information in my last post about how to contribute financially toward the Hongor water situation. If you are interested in making a contribution, you can go to the Lifeqwest website, www.lifeqwest.org, and donate online or via check. When paying online, in the subject line indicate "Hongor water." If by check, be sure to make your check out to Lifeqwest and include a note indicating it's for Hongor water and mail it to the Irving address on the website. I will provide updates on the situation as I'm able.

Thank you!!

Living water

This is a great story. I've been here less than 2 weeks and already our organization has been thrust into the middle of an incredible opportunity to serve. In the village of Hongor, not far from my city of Darkhan, there was a recent incident that contaminated part of its well water supply. A Chinese mining company dumped some toxic waste on the ground and contaminated their well water with sodium cyanide and mercury. It killed some of the livestock, and the people were warned not to use the water. The city officials' plan was to have clean water trucked into town from the Darkhan water utility. Unfortunately, the town of Hongor had no money, so the utility wouldn't bring the water. After a week of no water, the people started drawing water from the contaminated well, despite posted warning signs not to do so (see first picture).

Our ministry is very involved in the community, so as soon as we became aware of the situation, we met with the city officials to see how we could help. They were desperate for help (why the Mongolian national goverment wouldn't help is beyond me), so we took a step of faith to start paying for daily water deliveries indefinitely. In the meantime, we already have other plans in place to work on cleaning up the contamination. Scientists and engineers from Baylor University are heading here later this month to volunteer their services.

The cost of providing this water is incredibly small, considering the life-sustaining necessity of it. For $100 per day, we are providing drinking and washing water to approximately 5,400 people. This was not in our budget so we're trusting that God will provide the finances. Even if we have to put some of our other projects on hold, this was an obvious and easy decision.

The pictures show a woman drawing water from the contaminated well despite posted warnings signs; me helping pour water from the first water truck (cheesy, I know); and some of the cute village kids. None of them have anything larger than a medium/large bucket, so they usually have to make several trips. Now don't you know we have an awesome opportunity to share with them about the Living Water of Jesus? While standing at their new "well?"

My building

I live in "new Darkhan," which is the nicer part of town. This is the front of my building, #7, and my entrance is the first one on the right. I'm on the 3rd floor but my balcony faces the back. Guess I should get a picture of that! I can't believe I'm actually hanging my clothes on a balcony clothesline for all the world to see. Every day has been different weather - sunny/hot, overcast/cold, rainy, etc. It will soon settle into the hot summer.